Five for Friday ~ 3 more Fridays left!

Yup ~ only three more Fridays until school's out!  It seems hard to believe that this year is nearly over.  Because of all the crazy winter weather, our school year is only 178 days this year (two days were waivered by the DOE).  My little cuties have really made an impression on my heart ~ I am going to miss these Kinders!  I was blessed with an amazing group of children this year.  They have learned and grown so much since August!  It will be so hard to let go of them.  But, I do have to say I am looking forward to lazy summer days spent on my front porch.  Click HERE to see a post on a lazy summer day to see what I'm looking forward to.

It's time to link up for the fun Five for Friday linky party hosted by Doodle Bugs Teaching!

 

Mother's Day gifts.  Yes, I know Mother's Day was a while ago, but here is what my kids made for their mothers.  A few weeks ago my teaching partners & I went to the "Free Teacher Store."  One of the goodies we got was a craft kit that contained these wooden door hangers.  The Kinders used them to create these cute gifts.  After the paint dried, they adorned their door hangers with a small picture and some foam stickers. 

 

Seriously one of the cutest bulletin boards ever.  The hallway bulletin board next to our Reading teachers' room is very Pinterest-worthy!  

 

 

Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus! ...or the boat, or the train, or the wrecking ball!  My kids love, love, love this silly book!  I have so much fun hamming it up as I read it.  (Hamming it up ~ just another perk of being a kindergarten teacher!)  We used this book for a lesson on speech bubbles.

 



 

I recently purchased some of Deanna Jump & Deedee Wills' Writing Through the Year sets.  Because they were a late-in-the-year acquisition, we just finished the "How To" unit.  I am SOOOO excited by how much my Kinders' writing has improved just by doing this one unit!  I had never done a Writer's Workshop before, so it was a learning experience for me, too.  My corporation is moving toward the Writer's Workshop next year, so I decided to try it out with my current crop of Kinders.  I figured that it is good to try out new things with kids who already know procedures, etc.  This way, I get experience in using it before I take the plunge with a bunch of newbies.  I have to say that I am totally in love with this product!  ...and plan to purchase all of their sets!

The picture on the left shows an almost-ready-to-be published piece.  We worked on the same pieces for a couple weeks.  I had never thought that kindergarteners would have the stamina to stick with the same piece of writing for so long.  (I was wrong!)

This sample is from a very average little Kinder.  The spelling is well, kindergarten spelling, but I love the subject!  "How to read Words If you're not sure, sound it out.  If that didn't work, then try a different one.  Break it into chunks.  If that doesn't work, then try a different one.  Look at the pictures.  If that doesn't work, then try this one.  Ask a friend.  If that doesn't work, try this one.  (not exactly sure...) Then ask the teacher what the word is."

We "published" our writing & invited our principal to our Publishing Celebration today.  I didn't snap any pictures, but we sure had fun.  My students have developed a love of writing that I hope follows them throughout their life.   

Our ONE AND ONLY finger painting day.  I must be getting old or something ~ I can only handle finger painting once a year.  We do use other paints throughout the year, but I can only handle the mess of finger paints once a year.  One of my little cuties asked me if May 16th was always finger painting day!  It sort of is ~ give or take a few days ~ I only break out the finger paints in May.

This week really flew by ~ full moon, end-of-year testing, and all.  Tomorrow I will be participating in Relay for Life with my teacher friends.  We walked in Relay for Life last year, and I am looking forward to doing so again.  (Even if it is going to be so cold that it could snow.)  My dear father had cancer, so this event is especially meaningful to me.  I need to remember to put on my pedometer to see how many steps I take tomorrow.  I figure I'll walk to keep from freezing! 

 

Have a great weekend!

Five for Friday

TGIF!!  It's Friday, and time for another Five for Friday linky!  Thank you to Doodle Bugs for hosting such a fun link up. 

1.  Shower update:  Here is Mommy-to-Be Emily looking beautiful behind a mountain of gifts.  Baby Amelia is all set to enter the world!  I can't wait!

2.  Mother's Day gifts. We made these beautiful handprint pictures.  I'm sure the moms will love them (and keep them as a lovely keepsake of their little darlings' little hands!)  I wish I could say that this was an original idea, but alas, it was one of my many Pinterest finds.  Find my inspiration on Splish Splash Splatter.

 

 3.  Teachers Appreciation Week.  Our PTO and student council spoiled us with lots of goodies and treats this week.  Yesterday we each received a bag with some fruit, Hershey Kisses & a water bottle.  Today, after a delicious Mexican fiesta lunch our PTO president hand delivered a thank you card to each of us - along with a $100 gift card to our local teacher store, Sharp School Services!!!  Needless to say we were all stunned and very thankful!  Our PTO rocks.

4.  Robin eggs.  A silly robin chose a chair on our front porch as the location of her nest.  Of course, now that there are four beautiful blue eggs, we are just going to have to wait to sit on the porch.  This next reminds me of when we had a robin nest in our girls' backyard clubhouse.  When the babies were big enough to leave the nest, but not strong enough to fly, Emily (who was about ten) picked up one of the babies.  She didn't hold it for long because a half dozen or so robins dive bombed her.  She came racing up to the house!  I'm pretty sure she will leave these baby birds alone.  :-)

5.  Literacy Stations for this week.  Two of the stations we are doing are from my daughter's Teachers pay Teachers store.  In the first picture this little Kinder is writing the room to find words that form a sentence  to  illustrate.  The second picture shows a beginning/ending sound literacy station.  Go to Sarah's blog, Kinder Cakes, to see pictures of these and several more in action in her classroom.  While there, please show her some love and become a follower (me, too, please!).  I was so excited when Sarah got a kindergarten position - even though we teach in different corporations - we have fun sharing ideas and talking about our Kinders.  When you are visiting Kinder Cakes be sure to check out her cute Mother's Day video.

I hope your week was fun and productive, and that you felt appreciated.  And, I wish all of you moms a very Happy Mother's Day!

My Marvelous Mom

We have been busy working on goodies for Mom this week.  Today we wrote about our marvelous mothers.  It turned out to be a pretty good writing prompt - the Kinders were eager to write all about their mothers, and tell why they loved her.  Here are some samples.

Super cute, don't you think?  The kids used the word wall and phonemic spelling to write these all on their own!  A few kids did ask me how to spell a few words, but for the most part these papers were done completely on their own!  *YAY!*  One little student very seriously asked me, "How do you spell rum?" Um...  I gently asked him what he wanted to write, and he explained that he wanted to write about his mother's yummy rum cake!  Well, that was a first!  I have never had a Kinder ask me how to spell rum before!  That's one of the reasons I love kindergarten - you never know what they will say!  Click HERE for a copy of this writing paper.

Happy Mother's Day!

I want to wish all of you a very Happy Mother's Day!  As a mother myself, I know the joy of seeing the delight of a child presenting a carefully handcrafted gift.  It has been so much fun these past few days helping my Kinders to write letters to their moms and to make gifts and cards.  The gifts turned out so cute!  **Spoiler Alert** If you are the mother of one of my students, please don't go any further!  :)

Card making.

Everyone designed a special card for his/her mother.

Flowers!  The theme for this year is Flowers for Mom.

The finished cards.  They are as individual and unique as the children who made them.  They were given free rein with the scrap box, and I think the cards turned out pretty special!

Gift bags. 

Ta da!  I think there will be some pretty happy moms on Sunday (or most likely tomorrow afternoon - the kids cannot wait to give Mom her gift!).  Using some simple materials, we created flower pot photo holders.  Most of the materials came from Michaels (teachers get a discount everyday!):  small terra cotta pots decorated with foam stick on flowers, skinny craft stick stems and wooden flowers that were decorated with crayon, and moss.  The sticks are stuck into packing foam that I had saved from a recent mail order purchase. 

Here's a close-up of one of the flower pots (that lil 'cutie' is me in second grade!)

 Teeny clothes pins make wonderful photo clips!  I have an eighth grade student helper (my corporation is very small - all grades are in one building) who comes into my room two mornings a week.  She glued all of the little clips onto the sticks, and stuck the foam into the pots.  I cut the foam at home last night, making a huge mess in my kitchen.  Even after vacuuming extensively, there are still bits of foam clinging to things.  But, these cute little flower pots were certainly worth the mess.  Now, I'm not sure if our custodian, Miss Sandy, will agree that the mess was worth it!

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