V and Literacy tubs

 As a district, next year we are going to be required to do vocabulary like this so I have practiced all year with my class.  Our word was adjective this week.  We did this together and then they copied to their vocabulary journal.

Vegetable starts with V and we colored and sorted these vegetables by what we liked and did not like.  Most of the kids liked them all!  I don't know if they really did or if they were showing off!

 This was a mini lesson on the teen numbers.  It is such a hard concept for them to grasp.  But I have 38 more days to explore ways to open that door!

 This was a mini phonics lesson on ending word families.  Each child got 2 pies and we had to feed them to the correct pig by looking at the ending.  Then we read the words and talked about how they all rhymed.

 This is a game where the children took turns hiding the sheep behind a barn with sight words on it.  The other children would then guess where the sheep was hiding by saying the sight word.

Literacy Tubs

 This tub was for those finger muscles and the children had to lace and unlace the shoes and practice tying.

 This is a sight word game.  The children would pull out a card and try to read the word.  If they could read it, they kept the card.  If they could not read it, they lost the card and the next child picked a card.  If they pulled out the card that said fire, they lost all their cards.  It is so helpful to have a student teacher with games like this.

 This game was syllable count.  I had the kids count the syllables and circle the correct number.  THEN they got the hole punch and punched that number out.  Note to self-little hands have to struggle with a hole punch.

This last tub had sets of letters and cards.  The child picked a bag and found the two letter cards in it.  They sorted the pictures by beginning sounds.

Farm Unit and May Farm field trip

I always try to introduce everything I do with a book.  I have a wide collection of personal books and I can usually find everything I want.  I did not take as many pictures this week.  We have STAAR testing as many schools in Texas did and we left the campus as much as possible.  It is very hard to keep 130 kindergarten students quiet!!  I took lots of pictures of the kids but I try very hard not to put their faces on the blog!

We read this adorable book about a horse that didn't have a friend.  It was a great opportunity to talk about being friends with everyone.

 This is the page we created for our nonfiction book about farm animals.  It includes three facts about horses.

This is the page for the sheep with three facts as well.  I read Charlie Needs a Cloak and we talked about wool and that it was very warm.

We also made a page for a pig and a cow.  I did not get a picture somehow and they have gone home!  :(  We watched how to make ice cream on You Tube and then we ate ice cream!  It was great!

These are the shirts we painted to wear to the May Farm.  Each child will bring 3 shirts and we paint them to wear for various times of year.  Miss Morte and I drew the pig outline and the kids painted the pink part.  We added a black oval when it was dry and the kids added two black eyes and two black nostrils.  They were adorable.  Each of the 6 classes chose a different animal so we could tell by looking at the shirt where that child was SUPPOSED to be!

 We went to May Farm in Hawley.  Brenda May has invited most of the children in this area to her place at one time or another.  She takes rescue animals and has created a petting zoo.  There is a fee for each child which helps pay for food for the animals.

 This is Mrs. May holding a 10 day old lamb that was born blind.  They are going to try to train it to follow another lamb with a bell on it.  It was sooooo cute!

This is another baby lamb that had the run of the place.  We caught it several times on the picnic bench checking out our lunches!

Letter W and Farm

This is one of the games in the literacy tubs this week.  The kids had to look at the mouse cards and then sort the words on the hearts on to the correct mouse.  I had an extra helper this week and it was very helpful with this tub.

 This was a word game.  The kids had to pick a sight word out.  If they could read it, they got to keep the card.  If they drew a card with a cheese, they got an extra turn.  If they drew a cat, they lost all their cards.  My student teacher, Miss Morte, was a great help with this game.  I found both of these games on teacherspayteachers free downloads. 

 I created these games!  I love all of Mrs. Lee's games from her blog and decided to try my own.  It took me a long time but I love them.  The kids had to pick a pig with a picture on it.  They would color the pig on the answer sheet so I knew which pig they were looking at.  They had to sound out the CVC words.  It was a lot of fun.  I did sit with this group but I am hoping they will become independent on this game by the end of the year!!

 This was a farm book.  The kids had to color the pages and read the book. 

We watched the clip from YouTube of Where the Wild Things Are.  We listed as many adjectives as we could think of to describe the wild things and then created one of our own.  Deanna Jump has a great unit on teacherspayteachers about this book.

We still sing the frog street press songs for our letter of the week.  This week was Wanda and Willie Walrus.  We made a mask and planned a big wedding.  All six classes stood in the hall and pledged to be great friends forever and to respect each other and be kind. 

 We had a feast of watermelon and we had ring pops and bubbles to end our celebration!

 We read the story of Mrs. Wishy Washy.  The kids loved this story.  I had a small tub and three animals which I put in a center so they could retell the story later. This was for W and farm!  Love it when it works out that way!!

 This is another syllable sort from Mrs. Voss.  The kids are so good at counting the syllables.  Then we try to spell each section.  I let them tell me what sound they hear and I write on one under the elmo.  I don't correct them at this point.  I am trying to give them the power to write freely and not be afraid of spelling something wrong.  I call this "kid writing"!!

Deanna Jump's farm unit is amazing.  We are creating a book about the farm animals.  We record what we know about the animals on a tree map and then use that data to write a paragraph.  The book will have 5 animals and include a table of contents.  Love this idea!!

 This book is precious.  We read as many books as we can squeeze in but this was one of my favorites along with the Little Red Hen.

 We read Rosie's Walk and then recorded all the words the author used to show Rosie's movement in the story.

 We pretended this bag was our barn and we drew a picture of ourselves as a farmer on the front.  We sang the EIEIO song as we put the animals in the barn. 

Letter U and Insects

 We decided to crowd in one week of insects before Spring Break and I used all of Deanna Jump's adorable unit.  You can buy one on teacherspayteachers.  You will not be sorry!  We made a schema chart first to determine what we thought we already knew about fireflies. 

We created these fireflies from construction paper.  I had the pieces precut and the kids just rounded the corners and glued together as we went step by step.  It was very time consuming to cut the pieces for 4 insects for 23 students but I love the ending product.

We also made a book because we are entomologists now!  We made a cover, a table of contents and a page about each insect.  This is my chart but each child has his or her own book with the recorded facts.

I learned something new about each insect.  I also have a child that has incredible knowledge about all animals and he told us a lot of facts.  Thanks, Jacob!

 This is the butterfly chart with the information.

 This is our "flock" of butterflies.

Praying Mantis was the most fun to make.

Mrs. Voss made grouchy ladybugs and each child had to make themselves make a grouchy face.  HILARIOUS!!

We made a dragonfly which was the easiest because it was circle glued in an AB pattern! 

  

 We read the book Underwear and Aliens Love Underpants.  The children laugh every time they hear the word underwear.

 We each designed a pair of boxer and hung them in the hall for everyone to see and enjoy!

 This is creation of an underground scene.  I saw this on pinterest and it took me to a website called brilliant beginnings preschool.  They have some really cute things and I will probably use some of it for letter work!

This is a picture of Mrs. Voss's class with a hat like the Cat in the Hat.  They recorded words that are in the "at" family.

 Mrs. Voss' class also enjoyed eating green eggs and ham!

Texas Symbols

 This is one of my favorite books about Texas traditions!  It is a play off of Little Red Riding Hood.  Little Red and her grandma are tough and they become the heroes in the story!

 We looked at these fancy boots and talked about who had some just like these!  Then we decorated a pair of boots to create a picture of us.

 This one has a mustache!  I L.O.V.E it!!!

This one has cute little flowers on her boots.

 This is a poster I have of beautiful Texas wild flowers.  Of course, West Texas does not really look like this!

 We are going to make bluebonnets, our Texas state flower.

Oil is a big product in Texas so we colored a picture of Spindletop and then painted black oil on it.

This is a really cute representation of how big our community grows.  I showed the kids on Google Earth how the Earth looks from outer space.  We kept zooming in until we found the USA and then Texas.  We narrowed it down to Abilene and even saw Ortiz on the screen.  Mrs. Jordan found this idea on pinterest and she shared with us.