Classroom Update

So my big grand idea of starting centers this week didn't work out so well. But I think I've gotten them all introduced and we'll be ready to start them on Monday. That will probably be better for them to start them Monday and do the full five day rotation. The only kids I haven't had a chance to introduce stamping to yet are my ELL students. They have their pull out ELL time during center time. In fact, they miss a whole hour of literacy learning. I have to live with it. I hate that I won't really have them for any small group time.
The gear bags are working out pretty well. We've only used them once and it was a little chaotic but I think it will get better as we use them. It was way better than passing out all the materials one at a time. I finally finished my birthday display. It's from looking at lot of different displays.
Last night was Open House so I wanted to get as much finished as possible. . I'm loving my scrapbook paper bought at JoAnn's Monday. I've been using it for everything. I made the Hiss game on Kindergals. But instead of using the snakes as the backs of the cards, I used scrapbook paper.  I have a limited supply of ink and copies so the scrapbook paper worked pretty well. I tried to keep with an animal theme. Check her game out. It was free and my kids have really enjoyed. I realized after playing it with my afternoon games that I taught it totally different than Kim Adsit had created it. But it worked anyway. It is helping me see which kids have ideas about letters and which don't.
I introduced the kids to Pete the Cat this week. They loved the story but I was so disappointed that I could show them the video. It was blocked and when I tried to use the trick I saw on a blog that was blocked too. I'm going to try downloaded the video at home on my laptop and bringing it in. I have bought Fran's Pete the Cat unit and DeAnna Jump's unit. I love the ideas in both and plan on doing a little Pete the Cat each week for a while.
Overall my week was good. Most of frustration is subsiding and the kids are really doing a great job. They make me laugh and smile so much. Next week we jump into the meat of our reading series. The first three weeks of the Treasure series is slow paced and introductory. Next week it starts to move a little quicker. The series teaches a letter a week. I've already introduced all the sounds and I plan of reviewing them everyday but just focusing on the one letter. Check back Sunday or Monday. I plan to have some M resources. I'm debating about making my first unit to sell on TPT. I can't quite decide but I will definitely have some freebies.
Hope you have a happy happy Friday! We get out at 2 pm because of traffic from a car show so I plan on it being a great day!