Move it! Move it! Move it!

Hello Everyone!
Just a quick share tonight. We are continuing our study of the animal world in science, and you know me!  I can't help but to integrate, integrate, integrate.  I am sharing two ultra mini units tonight.  I hope to be able to squeeze these in next week yet before Spring Break.  The first 10 page unit is a celebration of how animals move.  Cute little poem and mini book the kids can put together, finish, illustrate and share with buddies.

 

Click here for your free unit including poem, mini book, and a couple of other things!

 

The second unit I'm going to try to fit in is about animal homes.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Click here for your free unit including a poem and two mini books for the kids to make!

Kids looooove studying about animals!!  They are going to love these poems and books!!

Hope you love them too!
Have a great night!
Joyfully!
Nancy

 

Eat Your Words and "If I had a Fishbowl..."

Hello Everyone!
We had a "fin"tastic day today!  The kids have been working so hard on everything first grade!  Yesterday we definitely built our stamina by writing for almost an hour! We are focusing on editing, and revising.  Today we were ready to publish one of our pieces big time! After writing about what they would put in a fishbowl, the kids got to create themselves holding a fishbowl with their written expression displayed.  They did an amazing job!!! I can't wait to put these up for open house! It amazes me how they can make their little faces look like them!!!

 

This craft connection including patterns is available for free here!

 

We haven't forgotten about word work!!  This week we are working on the fun little ee vowel chunk.  I decided to do another little "Eat your Words" activity and gave the kids some Cheez-its for the ee's!  So fun!!  I think they will remember the ee!!

 

 

Here's your printable...click!

 

Hope you're having a great week as well!! 

Joyfully!

Nancy

 

 

Riding the Food Chain!

Hello Everyone!
Just a quick post tonight.  We are full on with open house projects. Open House is next week!  So much to do!  We will be working on producers and consumers this week and incorporating the concept of Food Chains into our science.  Here's a quick look at what we'll be doing! (Hope we have time!)

 

A six page mini book for kids to read and illustrate.  Patterned after "There Was an Old Lady"

Make a food chain pyramid

 

Poetry!

 

For your quick 10 page mini unit, hop on the food chain and click here!!

 

Hope you can use this!!  Hope the kids enjoy it!!

 

Have a great night!!!

Joyfully!

Nancy

Double Bubble Number Necklaces and What Fish Never Get To Do.

Hello Everyone!
We are continuing to enjoy learning through our aquatic habitat unit.  This past week, we practiced our addition of multiples of 10 + single digits using the "Double Bubble" method and number necklaces. I went to a mentor training last week and "played" the little circle game.  It was quite engaging, so I decided to  manipulate it for my firsties!  I printed off some bubbles (to go along with our study of fish) with numbers and had the kids string them on yarn to make number necklaces.  Then I called the kids with multiples of 10 to come make a "bubble" facing out. The kids with single digits made a "bubble" facing the inside bubble. On my cue, they had to add the two numbers.  After a few seconds I cued the outside bubble to shift to the left one space.  Now they all had a new addition fact to solve.  We kept shifting until they had made their way all the way around. A quick, easy, cheap, but engaging math practice activity!

 

For your own copy of the number necklaces bubble on over to here! Click!

We also continued our enjoyment of language, rhyme, interpreting poetry, etc, with an extension of the poem "Goldfish."  In the poem, the author talks about what fish don't get to do, so we brainstormed other things that fish are missing out on. We turned our ideas into a written expression activity.  We are so glad we are not fish!

Poem is available in my "Sounds Fishy to Me" Unit. Click here for that! :)
Stay tuned for more of our wonderful journey into the world of water habitats. Thanks for stopping by for a peek today!!
Joyfully!
Nancy

Fishin' for Fiction and Nonfition!

Hello Everyone!
We are so getting into our whole aquatic habitat unit and have loved so many of the books we have found that have to do with the living things that make water their home. The past couple of days we have spent a lot of time comparing and contrasting the fiction and nonfiction books.  We created this little anchor chart and began sorting our books according to what we discovered.  It was interesting to find some of the nonfiction books that looked like they belonged in the fiction category.  Dr. Seuss has some wonderful selections from which the kids were really learning facts!  

Here's a mini poster that covers the same ideas as my anchor chart.

If you would like a printable, swim on over and click here!

If you would like my entire 100 page Fishy unit, click here! It's free!

I've got to keep swimming to keep my head above water at this time of the year, so...Thanks for stopping by to take a peek into our W.O.W.!! Gotta go!!

Joyfully!

Nancy

Happy Habitat Place Value Practice

Hello Everyone!
Great day today!! We are really getting into our science unit on habitats, food chains, and have welcomed some new little guppies to help us understand all this and more!  We got one male and one female guppy, and set up their sweet little living space.  Of course we had to name them. Lollipop and Bob seem to be happy...even with 20 little sets of eyes watching them almost constantly!
Math today had to carry the theme through.  We are working hard on place value and multiples of 10 plus single digit numbers.  You know by now that I like to make things oversized when I want to emphasize something.  I made a giant paper fishbowl and some giant base 10 blocks. I had the kids close their eyes as I arranged a set of blocks on the fishbowl. When kids opened their eyes, they had to simply write the standard notation of what the picture was showing on their whiteboards. We learned through mistakes, reorganization, and trying it again. Then I had the kids write the expanded notation as well.

Then the kids got to work in small groups during our Math SOLVE it time using activities with the same ideas.

Here's a quick peek at this little activity.

 And here's a quick link to the 12 page activity :)

Have fun making math fun!!

Joyfully!
Nancy

Reading Between the Lines and a new unit!

Hello Everyone!!
My firsties spend a lot of time with their hands on books.  A huge part of our day is spent simply reading.  Research tells us that the more time kids have interacting with books, the better readers they will become.  I do not take that term "interacting" lightly.  Today we interacted with one of my favorite Valentine books, "The Biggest Valentine Ever" with a focus on inferring. Learning how to infer is a vital component in teaching kids the intricacies of literature, and diving deeper into comprehension.  With all of that in mind, I decided I needed to help that deep dive by incorporating some fun.  Inferring is like "reading between the lines" of the words the author gives us. 
I had to grab some of those funky lined glasses to use for this lesson!! Of Course! So, our anchor reminder chart includes that little visual.

 And the kids had a ball with them as well!

As we were reading, kids took notes on some of the tings they were thinking about or inferring.

sorry this pic got flipped!

Great job kids.  And yes, we will save the glasses for another time!!

And now I'd like to share my newest little unit.  We have begun studying about habitats, interdependence of living things, and the environments around us.  We have decided to start observing fish(guppies) in a fun little fishbowl. Of course I needed to connect learning with literature, so alas, "Memoirs of a Goldfish" by Devin Scillian came to the rescue!  This unit revolves around the themes included in this book. It is a unit that will take about three weeks or so to complete.  It includes poetry, literature response, science (of course), a couple of craft connections, and a ton of math tub and whole group activities. Here are a few pics.

Have kids write a poem, list, observations, whatever you are working on!

Skip counting starting at random numbers game

A take off from "I have, Who has?" game

Multiples of 10 plus single digit numbers game

Memoirs of a First Grader book for kids to write and make

Spatial organization on a number line game

poetry
For your free 100 page unit, swim on over and click here!

If I have already shared this with you, please re-download as I have added a few more games!! :)

Thanks for taking time out of your busy day to enjoy the peek into the life of a first grade classroom!

As always, thanks for your support and encouragement!  My hope is that you can glean even just a tiny spark of an idea from my sharings. Please let me know if this post was helpful to you  at all!!  

Joyfully!

Nancy