Christmas Time is Here!!

Merry, Merry!!!  Don't you just love Christmas?!?  Such a wonderful time of year with so many fun things to do!  Hope you are having Merry days wherever you are!

Our journal this coming week is how to decorate a Christmas tree.  Saw something on Pinterest that I tweaked. :)  

Here is the sheet the kiddos will fill out.  I did circles with 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th so they can write or draw the things to decorate a Christmas tree.

Here is our Housekeeping center~ Gingerbread Bake Shop!    My puppet stage likes to play dress up a lot!!

We made our Gingerbread dough on Wed., and we were going to bake him tomorrow, BUT we are out for a snow day!  So, Gingy will have to sit in the freezer until Mon. 

Merry Christmas!  

"It's Almost Time For Thanksgiving, It's almost time for a Feast!!"

I LOVE Thanksgiving in K.  We've done many things that we've done in past years, you can check them out out on the blog.  Here are a few new things this year!

My Kiddos were the Pilgrims for our feast this year, so we made Pilgrims.  The girl's bonnet is 1/3 of the paper plate rim with center cut out.  Use the center on the back of the hat to make the bonnet puffy.  The neck on both the boy and girl was about a 1/4 of the plate rim.  Glue the point behind a pink or flesh colored circle.  Boy hats were just back construction paper.  I let them use markers to decorate their Pilgrims!  Fun project and easy. 

This year I found a Martha Stewart hat pattern on Pinterest.  Loved it!!!

Here is the link~ http://marthastewart.com Pilgrim bonnett. :)  It was easy and turned out so cute!!

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving with your families!!  Christmas is coming soon!!  I think I'm starting a new tradition with a stuffed Gingerbreadman.  He will be a bit like the elf on the shelf.  

Be sure to check out Dr. Jean's Happy Everything for some fun Thanksgiving songs.  We are done until Dec.:)

Pumpkinology!

My K kiddos paired with 4th grade to do some pumpkin study!  What a fun morning it was.

We drew some pumpkins.

 We tasted pumpkin in a can, pumpkin bread, and pumpkin seeds.

We estimated pumpkin seeds.  The big one had 403 and small one had 223, we didn't count the gourd...

 We counted pumpkin lines.

We tested to see if a pumpkin could sink or float...  It floats!  I learned something new! :)

We measured several pumpkins with cubes, chains, inches, and feet.

At the end, the kiddos put together a book with their findings.  It was a fun morning! Each pair had a sheet so they could record their findings and they each got their own book.   When the kiddos were all finished, we read Liz Curtis' book, The Pumpkin Patch Parable and made a Happy pumpkin.

Happy fall to all!!

50th Day in K~ Sock Hoppin' Fun!!

Tomorrow is the 50th Day of Kindergarten!  We are 1/2 way to 100, so we are going to have some 50's fun!!  Housekeeping is  the 50 Days Cafe!  Used my puppet stage to make a frame/store front, we'll take pictures of the kids with the Happy 50!  Found some food baskets and paper at Target $ spot for the food, and made floats with some shimmery gift bag filler. ;)

We are going to celebrate by having rootbeer floats as a treat!  Our journal and craft are going to be "How To Make A Rootbeer Float".  The kiddos are going to write directions on paper that is shaped like our float cup, after they finish both the craft and the paper, we'll put them together to make an individual book. 

We are going to have a hula-hoop contest and a bubble gum blowing contest too!  

Also, found a freebie on Teachers Pay Teachers with how things differ from the 50s and today~  it's by Erica DeMaria.  We printed it off and will let the kiddos graph them under 50s and Today. :)  We'll also measure records with tootsie rolls, it's going to be fun to see if any of our kids have seen records!  I have a bean bag C.D. with 50s songs on it, so I'm sure we will need to do a sock hop with bean bags too!!

I'll post some of our fun day soon!!

Happy Teaching!!

End of the Year Memory Project

It's hard to believe that we are almost to the end of the year!

Where has this year gone?!  Yesterday we did our end of the year memory project, the handprint pillow case. ;)

This is one of my favorite projects, and I know the kiddos love it too. :)

Hope your end of the year countdowns are full of fun!

Poetry Cafe~ Open Mic Day!

April in K we've been studying Nursery Rhymes, Fairy Tales, and Fractured Fairy Tales and studying poetry. :)

We have a pretend mic and stand in dress up so the kiddos dress up and act out some of their favorite poems, fairy tales, etc...  

We also have a "poetry apron".  It's just a cute apron I found with pockets and I've typed out all our poems and songs throughout the year and they can pull them out and say or sing them.  They are having lots of fun with that!

Friday was our Poetry Cafe.  It was tons of fun!  I'd found the idea on Dr. Jean's blog for April.  We had each of the kiddos bring a mug for hot chocolate and we served cupcakes.  We set up several tables, placed lamps around the room, and turned out the overhead lights.  We gave the room a coffee house feel.  The mic and stand were at the front and we even had a beret if they wanted to wear it. :)  The kiddos were encouraged to either write an original poem, learn a new poem, or share a poem we already knew.  Instead of clapping we snapped.

It was a fun morning, and the kids loved sharing!

The Lorax and Thing cuppies!

We've been having fun dressing in colors in honor of some of the most popular Seuss books. ;)

For Truffula Tuesday, we wore orange and made this cute Lorax out of paper plates.

For Thing Thursday, one of our creative Moms made us Thing cupcakes!

Such fun with Seuss!!  We've been rhyming and the kiddos are having fun trying to make up some of their own rhyming words like chimbley! ;)

If you are looking for a fun Seuss game, check out "I Can Do That".  The kiddos LOVE it!  They have to follow some crazy directions with some Seuss props.  Reading skills, some gross, and fine motor; plus the added bonus that it is fun!!  

Spring break is here for us tomorrow!  Looking forward to a break!

Happy spring to all!!

Truffula Tuesday!

Our Seuss fun continues!  Tuesday we are going to dress in orange and read The Lorax, one of my many favorite Dr. Seuss books!

I made this for math, found something similar on Pinterest and tweaked it for what we were learning in math.

The pom poms are the counters and the kiddos can write their answers in erasable marker.

We'll also be making a Lorax craft that was on Pinterest.  I'll post pics when we get them done. ;)

The kinders in our class are really having fun with all the different Seuss things we are doing!

Happy Teaching!

Seusstastical Time

The day it came, the day was here!  Dr. Seuss' birthday, the most fun of the year!!

What an exciting day in K it was Friday to celebrate this crazy creative author!  The kiddos and parents were very creative and they all dressed up as their favorite Seuss character!   We spent the day yesterday enjoying some Seussy fun!  We will be spending the month celebrating him, but yesterday was a whole day of fun in honor of him. :)

We made Thing 1 and Thing 2 out of handprints.  

Our snack was a green egg in honor of Sam I Am!  We had vanilla pudding cups, the kiddos stirred some green food coloring in.  Then they poured it on the plate, topped with a vanilla wafer and green sprinkles.

This messy table was actually full of fun!  We put out some Seuss books and The Green Eggs and Ham Cookbook, and the kids used playdough to make some Seuss creations!  Happy find on Pinterest!

Our dress up center is "Seuss on the Loose"  There are stuffed animals for a puppet show, dress up hats and masks to act out characters. :)

House keeping is the Green Eggs and Ham cafe.  We have all sorts of breakfast items  for the kiddos to play.

Our reading center is full of Seuss books.

This was my headband for my Truffula tree  outfit.

Truffula Tree shirt

Much fun was had by all!!

Next week we are going to have Moooonday in honor of Mr. Brown Can Moo, Can You?  We are going to dress in black and brown.

Found this idea on Pinterest and made up my own...

We are going to have a large sign of all the sounds in the book and the kiddos can fill out this page and draw a picture of what can make that sound.

As a treat in honor of Mr. Brown, we will have some chocolate milk in a special cup!  Found the pic online and taped it to clear cups. ;)

Can't believe March is here!  Looking forward to some spring fun too!  

We'll be having Truffula Tuesday, Wacky Wednesday, and Thing Thurs. this month too!  

I'll update with some of our other ideas soon!

Beach Day Update, Snowy Fun and The 100th Day!

I'm a bit behind on posting!  We had tons of fun in Jan.!  We started with Beach Day, did some fun winter crafts, and ended with the 100th day of school!!

Okay, this isn't a kinder, it's my older niece hanging out in K. ;) I had a big blow up crab pool in the room. She always likes to come hang out and see what's new in K. ;)

Here are the kiddos enjoying some octopus (hot dog). ;) I cut the bun length hot dogs in 1/2 and cut slits on the bottom. Boil until they are curled up.

Here are some cute torn paper snowmen.

We also did some q-tip painting snowmen. Lots of snowy fun even if we haven't had any good snow. ;)






 For the 100th day, we made some crazy hats with 10 colored strips of paper. On each strip, the kiddos used q-tips again to paint 10 dots on each strip to make 100. The kids put 100 things on their clothes and shared them with us. We strung 100 fruit loops, colored 100s, made 100 day snack mix, drew ourselves as 100 year olds, and counted lots of 100s!

Found the cute 100 day snack page on TeachersPayTeachers.






 Okay, updated! Now it's time for February ideas! I posted one on my previous post. Hearts with dot painters. I cut out a heart and taped it to the kiddos paper and they used dot painters to paint around it. Turned out cute! Here it is again. :)

Have a happy heart and happy teaching!!

A Happy Heart and a Playful Spirit! :)

Okay, here's another soap box, I get on those every now and then. ;)  Play in Kindergarten is how children learn!  Do I teach academics, absolutely, if you go back a bit I got on a soap box about abeka phonics, math, etc...  My kiddos are blending, counting, writing, reading, and more, but they are also playing.  When I'm teaching they don't just sit and attend, which has it's place too, but we move and learn.  We count and jump, we sing and dance, we rhyme and memorize, but we also play.

Some of my favorite times are when kiddos are in centers.  I love to hear their ideas when they are working together, I love to watch as they plan out a block building project, I love to hear them "read" and discover books through pictures, and I love to see their creativity as they play and imagine.  I change out the big centers each month, housekeeping, dress-up, and books, when I do that, you'd think I was the greatest decorator around.  The kids get so excited to see and try out the new areas!  Sometimes housekeeping is a store, it's been  a restaurant, it's been a pumpkin market, a beach shack cafe, pizza parlor, bakery, etc...  Dress up has been transformed into a vet, a puppet stage area, fairy tale and nursery rhyme acting stage, crazy hat dress up etc...  It's such fun to think up some new and exciting things in these areas!

Each week we have a writing center, math center, art center, listening center, table toys, blocks, and science.    These usually have a theme for the month.  Sometimes we throw in sand or playdough.  Through all of these, children are exploring and learning at their pace.

These children are going to have years sitting at a desk and doing homework, this is their time to be kids, to enjoy learning and have some fun!  Kindergarten is usually the year that sets the tone for learning through the years, and don't we want them to have a positive outlook on that?  So, let your kinders be kids a bit longer, let them squish some playdough, put on a fun and crazy costume, pretend they are a great chef, build a skyscraper, and just be kids!  Research shows that play is key to all kinds of higher learning, so pat yourself on the back, and when one of your students is a National Merit Scholar, you can say, I had a part in that, I let them play! ;)