Dice Games for Math and Freebies

I have been wanting to link up with my Bloggy BFF Laura at Kinder Kraziness for her Math Monday party for a couple of weeks. But as I'm learning life with a baby doesn't always let me do these things. But she's still sleeping, so I'm taking advantage.

I think I'm a pretty good reading teacher but I feel like my math instruction can always use some work. I love the workshop format that Deanna Jump and DeeDee Wills have set up in their Guided math units. But I don't always follow that format. One of my goals for this coming up school year is to make my math a little more workshop like. Our math series for the past 4 years or so has been Envisions and it wasn't the greatest. But we're getting a new series this Fall so I'm interested to see what it is like. I've always supplemented my instruction with activities that I've created or found on TPT. One of my favorite things to do is incorporate games into my lesson. The kids have a blast and they don't even realize they are learning. Plus once we play the games a few times in class, I move the games into their math center. I would love to say I use Math Workstations but I have never been able to get that to work for me. So as part of my center time, I have two math centers the kids work on. There are lots of different games that we play but today I'm going to focus on dice games.
I almost always start the year off with a roll and cover game. They are pretty easy for kindergartners to learn how to play and they can be differentiated pretty easily.
The beginnign of kindergarten I like to focus on Pete the Cat and Jennifer Knopf from Herding Kats in Kindergarten has a roll and cover that I use. You can check it out here. I also like roll and color which is the same concept just you color the picture instead of cover it. I have one of these in my newest math pack Sweet Treats.

 I tried it with my niece today and she had a lot of fun. 

I found a freebie I posted some time a while back of a roll and cover with a pet theme. You can get it here.  It is simple but it gets the job done.

Another dice game that I love is Bump. The kids love this one too. They can practice their numbers and they have the opportunity to bump their friends off of places. I made a freebie for you that I'll be using the beginning of the year with a blue cat theme. Sophie and I tried it out today and she had a blast playing it.

Click here to get the freebie on Google Docs. 

I try to include some kind of dice game in any unit I create for math. Another one that has dice games is Growing A Garden of Math Activities. There is a bump game in this unit for spring or a plant theme. 

Last year in first grade, I bought Just Add Dice Math Games Bundle from Jennifer at First Grade Blue Skies. I loved this bundle. I could find a game for any first grade skill I was looking for and there was a theme for anything.  This became one of my favorite resources to use through out the year. 

My friend Kristen and Kristen's Kindergarten had a post all about dice games as well. So be sure to check her post out. 

Hopefully I'll be back again next Monday to talk about some more Math games that I use. But meanwhile check out the party at Kinder Kraziness and see what others are doing in math. 

Using Alphabet Books and a Freebie

I have planned on posting all week long but it just hasn't happened. My sweet girl has had a difficult week. She has decided that she no longer wants to sleep longer than 2-3 hours at a time at night. She had been sleeping for at least 5-6 hours at a time for a while so this has been a difficult adjustment. She also has decided that she wants to get up early. Usually I get up by 7 so I can have my quiet time, start chores and do whatever else before she gets up at 8:30 or 9. This makes posting and updating things difficult. I'm working on updating some old units that I have on TPT. I'm kind of embarrassed by some it. Right now I'm working on my Cupcake Math Unit and giving it a complete overhaul. This was my first unit I ever created and I did it on publisher. I don't have publisher anymore so I'm having to start from scratch on ppt. But I'm really pleased with what I've been working on. I can't wait to use it this fall when school starts back. Here's a sneak peak:

I love this clipart from Creative Clips. I plan on overhauling a lot of my activities with new clipart, fonts and activities. But first I need to organize my clipart. Currently is by artist but I have a hard time knowing what I have so I need to work on a different way.
I'm linking up again with Reading Toward the Stars for her weekly Book talk party.

Last week I wrote about what I've been reading. I've finished a book or two since then but I wanted to blog about alphabet books. I try to read a book or two to Sweet girl everyday and every night her daddy reads to us before bedtime. We've been reading The Chronicles of Narnia during this time and are on the 5th one I think. I know it's advanced for a 5 month old but I love this time as a family and we've enjoyed it. 

I had a Hawaiian themed baby shower at my school because that was the theme we were going with Sweet girl's nursery so she got several Hawaiian themed gifts. One was an awesome alphabet book. 

Animals Sing Aloha

I love this book because it is like the traditional alphabet book that has a letter and then something that starts with a letter but it also has the sound as part of the song and letters kids can trace with lines for how you would write the letter. Obviously my 5 month old is not doing that but we are talking about the letters and their sounds in a fun way.
We also got the Dr. Seuss ABC book.

It is another fun read with alliteration and silly animals. This one is just a fun one to read and gives another opportunity to talk about letters.
The last one I discovered accidentally. It wasn't a gift at a shower but a book I already had and hadn't read. I love Sandra Boyton's books. They are perfect for little ones. Her A to Z book is no different.

This book has an animal that starts with the letter and then an action word. The animal is doing the action. I could see a lot of potential for this book in the classroom. There is another book that is similar that is animals and adjectives.

What I love about these alphabet books is that it gives us the opportunity to talk about letters in a fun way.  A friend of mine is working on her phd in reading and she read that reading alphabet books at home is one of the best ways for kids to learn letters. Because at home they have the opportunity to talk about and interact with the letters. So that is now her go to gift for new babies and kids.
I have a freebie to share with you that is a couple of activities to do after reading some alphabet books. They aren't earth shattering but they could make a neat class book.  Click here to get the file.

What are your favorite alphabet books and what do you do with them? If you download this file, I would love to hear about it.

Sunday Smorgasbord plus a Journeys Freebie!

So I was going to link up with Doodle Bugs Teaching but I just didn't get my act together. I went to see Chris and the boy scouts on the fourth and then got back kind of late in the afternoon yesterday. So I thought I would like up with Fabulous in First for her Sunday Smorgasbord party.

So I really didn't get all the things I wanted to get done this past week done at all. I haven't even started on the nursery yet. But I did have a good week with my family and friends. So this week it is on. I have to get busy on the guest room or I won't get it done before school starts. And we all know once school starts it is going to be hard to do the clean out I want to do. My sister in law was talking about having a yard sale next weekend so I'm hoping that's the motivation I need. This is what I'm working with:

I need all this stuff cleaned out and whatever can go somewhere else or I can get rid of I need to do it. (I kind of can't believe I'm sharing this on my blog. So embarrassing how bad it is) Be sure to ask me how it is going. Maybe that will keep me motivated and accountable.

I did finally sit down and work on a couple of things for school. Nothing earth shattering but what I needed to get done before I could move on to my homework. I took all the teacher's editions of the first grade Journeys series and put together an outline for me and my team to help us with planning. I don't have that to share because there are similar things my blogging friends have come up with to sell. But I do have the sight word list for you. Last summer I made some sight word sheets for Journeys Kindergarten to help you with planning and assessment. I finished the one for first grade. I put this sheet in my students' notebooks at the beginning of the year and then parents had the sight words for the whole year. For kindergarten, I was able to fit all the words on one sheet. First grade, it takes two. These sight word list are for the Common Core aligned version of Journeys that was adopted in our county last school year. I think it is the 2014 version. So that is why it might seem like there are a lot more words in kindergarten. I promise I didn't add any words to the list!

Click here to get the first grade file on Google Docs. 

Click here to get the Kindergarten file on Google Docs.

It isn't much accomplished on my to do list but it's a start and it makes me feel better. This week I've got to tackle the homework pack. I want to have that ready before school starts too. Last summer, I did the first half of the year in the summer and the the second half when I needed it. This summer I really need to get them both done. Since I'll be on maternity leave the spring semester. So I might just have to hole myself up with the computer rather than having so much fun everyday. 

There is one thing I have to make time for and that's the reading program I'm part of with our local public library. We have partnered up with a local church and we bring the books to the church and the church runs a van to pick up kids. The kids are part of our ELL population in the county. We had 14 kids this past week and 6 volunteers. The volunteers read with the kids or listen to the kids read. Then those kids who have brought back the form, can check out books. We haven't had a ton of success with getting the forms back but we do have 3 kids checking out books. It is pretty exciting stuff. My partner in crime, Cassie and I are on the local library board so we're really representing the library but using our connections as teachers to make the program happen. All of our volunteers were either teachers or parents we know through our school. Our librarian suggested this week we submit this to a conference in the Fall which is kind of exciting. Here are the kids listening to a read aloud. We were trying to engage all the kids in it. 

It is so much fun to be a part of this program and to get to read with kids one on one. I love it!

So that's my randomness for the week! I have plans to be back tomorrow with a Monday Made it! I would love to hear about how your summer projects are going! I hope they are going better than mine! 

Be sure to head over to Fabulous in First and check out the rest of the party!

Monday Made it - Sunday School Style

I said last week that my blog might take a turn towards the more personal and not as much school related material since it was summer and my brain was elsewhere. During the summer, I also find myself more involved with church and the activities we have going on there.  My husband and I are very involved at our church. It was definitely one of the things that drew us to each other when we first started dating. I was involved with the youth and had a girls ministry at the church I attended and he was involved in the youth and so much more at his church. God really works in amazing ways. When I met Chris, I was in need of a change and started going to his church. I loved the youth that I worked with at my church but they were graduating when I made the change. I feel so honored to get to see the things that God can do in the lives of the youth at both churches. I have been lucky enough to work with some fantastic kids and God continually challenges me to do more. One of the areas that he has been challenging me in is writing my own curriculum for our children's church. I have been helping once every other month with children's church. Our Children's church is during the regular service and for grades K-2. The curriculum we use is not bad but the teacher in me sees where it could be improved. I would love for our kids to get a firm foundation in the stories of the Bible and then move on to some of the deeper things. I'm not sure that what we use now builds on each week. Well, I was presented with the opportunity to create some activities to go with the lessons. So I thought I might share them once a week on my blog. I created another blog last summer to write about my faith but it just too hard to keep up with it. I am sure that I'm not the only teacher out there who finds themselves teaching in their church as well. So hopefully, you will find these posts helpful. I feel like it is something I'm being nudged to do.
So a couple of weeks ago, the focus of the lesson was about the Holy Spirit. The passage to focus on was from John chapter 14. In this passage, Jesus talks with the disciples about how he is leaving but the Father is sending  a gift. The gift is the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is there to guide us and to teach us. In this passage, Jesus also talks about how he lives in the Father and the Father lives in him. This passage helps give us the Holy Trinity. So I created a craft to go with the idea of the Trinity.
There are three hearts and each heart represents a different part of the Trinity. Have the students write or draw a picture of each part. Then they cut out the hearts and put them together to make a clover. There are direction included in the file. Check it out here.  Here's a screenshot of the file.

So I'm linking up with Tara at Fourth Grade Frolics for Monday Made it. Hopefully I'll be back next Monday with a craft I've completed. Since I've only been home for about 2 days, I haven't gotten any crafts completed yet. Be sure to head over to Tara's blog and check out the other what everyone else has going on this Monday.

I would love to hear if this kind of post is something you might be interested in and if you use it. I guess if you aren't interested, you could leave a comment but I'm pregnant and it doesn't take much to make me start crying.

Fourth Grade Buddies and the Kid President

Check me out. Blogging two days in a row. Must be the new computer. It is so nice to have a computer set up all the time. With my old laptop, I would have to get it out and set up anytime I wanted to do something and it took forever to load. Plus I was never sure if it would come up or not. Maybe the newness will wear off but probably not for a while.
I am working on a new set of activities for math with a garden theme. I am so excited. I'll be trying one of the activities out tomorrow and I can't wait. I'm also really excited about fourth grade buddies tomorrow. We always meet on Wednesday afternoons. I look forward to these afternoons and so do my kiddos. Usually the idea for what we are going to do is something that Cassie and I have talked about for a few days. Tuesday we finalize our plans and get anything together that we can.  This week the idea started on Saturday when I heard about the newest Kid President video.

I hadn't watched it or anything but just heard the beginning. The video is about what a newborn needs to know about the word. So I sent the link to Cassie and told her this is what we should do. So today we watched the video (this was my first time to give it a listen all the way through. He suggests making your own video at the end) and came up with a questionnaire for the kids to work on together. Cassie typed it up and then I prettied it up. It is my downfall to have to make everything pretty. You can check it out here.
Here's the plan for tomorrow. We will watch the video on the promethean board and discuss the video. Then the kids will work with their buddy to answer the questions. The questions could be a little deep but I think it will be interesting to see what they come up with. This week will be all about preparing to make a video. They can work on a script and practice what they want to say.
Next Wednesday we're going let them practice for the video and then we're going to use our iPhones to video it. I'm pretty excited. I think the project will be a lot of fun! I'll be sure to let you know how it goes. I've been on the computer since I got home besides eating dinner so I should probably go spend a little quality time with Chris before it's bedtime. He's watching The Doctor and I'm listening. Time to go see what is going on.

Turkey Time! and a freebie

I haven't blogged in way too long! I hate it. I miss chatting with my bloggy friends. Life has just been too busy lately and I haven't had the energy to blog much. But I'm hoping to catch up over my Thanksgiving break. I'm so jealous of all you that have the whole week off. But I'm thankful for my 2 and a half days off I have. I was talking to one bloggy friend who only gets Thursday off. I am in need of this break badly. Anyway, this is just a quick post to share a freebie for those of you that are in school this week too. It's a color by sight word page that reviews some sight words from journeys. We just finished lesson 11.

You can click here to get the freebie on google docs. 

I also have a freebie in my tpt store that is a fun counting activity with a Thanksgiving theme. Check it out here. 
Even though it would be nice to have the whole week off I'm going to enjoy the days I've got with my kids. I sent home the Disguise a Turkey project a few weeks ago and it's suppose to come back tomorrow. I've gotten a few in and can't wait to see them all. So far they are looking good. Wednesday for our half day we're going to have a Charlie Brown Thanksgiving Feast with our Fourth grade buddies. We'll watch the dvd and then compare it to a book. Then feast on popcorn, jelly beans and pretzels. It should be a good day. Hopefully over the break, I'll have the chance to share what we've been doing with our buddies. We've had a blast with them lately and learned a lot. So how long do you get for a break? If you are going to be in school this week, what do you have planned?

Centers + a freebie

I change out my centers about every 2-3 weeks. I have 10 stations and kids go to one a day. I would love to have them rotate through more than that but it just doesn't work for me. So here's what's up for this round:

 The hole punch activtiy is from Crystal at Kreative in Kinder's Print and Punch unit. Check it out here. 
The upper and lower case letter match is from the Printable Princess's A Dab of Learning unit. Check it out here. 

 Roll and Cover and the ten frame practice is from DeeDee Wills Save My Ink: November Math and Literacy activities. I've found that adding markers to an activity makes my kids think they are getting to do something really special.
The Thanksgiving Clip it is a freebie on my TPT store. Check it out. 
Special Delivery game to practice numbers 1-6 is from DeeDee Wills's Fire, Rescue and Community Helpers Math Workstations. 
Corn and pumpkin comparison activity is from Kaci Hoffer's I am Thankful Unit.

Turkey cvc word activity  is from Kaci Hoffer's I am Thankful Unit.
Sentence writing activity is from Dee Dee Wills Super Sentences: Predictable Sentences for Thanksgiving 

Roll and Graph sight words is from my Wild About Words unit for Journeys. 
At word family memory game is from Marsha McGuire's Short A word family Word work galore bundle.

This is my first attempt at differentiating my workstations so we'll see how it goes. We're getting better about working on our own and enabling me to work with some groups. I would love for you to leave me a comment if you see something useful or have any questions.

Math Monday: Pete the Cat and His 4 Groovy Buttons

I'm back again this week with another math Monday. I know I'm impressed I'm making it two weeks in a row with a feature. Hopefully I can keep it up. My kids love Pete the Cat. It could be because their teacher loves Pete the Cat. I've made it my mission to introduce Pete to all the kids in my life. (I have 2 nieces but several adopted nieces and nephews.) We read a couple of Pete books to start the year off and when the number 4 came up in our math series, I knew it was the perfect time to introduce the kids to Pete and his 4 groovy buttons. We read the story and acted out the story a couple of times the day before. I cut out some buttons and the kids helped me show how they popped off.

We used words like whole and part. The kids that were the buttons that popped off went over to one side of me so the kids could see the two parts.
The next day we read the book again and acted it out. Then I passed the kids out a button sheet to record the different ways to make 4. I had kids come up act out the story as we recorded our problems on a sheet.

I used the document sleeve I received from mybinding.com to record the different ways to make 4. I used red and orange to color the buttons and show the different parts. Then recorded the parts with numbers.  I had this displayed on my board using my document camera and the students followed along. You can click here to get your own copy of the sheet. 

I love using literature to teach math. What are some of your favorite books to use when teaching math? Leave me a comment with your favorite books. 

Math Monday: 10 Piranhas

Welcome to a new feature on my blog. Math Mondays. (We'll see how long it lasts) I have been trying to do some fun stuff with math this year using literature. I love books and love all opportunities to bring in books with every subject area. One of the major components of the common core math is for students to decompose and compose numbers. So as we've been working on numbers I've tried to provide students with opportunities to do just that. I found the book 10 Sly Piranhas at the library and knew I had to check it out.

I read the book and used goldfish to act the story out using my part/part whole mat. After I read the story, I sent the kids back to their tables with a part/part whole mat and 10 goldfish. They then helped me to act the story out and I recorded the equations on the board. Then my lesson went a little haywire. I gave each student a half sheet of paper and wanted them to show me a way to make 10 by drawing fish with 2 different colored crayons. It was a little crazy but did give me an idea of who knew what we were doing. Here a few pictures of their work:

The first two pictures were pretty good. The first picture the student really came up with his own combination for 10 and the second one used the example I had on the board. Then the last one was one of my ELL students. He doesn't always get what we are doing when I am so open ended. I think if I had done a little advanced planning I could have come up with a worksheet for them to use that would have enabled them all to be more successful. So I've got a sheet to share with you so you can do this lesson in your class and be more successful.
Click here to get the freebie. 
If you download the freebie, I would love to hear how the lesson goes in your room. What books do you use when teaching math? Leave me a comment with your favorite ones.

This and That

I think I have been in a blogging funk lately because I feel like I need something really specific to blog about. Instead of just blogging about what it is going on in my class and my life. So I'm trying to just sit down and do some blogging with no worries about making it be all about one thing.
First up, I was so excited when I got home today and had a package waiting for me. This is what was in the package.

I pre-ordered the books this past summer. Like as soon as I saw that they were coming out. I can't wait to introduce them to my class. They are going to love them. I'm thinking about wrapping up the Pete and the Magic Sunglasses book and having it delivered to the classroom sometime next week. I want it to be a big deal.
This week has been kind of crazy already and it's only Tuesday. We had some standardized testing today and will again tomorrow. Kindergarteners and bubble test don't really go well together. Then Thursday we are suppose to go on a field trip. It's one of my favorite trips we take. Our school has a special relationship with the Great Smoky Mountains National Park and we take 3 field trips a year. Well since the government is shut down it means no field trip. We have to get ready like we normally would since we won't know what will happen. The whole National Park being closed is really not a good thing for our community. It is one of the most visited parks in the country and a large part of our economy relies on tourism. No park means no visitors. October is one of our busiest months of the year. So hopefully this will all get settled soon.
I'm always looking for new ways to spice up math. I am not the biggest fan of our math series so I need more activities all the time. This week we're working on numbers 6-10. I made a fall like 10 frame (You can get the freebie here. ) and today we used Halloween erasers I found at Target to practice showing different numbers.

So that's a little bit of what is going on in my class. My hubby is at some class tonight so I think I'm going to work on my pet pack I've been trying to get done. Or maybe I'll just veg out. I still have more testing, conferences, and report cards this week. Happy Tuesday!