Valentine's Day

Valentine's week was easy to plan - there are tons of freebies floating around out there, so this post will mostly be shout-outs to others for their awesome materials.

Highlights from this week:

CVC Lots of Love Word Activity

The heart containers are from Dollar Tree - SCORE!  Made for an awesome game.
Thank you, Melissa Freshwater!

Click here for this FREEBIE!

Real/Non-Sense Word Sorting

I used my own response page to match my own Real/Non-sense place mats  but everything you could possibly want is in the download.  Thank you K is for Kinderrific!

Click here for this FREEBIE!

Valentine Sight Word Search

Anything with magnifying glasses.  Seriously.  Easy and highly engaging?  Winner.  Thank you Mrs. Cat!

Click here for this FREEBIE!

Candy Land - Sight Word Edition

Love hunting the game/toy section at Goodwill.  Found this near-perfect Candy Land game board for $2.  I placed tape over the board to write in our high frequency words (I used tape in case I want to peel it off and use the board for something else later).

Love is sweet, ain't it?

Computer station is always part of our literacy station rotation.  Starfall is our favorite!

Greater Than/Less Than - Math

The Lesson Plan Diva took care of us in math this week!

Thank you for the wonderful goldfish activity and dice game.  Easy fun!

Love Bug Hat & Weekly Emergent Reader, Be My Valentine

The hat is just a pipe-cleaner folded like a V, stapled to a sentence strip.

I googled heart shapes and we glued them to the top to make the antenna.

The book I wrote this week is very unique to our classroom, as it features all the Kindergarten teachers at our school.   You probably wouldn't care to read it in your class, but you CAN peek at mine to generate your own ideas and create one of your own.

Our word wall words this week were if & be - this is what I came up with.

Be My Valentine Emergent Reader

Graphics by kpmdoodlesKPM Doodles

and what you've all been waiting for...

The Valentine Party!!! 

I had 4 groups of 7 kids that rotated around the class to complete 4 activities (4 because I gathered 4 volunteers!) - Cookie decorating, Valentine Bingo (actually, word wall bingo that I cleverly disguised as Valentine Bingo), frame decorating, and Bowling.  We had a fabulous time!

One last thing!  I must thank a very special person, my husband's grandmother.  She bought little frogs for all 28 of my little Valentines.  I put them on the tops of dollar store pencils.  She knows we are the "Frog Class," so whenever she finds something froggie, she sends it our way.  She is so good to us!  Aren't they so sweet?  Thank you, Grandma B!  We love you!!!

Hope you had a wonderful Valentine Week!

Natalie

Brush, Brush, Brush your teeth!

It was dental health week in Kindergarten.  Wednesday was a teacher PD day, so it was a short week, but a fun one.  (Truly, I would have rather have been with my 28 (yes, TWENTY-EIGHT) boogery-nosed Kinders all week, but meetings are part of the job I guess).

Here's what we've been up to:

CAVITY!  Played like BANG!

 ...and because of a wonderful fan with encouraging words (Thank you Roni!), I created additional CAVITY! cards with an extended word list.  I am interested in hearing your own themes/word wall lists so I can continue making BANG! games accessible to more classrooms. 

 

Click HERE for this FREEBIE!
FREEBIE, part 2!

Question Variety Spinner 

Writing Station (using tooth-related words from Making Learning Fun, of course!).  We are working on questions & answers in Writers Workshop - this spinner keeps my kids from writing the same question stem over and over.

 Click HERE for this FREEBIE!

ABC order

I created these based off of Doodle Bugs's awesome Dental Health / Teeth Literacy Centers & Activities unit.

 .  I have asked permission to post my more Kinder-friendly activities (with much of the credit going to Doodle Bugs, as their work inspired these games), but I have not heard back.  

Please e-mail me at nkbrenneman@gmail.com if you would like this FREEBIE (because they are not on TPT...yet).

Sentence Matching

Check this out at Making Learning Fun!

Real/Non-Sense Sorting 

Check this out at Have Fun Teaching!

We are working on Greater/Less Than in math, so I created some cool toothy-homework. 

Click HERE for this FREEBIE!

Emergent Reader

Our word wall words this week were who & that, so I created a printable book, Who Loves Teeth?.

Click HERE for this FREEBIE!

    

Vowel Sorting

Okay, not tooth related, but these vowel sorts from Bunting, Books, and Bainbridge are fantastic and FREE!  Pocket chart was a hit this week as we reviewed short and long i!  Thank you, Christina!

And during our dental health presentation, we all took turns brushing the teeth of a unicorn.  Totally weird but they loved it and hey, I didn't have to teach for a solid 20 minutes.  Everyone needs a break sometimes!  

This post is jam-packed with FREEBIES, so like me, rate me, follow me, and keep reading.  I'm trying to establish a ballin' following to prove that my resources are worth it (so I can start selling some of my items, too!). 

Brush on, 

Natalie

Winter Stuff

First post.  Hi world.

Let me preface this post by saying that it has taken a lot of encouragement from friends, co-workers, and loved ones to get me here.  I don't feel like a blogger, but maybe I'll catch the bug.  What I really feel like is a teacher who loves to make stuff.  Most of the materials I use in my classroom are made by me.  Creating materials is one of my favorite parts of my job.  Because I make so much from scratch, I always hear "You need to start your TPT store, you need to blog, get your stuff out there!"  The problem is that a lot of my materials aren't...well, "copyright friendly."  I gank images from google here and there, so I guess the legality of some of my work is in question (especially if I tried to give it away to others in cyberspace).  It was my new years resolution to change that, to finally take the advice I've been hearing from everyone.

The more I share my work, the better I feel (I love creating for my kids, then see it in use - now I'm realizing I can reach other kids out there, too.  And bonus, help teachers out, too.  Right on.).

In an effort to get my materials out there, I'm blogging.  I've actually had this blog for a while, but neglected to post.  Forgive me, pro-bloggers, for my novice ways.  I'm trying my best.  But so far, this isn't my most favorite part of the job.  Here's to catching the bug!

Check out the wintery stuff we've been working on.  Enjoy!

Ice Fishing - Word Family Sort (at, an, et)

Click HERE for this FREEBIE!

100 Day Trail Mix Sorting Mat

Check out those 100 hats!  Whoo!!!

I wish I could credit someone for this - I have seen various trail mix mats floating around but never for download (so I made one myself, but it is not my original idea!  Thank you cyber friends!)

Click HERE for this FREEBIE!

MELTED!  Played like Bang!

Want it?  Click here!

Pinterest-Inspired Snowball Throw

They wrote certain word family words - ake, ell, an (depending on what hole they landed in)
I don't have a response page to share, but I thought it was a fun picture!

 

Pinned from HERE

Until next time (assuming there's a next time!  I'm really going to try to make my presence here!).  

-Natalie