Mitten Match Activities

admin December 21, 2012 No Comments

Oh my, the snow is flying up here in Northern Michigan!  Winter is alway a fun time of the year and it’s a great time to add a little seasonal spirit into your center activities.  These mitten match activities may just do the trick. Assembling the activities is pretty easy.  You’ll want to print the mitten on cardstock so that they are durable and then laminate. Just grab a few clothespins and your activity is all set.  This is so not necessary, but I decided to “cutesie” up the clothespins by attaching little snowballs on the ends.  I picked up this foam packet at Micheal’s Craft Store.  There’s a variety of shapes to use for different activities. You can find

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10 Activities for Teaching and Practicing Letters and Sounds

admin November 23, 2012 No Comments

So it’s late November and we have just a few first graders who have not yet mastered their letters and sounds.  For these little firsties, we needed to readjust their intervention plan and bump it up a knotch in terms of intensity.  It’s always difficult to find time in a jam-packed school day, but mastering letters and sounds is really important and must take priority right now.  One way to add intervention time is to teach volunteers and/or the child’s parent in how to teach and practice letters and sounds.   Having the right activities available and directions for correctly using the activities is really important.  I’ve collected 10 of my most favorite activities for teaching letters and sounds and gathered them

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R Controlled Vowels

admin November 11, 2012 No Comments

When a vowel is followed by an r, the r changes the sound that the vowel makes.  The vowel is called an r-controlled vowel.  Sometimes teachers refer to the “r” as the “bossy r” because the r “bosses” the vowel to make a new sound.  When the “a” is followed by r, it makes the sound you hear in “bar” or “car”.  When the “o” is followed by the r, it makes the sound you hear in the word “corn”.  The “ir”, “ur” and “er” make the same sound /er/ as in the words “bird”, “fur” and “her”.   It is important to teach students to recognize and practice words containing r-controlled vowels. Here’s a little freebie for practicing r-controlled vowels. 

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DIY Magic e Wands

admin October 24, 2012 No Comments

Look what I found at the Dollar Tree!  The Dollar Tree is literally a gold mine of fun stuff for creating engaging classroom activities.  I found this pack of three foam wands in the arts and crafts section and thought how easy it would be to write an “e” on the star and make them into a “magic e” activity. I created these magic e templates which can be placed on the table or floor.  You could also tape them on your white board for a super easy literacy center activity.  Students simply read the CVC word and then places their magic e at the end to change that vowel sound.  When you download the pdf you’ll received 24 CVC/CVCe cards.  Just in

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Eyeball Bingo

admin October 20, 2012 No Comments

Yesterday I decided that I really needed to be done with making Halloween activities and move onto Thanksgiving, but then I received the Dollar General flyer with our newspaper.  These eyes were literally staring back at me!  Oh my gosh! They look exactly like the 4-In-A-Row eyeball template that Kyle created– I thought Bingo!  Literally, I thought Bingo!  They’d make such a cute Halloween themed bingo game. These ping pong eyeballs are $1 for a package of 8.  To make this activity, you’ll need 5 packages for a total of 40 balls.  If you cannot find these balls, regular ping pong balls will do and you can draw the eyeballs on with red, blue and black Sharpie markers.   I purchased

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Focus Sticks

admin September 17, 2012 No Comments

I love my job.  I really, really do!  One of the favorite parts about my job is that I get to network with a whole bunch of very talented teachers.  I love hearing about and seeing them implement creative strategies to improve student learning.   During the past several years, many of our local school districts have focused on improving writing instruction.  All of our schools, from elementary to high school, received training in the Collins Writing Program.  In addition, teachers were able to participate in other inservices such as the 6 Traits of Writing to enhance their instruction in this area. My good friend and colleague, Michelle (same job, just different schools) came back to our office one day so excited to share what she had seen in

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Build It- Write It Cards for CVC and CVCC/CCVC Words

admin September 13, 2012 No Comments

A few months ago, my good friend Keri from the Sweet Life of Teaching was preparing for a training that she was about to offer.  On the table was a roll of vinyl chalkboard paper (I’ve never seen or heard of it until this time).   As she was describing what it was and how she uses it in her classroom, I was literally getting goosebumps.  You can purchase the paper in single sheets, but Keri loves it so much, she purchased a whole roll!  Whoever invented vinyl chalkboard paper is a genius.  This product is so versitle… from using it to label bins to creating activities…it is awesome!  The paper can be cut into any size (just like contact paper).  You, or your

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