Symmetry & Stations...& AI, AY

As a new teacher in the wonderful state of Ohio... we new teachers get the privilege to get observed on a bi-weekly basis. I am not even kidding. The past two months I have had observation  conference, observation, another conference, ehh let's through a random walk through in there... and guess what I get tomorrow?.. Another observation and I get pulled out of my classroom again next week to have a conference to talk about my lesson. Do you want to know how I know I get pulled from my classroom too much? My kids are starting to ask, "Ms. Williams why are you always leaving?" I feel so bad... I tell them... "I have to, but I don't want to." Poor little kiddos.

So, I went on that little vent for a reason.  To SHOW you what I will be doing for my observation tomorrow. We are working on SYMMETRY!  I am SO excited for this lesson. You have no idea how long I have been waiting to do symmetry.  I found a lesson on Cara Carroll's blog and well let's just say I am doing a spin off from hers!

First, we are discussing what symmetry is. I created this anchor chart to help introduce the concept to my students. I can't wait for my kiddo's to see it. They love, love, love the cutesy stuff!

After we go over the anchor chart we will then sit in a circle on the floor and I will have my kiddo's make the snowman symmetrical. As we do this we will discuss why he can be symmetrical and discuss other things that can also be symmetrical.

When we are finished with these two things I am going to give students a picture of themselves. But, here is the catch... their face is cut in half.  They are going to draw the other half of their face to show that they are symmetrical.  I am so excited to see these. I took pictures of them today and they are so curious as to WHY I had to take ALL of their pictures!! I can't wait !!!!!

Now, onto this weeks literacy stations... I only have one picture. It is a picture that may help though.  When my kids do stations they are sorting and combining all sorts of cards and other things.  Let's just say that it can be a mess.  Well, today I gave students pocket charts to do the activities with and I must say... not one card on the floor. I can't hang up the pocket charts in my room because my room is literally the size of someones living room... take away half of it ;)... so not kidding right now.  So, I had them rolled up and stored away... then all the sudden this morning it dawned on me... umm... these don't have to be hung up to be used! So, there we go! Now, I just need to go buy more! I only have 2!! Ahh

Now, onto my last thing. Our big focus in reading this week and next is Ay, and Ai digraphs. I created a packet to help with this concept.  Right now we have the Scott Foresman reading series and it does not really offer a lot of hands on, student led opportunities so I have been creating, creating.  here is the pack and a preview of it!

Click on either of the two pictures to get to the link!

I would love to hear from you! 1st to comment gets this whole pack for free! 

Just become a follower & leave your e-mail!

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Valentines Day Festivities!

My post is a little late... But, as all of you teachers know... the first year of teaching is always the hardest. I find it hard to believe I make some time for blogging! Good thing I like it!!

My first Valentines Day party was somewhat of a success.  When I say somewhat... I mean... I ate too much candy.  The part with the kids and the activities during the party were fantastic! I have such a great room mom who plans activities for the kids to do at each party.  She came up with the cutest idea ever.  Each child got half of a heart.  She wrote a message on the hearts.  Students had to walk around and match their heart to another classmates heart who matched their secret message. It was adorable and they loved it!

Students also came in with the cutest valentine's day cards and boxes! There was one I really wanted a picture of but I completely forgot! Here is my mini-bloggy scrapbook for you to see some of the goodies from the party!

We started our Valentine's Day week off with this story!

This book is so perfect for Valentines day! We completed a sequencing and retelling activity with the book. Students sorted sequencing cards.  I provided differentiated cards so my high leveled students would not get done so quickly! It worked out great!

Sequencing "Olive My Love"

Next, we had a little fun with some silly sentences. These were such a hit with my class! Students rolled their dice with a partner.  They read the pink dice first, then the red and combined their sentence.  Students wrote their sentence and then found the noun, verb and adjective. My room was so loud with laughter! I had a parent helping and we were both just rolling! It is a memory I will forever cherish!  Anyway... this was such a hit that the kids asked me to make them more copies for recess and half of my class was completing the activity at recess!! HA... that's when you know you created a great lesson!

Now, just to share some cutesy things. My presents to the kids and their cute little presents to me! I had to take pictures of them all... I do not want to forget any of this from my first year!  

These are Valentines! One of my little ones brought in a whole box. She created one for each person in the class! They had goodies and cards inside! 

Here are some of my cute gifts from my kiddos! I just love them!

(The chocolate was given to my boyfriend who took it to work.. phew... thank goodness!)

 

Alright! That is all for me!! If you want any of the Valentine's Day Activities for next year you can go to my Tpt store.  The Olive activity pack is free! Then, the Valentine's Day activity pack is just 2.99!

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New Ideas for Literacy Stations

I have come to realize that my "thing" is literacy stations. I LOVE making literacy center activities. I LOVE doing guided reading groups. I LOVE seeing what my students need help with and I LOVE helping them with their particular skill they are struggling with or just need more emphasis on. First grade is so much fun! It is so fun to see them grow.  Anyway, right now for my literacy stations my students come in first thing in the morning and they complete one station (takes an average of 15-25 minutes per student--their challenging and I am scaffolding). After their one station they go onto read to self/partner. I am loving it... but I need more time with my guided reading groups. I enjoy making these literacy stations a bit of a challenge for my kiddos... but I would like them to be doing stations independently so I can meet with my guided reading groups more.

This is what I have come up with. I hope this may be able to somehow help you too.  I am still going to have students come in at 9:00 work on their literacy stations until 9:30.  We complete a whole group lesson and do this for about 40 minutes.  Then for the last 15 minutes of reading I send students to their stations.  These stations though will be ones they can do independently and stations that I do not have to change weekly.  I want stations like the Daily 5 intends for.

I am like the most confusing teacher ever right now? I want Daily 5 stations... I like a challenge... that is contradicting.  I want them to have a challenge in the morning: I want to scaffold students with those. But.... during the 2nd part of reading I want them working completely independently and choosing a station so I can pull students aside to meet. I have time later in the day to pull 2 groups.  I get to pull groups and we get to work quietly with no interruptions because it is read to self and read to partner. I do not want to do that to my kids in the morning too so I can pull more groups. We read a lot and they love to work independently.

Okay, I will stop rambling. I am going to implement this Monday! I hope it works... Oh, wait! How should I track this or should I let them just choose what they do each day and not keep track? I was thinking about laminated a strip for them.  Placing colors on the bins with the idfferent activities and then students put a check when they complete that color bin.  Then on Friday (just saying) they look at their chart and go to the color bin they have not yet been to... I think I may do that or else I will have students doing the same thing everyday!! (I have a few that would do that and I am sure you do too!

Alright... really... no more rambling! I found some AWESOME FREEBIES to help me transition into this new wave of literacy instruction.! I wanted to share because they are so great!

First, I went and observed a teacher today at another school.  Her students wrote their spelling words on strips and then glued them into a chain. It was so cute!

Here are the things from Tpt I found!

Character Writing Pages from Latoya Reed

Write the room from Alisa Barrett (this will be fun to do with sight words)

I will be going to wal-mart to buy stickers this weekend for this one! I have decided that this one is a FOR SURE!

Sticker Stories! How cool is this? Thank you, Sarah Paul

A Mini How-To Book: Thank you, Caitlin Kramer

A Never Ending Story... Some of my kids would love this one!

Thank you, Kelly Morgan

Mini-Book Writing and Rubrics

Tanya Dwyer

Connect 4 (Sorry for blurry pictures)

Thanks, Michele Smyth

Word Families:  I am thinking about putting a word family menu on the board. Students choose one and complete the form included in the pack below.

Word of the day template (This would be perfect for a sight word for the week... or for my higher ones I may have them look up a work in the dictionary and fill out the template) 

A Book Report Template

When students read a book they can fill out this template for their comprehension.

Alright! That's All I have for now! Let me know if you have any ideas for this! I am all open ears! Trying to do my best during my first year of teaching! :) 

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Howdy Ya'll Stations and 100th Day!

These past two weeks have been a whirl wind! We have been working hard on all sorts of new concepts while trying to include a cow boy theme! We also got to celebrate 100th day! It was so fun! We all dressed up like we were 100 years old! Kids came to school with the cutest outfits, canes, glasses, humps in their back and of course; grey hair! My room smelled like baby powder! I wish I could share pictures of my kids but I can't. :( But, here are the pictures I can show!

We will start off with the preparation of the Cowboy Literacy Stations...

My boyfriend helped cut and bag cards... doesn't he look excited?!

Okay, enough pouting... here are the kids having fun!

Math Turn Around Facts

Fix er' up sentences!

ABC Order Sight Words

Synonym Sort Station

Here is our 100 day Celebration!!

We made delicious fruit loop necklaces!

We sorting our 100 items to make sure we brought 100 things! (Some had 101--It was so much fun because they were SO SURE that they brought exactly 100 items!)

100 year old me writings and pictures. These are so cute!

Here is their little 100th day present from me!

If you want the cowboy literacy pack you can head over to my Tpt Store!

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