Giveaway at Kindergarten Kel!

Kelly from Kindergarten Kel is throwing a big birthday/back-to-school giveaway and I'm excited to be a part of it!  There are four prize packs to win from some fabulous teacher-bloggers. You can check out all of the loot and then entry the giveaway below!

 Here is the good ol'Rafflecopter. Enter and share away...have fun and good luck to you all!!!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Made it Monday!

I love sharing my weekly projects with everyone, so I am linking up for Made it Monday again this week.

I have two projects this week.  The first one I was really good at taking pictures of the process.  It's a "Welcome" sign for my classroom.  I love blue and yellow.  My classroom color scheme includes these two colors.  I think they look great with bee themed rooms.

Here's what I used to make it:

I found the doilies at Michael's in that little section near the check out line.  You know, where things used to be $1, but now they're $1.50.  They're packs of 12 for $1.50, so that's a good deal.  I already had some letters a ribbon.  I also bought the bow at Michael's.  Those little bows are great because they're already made.  I love them!

First I spray painted the white doilies yellow.  That's where the wax paper cam in handy.  I need to paint them and make sure they did not stick to whatever I painted them on.

Once the yellow ones dried, I glued on the letters to spell "Welcome" and glued each doily to a white piece of card stock.  Then I laminated each one.

Time to cut!

Then I hot glued them all to the ribbon and attached the bow to the top.

 

My second project doesn't have any pictures of the process, but here it is.

I made a little marker caddy two summers ago.  Do you see it in the picture below?

I loved this little caddy, but the paint was getting all chipped and I really wanted to have the colored buckets distinguished with scrap paper, rather than construction paper.  (I just love scrap paper!)

My advice when making one is to use LIQUID NAILS to stick the cans onto the lazy susan.  You can find it at Walmart near the super glue.

Have a happy Monday!

Made it Monday!

Happy Monday!  I am linking up with Made it Monday to share some small goodies I made this week.

Project number 1 is this little bunting I made for a baby girl shower I am helping host next week.

Project number 2 is all of my little alphabet letters for my word wall are laminated an cut out.

These are from my latest freebie in my TPT store:

Project number 3 is silly, but fun!  I am tutoring this summer for a wonderful little girl.  We are working on CVC/vowels right now, so I decided to play some games from my Very Busy Vowels unit, in which there are gameboards.  So I made little pawns of me and the little girl for us to play some of the games.  Aren't they cute?!?!

I also started a cutie patootie sign for my classroom, but didn't quite finish.  It will have to go on next week's Made it Monday post.  

Have a happy week!

Free"bee" Yellow Polka Dot Word Wall Letters

As many of you know, I have a bee themed classroom!  I love my bees and really enjoy finding or creating items to go along with that theme.

While "bee"ing a busy bee this week in my new classroom, I realized the letters I had been using for my word wall were not going to fit very well in this new room, so I created these "bee"auties:

(Click the picture above to download them.)

 

Just a little free"bee" for my bee loving or yellow loving friends.  I hope they're useful!

Throwback Thursday: Our Weekend Friend

Happy Thursday!  I am linking up with Cara Carroll for Throwback Thursday.

I have been blessed to work in my room this week and unpacked our Weekend Friend, Dixie, from the {many} boxes in my room.  Here is what I wrote about her on January 16, 2012:

Dixie the Dachshund is a weekend traveling friend who visits kindergarten cuties' homes.  She comes in a bag that I ordered from VistaPrint.  If you don't know about VistaPrint, go check it out and sign up for the emails.  You can get FREE stuff.  You can see some of my VistaPrint creations here.

Inside the bag, my cuties will find Dixie, her journal in which they complete a journal entry, Dixie's favorite books, a check list of materials in the bag, Dixie's scrapbook, and her food and water bowl.  

 

My cuties LOVE taking Dixie home.  In order to take her home, students had to get a permission slip for signed.  I placed all of the permission slips in a basket and I pick one slip each Friday.  That slip goes in the trash, so that each student can take Dixie one time.  Click here to visit my website to learn more about Dixie.

Speaking of dachshunds, I just had to post a picture of my two doxies, Daisy and Duke.  Aren't they cute!?!?!

Math Stations Tips

Happy Tuesday!  I am linking up with A Differentiated Kindergarten to share how I run math stations in kindergarten.

Each day my students do NUMBERs while I work with a small group.  

NUMBERs is an acronym for:

Number activities

Use technology

Meet with the teacher

Buddy games

Explore math tools

Reveiw   

Basically, students have their name on a clip and they place it on this ribbon with the letters for the acronym.

The only students who don't get to make a choice for the day are already placed on the ribbon prior to the day starting by me.  These students are on "M" for Meet with the Teacher.  These are the students I will work with during small group that day.

  

When students arrive in the morning they take their clip from these buckets

and place them on the ribbon.  The little dots on the ribbon allow my students to know how many clips can go on each section.  I also wrote their names so that girls go on one side and boys go on the other side.  When we first started, I just reminded them that their name couldn't be upside and that helped with making sure that boys clips went on one side and girls clips went on the other side.

  

Then, when our NUMBERS math small group starts, I read where the clips are located and students get their supplies from here:

I labeled each tub with a picture that matches what's inside.  I also make the frame around the NUMBERs letters match the color of the buckets that those materials are located in.  For example, everything that is in "N" for number practice is in the column of blue buckets and the frame around the letter "N" is blue.

While students are working, they are quiet and spread out around the room.  The only students who are talking are the students on "B" for Buddy Games.

If you're interested in your own NUMBERs labels, here they are:

Made it Monday!

I love getting to link up on Mondays for Made it Monday!

My first project is my Word Wall sign.  I am not quite finished.  I still need to tie some cutie patootie ribbon between each letter, but it's getting there.

I found the idea from this pin.

I also made the fabulous weather watcher vest, inspired by Little Miss Hypothesis (TX gal!).

I am going to use it daily during calendar time for the meteorologist of the day to wear while checking the weather.

My last project is a rhyme matching game.  I can use this as a center game or as a "find your partner" game.  The little bees and honey pots were $1 at the Dollar Tree.

Enjoy your Monday friends!  I get to work in my NEW classroom today and start setting up!!  Wish me luck!