Test/Standards Review

I am always looking for different ways to make sure that my students are understanding the standards, or that they are ready for their upcoming test, or just different ways to have fun with math!

'Hot Seats' have been the BEST way to get students excited about learning and they have become an amazing review for us!

Before the students enter the classroom, I hide a hot seat or two under their chairs. The best part is, you can differentiate the questions for different kids. If you know one student needs to work on a particular math problem, then you can purposely give them that question.

Sometime during the day I announce that there are HOT SEATS!!! and the students all jump up and look under their chairs to see if they have a question...

If they do, then their challenge is to come up with the answer! If they are having trouble answering the question, then they are allowed to 'phone a friend' and ask someone at their table for help.

On this day, I had three hot seats! Here is another little one working on his counting...

My students absolutely LOVE hot seats. They literally asked me if there was a hot seat ALL.DAY.LONG for the first month I introduced them! I kept explaining to them that it was supposed to be a surprise!

I love these cards because they hit every common core standard and they are super easy to use! You can find them for different grade levels below:

Kindergarten

First
Second
Third
Fourth

Fifth

Let me know if you've tried these out!

Friday!

I am linking up with Doodle Bugs to share five random things from my week! 

 1. I got to babysit my favorite Love Bug...my niece Savanna! She is a little over one month old and she is just the most precious, perfect little girl in the world! 

 2. We went dress shopping for one of my sisters! My little sister made these awesome treats for us!

  3. Beary Fun Sounds! We wrapped up our bear unit this week! My children had a blast these past 3 weeks learning all about polar bears, black bears, and brown bears!

4. Digging Up Digraphs! We have really been practicing our digraphs! Some of my littles were still having difficulty with the th, sh, ch, and wh digraphs. 

5. I am spending my Friday/Saturday wrapping up my Career Math and Literacy Centers! It is basically finished and just needs some proofing! I can't wait to share it with ya'll! Next up...finishing my America Centers! (Then weather, plants, and space) :)

Happy Weekend! 

Kindergarten Reading Groups/Centers

The email I receive most often is one asking me how I run my literacy centers. I read the Daily 5 book during the summer and even though I don't do the Daily 5 exactly the right way in my classroom, I incorporate a  lot of what I read into my centers. Click on any of the photos below to enlarge them. Hopefully this post will explain my centers a little better!

Both of these activities are from my Bear Unit HERE

My Word Work cards can be found HERE and Magnetic Letters HERE

My Writing Center Activities can be found HERE and my writing folders HERE

This is from my Bear Unit HERE

Abby's RTI binder can be found HERE

Even though I don't have it pictured in this post, I also have a pocket chart center where students can complete a lot of sentence scrambles, syllable sorts, rhyming sorts, etc. 

I tried to think of everything in this post, but if you have any additional questions please let me know! :)

You can find the center cards seen in this post below.

Naughty Leprechaun Story and Giveaway!

 

Yay!! My Naughty Leprechaun Story came in the mail and I am SUPER excited about it!! My students had a blast with the Elf On The Shelf and I know they will just get a kick out of this!!!

The Naughty Leprechaun comes with a special coin. The coin allows students to choose who will visit each night--Liam or Leyland.  One leprechaun leaves a small treasure as a reward for doing your best. The other leprechaun creates mischief and pranks! 

If the students are good throughout the day then they get to choose which leprechaun will come to visit (I have a feeling mine will love the mischief and pranks!) But, if they don't work hard and do their best, then they don't get to choose...it is just up to luck!

The book explains the story behind the two brothers and at the end explains how on the last night before St. Patrick's Day both brothers will visit the class! They will even leave behind a small (hidden) prize.

 Overall, the basis of the story is to get children to do their very best! I am excited to try this out with my kids for the first time this year. I am hoping it gets them motivated just like our class Elf did!! :)

You can read more about the Naughty Leprechaun Story HERE.

You can also enter to win your free book and coin below!! Good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway