I am back! Plus a freebie and TPT updates!

Hey all my blogging friends I'm back and what a crazy fall I've had! I had my hands full to start the school year but overall have a great group of kids. Then this past weekend I fell at a wedding and hurt my ankle and foot causing me to take 4 days off this week while I was at home with my leg up. I'm attempting to return tomorrow on crutches since I'm going stir crazy at home. So I thought I'd announce my return to blogging with a freebie! 
So in our kindergarten classes we use colored glue to help students with fine motor development and to get them excited about using glue bottles correctly. To make colored glue, take a bottle of Elmers and add a few drops of food coloring. Shake it up and leave it upside-down overnight to let the food coloring to move through the bottle. So the kids use the colored glue to make dots on seasonal pictures they have colored. We let them dry on the heater and they take them home the next day.
So here is my October Bat Dab Will Do Center for my blogging friends. Hope your kids love it as much as mine do!
Also since I've been home for the week I started gathering and bundling the different handwriting and alphabet sorting activities we do at school to share on Teachers Pay Teachers. I posted my Alphabet Handwriting Practice Set that we use for morning warm-up activities. The second set I use in small group to work on sorting and fine motor tasks with dabbers and letter recognition. We use the large letters to do an end of the week fun letter activity like turning the A's into apples. I've posted samples of both items and many others on my TPT site. Please let me know if you like them and as I go through my computer I will continue to post more!

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Alphabet-Handwriting-Practice-Set

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Alphabet-Handwriting-and-Sorting-Pack-2

- Lindsey

Sorting Rubber Ducks

My rubber duck sorting collection continues to grow and the kids love it!

Question of the Day Graph - Need help!

Hey bloggers I need your help! My team has talked about doing a question of the day to graph with our class this year and I'm trying to come up with the best way to do this. There are products out there that are made for this like these two from Really Good Stuff... but... I'm going to have up to 27 kindergartners and neither of these are the most kindergarten friendly. Plus I'm told the yellow graph's magnets don't stick very well even though there is enough space for my class.

Pre-K Pages Graphing

Does anyone know what this is from?

So I'm looking for ideas of other products or something I can make to have a daily graph. I don't have a Promethian or Smartboard.  I don't have a ton of magnetic blackboard space and the kicker is how to fit up to 27 kids.
If you've done class graphing that can be changed everyday to a new question in your room or know of a picture of something like on the web please link up with me. I've been searching pinterest and blogs for ideas but keep coming up empty handed. Help!
-Lindsey

Summer School

Well after the horrible thunderstorms last week delayed our start, summer school finally began this week! I'm teaching kindergarten in a 2nd grade classroom so as you can imagine everything is a bit big for my kiddos but they like it! Here are a few pictures of my room. Updates to come about my experience with the 4 and 5 year olds in a bit!








- Lindsey

End of the year!!

5 more days to go!! Today was my last regular Tuesday of the year, next week our last day is a half day!! So tonight I worked on my end of the year gifts for the kids. Many thanks to Pinterest for ideas as Target's summer section for the $1 crazy straw water bottles!


I also used my Scholastic points to order each of my kids a copy of the book, I Knew You Could!



Let's just say what I learned this year is that having 23 kids adds up to making everything more expensive instead of the 17 kids that I had last year. I love them all but don't know if next year when I'll have even more kinders if I'll be able to continue to afford all the fun activities I do with them. Guess I can't worry about that now. TTFN!
- Lindsey

Dinosaurs

So a little while back my math dinosaur which I used for addition and patterns appeared on Pinterest and I have been asked for the pattern to make it. I will first say the original idea is not from me, I found it online somewhere last year, but I do have a tracer for the body.If anyone knows who I got it from please let me know and I'll link up to give them credit.
























So I took a picture with hopes that it would help!

I'd recommend saving the picture of the tracer and putting it in a word document and stretching to get the right dimensions. He is 16 inches long and 6 inches tall. I hope this helps teachers who were looking for my dinosaur!



- Lindsey

Mother's Day project

So I've been brainstorming for Mother's Day this year and thought I'd post one of my projects I did last year to help others with ideas.



Last year I also had the kids make a breakfast in a bag with oatmeal and tea but I think I'm going to pass on that project this year and am looking for new ideas. Any good ones out there?
- Lindsey

Teacher Appreciation Week - TPT

It's Teacher Appreciation Week!  

Use promo code TAD12 to get 28% off every item in my store!!  

I know I have my  wishlist ready for shopping on my TPT ready to go!  HAPPY SHOPPING!!

-Lindsey

Earth Day

So many thanks to Pinterest I tried some new activities with my kids this year that I hope to continue next year. So I made the earth cupcakes ( split white cake batter in half, add blue and green food coloring and then alternate pouring into the cupcake trays with a spoon). They were very yummy! The only problem I ran into was the humidity in my classroom today actually caused the red hearts I iced on top to literally melt away! So by the time the kids got them it looked like something died on top. I won't do this part next year. Definitely a learn by doing experience!






We read, Recycle, and made a list of ways we can save the earth. Then the kids made the handprint My Earth Day Promise pages I found on pinterest they loved it!!
We followed it by each kid making a hand print or two  on a white earth to make our planet for our bulletin board in the hall. Then using old index cards they wrote and illustrated how to save the earth! I love this idea and will have to do it again next year!

A few close ups of the kids work

I love the blue one of the recycling bin!

When I taught 2nd grade this was one of my earth day projects they wrote a promise to the earth about what they would do to save it. I did something similar with my kinders last year and had them color an earth and glue on a plate then did the same folded strips.

One of my teammates did this with her kids she took a picture of them reaching up really tall and then on earth day she had them color and cut out the earth and make a card with their earth day promise.

I know this post is after earth day but it might help with ideas for next year!






- Lindsey

Spring Forsythias and Money Clip-It Activity

Happy Spring everyone!! I wanted to share the beautiful forsythia art one of my kids made this week! I was very impressed with how hard the kids worked after returning from spring break. I just posted a new Clip-It Activity about Money on TPT. It focuses on counting pennies, nickels, dimes, and quarters. My kids love these self correcting activities and it's nice from my side to know they are getting the answers correct. Please check out and follow my store at Teachers Pay Teachers.

Additionally I have my Time Clip-It and Measurement Clip-It activities posted on TPT if anyone has units coming up on those topics.

Happy Shopping!!

-Lindsey

New Kindergarten Blog to Follow

I wanted to let everyone know about a new kindergarten blog that you should follow called Kinder Curiosity.

http://kindercuriosity.blogspot.com/ 

Sharon  has taught 2nd, 1st, and kindergarten and currently teaches on my team. She has wonderful early childhood ideas to share with the blogging world! Welcome aboard Sharon!

Looking for t-shirt storage ideas

So I spent my spring break trying to get myself and my apartment more organized. I find one of my biggest hangups is what to do with my t-shirts. Do I hang them? Do they go in drawers? On a shelf? In a crate? I've never had a good plan for my t-shirts. I wear them daily for coaching and the gym so it is an everyday battle for me since the shirt I always want is on the bottom or when you grab one the rest all get messed up or fall down. So I've looked online and on Pinterest for t-shirt storage ideas and come up empty handed. So tonight after debating with my self if I should pay the $24.99 to buy the "flip fold" that stores use to fold shirts so I could put them into drawers I came up with a brilliant idea! Use my old hanging shoe rack (from my last apartment)!

So I folded each T-shirt into a normal square and then folded it in half again "like a hot dog" then I put them in similar groups of 3-4 and stuck them into the shoe rack! I hope this idea will last more than a few weeks and I love that I can see and find all the t-shirts quickly. I've purged and gotten rid of a ton over the past few months so I hope this new idea works and I wondered how do other people store their t-shirts at home? Please link up and let me know! Thanks!

- Lindsey

A Pinterest Spring Break

So this spring break I relaxed at home, bought a new car, and had time to deal with the last boxes from my move. As I was getting my home organized I took on some Pinterest projects to help get my closet and dresser organized. I took pictures through the process to document everything.

My first project was finding a way to conquer my closet and all the shirts that won't stay on hangers. I saw the glue gun dots idea and thought I'd test it out. Items needed: Target white hangers 10 for $1 (sale) & a glue gun (I brought mine home from school). I found that one dot of glue wasn't enough for all my different shirts so I did 3 dots on each arm of the hanger. I love that I can hang all of my shirts now!

My next project was my hair bands. They are everywhere! So I saw the large oatmeal container hair band holders on Pinterest but surprisingly my grocery store didn't carry the big oatmeal container so I looked around at home for something similar to use. I came upon a Growler from a brewery visit in the closet which worked quite well! I decided not to cover the growler because honestly I like it and well it's covered up all the time if I put my hairbands back so no one else will know what's under there (except you all of course!).



My last project was how to organize my necklaces so they don't get tangled up and I can actually see what I have. I came across these bead holders at A.C. Moore for $2 (sale) and it worked perfectly!


 The last project that's driving me crazy and I can't find a good idea for is how to organize and store my t-shirts. I currently have them in crates in my closet but of course the one I always want is on the bottom and they never go back in the way they came out. I have purged my t-shirts and I still have two crates full and I wear them pretty regularly when I coach. I'm open to any and all ideas so please let me know if you have any or link me to pins that could help to inspire me! Thanks for reading!
* I downloaded Pic Stitch on my iPhone to make these photo collages*
- Lindsey

It's Cherry Blossom Time

I'm very lucky to teach just outside our Nations Capitol surrounded by the Cherry Blossoms. I try I teach a small unit on the Cherry Blossoms and wanted to share what I've done over the years from 2nd grade through my kindergarteners. The lessons begin with the book, Cherry Blossom Friends which I purchased through the Smithsonian a few years back. I have my typed lesson plans below from 2nd grade.




I coordinated with my music teacher and I taught the kids the song Sakura that I learned when I was a child. We learn the song in both English and Japanese. I have the music for the kids from the music text books and I have a CD with a copy of the song to sing in the room.




Next we made a cherry blossom art project depicting the cherry blossom trees and the Jefferson Memorial with the tidal basin in the background. Many of my students have been down there and this image matches one of the first pages in the book so they love it!



With my kinders this year I read the same book but due to limited time I didn't get to work on the music with them. We made our own fingerprint cherry blossom trees using watered down brown paint to paint the branch and then they used finger prints to make the flowers.

They really turned out beautiful!



This is our spring Cherry Blossom center I had the kids do. They traced a tree and used tissue paper to glue on the flowers. They had to draw a spring scene and write about what they like to do in the spring. They loved our little unit!


- Lindsey

Moving, the Tooth Fairy and Dental Health

Sorry, I've been MIA since December. I moved right after Christmas and have been coaching 2 nights a week ever week so I've been exhausted and blogging was dropped for a bit.

So its Dental Health month and this year I decided to rethink my unit and get more involved (Thank you Pinterest!) So, this is my crazy looking tooth fairy I'm going to have the kids do for dental health month next week. She didn't turn out quite how I wanted to she seems a little "off" what do you think?



Next we will make a daily tooth brushing chart at centers. I'm tempted this year to send them home in a sleeve protector with a dry erase marker so they can use it more than once. Sorry I don't have this electronically.




I'm thinking About trying the playdough on the mega blocks activity on Pinterest but I'm looking for other methods to practice "cleaning teeth." Milk jugs are too big what's smaller that I could use?
- Lindsey