April Smartboard and Powerpoint Calendar

 

April Smartboard Calendar (Notebook)

April Powerpoint Calendar 

Here's the April calendar, just a little early.

 

Five Little Froggies Song

 

 Five Little Froggies song chart

Five Little Froggies Song 

I had several emails about the Five Little Froggies video I uploaded yesterday. You asked for the just the song and words, so here they are.

Pond Addition Sort

 Pond Addition Mats

Pond Addition Cards 

Response Sheet

Here's one more Pond Math Workstation to add to your unit. Students will sort the addition facts onto correct mat. They then choose two fact families to record on response sheet. This is a great activity for differentiation in your classroom.  This workstation is aligned with the Common Core Standard:
K.OA.1

Understand addition as putting together and adding to.

Pond Graph the Room

 

Pond Graph the Room

Pond Graph the Room Response Sheet

Here's another Math Workstation.

 Common Core Aligned:

K.MD.3

Classify objects and count the number of objects in each category.  

Five Little Froggies

Five Little Froggies

Here's a little movie about five bad little froggies.

Pond Measurement

Pond Measurement

Pond Measurement Response Sheet

As promised another pond math workstation for you. 

Aligned to Common Core Standards:

K.MD.1

Describe and compare measurable attributes

1.MD.2

Measure lengths of objects

Pond Counting Math Workstation

Pond Counting

Pond Counting Response Sheet

Have your students practice counting, making sets, making graphs and analyzing data all in one math workstation!

Aligned to Common Core Standards

K.MD.3

Classify objects and count the number of objects in each category.

1.MD.4

Represent and interpret data.
K.CC.5
Count to tell the number of objects.

Pond Word Work Station Freebie

Word Cards

Picture Cards

 This is another favorite literacy center of my kindergarteners. I hope your students will enjoy it as well.

Aligned to Common Core Standards

 K.RFS.3

Know and apply grade level phonics and word analysis skills in decoding words.

 

A Great Day for Discovery!

Below are pictures of the children participating in our pond research. At the end of the morning, every student had explored the bags, visited Pebblego.com (A wonderful website our fabulous principal purchased for our school) and watched the pond videos. They had collected words in each category and  I can't wait to see what they write tomorrow.

Before our Discovery time this morning, we used the group chart about ducks completed yesterday to write a class story. I asked the students to give me a sentence about each category. After completing the class story, I asked them to use their duck fact chart completed yesterday and write at least one or more sentences about each category. I think this exercise gave them insight into what they needed to collect today. (Their independence in writing and reading and taking the initiative to complete projects lets me know that all the frustration I experience at the beginning of the year is paying off!)





Pond Animal Bag Example and Discovery Bag Directions

This is an example of the alligator discovery bag. I have had a lot of questions about the bags. I am also including the directions I put in each of the bags that you can download. Look for pictures tomorrow.

Discovery Bag Directions

A Little More on Pond Discovery Bags

We started our Pond Discovery Bags Research today by completing a fact chart whole group. I opened the bag, took out the stuffed mallard duck (I have collected my stuffed animals through the years, some are puppets). I read one of the books in the bag, read the fact sheet and looked at the word bank. We watched the Ducks video. Before group time, I had made an enlarged version of the Fact Sheet( the picture above is a cleaned up version of the one I did today). We worked on boxes, one at at time. As I completed the group chart, each student had a chart and pencil on a clipboard. I talked about the importance of writing only a few words. From the words written on the chart today, we will write an information piece tomorrow. I will expect at least one sentence about each of the categories. I will model the process whole group and then let the children practice using information collected on their fact sheet. I am hoping that modeling the process from collecting information through various resources to completing the fact sheet to writing the information piece, the students will have a clearer idea of what I expect as they independently start the process. I'll be back tomorrow with some examples of our first day of independent research (good or bad!). I hope this post answers some of the questions from emails I received today.
 

Pond Write the Room Freebie

 

Pond Write the Room Cards

Pond Write the Room Response Sheet

Though we are working on our pond discovery bags this week, if the children are finished then they can visit various literacy centers around the room. This is one of their favorite centers.

Using Pond Discovery Bags to Help Students Develop Research Skills

 

Common Core Standards
K.W.6
With guidance and support from adults, explore a variety of digital tools to produce and publish writing, including in collaboration with peers.

K.W.7                                                                                                                                             Participate in shared research and writing projects (e.g., explore a number of books by a favorite author and express opinions about them).              

K.RIT.10                                                                         
Actively engage in group reading activities with purpose and understanding. 

By this time of year my students have developed reading and writing skills that will enable them to begin research with lots of support from me. Discovery bags will help them use a variety of materials to collect information about their pond animals.

I pack each bag with a stuffed pond animal, nonfiction books, and a laminated information sheet and a word wall . Students are given a fact sheet on which to collect information. The collected information will be used to write about their pond animal.

We begin the project with a discovery bag that I will use to model with the whole class. We will unpack the discovery bag and discuss all the components of the bag. We will complete the fact sheet together and then model how to use the facts to write an informational piece about the pond animal. I also made videos about each pond animal and uploaded them last year. I want to give my students an opportunity to use technology in their research as well. Here's the link to the pond videos.

Videos

I shared information sheets and word walls last year, but I have updated them and I'm sharing the new ones below. I will share some finished products as we finish our pond unit.

 

 

Alligator Word Bank

Alligator Information Sheet

Beaver Word Bank

Beaver Information Sheet

Duck Word Bank

Duck Information Sheet

Frog Word Bank

Frog Information Sheet

Raccoon Word Bank

Raccoon Information Sheet

Turtle Word Bank

Turtle Information Sheet

 Animal Fact Sheet

 

Spring Patterns

 Spring Patterns

I visited Dollar Tree today and found some adorable Spring erasers. I hurried home and made a set of patterns for you. If you're not able to pick up the erasers I am also including cards that the students can use to make patterns.

Bunny Subtraction Game

 

I made another trip to Dollar Tree yesterday and found the Bunny Brain game. I bought three games, you'll need three to make a game for two players. The players each start out with 15 bunnies and roll the dice to suntract. I found the same type of game in the fall and my kiddos loved it. I am posting the Easter games early because the items sell out quickly (at least in my area).

 

Bunny Math Game

 If you are a long time reader of my blog, you know I can't resist regular trips to Dollar Tree, Target and WalMart. My sweet cousin, a fellow kindergarten teacher in Mississippi found the bunny trays at WalMart ($.97 each). I bought 5 and found some mini Easter erasers ($1.00) at Target. We are going to play the game with dice. Two erasers will be placed in each indention. To play the game, the students can only remove erasers from the indentions if they roll a 2, 4 or 6.