YouTube Video Linky Party!!

What a FaBuLoUs idea!!! Miss Nelson is having a YouTube Linky Party!  Click here to join!

My students love to create videos and it has increased their fluency and excitement in reading by recording many reader's theatre!  Some YouTube videos I use to teach and reinforce digraphs are in the prezi below.

Digraphs on Prezi

A fun video we made was a claymation of our pond habitats.   It gave the students a chance to share their pond habitats they created during our habitats and adapations unit.

I wanted ideas for more educational videos to use, which is why I linked up and you should too!

I have a confession...Linky Party

Living a Wonderful Life is having a linky party.  I felt I need to confess some of my obsessions, so I decided to join.

1.  My Keurig Coffee Maker~ Why did they have to come out with a more enhanced model? {I want it}

2.  My Cricut~  My Get It Done List includes making many creations on my Cricut this summer!

3.  Blogging~  Why does the clock move faster when one is blogging?????

4.  ThE DoLlAr StOrE~  If you have ever screamed in the dollar store because you have found the most incredible teaching tool or classroom item that you know your students will love, then you may also be obsessed with the dollar store.

Fingasaurs made me shout in the
middle of the dollar store!!

Water Blaster to play Blast the Vowels during our ABC Carnival!



Finding many items for our Star Word Beach Party!  All the beach
decorations added the extra fun to our party!  The inflatable limbo stick
 was a perfect for playing sight word limbo!

The glasses are by far my favorite {recent} find at the dollar store,
along with the beach ball ocean creatures!

5.  Pinterest~ It has changed my life!!

Why didn't I think of that sooner??
Egg cartons to hold playing cards
for those little hands!!

6.  Elephant & Piggie~  I♥Mo Willems!!  Everytime I go into Barnes and Noble {which is too often} I need to read Elephant and Piggie Books!  They are hilarious and make me laugh out loud!!

 

7.  Criminal Minds~ 

I am going to pretend I do not have anymore obsessions!!!  Time for you to share yours!  The first step is admitting to the problem...right?

StAr WoRd BeAcH PaRtY w/ Ocean Book Freebie!!

Yes!! We are party animals in kindergarten (especially at the end of the year)!  I am so excited for our Star Word Beach Party tomorrow.  The day when we celebrate all the words we have learned over the year!  (details and pictures to come soon)  To prepare for our party, we become marine biologists and study the ocean.  One project we complete is the research of an ocean animal.  The students pick an animal and with their 4th Grade Friend.  Together, they create an oil pastel drawing and research facts about that animal.  On beach day, we video tape a movie with them dressed in their beach attire reading their facts about the animal they researched.  It is adorable and I usually show it during our kindergarten graduation ceremony!  Here are some other ocean activities we have done.

I used Carson-Dellosa Fish and Waves Border and DJ Inkers Sea Life Bulletin Board Accents.  I cut out 5 fish from the border and used velcro to attach the swimming fish to each page and the eaten fish to the back of the shark.  I attached the plain ocean border to each page so the shark puppet could slide through.  As you read the story, one could practice addition of subtraction, as the shark eats fish or gains fish in his belly.  Print the story here on blue paper or cardstock.

I used the other accents in the book Guess Who Lives in the Ocean, a book of ocean riddles.  Start printing here on blue paper or cardstock.  (I apologize for the extra neck exercises)

We also reviewed time with this whale clock activity.  It could also be done as a shark to go along with the book Tick Tock Sharks by Elizabeth Mills.

Enjoy!!

We Love Pond Life!!

Here are some pics of my reading zone turned into a pond habitat.  You can see our pond K-W-L chart and our fishing for sentences game.  Lily pads are hanging from the ceiling with the writing prompt In a pond...  There are paper plate frogs and toads  with facts written on the inside.  The cattails are made of wrapping paper tubes covered with neutral wallpaper and cotton balls painted brown.

During the habitat fair, the students wore these adorable frog life cycle hats!

Grade Level Linky Party!!

Want to find ideas for you specific grade level or are you switching grade levels next year?  Check out the grade level linky party at The Teacher's Lane.  It is wonderfully organized by grade, so LINK UP!!!

 

The Teacher's Lane

Bug Jar Math

The students created bug jars on www.kerpoof.com.  They were given a scenario where they caught some bugs in their jar and some escaped.  The students drew bugs in their jar and on the outside.  They recorded their word problem on VoiceThread and we created math equations for each drawing.  This was an interactive way to practice subtraction!

Frog X-ray Freebie

During our pond habitat unit, we were also celebrating the letter Xx.  I have created a template to create frog x-rays using various noodles.  Get the template here and copy it on to black paper for the kiddos.  Have them piece the "bones" together to create a frog x-ray or skeleton.  I used an assortment of macaroni noodles, spaghetti, bow tie pasta, ziti, and alot of tacky glue!! Enjoy!

Pond Habitat!!!

Every year we have a school wide fair, and this year we decided to do a Habitat Fair.  Kindergarten was lucky to research the pond habitat!  To assess the student's learning at the end of our unit, I had them create a pond habitat diorama out of a shoe box.  They created a setting and added modeling clay pond animals.  They added so much detail and did a wonderful job explaining the animals in their habitat.  The dioramas turned out so adorable that I decided to have the students turn their habitats into a "claymation" and on our classroom blog they wrote about what was going on in their "claymation".  You can view the claymation below.

The students also created virtual ponds with many pond animals on www.kerpoof.com.  We then added them to a VoiceThread project.  The students created their virtual pond into an addition word problem.  I posted the VoiceThread on our classroom blog and the students had to write the addition equations as it played on a wipe off board.  The students said they even quized their parents at home