Favorite Read Aloud Linky Party!!!

Story time may be my favorite part of the day with my kindergartners!  They make the greatest and and craziest connections to stories that we read in class.  My all time favorite story to read is Wait! No Paint! by Bruce Whatley.   It is a different take on the story of the three little pigs, only the illustrator starts to run out of paint.  It is a playful retelling of the story and it gets the class giggling!  It would also aid in teaching about writing a story from the illustrators perspective.

Join in on the fun!!!  Courtney from Swimming into Second is having a favorite read aloud linky party!

Math Centers Linky Party

Check out some awesome math centers at my most loved site for early childhood educators!  Chalk Talk is having a Math Center Linky Party! 

I wanted to share a math center that my students love and it engages them in predicting and measuring.  In this center, the students create a nonstandard measurement booklet.  I create four-page booklets and place them in my Math Zone with Inch Worms (3 mini green pom-poms glued together with some small google eyes), and crayons.  The students write their name on the cover page and then make drawings of objects they will measure on the remaining pages.  On the top of the page they estimate how many inch worms that object will be.  Then they measure the object and below the picture, they write the actual amount of words.  The students love this activity along with being able to use a clipboard to record their measurements if they would like.  This activity could also be used with various tools for measuring like Unifix cubes, paper clips, etc.

Go check out the other math center ideas at Chalk Talk!

Pet CVC Words

During my pet theme, I include this game in the Writing Zone and the kids love it!!  I call it Doggy Bones and I have glued lowercase letters on medium sized dog bones.  I also made dog word mats to help build CVC words.  They record these words on the Doggy Bones worksheet.  The students have the choice to build words or play a game to be the first to create a real word by picking dog bones one at a time!

3...2...1... BLASTOFF!!

 We blasted off learning about space!!  We began our lessons by becoming astronauts and wearing our gallon milk jug space hats.  We created outer space in the classroom including a space ship with many control panels.  The unit was started with a KWL chart.  We wrote many class books and kept track of what we learned in our Space Journals.

Many of our math and literacy centers revolved around space.  We used alphabet moon rocks to create words and the overhead projector was used to create moon words.  Launch Pad and Count the Stars were games to practice number recognition and one-to-one correspondence. 

We concluded with an astronaut snack (instant pudding and milk in a baggie)!

I lOvE mY cLaSsRoOm ThEmE!!!



This idea came to me from the magnetic Chicka Chicka Boom Boom Tree!  My theme this year is construction which is inspired by my 30 mile drive to school, which is lined with orange barrels (the entire way)!  I have created a "Word Work Crossing" sign using a large butcher block paper roll and magnetic paint.  The ABC train cars are used to teach alphabetical order and word building in the word work zone!



Kinder Crew Classroom

TBA is having a classroom linky party!  Here is a slideshow of some of my classroom pictures prior to having students!  I am extremely excited for my construction theme kindergarten classroom!  Enjoy!

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Go PaCk Go!!!!!!!!!!

Each week we keep track of the Packers' score and use tally marks to keep track of the wins (and losses if any occur)!!!  We also track which state they play in each week!  My amazing attention getter that is working well right now is the Packer chant.  Teacher says: Duh na duh, Duh na duh!  Students say: GO PACK GO!

Dinosaur Bones or X-rays!!

This can be a dinosaur activity to go with your favorite dinosaur story or a letter Xx activity!  Either way it is a blast!  I set up a bin full of sand and the paleontologists excavate the sand with a tweezers to find the bones.  This activity works on one-to-one correspondence and developing fine motor skills!

Post-It Linky Party!

You can never have enough post-its!!!  I use post-its to track my story stretcher ideas.  Inside many of my picture books you will find post-its with ideas and projects that I come up with for various stories.  My students also give me inspiration on activities to incorporate with books.  This is a quick and easy way to keep track of these ideas.

I have also realized that some dry erase markers do not want to wipe off and it drives me crazy!  I have a poster board story map that is laminated and instead of filling it in with a dry erase marker, I now use post-its.  After reading a story, the students can write the parts of a story on a post-it and add it to our story map.  For instance, each character in the story would get its own post-it and when writing the problem of the story each word in the sentence would get a different post-it.  This also helps with sentence structure!  My students enjoy writing on the post-its and adding them to the story map.  It also tunes them in to comprehending the story!!  The students also enjoy making a pattern on our story map using various colors!

Post-It Linky Party, come and join the fun at http://mrsrojasteaches.blogspot.com/

Back 2 School Bonanza!!

Are you ready to go Back to School?  Erica Bohrer is hosting a Back to School Bonanza Giveaway that should help you get in the mood!  Twelve fabulous bloggers have teamed up with her to give one lucky winner a huge back to school prize pack!  Scroll, down to see the twelve tantalizing prizes you could win.The contest will run until midnight eastern time, on Thursday, July 28th. You have 4 chances to enter HERE!!