Picture-Prompt Linky Party

Kathie from The Diary of a Not So Wimpy Teacher and Selina over at Classroom Magic are hosting a picture-prompt linky and Pinterest party.

If you link up and participate, you will get your very own e-book copy of all the pictures and prompts to use in your classroom. You will also get added to the collaborative Pinterest board. This is a great way to share ideas and create some great writing/ oral language prompts for your students.

Here's a couple of picture prompts that I made from my own photographs.

What resources do you use for writing prompts? Is all of your daily writing structured? I would love to hear how you use picture/ writing prompts in your classroom.

Valentine's Day Exchange...and linky party

Well, it's time for another linky party, mateys! After the overwhelming response to Holly Bloggy Christmas, Caitlin from Ms. Preppy and Sarah from Kindergarten Korner put together yet another exchange for us. Caitlin and Sarah got such a great response, they had to create a special blog just to hold it all.

I participated in both the teacher-to-teacher exchange and the classroom-to-classroom exchange. But, first, I have to brag a lil' bit share a pic of my loot. Maybe I've talked a wee bit too much of my fondness for chocolate? I now have a stash that will last me for months!

For the classroom-to-clasroom exchange, these are the adorable valentines that Tamera and her class from My Heart Belongs in First made for my class. The hand-drawn faces and individualized outfits on the bears holding a bag of gummy bears were oh.so.cute! I also got a large decorated clothespin perfect for holding reminders for me or messages for my students.

notice the face at the top right

freshly opened box

These are what my kiddos sent to her class, inspired by this find. The flowered pops turned out sooo cute. We also sent some Pokemon valentine cards, a valentine bucket, and a lil' something for Ms. Wilson.

It was the perfect exchange because we both have the same number of kiddos and teach firsties.



For the teacher-to-teacher exchange, here's what Barbara over at First Grade Delight sent me: a journal (a place for me to write all my blog ideas down), a mini notepad and pen set (perfect for my purse for those afore mentioned blog ideas), an assortment of valentiney stickers, a chocolate bar (my kiddos say 'thank you' for keeping Ms. Talley happy), a pair of fuzzy socks (perfect for the freaky cold front that came in this past weekend), a gift card to Subway, and a cute green bucket to hold all my goodies :)


This is what I made for Jennifer over at Herding Kats in Kindergarten (the "K" is for Knopf). I also got her a bag of chocolates. I enjoyed getting back to my creative side which has been reignited by my new friend Pinterest.

I enjoyed sharing my treasures with you! What is the best Valentine's Day gift you have given or received?

XOXO,

Assessments

Well, it's that time of year (again) where I assess my students in reading and math and see where they stand how much progress they have made since the fall. One area of difficulty with my first graders seems to be with the Common Core Standard of "representing and interpreting data."

My students first worked in small groups and sorted objects onto large sorting mats.



Most of them can sort and graph like champions, but cannot put into words what they have done or describe the data on the graph. What always seems to blow them away provide some difficulty is the dreaded "how many more ______ than ______" when comparing groups of objects on a graph. So, I made up a way to assess them working with a group and one-on-one with a sort-and-graph recording sheet.

grab your copy here

Here are some students using their recording sheet to show how they sorted their objects.



This allowed me to easily see who still simply sorted just by colors and who was using higher-level thinking skills to group their objects by other attributes. I was pleased with how well my students did using the sentence frames on the recording sheet.

I hope someone finds this useful!

What kind of activities do you use to help your students with sorting and/ or graphing?

Thank you, Debbie, over at Rainbows Within Reach for the link up!

You Know You're a Teacher When...linky party

Jeannie over at Kindergarten Lifestyle had a fabulous idea to host a linky party where we all finish the sentence starter "You Know You're a Teacher When..." and here's mine:

Everyone knows that when I give a gift, it's going to have an educational spin to it. At a recent baby shower, one of my gifts to a former colleague was a book box filled with hardcover books (her son's very first book box). I make encourage my niece to write me a story in her journal every time she visits me. I have even dragged taken my niece with me on author visits at the local bookstore. Once you become a teacher, you just can't escape the teacherisms that make us who we are!

How would you finish "You Know You're a Teacher When..."?

Recovering from the Super Bowl

I don't know about you, but it seemed like a few most of my kiddos stayed up late to watch the NY Giants defeat the New England Patriots last night. They were lethargic and quiet most of the day - seriously not my usually energetic bunch of first graders :) 

After a morning greeting of "You Are My Sunshine" (we have specials the first hour of the day - which makes for a looong continuous academic day) that they were just taught in music class, the yawning began (and not from me).

Although it worked in my favor while I snuck in a couple of DRA assessments during their Daily 5 time, the tiredness loomed, and two of my students even fell asleep during draft book writing. I am going to blame it on the "thinking music" that was quietly playing in the background. Thank goodness I didn't have any walk-throughs at that time. 

It was even more evident that my students were not there normal selves when they were asked to sort and graph (paper) critters during math. They were allowed to color and decide the sorting criteria to their liking (let me tell you, we don't spend a whole lot of time "coloring" so that is usually a treat), but their attention still waned.  

I drove home feeling like I just didn't make the impact that I wanted to today, and then I checked my mailbox. 

Low and behold, all is good in the world again!

I would love to hear about your favorite pick-me-up after a day that did not go as planned (which could quite possibly be any day of the week).

100 Days Smarter

My oh my! My students celebrated 100 days of school (with great enthusiasm) by dressing up as if they were 100 years old, making construction paper chains, and sorting objects into groups of 10 (which they happily sorted and re-sorted) until they reached 100.

Some of the objects they counted were marshmallows, M&M's, pennies, snap cubes, assorted counters, buttons, square tiles, lollipops, and shapes. What I liked watching was the light bulbs going off when some students used different strategies for keeping the objects in groups of 10 when some of the objects would not fit exactly in the round circles and interfered with their counting.

Notice their groupings changed from scattered objects (on the left) to organized groups (on the right) without any prompting from me!








I sent home a take-home project for them to complete. They were to place 100 objects on a large outline. Some understood the concept, and some apparently did not :)

I also created a large circle map that had the sentence starter "If I had $100, I would..." to which I solicited responses from all four first grade classes.

Some of my favorite responses were:

• "give sister money to trade rooms"
• "mail it to everyone to make them happy" (aww...)
• "spend it on a sculpture"
• "save it"
• "buy a mansion" (If only $100 went that far...)

I hoped you enjoyed hearing a little (or a lot) about our 100th day of school!

What is your/ your students' favorite 100th day activity?