Getting ready for the kids!

So I accomplished a ton at school today! Now that my room is finished and I have all of our new reading series put away neatly, I got started on getting materials ready for the first week of school. In our district, we have the first 5 days to meet with the kinders in small groups instead of them all arriving at once. We take that week to assess the kids with Brigance and Dibels to see where they are developmentally and academically. This will help us group them at the beginning of the year for our guided reading and math groups.

During that first week, our kindergarten team prefers to meet with the kids TWICE before they arrive with the whole class so they can learn the rules and procedures as well. So the first 3 days we'll split our class up into 3rds and try to get all of our assessing done then and work on lots of rules and procedures, with lots of center (social play) time to help them adjust to being in school. Then the last 2 days we'll split our classes in half and really drill the rules and procedures into the kids so that on their first day they know what to expect and how to behave. We did this last year and it worked wonderfully!

So I've been getting ready for the testing week and our first full day with all the kids! I'll tell you first.... if you're a kindergarten teacher and haven't purchased the "Crazy for Kinders" Unit by Abby (from Inspired Apple)... I recommend it! I loved her activities to go with The First Day Jitters! Also, Julie Lee has a wonderful "All About Me" unit that has some great beginning of the year activities for the kids. I like to do a few cute craftivites with the kids that first week since I can have more attention to help them in a small group versus the whole class! I am in no way promoting for these ladies, as they do just fine on their own b/c they are so amazing! But in case your wondering where I got my ideas... that is where! =)

So here are some pictures of what I have been up to today!

Our first day of school graph. I'll take the kids picture and let them place it above how they feel on their 1st day! excited? happy? scared? or sad? (Abby's "Crazy for Kinders" unit has a recording sheet for the kids to use too!)

All the craft pieces for the boy/girl graph and our Chicka Chicka Boom Boom tree names are ready to go! From Julie Lee's "All About Me" unit.

Our hallway display. It currently is holding my kindergartners writing from last year with their "words of advice" for the new kinders! So funny! (inspired by one of my favorites: Life in 1st Grade)

I'm so excited about our new leveled readers that came with our new reading series! These ones are SOOOO much better than the old ones!

New reading series is nicely put away.

All my beginning of the year books ready to use!

Thanks to my awesome pal, Lisa for making these! Once they are laminated, I'll put the kids pictures on one when they can count to 100, another when they can name all the letters (lowercase and uppercase) and on the third when they can name all the letter sounds correctly!

Can't wait to make jitter juice for the kids this year! After reading "The First Day Jitters" we'll read the poem. The poem is about how the jitter juice helps us get rid of the "first day jitters" and settles the nerves in our tummies. Then we'll make tally marks and graph if they liked them or not. On the first day with ALL my kinders, we'll count them all and add them up to see how many kids are in our class. It's going to be so fun!

Tomorrow my plan is to get our "No, David" and "David Goes to School" charts ready! We're going to make the Peacemakers and Peace-breakers charts as seen HERE. The original idea came from Julie Lee and you can read about it HERE. I also need to get the craft pieces together so the kids can make their own "No, David!" We have lots of fun planned!

MORE TO COME! =)

More classroom photos 2013-14

I have a few more photos to share with you today! I can say that I'm officially done with setting up my classroom as of today! Hooray- I've never been DONE before Open house before! I forgot to take a picture of the hallway display that is ready for the kids' first piece of work! I'll try to remember to get a picture tomorrow. =) I plan on getting everything ready for the first few days of school the rest of the week... with two school in-services Thursday and Friday morning. (They should be good ones!) I'm so pumped for this year! I look forward to seeing everyone's classroom photos as they get into their rooms!

I will still need to do things with the kids names' once I get my roster on Friday...  mailboxes, nametags, desktags, folders, etc. But not stressing about it just yet! I plan on adding my job chart and standards to TPT as freebies by the end of the week if anyone is interested. =)

Here are the pictures..

Where I will post our standards each day--- they are in frames from the dollar tree =)

View with my new daily target boards... LOVE <3

Put some headers up on this board...

My favorite board =) Bumble bees inspired by First Grader, at last!

Got this baby organized!!!! =)

My new job chart!!! LOVE it! =)

Classroom Pictures 2013-14

Hey all! I've been lucky enough to work in my classroom all week and got a lot done! =) Here are some pictures of how it looked when I left today... (you can click on each photo to enlarge it)

My awesome new behavior chart and word attack buddy posters!

Our "writing" wall... the kids names and picture will go in these pocket charts =)

I'm going to post our anchor charts of the week on the board to the left and the chart on the right is our station rotation chart.

Lots of color, just the way I like it!

I love my little white shelf with the purple and blue baskets next to that blue border- So fun!

Specials schedule! I love how it turned out! This was a Gleadall original idea! No pinterest here!

Calendar and morning meeting area...

LOVE my new ABC wall cards

ABC tubs are all ready for the beginning of the year!

ABC tubs, Letter of the Day chart and I'll post our weekly sight words in the apple chart!

Literacy tubs, journals and clipboards underneath the calendar area.

Math tubs, good listener rules and our pocket chart where I plan to post poems and such we can use in whole group!

My teaching books, easel and Grandpa's rocking chair

Reading center (big books and library) with pointers... whiteboards, markers and "erasers" (aka: tissues) on the big book cart.

I'll put our listening center on the trapezoid table. Small group table is the left. Reading buddies are on top of the middle wall. Thanks to my momma, sisters and BFF for them!

The pocket chart center in blue, red pocket chart is where the kids will keep their library folders and put their library books to return when they start checking out books. The birthday chart and Bear Bucks chart is in the middle.

I'm going to post "Bee-utiful" Work in the middle of the bulletin board with the bumble bees. Kids mailboxes are on the counter with writing paper, turn-in basket and writing portfolios container. Bumble Bees inspired by First Grader, at last!

Housekeeping center- plan on posting kids' work on this bulletin board!

This area is clearly "under construction"... lol

LOVE my new supply labels! This is where I'll store the kids' extra supplies throughout the year til they need them.

View from the back playground door- still need to put out the chair pockets mom made last year. (FORGOT them at mom and dad's house! oops!)

Another view from my back playground door

Indoor recess toys are all organized!

Love my Welcome sign

So happy how far it's coming along already! Updates to come next week!

Music in the Classroom

I wanted to share these adorable little songs that I discovered last year that my kids loved! When we would come inside from recess and take a drink break, we'd sing a few of these songs while everyone had their turn... the first song is my favorite! Anyone have any favorite songs they found on youtube I should check out?

Open Shut Them

Bingo

Ten in the Bed

 

Following Directions song

  

Here are some songs we would sing during morning meeting! I personally love the first one! =)  

Alphabet Song (We also sang the individual sound songs as well during phonics time!)  

 Vowel Bat

  

This is one we would sing first thing in the morning! 

 

Letter Sound song by Jack Hartmann  

During math, we would sing these songs...


 

 

ABC goodness!

As the end of summer approaches (insert tears here).... I have been busy getting things ready for the beginning of the school year! I wanted to share with you a few items I have added to my TPT store! =)

The first is some simple tracing pages. I'm going to print them off in color, slip them in some page protectors and put them in a binder! Instant center! This will be one of the ABC tub options for my kiddos.

The next item is some polka dot Alphabet cards for my classroom! I know there are a ton of adorable ones out there, but I really wanted something that had both the long and short sound for the vowels... with the vowels in red. So I had the clipart, so I just made them up for myself! I have polka dot ones up now... but I also created some in chevron for one of my best friends, so that will be posted later today in case you are interested!

I've also cute-ned up my word attack posters! I LOVE them and can't wait to post these in my small group area! =) Can you tell that I love color?

I also added a tracing book and ABC chart to my Common Core Letter Sounds pack since last summer! There is a whole bunch of goodness in this pack! I'll show a few pictures so you can get an idea of what's in it because TPT only allows me to share 3! 

You can see a few pictures of the wall cards included in this pack HERE

This pack also includes flashcards for both uppercase and lowercase letters...

Sorting mats..... (there are many more! This is just a preview.)

A page of letters for each letter of the alphabet to sort...

Beginning sound sorting cards 

Another sorting mat...

If you like what you see, head on over to my TPT store! You can also click on any of the pictures!


Hope you are all enjoying your summer!!!!

Back to School Finds =)

I wanted to show you all the fun things I have bought for the beginning of the school year! The sad part is, I am now broke for the next two weeks... so printing and laminating will have to wait til the day before Open House! Yikes! But it will be ok! ;)
I hit up the teacher store after an inservice last week and bought these two posters and some more polka dot borders like last year! I loved all the new ones they have out, but couldn't get myself to change the entire theme of my classroom!

Couldn't pass up this adorable welcome sign and bright colored chevron chart! I blurred out my room number for safety reasons! ;)

Here are some cheap finds from the Dollar section at Target!

I have a first day of school craft in mind for the little foam school buses! I plan on using the pipe cleaners and beads to make number bracelets! =) All found in the Target dollar section!

Stocked up on pocket charts (love that blue!) and a bunch of stickers in the Target dollar section!

Bought these for the kids to use as counters! =)

I went to Walmart to get a class set of clipboards for next year so we can do more work on the carpet! =) I also found these while I was there...

I found these tiny little clothespins at Walmart in the office section... so had to grab them! And stocked up on my favorite colored expo markers! =)

I plan on having a Pirate theme in my classroom so I thought the banner would be adorable to hang up on each child's birthday! had to grab the napkins too for 50 cents!

Found this at Walmart... Can't wait to use it for subtraction fun!

And this is basically the only DIY I had time for this summer. I bought some adorable scrapbook paper and thought about making clipboards... but decided against it b/c it was so much work to do one! haha!

Finally go around to making a first day of kindergarten frame for pictures this year!

I also wanted to share pictures of my planning binder I put together! You can find these on my TPT store for FREE! =) 

I've got some new items listed on my TPT store and will try to post about them tomorrow in case you are interested! =)