Number of the Day - Updated & An Update!

Hi Everyone,

It really has been forever since we have last blogged.  Sometimes life gets in the way and you just can't do everything that you would like to do, and something has to give.  Fortunately we are back and we are updating our older products and in the process of creating new products (especially Canadian based)!  This has been so exciting for us coming up with fresh and new ideas that we hope you will find useful for your classroom.

For a quick personal update - we both have made grade changes and now we are teaching kindergarten and grade one!  This has provided us with many opportunities to come up with new and creative ideas to suit the new grade levels we teach.

Most recently our Number of the Day product has been updated (so if you have purchased it already please re-download).  Included are four different versions of Number of the Day that you can use with younger learners.  These versions have been tried and tested in my kindergarten classroom with success!  These versions also allow for differentiation for many different learners. My goal in updating this product was to allow you to find the best Number of the Day that suits you and your learners' needs.  We hope that you love the additions and find them useful in your classroom.

If feels so good to be back blogging again!

Christmas Concert Hoopla, Elf on the Shelf and Winter Math!

Hello Everyone!!!

I don't know about you all but it is so crazy around our school.  We are in full Christmas force.  Our Christmas concert is next week and we have been busy preparing decorations for the concert as well as practicing our songs that we are singing.  I have to say though I just love this time of the year.  The building feels like a different place - LOVING the Christmas spirit.

My class created shaving cream/glue snowman for our concert.  We are performing Melton the Warm-Hearted Snowman and the little snowmen they created couldn't be cuter.  I found this fantastic idea at this blog!

Guess who arrived from the north pole this week?  Buddy our Elf on the Shelf!! The kids are super excited to see where he is going to be hiding each day.  They are convinced that he sometimes moves his eyes and legs.  This is the first year I have ever done Elf on the Shelf with my kids and so far it has been so much fun!  To see the joy on their faces when we opened our present from the north pole was priceless.  As is the enthusiasm each morning to see who can find Buddy first!

I also have created a Winter Math product that I think you will really love.  It includes a lot of useful printables for this time of the year with a wintery theme:

1) Greater Than/Less Than - 2 pages
2) Odd and Even Numbers - 2 pages
3) Snowman Measurement - 2 pages (one in inches, one in centimetres)
4) Count and Graph - 1 page
5) Ordering Numbers - 2 pages
6) Skip-counting - 2 pages
7) Winter Patterns - 2 pages (one page is the answer key)
8) Winter Addition - 3 pages (3 different strategies)
9) Winter Subtraction - 2 pages (2 different strategies)
10) Equality and Inequality - 1 page
11) Winter Symmetry - 1 page
12) Ten Frames - 6 pages (3 different themes, one colored page, one black and white page)
13) My Winter Problem Solving Booklet - (13 winter word problems included. All problems vary between change, compare, equalize and combine word problems).

 

You can check it out at our Teachers Pay Teachers or Teachers Notebook shop!

Lauren :)

Remembrance Day Sweetness

I know that this post is a little late, but it is just too sweet not to share.  For Remembrance Day my classroom really focused on peace and what peace means to each of us.  Using Todd Parr's The Peace Book and pages from our Remembrance Day product these are some of the sweet creations that my little ones came up with:

(Love the peace blanket!)

(Peace is having a nap, keeping the roads clean, being kind, saying sorry)

 

Also, just a reminder that all of our products in our TPT shop are on sale for Cyber Monday and bonus Tuesday.  Use the promo code CMT12 at checkout to get an extra 8% off our discounted products!  As well, our Teacher`s Notebook products are 25% off until tomorrow.  You also get an extra 10% off at TN at checkout!

Happy shopping friends!

Lauren :)

Back to School Sale & Number of the Day

Well I have to say that I am officially starting to look forward to going back to school.  I am really excited to meet my new students and teach a new split (1/2)!  During this past little bit of summer holidays I have been really starting to think of classroom decor, organization and planning.  I was able to get in a trip to the states and picked up some great classroom stuff at Target and Wal-Mart.  I also popped into school this week to start re-organizing my classroom.  Over the summer holidays we are required to put everything up on shelves and it looks like a complete disaster!  I was pretty much able to get everything back to its spot, do an inventory of school supplies and send some stuff to the print shop.  It is so eerie quiet in the building at this time.  I was missing the hustle and bustle that the school usually has.

In honour of back to school Jeanine and I will be holding a back to school sale in our TPT shop on August 12th and 13th.  This means that you will get 20% off of all our products!  As well, enter the promo code BTS12 and you get an additional 10%!  Sweet deal!  I can't wait to get my back to school shop on tomorrow!

 

On another note, I have created a new product for our TPT shop that I use frequently in my classroom.  It is called Number of the Day.  Many of you may have heard of this already, or my do this already in your classrooms, but I absolutely love Number of the Day.  It helps my students with all aspects of number representation (tallies, ten frames, base ten, coins, skip-counting, odd/even, ten more, ten less, number sentences etc.).  In this package I have created four different Number of the Day worksheets that you can use with your students.  These sheets are fill-able and DO NOT have a specific number on them so you can differentiate your instruction and put your own number in exactly at the level that your specific students are at.  I used Number of the Day last year in my grade two/three classroom and we had students ranging from numbers 25 all the way into the hundreds.  It really is a great tool for assessment purposes and can be used as a math warm-up, a center or a fast finisher activity!

Happy back to school shopping!  Have a great weekend!

Lauren :)

Can You SPOT The DOT? ...or believe it's already July 17th?

Well, I can't believe it's already mid July!!! I haven't posted on our blog in quite some time. The last few weeks of school were CrAzY busy and then to make life just a tad CraZiEr we decided to host our youngest daughter's family birthday the morning after school ended! (Seemed like a good idea at the time as we were accommodating family that was in town and family going out of town) Note to self: won't do this again next year! Needless to say, running around getting goody bag stuff, party supplies, presents, ordering balloons, making cupcakes all whilst whisking our girls off to soccer four nights a week, followed by evenings of finalizing, signing and stuffing report card envelopes, was a little chaotic! Anyway, summer holidays are here now and I am loving spending the days with my favourite two kids! I decided to post an activity that I have done in the past in my classroom and plan to use for a Back-to-School activity in September. It's a book art activity to do in response to Peter H. Reynolds' book, the dot.

My students LOVED this activity and were super creative with their pictures. Can you SPOT the DOT in the pictures below?



Have a great week! I am looking forward to more sunshine filled days this week! Enjoy the freebie!

~Jeanine

Freebie - How-To Survive ________ Grade - End of School Year Writing Template

Hey Everyone!!!

I had myself convinced that I had four weeks left of school this weekend....but when I checked my calendar this afternoon I was sadly mistaken. Five weeks it is! With the "four week" excitement that I woke up with I decided to create a How-To Survive ___________ Grade writing template for my students to use.  I have customized this template for grades one to four so hopefully many of you can find a use for it!  There are two different templates included: one template offers space for just writing, the other template offers space for writing and a small picture.  This product is great for end of school year bulletin boards, or can be shared with students entering the grade your students are leaving. 


You can download the product for free from our Teachers Pay Teachers store.  I really hope you and your kids have fun with this activity!


Happy Sunday!  Have a great week everybody!

Lauren

2D Shapes, Spring Art and a Freebie

Hey All,

Just wanted to keep you up to date with what was happening in my room last week.  We just finished up our 2D Shapes and 3D Objects unit.  If you are interested in what we did for our 2D Shapes unit, you can find the unit I used by clicking the picture below. 

In Writer's Workshop we have been busy with our story writing for the past few weeks.  Tomorrow we will be doing a spring rebus story.   I am sure the kids will have so much fun with it!  This past Friday afternoon the kids and I made spring plasticine art.  We created beautiful spring flower portraits.  It was a very step by step process.  We started with a 5x6 piece of cardboard.  The first instruction was to warm up the plasticine in their fingers and then spread it onto the cardboard.  After we finished the sky and soil we got to creating our flower.  I told the kids that the stem was like a little worm and the leaves were like eyes/teardrops.  For the flowers it was a very similar explanation as to the leaves.  The students had a choice as to what type of petal they were going to make and the colors they were going to use.  For this project I gave very small pieces of plasticine to the student to ensure that there was no waste and that their portraits did not start to overflow with plasticine.  I think the flowers turned out beautifully and it was a great way to end the day before a long weekend! 

I have to say I am very jealous of those of you who are off of school already or are off in the next week or two.  Jeanine and I still have five weeks left.  With that being said though I am most definitely positive that they are going to fly by with the many field trips and special activities planned.

Please enjoy a freebie from my 2D Shapes unit!

Have a great week!! :)

Lauren

Mother's Day and Birdhouse Ads!

As Lauren already mentioned, last week was a bit of a whirlwind! I am thankful that things have slowed down this week and we are back to our usual classroom routines. For Mother's Day, my class also created the mini My Mom is Excellent books that I posted on TPT. We also painted frames that held photos I had taken of my students on the playground. The frames looked super cute and sparkly when completed. During our Monday morning meeting, my students were excited to tell all about their mom's responses and reactions to their presents! I have included a couple of pictures of some finished books.

Last week we also did one of my favourite Spring activities for our bulletin board. I THINK I got the idea, years ago, from a Mailbox Magazine. My class LOVED this activity and had tons of fun creating their little masterpieces. We made birdhouses out of a variety of construction and coloured paper. (I supplied a variety of tracers for the kids to chose from.) My students got very creative and added lots of little details and features. Next, we looked at apartment/house ads on the internet to see how ads are written. Then my students had to get busy creating their own ads for their birdhouses. Next, we typed up the ads during our next scheduled computer time. Check out some of our adorable birdhouses and ads.

Dad, You Rock! A Father's Day book to give!

Hello and Happy Teacher Appreciation Week! I just thought I would post this Father's Day writing activity early as many of you fellow teachers will be starting your summer breaks sooner than us. Please click on the picture below to check it out.

~Jeanine

Mother's Day in Lauren's Room and What a Week!

Hey Everyone!

All I can say is WHAT a week!!! Sooo busy!  My kiddos and I were busy preparing for our spring musical Go Fish which was showcased this past Wednesday.  There were lots of practices, decorations to be put up,  dress rehearsals, and last minute things that needed to be done.  The kids and I were so wiped Thursday morning after all was said and done.  We then quickly had to switch gears and get to work on our Mother's Day presents.  No time to waste!

This year my class wrote cute little mini-books about why their Mom is excellent.  We used the Mother's Day Mini-Book that Jeanine created and which can be found at our Teachers Pay Teachers store.  Let me tell you - these books turned out beautifully!  I just know that the moms will love them!

I also found a cute idea on Pinterest that I thought the kids would love to make for their moms.   The idea can be found here: http://funhandprintart.blogspot.ca/2011/05/handprint-fingerprint-flowerpot-with.html   

You must check out this blog - it has the cutest ideas for hand and footprint art.

Our mother's day gifts wouldn't be complete without a card.  We were lucky enough to have an origami specialist come into our classroom about a week ago.  She helped us create the beautiful origami hearts that you see in the above picture.  We used these hearts as the cards for our moms.

It sure was a busy week in our classroom!  I am looking forward to getting back into routine and our regular schedule this week!

Happy Mother's Day to all of the moms out there! 

Lauren

Teacher Appreciation Sale

Happy Sunday Everyone!

I was sooo excited to get up this morning because I cannot wait to get my Teachers Pay Teachers shop on!  In honour of teacher appreciation week many amazing teachers are holding sales in their personal Teachers Pay Teachers stores.  This includes Jeanine and I as well!  We are so excited to be hosting our first sale, and in honour of such an important week.  We absolutely love what we do and we have the utmost respect for all teachers out there.  So click the link below to find some super sales in our store - 20% off of each item!  Also, don't forget to add the promo code TAD12 for an extra 10% off at checkout!!!

Happy shopping!

Lauren

Mother's Day Mini Book

Happy Sunday everyone! I hope you have all had a restful and enjoyable weekend. It was beautiful here yesterday and it was so nice to be outside enjoying the sunny weather. Well, Mother's Day is just around the corner so I thought I would post something I have done in the past. I will be starting this with my class tomorrow as well. It's a super cute mini book for students to create for their moms for Mother's Day. Please click on the above preview to check it out!

-Jeanine

Persuasive Writing, Earth Day & Doubles Math Facts

Hey Everybody!

Things have been really busy in my room for the past few weeks.  We have been going full force with persuasive writing and are just about to dive into story writing.  The things that my students are writing about in their persuasive pieces have been hilarious and heart warming all at the same time.  It is great to see all of my students so passionate about so many things.  We even had one little boy moved to tears in his persuasive letter.  It was precious!  We also have been really busy with earth day activities.  I found an amazing recycled art project on Pinterest that I could not resist.  The kids and I did it today and boy do our recycled flowers look beautiful on our bulletin board (pictures to come).  The activity can be found on the following blog: artiswhatiteach.blogspot.ca/2011/05/3rd-grade-recycled-daisies-and.html.  There are so many fantastic art ideas on this blog.  LOVE, LOVE, LOVE!  We also have gone out and cleaned up the school yard and written persuasive letters around the topic of taking care of our earth.

On another note, I have just put up a Delightful Doubles unit our Teachers Pay Teachers store.  I found that this year some of my little ones were just not getting doubles.  So I put together a package full of things that helped them to master these basic facts.  This doubles package includes:

-My Book of Doubles (a printable book for students to draw their own pictures of doubles facts to reinforce facts 1+1 up to 10+10)
-Doubles flash cards (with and without dot picture prompts)
-Doubles Memory math center game
-2 Doubles Connect 5 math games
-2 I Have, Who Has? activities
-3 doubles worksheets (matching, fill in the blanks, doubles addition with dot pictures)
-Suggestions on how to use each activity are included in this package

 Happy Wednesday everyone!!! Only two days to go!

 Lauren

Writing Templates & Problem Solving Packages!

Hello and Happy Easter everyone! Last night Lauren and I were busy finishing our first products to sell on Teachers Pay Teachers. It was a late night, but we’re both very excited about our products and hope you will find them useful in your classrooms.  Please click on the pictures above or our TPT link to check out our products! 

-Jeanine