A peek at our stations

I recently revamped how Math and Literacy Stations work in my classroom.  That post is coming soon.  In the meantime, here is a glimpse of some our first stations.  They really learned to work well independently doing these centers and got our routine down.

Parker showing off What's Your Bus Number and Victoria showing off Backpack Boogie (version 1) from The Backpack Boogie by Growing Kinders.  I absolutely love all of her creations and they always seem to perfectly match the skill level of my class.  

 Apple patterns from Shannon Martin at Kindergarten Hoppenings.  You can find great free apple activities HERE on her site.  She also recently started creating units for sale and they are great.  She's a rockstar teacher and I used her work a lot last year (my first year teaching K!).

The above activities are all from Deedee Wills' Back to School Math Work Stations.  She's a Kindergarten guru.  She has the greatest games.  My class could play different versions of  them all year!

When I started teaching, I wondered what teachers did before computers and the internet.  Now, I'm wondering what teachers did before the blog world and Teachers Pay Teachers.  It has changed the way I teach and given me access to so many fabulous resources.  Don't you agree?

Fine Motor Skills

Like all classrooms, I have a wide range of learners.  These first few weeks I've learned a lot about what skills my students are bringing in to Kindergarten.  It's amazed me how different they are than my bunch last year!  To practice fine motor skills, they placed tiny stickers on the letters A and B.  Some of us are still working on recognizing these letters, some need a little more fine motor skill help, and for the rest- stickers are a winner anytime!!  Here are my Table 5 cuties hard at work:

When they were done, they got to go to the carpet to look at a picture book.  I had held my books hostage for the first two weeks until we learned about how to take care of books.  I used Kindergarten Kindergarten's Forest Friends Go To School (downloadable for free-- destroy it yourself!) this week to teach them how to take care of books.  They promised me they would take care of my books so MY kids (as in, future biological children) will get to have them someday :)

Does anything make a teacher happier than a roomful of children reading.....quietly?!?

What do you do with your class to build fine motor skills and letter recognition?