Peek at my Week 10-13-15

This week I'm excited to use the Stellaluna lessons from Amy and Katie's Rooted in Reading October unit! We also have midterms on Tuesday and Thursday.

Download the pdf here.

Resources:

Rooted in Reading October

Writing Through the Year Unit 2

October Literacy Stations

Character Traits: Courage

Head over to DeeDee's to link up and see other plans.

Peek at my Week and October Literacy Stations

     This week we are reviewing content and skills for our midterms next week. We will also be reading some of my favorite fall stories.

     You can download the pdf here.

     I just added October Literacy Stations to my store. There are five activities that cover different skills. I will use these activities as part of a mini lesson this week in whole group before adding them to literacy stations. The activities include:

Pumpkin Sentences-types of sentences (statements, questions, commands, exclamations)

Halloween Photo Subjects & Predicates-match sentences with pictures, circle the subject and underline the predicate

Monster Sentence Mash Up-combining subjects and predicates

Apple Singular and Plural Nouns-sort nouns as singular or plural

Monster Nouns-sort nouns as people, places, or things

You purchase it here. It is on sale for $3 until tomorrow night.

Head over to DeeDee's to see more visual plans and link up.

Peek at my Week 8-31-15

     This week, we are working on retelling the beginning, middle, and end of stories in reading. During writing, we are still working on procedures, and will be writing about something we have done with a friend or family member. In grammar we will be learning about commands and exclamations, and reviewing capitalizing the first word of the sentence, and putting punctuation at the end. I will also continue introducing literacy station activities and pulling students individually for DRAs. In social studies, we will learn about rural, urban, and suburban communities and using a compass rose. Our character focus is kindness. We will create an anchor chart with examples of kindness.

     You can download the PDF here. I made sure it was set to anyone with the link can view. :-)

Resources I'm using:

Writing Through the Year Unit 1

School is Cool! Literacy Stations

Character Traits: Kindness

Head over to DeeDee's to link up and view other lesson plans. 

Back to School with Pirates

     During the first week of school, our reading and writing activities centered around the book, Pirates Go To School by Corinne Demas. All of my students were super pumped about the pirate book!

     On the first day, we read the story and focused on the Pirates' character traits. I modeled identifying the traits and using evidence from the text to confirm the character traits. Then we charted  their character traits and the students had to support their answers with evidence from the text. I teach two classes, so I recorded one set of answers on one color sticky notes and the other classes' answers on different color sticky notes.

     

     Then we sorted some pirate and school words by the number of syllables in each word. 

     On Thursday, we read Pirates Go To School again. This time we focused on the characters and setting. As we read, we identified the characters and the setting. Then we created an anchor chart and sorted pictures as an example of characters or setting.

     We also put pirate and school words in alphabetical order. 

The syllable sort and abc order activities will be added to a literacy station once we begin stations.

     We also worked on writing stories about what would happen if pirates were in our class. On Friday, we made pirates to go with our writing. The pirate patterns are from Rachel Lamb. You can get them here. 

      You can get my pirate activities in my store. 

      It was a successful first week of school!

Peek At My Week 8-24-15

     It's my first full week of school this week, so we're hitting the ground running. This week I'll begin introducing station activities-one a day until I feel we have enough to begin stations. I'm also going to begin DRA testing this week, so I can create my reading groups.

     It's such a blessing to have had both of these classes last year. We did a quick review of procedures, and things are running smoothly.

      You can download the pdf here.

Resources I'm using this week:

Writing Through The Year Unit 1

School is Cool! Literacy Stations

Head over to DeeDee's link up and view other lesson plans.

Back to School Resources and Sale

      Today begins the Teachers Pay Teachers two day Back to School sale! Here are some resources in my shop that are perfect for back to school.

     My classroom rules pack has rules posters in two sizes. It also have a couple of sorts to help your students understand what following these rules practically looks like. There is a rules contract to be taken home and signed by the teacher, student, and parent. There are also two versions (younger and older) of the Classroom Rules book for students to complete.

     My Pirates Go To School unit has reading, writing, and word work activities that are perfect for the first few days of school. The reading activities focus character traits, setting, and feelings. The word work activities include abc order and syllables. The word work activities are perfect to move into a literacy station. The writing is If pirates were in my class. These activities go with the book Pirates Go To School by Corinne Demas.

     Finally my School is Cool! literacy stations is filled with activities perfect for the beginning of the year and are a review of skills from first grade, but also address second grade TEKS. These stations come in a full color, partial color, and black and white version.

     You can save up to 28% off in my store with the code BTS15. 

Happy Shopping!!!

TpT Seller Challenge: Make Your Masterpiece

     Week three of the TpT Seller Challenge had us making a new product, and swapping with another seller to get feedback. I loved swapping. It's always good have a second pair of eyes look over things. I had two products I was working on that I decided to finish up for this challenge.

     The first product is a freebie that could be used as a literacy station or guided practice activity. I'll use it as guided practice, and then move it to an early finisher activity or literacy station. If you are a Texas teacher, it is TEKS aligned. The TEKS are on the color and black and white covers.

     You can download Synonyms Are Oh So Sweet! here.

    My second product is a sight word game. Erin Bradley has this adorable chevron mugs and donuts clip art that I just had to have. I also wanted to make a sight word game that I could use with my students and my boys to practice our words at home.

     Oh Donuts! A Sight Word Game is on sale for 50% off for 48 hours. You can purchase it here.

Click here to see the other Masterpieces!

School is Cool! Literacy Stations

     I am so excited about these literacy workstations. I have been working on them for about a month now. There are a total of seven stations:

• Complete or Incomplete Sentences?
• Back to School Blends-th, cr, gl
• Ouch! Sight Word Game-review of first grade word list, includes two ways to play
• Nouns at School
• Easy as A-B-C-abc order
• School Routines-sequencing three events
• Packin' My Bag-spelling

     The sentences station has a color and a black and white version. All of the other stations have a full color, a partial color, and a black and white version. An answer key is included for each station so students can check their work when completed. There is also a recording sheet for each station. I'm going to print two or three copies of each recording sheet, laminate, and put in the station with a dry erase marker or crayon. I'll have students show me or their partner their work before they erase it. 

If you use the black and white version, I suggest printing them off on bright colored paper. 

     Now I just need my Mister to buy some printer ink, so I can get busy prepping these. School is Cool! Literacy Stations is on sale until July 1st. 

Literacy Work Stations

When I pull students for small group reading instruction, the rest of the class works in literacy work stations. The work stations are a fun way for students to practice their reading and writing skills. Below are some the work stations we currently have and some of the skills we are or will be working on soon.

Writing Station: Students work on writing their name, word wall words, words found around the room as well as create books, stories, and letters to friends.

Sand Station: Students conduct letter hunts, practice making their name and word wall words with abc cookie cutters and sequence the alphabet.

Big Book Station: Students practice pointing to the words and reading, making their reading sound like talking, finding word wall words, letters, and the beginning and end of a sentence.

Puzzle Station: Student practice putting the letters in their name and order and sequencing the alphabet.

Block Station: Students practice socialization skills and create maps.

ABC/Word Work Station: Students practice letters/sounds/word wall words and work with rhyming and word family words.

Library Station: Students practice pointing and reading grade level texts. They also may look at the pictures and tell the story. They read to stuffed animals and tell each other about the stories they've read.

Computer Station: Students practice letters, sounds, and reading on Starfall.com.

Homeliving Station: Students practice socialization skills, as well as reading and writing menus, grocery lists, etc.

Pocket Chart Station: Students match names and photos of classmates, first and last names, sequence events and poems we've read.

Poetry Station: Students practice pointing to the words and reading, making their reading sound like talking, finding word wall words, letters, and the beginning and end of a sentence.

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