C Week

It is "C" week in our class and we have been learning about cats (specifically Pete the Cat).  I love these books, but I love the songs even more!!  They are at Scholastic and on YouTube!  They get stuck in your head and your kids will be singing them all day long.

                                 

As we were reading them, I was trying to come up with some cute PreK art that would be meaningful for my kids.  I always like to have a purpose for their art work.  

We are also on the number 4 this week (HOW PERFECT!)  I decided we would make Pete's 4 groovy buttons for our math lesson.  We reinforced our story, counted to 4 and worked on cutting circles.  I love when we can learn so many skills with one lesson!!! It's the teacher in me!  

Then we read Pete the Cat I Love My White Shoes and of course if you know me, you know we had to rewrite it!  I made some pages that are PreK friendly so that we can "read" it as we learn our color words. We Love Our Shoes. 

I put these class book pages at my TPT store if you would like to purchase it.

Finally!

I worked on several things this summer for the new school year and I am just now putting the finishing touches on them and putting them in my store.

We focus on a letter a week and we always have a poem.  I also look for poems and songs that my students can rewrite and make their own.  They remember poems better and what they are "reading".  I put these poems on a poster maker and blow them up so I can hang them around our room.  I can also put them on our promethean board and my they are interactive for my students.

One of the great thing about each poem is that is an original poem that is set to a familiar tune.  Each poem also teaches a different skill.  

Some of the skills included are: 

Addition

Subtraction

rhyming,

creative thinking

making 10

patterning, 

measuring

 Check them out at my TeachersPayTeachers store.  Just click on the image.

The first take home project we do at the beginning of the year is a book about themselves.  I send home the pages in a ziploc bag and when they send them back I bind them into a book for each child.  They get to sit in my teacher chair and read their book to the class.  It's a great way to get to know each child a little better.  Then they get to put it in their book box and read it during free reading time or partner reading time.  It is the book they go for all the time.  They get so worn by the end of the year.  They can use photographs, pictures from magazines or they can draw the information.  I always do one for me too.  My students love getting to know a little about me too!

This is new for my class this year.  It is my Count and Graph series.  As many of you know, information stays with our students if they can repeat it several times throughout the year.  I was teaching graphing for a few weeks, number writing for a few weeks, counting for a few weeks, etc.  They were all separate and then we would move on to another skill.  This series will incorporate all that over and over again with a different theme.  After we do the first couple of books, it will be an independent activity that I will put at my math stations.

Welcome Back!

It has been a long, hot summer here in Louisiana!  My poor blog has gotten no attention.  My kids have though! They have been at summer camps off and on all summer.  Our pool hasn't even gotten much use.  But now it's back to business.  School has started here and it's my favorite time of year!

I just love the first days of school.  I love the way school supplies smell and look all organized.  I love getting my classroom ready for all the little darlin's that are coming. And I love meeting all my little sweethearts and getting to know their personalities.

I have seen lots of people putting pictures of their classrooms up.  It makes me want to do better and be a little more organized (although my co-workers already think I'm crazy organized)  Each year I rearrange my room and do some different things because I get bored with the same thing year after year.  I have a small classroom so I have to make the most of each little nook and cranny.

This is my PreK-4 classroom this year (so far!!)
This is my view from my desk and it looks towards our calendar area.

 This is our "Measure Me" wall.  Every couple of weeks I change out the unit of measurement on the wall and take a picture of the kids beside it.  They count how many units tall they are and we leave their pictures up for about 2 weeks.  They love to have their picture taken and measure themselves and each other.  I hope to have this set up at my TPT store by the end of the week.  It will have the units of measurement and the picture cards for each unit.

 This is the view from my door.  You can see the block center, the Little People center and the kitchen center.

 Another view from my door way looking at my back wall.  Told you I use every available space.  I don't think I can put anything else in here!

 This view looks at my desk area and our carpet area.

 Ok! So I am sooo excited about my All About the Number board.  The theme in my room is monsters and thanks to Krista Wallden at Creative Clips, I have the cutest monsters to put on my board!

 Also, thanks to Creative Clips, I made some precious name tags for my tables!! I have 3 tables and they each have their own color monster.  It coordinates with their shelf in the back of our room where their supplies are located.

 These are the supply shelves in the back of our room.  Each table has their own baskets of supplies.  Each child's alphabet boxes are in the middle shelves and our Math Station boxes are on the bottom of the shelves.  

 This is our Art Center and Pocket Chart center.  We obviously don't go to those centers at the same time.

 Here is our writing center.

 Our Alphabet Center

 And this is our rug time area and reading center.  We spend lots of time here.

Check back soon to see what we will be learning and doing in our class!  We have some exciting things planned!!

Book Talk Tuesday

Like most good teachers, I LOVE books!  I can never have enough (even though my own two kiddos say I have plenty).  When I find a good author and illustrator, I want to get all the books they have!  I'm so glad Deanna Jump decided to have this link up on Tuesdays!  I love getting new book ideas.  I am making my list  now for the next school year!

I  love the books Rumble in the Jungle and Commotion in the Ocean.  I love that every page has great rhymes while teaching some facts and the illustrations are off the charts!  They are so bright and bold.  I teach PreK so the pictures have to be pretty incredible to hold their attention.  We go back to these all year!












                           




I can't wait to go buy some new books this summer and start making some plans to teach them to my kids. I'm a total school nerd, I know!

Summer or just Spring Break

We just finished Spring Break and it felt like SUMMER! As much as I love my job and my kiddos, it was hard to come back and get in the groove. Everyone has Spring Fever.  The up-side is that there are only a few weeks til actual summer!  Give me about two weeks of summer and I am ready to come back!  Here are some projects we did for Easter.

 Our Easter Art Bags

 Our super cute Easter bunnies!

We have been talking about weather and so each day my calendar helper has to not only decide what number they need, but they have to decide what the weather is too.  We have been counting and graphing our weather for the month of April.  You can tell we have LOTS of sunny days!!

Our next big unit is Zoo!  I can't wait!  Stay tuned!