We sure love the What If You Had Animal Parts book series! Swing by to see how we turned this book series into a 4 week, close read! We dig in deep so students can learn, but have fun along the way! Click HERE to read more!
Showing posts with label science. Show all posts
Showing posts with label science. Show all posts
What If You Had Animal Teeth?
We sure love the What If You Had Animal Parts book series! Swing by to see how we turned this book series into a 4 week, close read! We dig in deep so students can learn, but have fun along the way! Click HERE to read more!
NGSS - Patterns in our Space System with the Earth, Moon and Sun
In a few weeks we are starting our NGSS unit on patterns and predictability found in our space systems.
Hop on over to my blog to check out what we'll be doing!
Resources to get you Motivated in January!
Hello! It's Reagan from Tunstall's Teaching Tidbits! I am writing this post to hopefully help with the fact that in the next day or two it is time to head back to school. Heading back to school from vacation is just plain hard!
There's a part of us that craves structure and routine, but it's hiding down deep beneath the couch cushions, fuzzy slippers, half empty coffee mugs, and winter blankets. right?!? Of course there are ways to get motivated to head back...one of my favorite ways is to head out for a shopping trip! New clothes have always provided a reason to get out of bed on a tough morning. Can I get an amen?!
The other secret weapon for school motivation, is heading in with some fresh ideas and materials!
Here are a few items that I hope may help boost your teacher bag as you head back!
First up: Reading
These book box booklets will help get your students, their parents, and yourself organized and motivated to learn and track sight words!
The first side oft he page has 10 sight words and the back of that page has those ten sight words in little phrases. Students work their way through booklet one containing 100 fry's words and phrases. Then they graduate to the next booklet!
And to round out our guided reading secret weapon materials.... Phonics posters! I slid these into a binder to provide targeted practice for students as we tackled more and more phonics patterns week after week. It takes the booklets to the next level and has them apply the pattern with a word list.
All of my readers can work on unscrambling sentences. This helps us talk about monitoring what we read to be sure it makes sense. As they read and reread the words to get them in order, we can giggle about how silly it sounds before it is right!
Now some math materials!
First up, it is time to restock math tubs, journals, and printable practice.
I like to have a big variety of activities on hand. No matter what our instructional objective is, my students have plenty of spiraled objectives to practice and apply independently.
Up next, Science!
My tried and true January science topics are weather and penguins
When we head back to school in January, we become mini-meteorologists! For two weeks, we add to an interactive umbrella science book!
Then we head to Antarctica to study penguins much the same way! You can read all about this here on my latest blog post.
And we wrap up our new knowledge of weather and the world, with the help of iPads! This was possibly the favorite unit of the year for some of my students last year! Check it out here.
Finishing off our winter motivation is social studies!
My teaching bff Cristina and I recently completed an influential people unit that teaches students all about research!
We start with a video tutorial showing how to read a fact sheet or biography, then put the information into our own words with helpful and easy research templates with young researchers in mind.
There are 16 different influential people and 3 scaffolded fact sheets for each!
To see this further you can read this blog post all about it!
Hopefully you'll find a treasure to help get you excited to return to a brand new year! Happy New Year!
There's a part of us that craves structure and routine, but it's hiding down deep beneath the couch cushions, fuzzy slippers, half empty coffee mugs, and winter blankets. right?!? Of course there are ways to get motivated to head back...one of my favorite ways is to head out for a shopping trip! New clothes have always provided a reason to get out of bed on a tough morning. Can I get an amen?!
The other secret weapon for school motivation, is heading in with some fresh ideas and materials!
Here are a few items that I hope may help boost your teacher bag as you head back!
First up: Reading
These book box booklets will help get your students, their parents, and yourself organized and motivated to learn and track sight words!
A second material that may help your reading groups and RTI instruction are these flipping for phonics review booklets! Students can keep them in their book boxes or review them during small group at your table like in the picture below. I noticed a big difference in automaticity with blending and decoding once we had these booklets as part of our routine.
And to round out our guided reading secret weapon materials.... Phonics posters! I slid these into a binder to provide targeted practice for students as we tackled more and more phonics patterns week after week. It takes the booklets to the next level and has them apply the pattern with a word list.
January literacy centers are a nice change up from the red and green December filled world that we left before break!
I like to do this contraction center in small group! Once students are introduced to the idea, they can point them out in their reading. I begin with my more advanced readers on this one because it can be a difficult concept for some.
All of my readers can work on unscrambling sentences. This helps us talk about monitoring what we read to be sure it makes sense. As they read and reread the words to get them in order, we can giggle about how silly it sounds before it is right!
You can find the above materials by clicking these pictures
Now some math materials!
First up, it is time to restock math tubs, journals, and printable practice.
I like to have a big variety of activities on hand. No matter what our instructional objective is, my students have plenty of spiraled objectives to practice and apply independently.
All of my January math centers, journals, and printables come from the following materials. Click the pictures to check them out for yourself.
To cover my whole group math and small group math instruction, I created detailed lesson plans with all the materials to go along with my lessons! These lessons (below) are the "meat" of my instruction. The centers above are the review and practice for my students.
When we come back from vacation we like to launch into geometry and fractions.
My tried and true January science topics are weather and penguins
When we head back to school in January, we become mini-meteorologists! For two weeks, we add to an interactive umbrella science book!
Then we head to Antarctica to study penguins much the same way! You can read all about this here on my latest blog post.
And we wrap up our new knowledge of weather and the world, with the help of iPads! This was possibly the favorite unit of the year for some of my students last year! Check it out here.
Finishing off our winter motivation is social studies!
My teaching bff Cristina and I recently completed an influential people unit that teaches students all about research!
We start with a video tutorial showing how to read a fact sheet or biography, then put the information into our own words with helpful and easy research templates with young researchers in mind.
There are 16 different influential people and 3 scaffolded fact sheets for each!
Hopefully you'll find a treasure to help get you excited to return to a brand new year! Happy New Year!
Easter Freebies!
Hey y'all! It's Rachel from the tattooed teacher.
It know it is definitely Spring here in the South! My allergies have kicked in full blast, it's 70 degrees one day and 50 the next, and we have baseball every night of the week!
I wanted to share a few freebies I use each year in my classroom-I know not everyone is allowed to celebrate Easter at school, so there's a few non-religious ones, too.
It know it is definitely Spring here in the South! My allergies have kicked in full blast, it's 70 degrees one day and 50 the next, and we have baseball every night of the week!
I wanted to share a few freebies I use each year in my classroom-I know not everyone is allowed to celebrate Easter at school, so there's a few non-religious ones, too.
Using Starburst jellybeans, we investigate what happens when you place them in different liquids.
After reading the cutest little book called Three Pigs, One Wolf, and Seven Magic Shapes, we made these little bunnies from tangrams.
Even though these are in plastic eggs, they don't have to be! Or you could use them in an animal study, too. This Math Egg Hunt is a favorite every year. I've done it outdoors and in the media center. Team the kids up, give them a color to find, and let them go! It's perfect for reviewing how to synergize after Spring Break!
and here's another little freebie! I'm currently obsessed with watercolor and I've been working on printables for teachers, too. So here's a little sample! Hopefully I'll have more to post soon!
Just download from Dropbox and save on your computer. It's a png, so just print on nice card stock or have it printed pretty cheap at your local office store! (that's what I do!)
And click here to see all my posts about Easter activities in my classroom!
Happy Spring Blog Hoppers!
A Bit of SNOWY Catch Up!!
Hi there! This is Karen from Mrs. Stamp's Kindergarten.
Right now we are in SNOWY catch up mode... since our SNOW day totals keep adding up (8 closings and 9 delays, plus we are already closed for Friday!).
Right now we are in SNOWY catch up mode... since our SNOW day totals keep adding up (8 closings and 9 delays, plus we are already closed for Friday!).
Now, please know I.Am.Not.Complaining!! I have a 5 year old and a 9 month old at home... and I am enjoying EVERY minute. But, it does put somewhat of a crunch on your lesson plans.
So, this week (on 1 of the 2 days we were actually at school) we did an awesome science experiment that usually happens during Dental Health month--but got bumped into March. Luckily it fit in nicely with our planned week of a certain author's birthday celebration and tons of other great books about TEETH
!
We grew plaque! Trust me... if you're trying to teach your kiddos to remember to brush their teeth--this is the way to do it! You'll have kids grossed out for days... but seriously, isn't that why science is so much FUN!?
Here's how:
Your students will be promising to always brush their teeth after this one. It's easy to tell which cup had the sugar in it!
Here's a little sheet for recording the results. Just click on the picture to snag it!
Have FUN--whether you're catching up like we are (or planning ahead for next year)!
Pssst... I can't give any hints but you may want to hop by sometime soon...
!We grew plaque! Trust me... if you're trying to teach your kiddos to remember to brush their teeth--this is the way to do it! You'll have kids grossed out for days... but seriously, isn't that why science is so much FUN!?
Here's how:
Here's a little sheet for recording the results. Just click on the picture to snag it!
Pssst... I can't give any hints but you may want to hop by sometime soon...
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