A TpT Trick or Treat Grab Bag

Who doesn't like a treat?  I love a treat, especially when it is free!  In this weeks TpT newsletter, they shared a link to a great grab bag of free products!  Click here to check it out!

In addition to all of these treats from TpT I wanted to add to the sweetness!  (I can't believe they didn't include of of my fun and spooky freebies... just kidding!)  It is a cute way to practice 3 addend addition.  Grab it here!

I actually did this work sheet wit the students before I taught 3 addend addition.  I told them I found this really need worksheet, but wasn't sure if they could do it!  I told them I knew they were great at adding 2 numbers, but could they do 3?  Of course they were up to the challenge!  I let them work for a while to figure it out, then we discussed the strategies they used.  This made it soooo much easier to teach this skill with the math series.  Hope it works as well for you!

iFlash with Glitter

iFlash my students do you?  I'm not talking about the kind of flashing that will put you on the 11 o'clock news!  I'm talking about flash cards!  Skill and drill practice with sight words, addition facts, subtraction facts, numbers, and alphabet is key to building fluent readers and mathematicians.  I have decks and decks of flash cards!  (nothing is worse than when they get mixed up!)  I flash the students when they enter the room, when they leave the room, in small group and anytime I have those odd 3-4 minutes.

Many times I can't find the deck I am looking for or we have a few minutes and I don't have a set with me.  I usually have my iPad or iPhone with me.  Although we need constant practice, the same old cards can get kind of boring.  Wouldn't it be great if I had holiday themed or more colorful cards?

So, one night I had a fabulous idea!  I could load flashcards on my iPad as a PDF and flip through them in iBooks with the class.  Think how colorful and fun I could make them with no worries of printing and colored ink!  I could change them out as the themes change.  Not only can you view PDF files on iPads, most eReaders and tablets can do this too.  I can put several of these older devices I have to use!



So this is how iFlash was brought to life!  I took Pre-primer sight word flash cards and spooked them out for Halloween!  Click here to download them and try them out yourself.

Simply click here to go to my TpT page and download the freebie.  Then click open in iBooks if you are on an iPad.  (With the TpT app, you click on the little eye next to the download button.)  Download the PDF on any mobile device you can use to view PDF files and page through with your students!

I have also done an iFlash Halloween themed set for all 220 Dolch Words, Addition and Subtraction.  You can grab each one of them for only $1.  The students will love them!

As I was creating these, I have fallen in love with the glitter graphics!  It is all the greatness of glitter and sparkle with out the mess!  I am quickly becoming addicted!

You can grab other great freebies too at classroom freebies' Manic Monday!

What would your Jack-O-Lantern say?

If your Jack-O-Lantern could talk, what would it say?  Well if mine could talk it would say "where have you been?"  Oh my what a week last week, parent conferences, grades due, monthly monitoring meetings, organizing our school Fall Festival, running daughters to and fro and of course this is the week I got an awful cold!  Now that the week is done, I am beginning to surface!

This is a cute activity I am doing with the kids tomorrow and thought I would share.  The kids will make this pumpkin into a Jack-O-Lantern and then using the speech bubble write what it would say.   I am then going to teach them how to use quotation marks when writing a sentence.

Click the picture or here to grab it FREE!  I hope you have a great Halloween Eve!

"Eye" have ghost poop and a freebie!

I have a sweet, puffy, fun reward for my students this month!  I like to use quick little rewards through out the day,  and these are perfect!  I know there are all kinds of mixed reviews on using food as a reward for kids.  I give them the choice between a sweet treat or sticker.  My favorite thing with the ghost poop is that it is quick, cheap and easy.  I quickly hand it out, they eat it and there is no more distraction.  There is nothing worse than handing out a tangible reward, then the students play with it and it becomes a distraction.  I also love this little container, it keeps them fresh and allows me to sprinkle one in a child's hand without touching it with my germ infested hands.  Every once in a while, two mini "ghost poops" come out, Woo Hoo!

"Eye" must admit I have become quite obsessed with the cute eyeball ping pong balls I found the other day.  I wrote sight words on them and used them in the word work center and the kids loved them!!!  

You can pick up the sight word activity that started it all and a new "eye" can make 10 activity here.  I have included word and number cards, so you don't have to have the eyeballs (although it is way more fun!

My mind got to spinning and I came up with so many amazing ideas to use them in centers.  I kept going and going and before I knew it I had 13 activities!  I put them all together for you to pick up here at my TpT store for only $2.  Let me know what you think.

 I can not wait to see my students working in their Super 6 Centers tomorrow challenging themselves to become better readers, writers, thinkers and problem solvers!

Book Report Home Projects

I like to send a home project or book report home each month.  As a teacher and parent, I want it to be meaningful, able to be done by the student and not outrageously expensive.  I like them to be somewhat structured, but still allow for the students to express their creativity.  I also feel they should correlate with what we are learning and be fun, not just a dreaded project. 

I came up with an amazing project for October.  My "October Character Traits Book Report Packet" has everything you need and is ready to copy and send home.  It has a parent information sheet with detailed instructions, 2 graphic organizers and a grading rubric.  I offered it for free a few weeks ago, if you didn't get it click here and download it!

My students have had a great time with the project.  I have had a few projects come in and they are amazing.  The creativity of my kids never fails to amaze me.

I have had several people ask me about beginning book report/ home projects for other months.  I have put together three projects for the upcoming holiday months.  Along with the October Character Traits Book Report, I have included a November Non-Fiction "Fact Feathers" Book Project and for December a "Holiday Ornament" Book Summarizing Report.   I just posted Beginning Book Report Projects (Oct. Nov. Dec.) in my TpT store and put it on sale!  

 Do you send home book reports or at home projects?  If so what are your favorites?

Have you seen the Scentos Halloween markers??

My kiddos love using the Scentos markers for spelling practice in Word Work during the Super 6 Differentiated Learning Centers.  I have them practice writing their words in pen, pencil Scentos marker and crayon.  They would completely balk at writing all of their words 4 times each but love doing this! Click here to download the word template for this activity and just enter you spelling words.

This is a favorite activity for my kids so imagine how excited I was to find these at Michaels.  It made this old time favorite instantly new and fun again!

My kids loved the new markers so much, they may have spent more time smelling them then writing with them.  Yesterday when I was checking on the kids in centers, I asked them if they were working hard or just playing around with the new markers.  As they looked up to me and said we are working very hard, I noticed both boys had marker under their noses.  I couldn't help but smile and giggle!

Well today I put the Sight Words "Eye" Can Read in the writing center.  The kids loved digging into the bucket of eyeball ping pong balls.  The Super 6 was going great, everyone was working and it was nice and quiet until the bucket tipped!  The ping pong eyeballs went everywhere!  (I know this is aging me and many won't remember this, but I thought of Captain Kangaroo! Who else remembers this?)

Motivation and Eye Can Read Sight Words FREEBIE!

Last night my daughter taught me how important motivation is to getting things done.  I also learned that what I think may be a great motivator really isn't!

My youngest daughter Tori is super messy and her room was a disaster!  I tried for 4 days to motivate her to clean her room.  I offered her things (bribery), asked nicely, raised my voice, took away TV, dessert, and electronic devices.  Nothing worked.  (It did work with my older daughter.) Last night she asked "Can I wait until the morning to take my bath?"  I initially said no and she pouted.  So my response was "If you have your room clean in 30 minutes, you can wait until the morning to take your bath."  Wouldn't you know it, she had it cleaned!

So the lesson I learned to take into the classroom... You have to find the right motivation to reach each child!

Last post I told you about the really fun eyeball ping-pong balls I found at The Dollar Tree.  Well here is the first way I plan to use them in my room.  I wrote "sight" words on the eyeballs and put them in a bucket.  In the Word Work center during the Super 6 Differentiated Learning Centers, students take turns picking out an eye.  If they can read the word, they keep it in the eye and record it on their sheet. (Included in this FREEBIE at my TpT store.) Once they record their 15 "sight" words, they use them to write spooky sentences.  I have also included "sight" word cards to use if you don't have eye "balls" available.

I have a really funny story to share tomorrow and another Word Work Freebie!  If you haven't already, please follow my store and blog so you will know about all of the freebies coming up!