Earth Day Books and More

Happy Earth Day everyone!
This week in Kindergarten we have been busy celebrating Earth Day.
I went to the local library and found so many great books that discuss recycling and taking care of our planet. I even found some Earth Day books featuring some of out favorite characters like Fancy Nancy, Pinkalicious, Franklin,  Biscuit and Clifford.  Here is a list of our 15 favorite Earth Day Books

• Franklin Plants a Tree
• Recycle (Non-fiction)
• Earth Day
• Earth Day Hooray
• Reecyling is Fun
• Why Should I Recycle? (Non-fiction)
• Compost Stew
• Michael Recycle
• Biscut Celbrates Earthday
• Earth Day Puppy
• Where Does the Garbage Go? (Non-fiction)
• Fancy Nancy Every Day is Earth Day
• The Adventures of a Plastic Bottle
• Emeraldlicious
• We Are Extremely Very Good Recyclers 

We also got a little creative and made this cute Earth Day craftivity.
This kids had a blast making this craft. The kids used blue and green markers to create an Earth on a coffee filter. They then used pipettes to drop water on to the coffee filters.  They LOVED using the pipettes.  We let them dry over night and then assembled the rest of the craft the next morning. On the bottom they attached a writing prompt where they listed ways they could help protect the Earth.



How did you celebrate Earth Day in your classroom? 

Read Across America.

We just finished our  Read Across American Week . The whole school came together to celebrate our love of reading.  Here's how we celebrated at our school...
 We kicked off the week by decorating our classroom doors to mimic the covers of our favorite Seuss books. Unfortunately, my door didn't come out that great, but this beauty belongs to a friend of mine. It's one of the best doors I've seen. Way to go Sam and and Lauren!


Each day the children and staff were encouraged to show Seuss spirit by dressing in a different book inspired outfit. 

• Monday: Cat in the Hat (Wear Red, Black, and White)
• Tuesday: Fox in Socks ( Wear Silly Socks)
• Wednesday: Wacky Wednesday (Wear Mismatched Clothes)
• Thursday: Oh the Places You'll Go (Wear a Shirt you got on Vacation)
• Friday: My Many Colored Days (Wear your Teacher's Favorite Color)

Monday we read Cat in the Hat and did a character description of Thing 1 and Thing 2.  My little ones are still having a hard time describing the intrinsic traits of characters so we practice this skill A Lot! During writing we made this cute Cat Craft. During our Mini-lesson we discussed if we would let the Cat in the Hat come in our house and why.

Tuesday we focused on Fox in Socks. We started morning meeting by having a sock fashion show. The kids loved taking their shoes off and modeling their silly socks. I even got in on the fun too. During reading we read the book and spent the rest of the day working on our rhyming skills. I threw together this quick easy craft. The children were provided with a sheet that had different pictures on them. They then had to find the rhyming pairs and glue them to fox's belly.

 
Wednesday we had a mystery reader come in and read Wacky Wednesday. The kids had fun trying to figure out my clues. We then spent the rest of the day focusing on wacky things.  During snack I read If I Ran the Zoo and we made a list of animals that you find in the zoo. During recess I encouraged the kids to use the blocks and plastic animals to build their own zoo. During writing I had the students work with a partner to create their own Seusstastic animal and describe it for our class book.

Thursday we had a snow day, but here's what I had planned. We were going to read Oh the Places You'll go and discuss vacations that we've been on. Then during Social Studies we were going to use the world map to locate our vacation destinations.

Friday we read My Many Colored Days. During science we did a fun color experiment using zippy bags and paint. The students were split into teams to complete the experiment. The students had to record what colors they were mixing and predict what it would make. They then compared their results with the other teams, and determined if their predictions were correct.

Well, that about wraps up Read Across America. I would love to hear how you celebrated. Don't forget to check out http://www.seussville.com/ for videos, games, and printables. 

Celebrating Halloween

Another successful Halloween completed. Getting through Halloween at school can be arduous. The students are so excited that it is difficult to get anything accomplished.  The day is too long to waste just playing games so this year I planned some excellent Halloween related activities that kept the kids engaged and learning.

We started out our morning ELA block focusing on the classic Kindergarten Halloween story, The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything.  I found this great packet on TPT.
 The packet includes anchor charts and sequencing activities. First we read the story and used the anchor chart cards to retell the story as we read. I then split the students into two teams. I had each team use real objects to retell the story. Everyone wanted to be the stinky shoe that went Clomp Clomp. The students then went back to their seats and completed the cut and retell worksheet for independent practice. We've been working on retelling guided reading so this fit perfectly.

Then I had the students complete this adorable craft that my coworker found on toddlerapproved. I copied the template on to colored construction paper and had the students cut and sequence the pictures to create the scarecrow. I was surprised at how well they were able to cut the hands. Many of the students actually tried to cut in between each finger!

When everyone was finished we watched this cute youtube video of the story that was turned into a song. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BiUflxXF-Zg  The students love getting up and dancing.

After lunch we invited the parents into to help us with our Pumpkin Investigation. We counted how many ridges were on our pumpkin, we measured the circumference of our pumpkin, we tested to see if it would sink or float. We cut open our pumpkin and counted the seeds by making piles of 10 and then the parents carved the pumpkins into silly faces.

 Before we knew it, it was time to get ready for the Halloween parade and end our day. How did you celebrate this year?  

You Oughta Know Spetember Blog Hop

This month I'm joining up with other bloggers to pass along helpful tips and advice. This month's post focuses on classroom craftivities.

My students love crafts. I use  many different types of educational crafts with my Kindergarteners.  We make seasonal crafts for the bulletin boards, we create book extension crafts that bring stories to life and we even work on math crafts during  guided math. Although these crafts are engaging and purposeful, they can take a lot of prep time.   In the beginning of the year you have to find or make a template, trace the craft onto construction paper,  sometime you have to cut the pieces out or organize them into baggies.  I'm getting tired just thinking about the work.


Last year my wonderful mentor shared a time saving tip with me.... You can Print on Construction Paper!!! This saves so much time. You no longer have to trace all the shapes out before you cut. Just trim the construction paper to the size of  standard computer paper and feed it through your printer. You can also use the bypass tray on your copy machine and feed the whole sheet of construction paper through. This tip has made classroom crafting so much easier.

Try it for your self by downloading my ladybug math freebie. Click Here







Now take a moment to stop by and see what the others are blogging about.

An InLinkz Link-up