Sunday, June 26, 2011

Vacation at Last!!

Yay! I am finally finished with the school year. Monday was my last day with my kiddies. I had a little "end of the year certificates and math awards" ceremony and some light refreshments for everyone to finish it off. Whew. But that was not MY last day. The following day we actually had a staff development day. OMG! Seriously!?? The next day was FINALLY our last school day. But unfortunately for me, it took me 2 extra days to pack up. Why am I such a clutterbug/packrat!!!! Seriously need to work on that.

Now I am ready to party it up (linky party, that is) with all my blogger friends. Lots of giveaways going on and freebies that I need to catch up with. And speaking of catching up, I am so behind on Math Work Stations, so that's what I will be working on next. Summer, here I come!!!!

Friday, June 24, 2011

Miss Bindergarten Unit

Don't you just love Miss Bindergarten? I do and I have all her books! Kinder Kraziness has made a unit for Miss Bindergarten Gets Ready For Kindergarten. Head on over here to check out the details so you can receive a copy!

Saturday, June 11, 2011

Wall Displays

I love looking at other teacher's bulletin boards and seeing all the great ideas and artwork. Teaching Happily Ever After is hosting a bulletin board linky party. Go check it out and see all the wonderful boards.

One of my favorite art projects is having the kids paint paper plates to make their faces!
I got the idea for the graduate faces from Mailbox Magazine. We have a school wide theme that promotes going to college. Every classroom has a bulletin board promoting college and a college banner hanging outside the classroom.

This was hanging outside my classroom for my ocean theme for Open House. This wasn't exactly what I had in mind for the finished display, but I think it did turn out cute. With 32 little faces, I should have made the boat bigger. The pirate face idea came from Mailbox Magazine. The skull and crossbones on the hat are made from a cotton ball and q-tips! They were supposed to have gold pipe cleaner earrings, but we ran out of time!

I got this idea from Kim Jordano's book Oceans of Fun. I love her ideas, she's got a great website full of pictures.

I got this idea from Kim Jordano's book Down on the Farm. The students wrote on the back of the vegetables which part of the plant it is. When they came for Open House they just plucked it off the board. Oh, I made a paper plate face for myself and put it in the driver's seat but it wasn't up when I took the picture.

Now its your turn to share!

Friday, June 10, 2011

My Little Graduates


This is a bulletin board I made to promote our school wide theme of going to college. I just love painting paper plate faces for different themes. I got the idea for the paper plate faces from Mailbox Magazine. (I love Mailbox) Anyway, I was inspired by Peace, Love and Kindergarten to make these little graduate portraits.



I put these up for Open House and the parents loved them. I think they turned out pretty darn cute.

Sunday, June 5, 2011

Math Work Stations Ch. 1 & 2

Math was NOT my favorite subject in school. I didn't "get" it. I still don't care for math but I don't want my students to feel the way I do. So I'm excited about being part of this book blog party. Even though we can't be together in person, blogging is the next best thing.

How do I differentiate my math stations? I don't. We all do the same thing.

But by the time I'm finished reading MWS, I will be differentiating my stations and doing a bang up job, lol. Right now they're not even really stations, according to Debbie's book. More like centers.

Here's where I keep my math stations.

This is our meeting place. The shelves are under my calendar board. I don't have that much. I've been at my current school about 5 years and there wasn't much in my room when I moved in. I was given a box of manipulatives that came with our math series. It wasn't a huge box, which is a good thing, after reading Ch. 2. It actually had about the right amount of manipulatives needed to teach the lessons. And along with the manipulatives were ziploc bags. Wow, just like Debbie suggested in Ch. 2. I'm halfway there as far as organizing and purging. (Halfway. As I was reading ch. 2, and Debbie was naming off certain manipulatives, I'd remember: oh yeah, I have coins in my closet, oh yeah, the double sided counters are in a cupboard, oh, all those little Judy clocks are in a basket.)

How do I keep my math materials organized? You're looking at it. But my plan is to buy some shoe box sized clear containers and use Deedee's cute labels to organize what I have. Like Debbie suggested, I don't need that huge tub of teddy bears or linker cubes. Nor do I need all those scales that I found in a cupboard when I moved in. Its time to share the "wealth" of manipulatives with my team or the math storage closet. Good thing school is almost over, as I'm packing up, I can organize it so I'll be all ready come fall.

Saturday, June 4, 2011