Blog Archives
Cactus Lesson Ideas with FREE Printables!
Who doesn’t love a cute cactus themed activity? I created some super simple, super cute cactus themed activities that your students can enjoy anytime of year (even in the summer!) Each of these activities are great for individual practice, center practice, partner practice, or even small group practice!
Just collect a few supplies and you will be ready to go! These printables are FREE!! There are two additional printables that also round out this collection of cactus themed activities that are perfect for anytime of year!
Click here to get your printables and to see the list of simple supplies you’ll need to make these activities happen!
Learning to Write Numbers
In Kindergarten, it’s important to have students practice writing and recognizing numbers as soon as you can. There are so many other things that students will need to do in the first few weeks of school that involve reading, writing, and recognizing numbers! With a few simple activities, your students (and mine) will be writing and recognizing numbers in no time!
I’m a big fan of anything that creates a tactile learning experience for my students because its another way to cement the learning in their brain. In an age where so many things are learned through digital media, it is sometimes nice to just have your fingers interact with another surface. 🙂
I’ve got three super easy activities that your students can use to help them read, write, and recognize numbers. You can start with the numbers 0-10 and add in 11-20 as you find your students mastering the first group of numbers.
My students LOVE using each of these activities and its already given me great insight into who knows which numbers. I sit with my students as they use these materials and am quickly able to find out which numbers they know and which ones they are still working on (check off those number id standards!).
You can read more here and get everything you’ll need to get these easy, fun, and tactile number making experiences going in your classroom!
Snowflake Science
You all know how near and dear to my heart teaching science to my Kindergarten students is! One of my favorite science concepts to share with my students is weather! If I weren’t a Kindergarten teacher, I would have been a meteorologist. I’ve always loved the weather and I’ve taken several classes in high school and college just for my own knowledge. It is neat to me to understand how weather works and how we can tell what the weather is going to be like just by understanding what the sky is telling us!
In Indiana (where I live!), we have a saying…”Wait 5 minutes and the weather will change!” It is SO true! So a few days ago, we were going about our day and when we looked out the window, the weather had gone from a wonderful sunny winter day, to snow!!
At the start of every winter, I get out my winter kit, so that when we get a snow happening while we are at school, we just pull it out and go! We do get outside to collect snowflakes on black paper, and then we come in and have some fun creating our own:
I got a class set of these fingerprint snowflake kits from Oriental Trading, just so we could talk about how each snowflake is unique, just like each and every one of us! We also created our own snowflakes out of pipe cleaners and beads, and we sorted some sparkly snowflakes! Click here to read more about our snowflake science fun!
Graphing Activities Galore!
Raise your hand if you create graphs with your students! We do!! I try at least 2-3 times a week to create and collect some sort of data from my students so that we can talk about it and learn how to compare, contrast, and most importantly; make sense of the information we are looking at.
I got this AWESOME graphing pocket chart from Oriental Trading Company this summer and I’ve been using it every chance I get!
Our new math adoption includes a question as part of our daily routines and this pocket chart was perfect for capturing that data. I love that I can take the number cards out if we need all the columns and that there are pre-printed cards included. When one of those don’t work, I just turn one of the header cards over to the back and write my question there! There are also 50 picture/word cards included so that you can ask all sorts of interesting questions.
Check out some more fun ways we used this pocket chart and how we incorporated our first science lesson and graphing!
Math Explorations
At the beginning of each school year, I let my students explore all the manipulatives that we will be using throughout the year. This helps get their excitement for the manipulatives out of their systems so that when it is time to use them, we can get right to work. 🙂 Here are some pictures of the manipulatives we used along with some of the creative ways my sweet kiddos used them:
Interactive Number Line
I took a STEM (mostly Math) workshop the first two weeks after school got out this year and after listening to our instructor talk about Number Lines, I decided I wanted to make one that was more interactive than just a line of numbers stuck on my wall. I wanted my kiddos to be able to use it and grab parts of it if they needed to; so I came up with this number line!
I’m super excited that my kiddos can un-Velcro any card they might need to help them identify numbers.
Right now, the number line only goes to 10, but I may increase it to 20 if I think my students need it.
I’ve represented each number in a variety of different ways to meet the needs of my different learners:
- tally marks
- dice
- ten frames
- unifix cubes
- rekenreks
- finger counting
- number word
- number
- base ten blocks
The number symbol goes at the top and it permanent. Each of the cards below hangs on a ribbon and is attached with Velcro. {The Velcro is not included}.
Photo directions are included {and so is a diagram!}. You can get yours from my Teachers Pay Teachers store! 🙂
Who’s Who and Who’s New Post- “Reken-what?”
I am honored to be guest posting again over at Who’s Who and Who’s New! Today I’m sharing a post about making your own class set of Rekenrek’s. I’ve wanted to make some for awhile and during a workshop I took 3 weeks ago, I learned more about them, how to use them, and the benefits to my students. Head on over to check it out! (Just click the picture below)
Let me know if you make them! I’d love to see them in action! 🙂
Measurement
We started our new math unit about measurement and got out the balance scales to practice measuring weight. We compared different kinds of plastic foods.
What kinds of things do you like to have your students weigh?
Stamp a Letter, Word, or Number
I just finished updating one of my very first products! I am so excited to show you the new and improved Stamp a Letter, Word, or Number pack!
I updated the pack so that the letters, number, and sight words are all in one place! Each letter, number, and sight word has a circle around it so that children can focus on daubing right on top of the word as they identify them. On the top of each page, a key tells the children what color each word should be stamped. I use BINGO daubers, but you can also use highlighters or markers/crayons to have your students complete this activity.
The list of sight words comes from our Journeys program, however, most of the words (99% of them) are also on the Dolch or Fry Word lists, so they are great for all learners.
This would be a great morning arrival activity, as part of a Literacy Work Station, or as part of a small reading or intervention group.
Capital and lowercase letter pages are included so you can specifically target the instruction or letter review your students need.
*Please note, I am leaving the older version of this product up, so others can continue to download it in the future*
New Math WorkStation
Here is a picture of a new Math Work Station I introduced this week. In the past we played this game with 5 chips and I noticed that we were getting bored with 5 so I increased the game to 10. The children shake ten chips in a cup and record how many are red and how many a yellow.
Kristen 🙂
Kristen's Kindergarten 