St. Paddy's Day Freebie!

I will have a full lesson plan and unit coming up later today but for now here's a cute freebie created this morning. Just click here to download it!

Writing Rainbow

This year we are really focusing on writing. I use this writing rainbow to teach my students abou the different levels of writing and we discuss how we can get to the next level. It's really good for them to see where they're at and what they should be working toward.

Who Took The Apples From the Apple Tree?

My kids love this book! They have sat on the rug for the past two days reading it (during reading time) and when they get to the end they just laugh and laugh. It was so much fun to do. It's similar to the "Who Stole The Cookies From the Cookie Jar" but is instead "Who Took The Apples From The Apple Tree?" Each page says, "___________took the apples from the apple tree. Good Grief, said _________. Not me, not me!" Each of the kids had to write their name on the paper and attach a picture of them and an apple (any color they wanted). After that I put the book together and secretly added a page at the end that said, "Mrs. Hardy took the apples from the apple tree!" They were so surprised and about fell over laughing because they thought it was great!

A Letter + A Sight Word + A Number A Day

This year the other kindergarten teacher and I have started a new program. Simply we call it the "Letter A Day" program, but in reality it's much much more than that. It also includes a sight word a day and a number a day. We use white boards and markers for this and it takes up about 20 minutes of our day. We talk about the letter for the day, what sound it makes, and how we write it. Then we write it on our white boards, we do the same for the sight word and the number. We simply rotate through the alphabet (changing it's order every time we go through it) and our sight words. That way the kids get their alphabet and sight words 6 more times during the year instead of just focusing on one a week. It works so much better and already I can see a huge improvement in my students. For the number we just use the number from that day in the month. For example, today's number was 4 because today is October 4th. This way you hit each of the numbers 1-31 multiple times during the year. Click here to get the specific format for this program.

Writing With Paint Bags

My wonderful husband helped me fill these bags the other day with paint! Thank you honey! These are so great because after they are made the kids can use Q-tips or their finger tips to write letters, shapes, etc onto the bags. I would make sure to use really heavy-duty bags so they don't rip especially if they're using a Q-tip because the Q-tips can rip through the plastic. Once you have the bags filled you just tape them onto a piece of poster board and you're ready to go. The poster board helps the letters, shapes, etc show up better. I use them in centers or when I have students who struggle with writing specific letters.

St. Patrick's Day Ideas

Here are a few ideas for St. Paddy's Day. First, we did an art/writing activity. You need to take a picture of each of your students then they color a hat, hair, beard, and 4-leaf clover to make themselves into a leprechaun. They loved it...they just laughed and laughed. As soon as I figure out own to attach a pdf file onto her I will give you the outline for the hat, beard, hair, etc. After they've made themselves into a leprechaun I gave them the writing prompt: "If I were a leprechaun:_________." Before we started writing we read stories about leprechauns (cute, funny picture books) and then talked about what leprechauns usually do. Most of my children said that if they were a leprechaun then they would "steal gold." That seemed to be the most common consensus that leprechaun's have lots of gold!

The next activity we do for St. Paddy's Day is called the "Magic Potion." After the kids come back from recess they come in to find the room a mess, that a leprechaun has been there, and that he's left them a note and a secret potion. The note says something to the effect of: "Dear Kindergarten, Today is a Magic Day and I have left you a Magic Potion, but you have to find it. When you find it you much drink it right away and it will keep you healthy. BUT if you an adult drinks the potion their feet will turn green...this I promise! Good luck. You can't catch me. Love, Lucky Leprechaun." Then you go and find the potion which is green juice. You give each of the kids a glass of the juice and wait for them to try and get you to drink the potion. Finally give in and drink the potion and make a big deal about it and then take your shoes off to show your now green feet. I use food coloring to make my feet green. I just put food coloring on a paper towel and pat it onto the tops of my feet. The kids absolutely love this!!!

Another activity I do is we draw our own leprechauns (free hand) and then use water colors to paint them. Then we cut them out after they have dried. They turn out so cute!