MoNsTeRs!

This year, instead of doing the typical Halloween activities during Halloween week, I created a Monster unit. It has 7 Literacy Activities and 8 Math Activities.  There are differentiation options for many of the activities. I can't WAIT to do this with my kiddos.  

These cute monsters are not at all scary, but still give a slight little nod to Halloween.  I have several students that don't celebrate Halloween in my class this year, so this unit suits us well.  I don't like Halloween myself, it's second only to my distaste for New Year's Eve (it never lives up to the hype!).

I digress.

This unit does not mention anything Halloween related, so it's easy to do at any ol' time.  It's on sale for $8.50 right now so snatch it up before I raise the price.

Find my Monster unit HERE!

What's your least favorite holiday?  Any other New Year's haters out there?  Everyone seems shocked when I say that I hate it!

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?

Football Season! {FREEBIE}

Fall and football go hand in hand in so many households.  I'm a Steelers Fan and I married a Bengals fan.  I've converted him, but he won't freely admit it ;)  On Steeler Game Days, we put the game on the radio (no TV here!), listen to it while we get our work done and while our dinner simmers in the crock pot.  Crock pot Sunday is basically a holiday in our household.

Now, Pittsburghers LOVE their NFL football, but never have I seen people so crazed about football season as I have down here in the south.  Y'all (like how I slipped that in there?!?) make this Northern born-and-bred girl wish she had at least gone to an SEC school ;)

Enjoy this little football themed number puzzle freebie.  The first two should be put in order from 1-10, but the second two are a little more challenging and they have to count backwards from 10-1.  Don't forget that little detail in your directions or your kids will have some unfortunate looking cheerleaders.

Please enjoy and keep spreading the word about my little blog.  I check my stats constantly just happened to notice that I am nearing that 50 follower mark.  Leave me a comment if you download this so I know you're reading (Pretty please?  My own parents don't even read this!).  




The clip art in this freebie was purchased from Doodle Darlin' on Etsy.  She has some adorable clip art for very competitive prices and was sweet enough to allow me to share a freebie with my blog readers. Keep her in mind for all your clip art needs!

Fall Math and Literacy Pack {Common Core Aligned}

Check it out HERE

I just posted my first BIG item on Teachers Pay Teachers.  This Fall Math and Literacy pack is 121 pages and is *packed* with activities for your classroom.  All of the activities were designed with my class of kiddos in mind, are aligned to the Common Core and I included a lot of different differentiation options.

I will use this packet throughout the next few weeks in my Math and Literacy work stations.  Since it's fall themed it will easily be used through November (and I may need that long to get it all done!).  Follow along as my guinea pigs  class uses these hot-off-the-press activities.

I put it on sale for $8 (down from it's $10 price) because I am really excited about my first big unit and secondly, I never know what to price those things out.  I know that it was like working a second job for a week to get it done, but I also know teachers have budget limitations.

This preview file is available on Teachers Pay Teachers, but you can check it out here as well.  Go alert the press, tell your teacher friends, and grab it now before I end the sale this weekend!

Ways to Sort Posters

I made these simple sorting posters yesterday.  We won't be sorting and classifying formally for a few weeks, but as my students have been exploring math manipulatives, many of them have been sorting on their own anyway.  Are these the future organizers of the world?!?

Find them for $2 HERE!

Parents, have your child help you sort the laundry!  They can match socks for you :)  

0-10 Number Signs

I made new number signs for my classroom this year.  They are very simple, but I wanted the focus to be on the number and not overwhelm the posters with too many graphics.  I plan to hang them on colorful cardstock and put them underneath my whiteboard so they are easy for my kiddos to spot.

The sayings I found in Math Work Stations by Debbie Diller.  I hope you can use them!

Classroom Labels

As I'm sure everyone else is, I've spent a lot of time thinking about and planning for the upcoming school year.  Since this will be my second year teaching Kindergarten, I'm evaluating what worked and what didn't work for me last year.  I read Math Work Stations by Debbie Diller this summer and am inspired to launch them in my classroom this year.

Though my classroom is always organized, I'm taking it a step further and labeling everything- starting with the math manipulatives.  After a quick search, I found KinderTastic's free math manipulative labels and loved them.  She was generous enough to offer them for free.  Since her labels didn't cover all that I needed labels for, I used her tips to create more of my own to meet my needs (the font she used is Tweed from dafont.com and I immediately went and downloaded it!).

I hope you can use these labels!  Thank you to Judy Lau at KinderTastic for the inspiration.  Hop on over and check out her fantastic ideas.