October in Kindergarten

October is my favorite month of the year!  I love pumpkins, fall colors, and Halloween.  I just celebrated my 11th wedding anniversary with my sweet husband.  We had a beautiful fall wedding during one of the most lovely times of year here in my little part of the world.

So, it's one of my favorite times of year in the classroom too!  This is a sweet Fall on the Farm bulletin board from last year...

It was done slowly over time during our farm unit.  The trees were done collaboratively using corks and tempera paint.  I drew the trunks ahead of time using pastels.  The kids painted the leaves and apples using the corks in small groups.

Fire Prevention Month is also super cool.  My kids love seeing firefighters get into their full gear.  They especially love the "Darth Vader" breathing of the oxygen tank.  It's cool to see the fire engine too.   We are sending kind thoughts to all the firefighters and those affected by the wildfires in California right now.  Keep reading to find a firefighter FREEBIE later in this post.

In my classroom we always learn about pumpkins and use Halloween themed materials to practice important literacy and math concepts being taught.  Learning is more FUN that way.  So I am super excited to show you a special new product I made...

This is the beginning letter sound match activity from my Kindergarten Centers for October.
I adore the watercolor graphics.  It's great literacy practice during anytime in October.  They are perfect for Halloween too.

These pumpkin letter cards are also super sweet watercolor graphics!  You can use them for letter sound practice.  Pulling them out of a plastic pumpkin like this is so fun.  We say the poem I heard from Miss Kindergarten to practice letter sounds...  "Pumpkin, Pumpkin, nice and round, grab a pumpkin, say the sound."  It's great practice AND formative assessment.  You can also use these cards to match uppercase and lowercase...

This activity also comes with a recording sheet for kids to practice writing the matching letter.  My kiddos NEED the handwriting practice... so it's a great activity.  It's split into two sheets, so you can do this as two separate activities on two different days.  It's a better plan to do it in two days for our little learners in kindergarten.

 I also adore these eyeball jars that we are using for number sense activities.  My kids just learned number words by making this Counting Bears Number Book.

So we will be using those eyeball jar numbers to practice number words, counting strategies, number order, and more.  The number cards and number word cards both work with this sweet activity too...

These cute candy corn numbers can be used in many of the same ways.  They also have star ten frames to match.  All these number activities will help make my hands-on lessons with my math curriculum much more fun.  All these number activities come with recording sheets so students can review and extend concepts with pencil and paper.  They make great homework for October as well.

I love to begin my number activities by having kids work collaboratively to put the numerals in order.  We do it forwards and backwards.  Then they can match the counting cards and other representations of the number to the numerals.

We are also working on decomposing numbers as we work on counting strategies and number order.   It sets students up for success with understanding addition and subtraction later in the year.  This mat is a fun way to decompose numbers.  Using candy corns for math manipulatives in October is a must.  Here you can see 6 decomposed as 4+2  and 3+3.

 You could also use little mini erasers, bears, or cubes from your classroom as well.   These simple mats will work with ANY counter manipulative. These decomposing numbers mats are in my Kindergarten Centers for October as well.

The understanding that larger numbers can be made with combinations of smaller numbers is a hugely important concept in kindergarten math.  So we practice this A LOT during the year.  These are a couple of other ways we practice...

This set of Roll, Count, Build Number Sense Activities has a mat for every month of the school year and some extras too.  It also has mats for both two dice and three.  This is a great way to differentiate and is actually great practice for first grade too.  It comes with recording sheets to write number sentences as well.

You can use the dice mats with dominoes too.  We LOVE dominoes in our classroom.  They are the original number bonds and help kids learn soooooo much about numbers.  So, I love this sweet little math product.  You can grab it right here: Number Sense Activities - Roll, Count, Build all year long!

This Roll, Count, Color All year long! is another way to practice these same concepts.  They also make easy homework for parents at home.  This set of recording sheets for dice also have images for the entire year.  They are made to use with one, two, or three dice.

You can grab these pages right here: Roll, Count, Color All year long!

Back to the October center activities...

This is another activity to practice decomposing numbers.  My students are going to pretend to be wizards or mad scientists making potions...

This fun math activity has pictures of fun potion bottles in different number combinations.  Here you can see 7 decomposed as 5+2, 3+4, and 1+6.  Students can make Potions with any combination that matches the total number (7).

There are cards included to record the number relationship like this or with full number sentences.  It has fun recording sheets too!

Here are some other fun activities in this set:

Practice for rhyming... this includes other materials and gives ideas for lots of ways to use these cards.

OK...  this is turning into the blog post that will never end.   This Kindergarten Centers for October set also includes activities to practice hearing and counting syllables and color words too.  It is going to help make my October fun for the kids and easy for me... now that all the cards are printed and laminated, Ha ha!

Thank you so much for reading this post.  I hope some of these activities gave you ideas for your kindergarten classroom in October.  If you want these activities for your classroom, you can find them right here: Kindergarten Centers for October.

I promised you a Fire Prevention freebie...

It's a labeling activity just perfect for little students who are learning to stretch words and listen for sounds to write them.  It only has five words, so it's not overwhelming for kiddos just starting to write.  I did this as a guided activity where we worked collaboratively to stretch and listen and I modeled the writing.  Don't you love the rainbow jacket in this one?

Here's what the page looks like blank:

There are two pages included with boy and girl firefighters.  It's in my TpT store. You can grab it right here:   FREEBIE-Label the Firefighter


I hope you have an amazing October with your class!  Thanks for stopping by my blog.
Happy teaching!

Apple Attribute Cards

Hi there!  Just a quick post to share something I made for my up coming week.  I am teaching that FREE NY Common Core math program for the first time this year.  You know the one I'm talking about, right?  The unit on numbers 1-10 starts with learning about attributes.  So I quick like made these little cards to help out.  I don't plan on going through my sock drawer each year to prep for the very first lesson.  Nor do I have room in my classroom to store a set of "teacher made plates, bowls, and cups in different patterns and colors".  I figure that along with my big chunky attribute blocks, these sweet cards will do the trick.  (I probably will go through my sock drawer tonight though ;)

I just wanted another set of tools that we can use to reinforce these concepts with games and activities.  I love using cards because they are easy to store, and easy for little hands to use when playing.  The cards above were sorted by the border style on the cards.

These are sorted by color.

These are sorted by design.  Some have hearts, some flowers, while others are plain.

These are sorted by size.  So that is four obvious attributes that can be identified, compared, and classified by your kiddos.  Plus, this set includes a few odd ball cards with a small heart and stripes.  Those will make students really think about attributes and have discussions about where they should be grouped.  Got to have some juicy discussions and critical thinking to make things fun!

Here are some examples of how I will teach the very first lesson with the concepts "exactly the same"  and "the same but...".  This lesson is all about noticing differences and attributes.  It also supports kids in verbalizing those observations.

These are the same but...  one is big and the other is small.

These are the same but... one is yellow and the other is green.

These are the same but... one is plain and the other one has a heart on it.

These are the same but... one has a squiggly line around the apple (different border styles).

You get the idea.  I printed two complete sets of these cards so that I can match up some cards that are "exactly the same" too.  I hope you like this idea.  You might want to use these in your classroom too.  They would be a great addition to any apple studies going on in your classroom.  This is a simple resource so it doesn't cost very much.  You can go get it in my TpT store by clicking on the image below.

Thanks so much for stopping by.
Happy teaching!

Follow my blog with Bloglovin

Math Fluency!

I am working hard this year to get my little sweeties fluent in addition and subtraction facts to five.  I also want them to be VERY comfortable with the number pairs that make ten.  Here are two simple  activities that I think have helped...

Sorting is such a powerful activity in every subject!  First, we made unifix cube trains with 10 cubes.  I told students they could use two colors.  Some of the students realized that you could also just use 10 of one color and zero of the other. (Clever little darlings who wanted to finish quickly!)  Then, I had them record it on a paper by coloring and writing the two numbers used.  Some students just naturally wrote an equation, but it was not required.  After that, I had them do it again with different numbers.

The next day, we sorted every recording sheet onto the chart (above).   It went really well and reinforced all those facts.  I think next time I would do it with category cards that are bright and more appealing rather than the boring chart.  But, of course busy teachers don't have lots of free time, so the boring chart served its purpose.  If I get a bug up my bonnet and decide to make the category cards, I will post them here as a freebie....

BTW, I did both of those lessons as small group math centers.

I have noticed a difference in fluency with these facts since we did this.  In fact, I gave the sweeties a word problem the following week to solve in groups that was 10 divided by 2 (10 cookies for 2 kids).  I was a bit surprised when several kids did it with mental math before we even got to tables to work on it.  As the kids were discussing the problem and recording their thinking at tables, it came out that knowing 5+5 = 10 made it easy to solve this problem.  That, and it seems like whenever we are figuring out how many cookies kids get they are super motivated.  Boy, did that make me HAPPY!!!

This is the other easy (for teacher) way I have been practicing addition and subtraction daily with my sweeties.  I started doing this when we got to 100 on the calendar and students were fluent in counting by 10s and 5s.  Each day there are different equations with different numbers missing.  Two students have to guess what goes in the blank spaces.  Some days we have good discussions when others disagree and students talk about how they solved it.  It is great to hear them explain their thinking.  This has also been a good way to reinforce that equations can go in different directions, the meaning of the = sign, and that sometimes you have to solve for the addend and not the sum.   The numbers and symbols are on card stock, and are laminated with magnets glued to the back.  It is quick and easy to change them each day.  I think this short activity (2-5 minutes) is a great use of instructional time and gets so many things accomplished at once.  I try to do this each day as a part of my calendar routine.

Hope this helps you and gives you ideas to use with your kiddos!  Please comment if you have any other ideas or variations on the theme to pass on.  Share the LOVE!

Happy Teaching!

Spring is here!

Spring is here!  The days are getting longer, the trees have blossoms, flowers are everywhere, and the little darlings are bouncy and chatty.  Spring break is next week, so we need to have FUN in the classroom this week.   This spring word building activity is the perfect way to teach or review the -ing chunk in words.  This set has all you need to build the words in the -ing word family as well as word cards for a sort.

We will be building the words with magnetic letters.  The set also includes little letter cards that are just the right size if you like to use those.  I prefer the magnetic letters because of the tactile feel and shape of the letters.  I also like to save the paper and printer ink by not printing out the letter cards.

Students will record each word on this cute sheet after they build it.   In my Kindergarten class, 10 words seems to be just the right amount to keep them focused and on task.  More than that and I start to lose them.  So, this set comes with 16 words; enough to do this two times if you feel it is appropriate.  Or, you could differentiate the words used in groups based on student needs.  The simple words king, wing, sing, may be more appropriate for some students while others need the challenge of string, spring, thing, and even- wring!

This is an example of the word sort using the -ing words and other words.  The other words will give your students a review of 2 and 3 letter blends and the sh, ch, th digraphs as well.  This word sort could be done as an extension of the word building or as a completely separate literacy center.  There is an additional recording sheet included in the set for that purpose.

If you would like to use this fun word building activity in your classroom, you can find it on my TPT store.  Just click on the image or link below to get it.

Spring-Word-Building-Literacy-Center Teachers Pay Teachers

We are also going to review addition and subtraction with a fun game.  This one will be used several times in the upcoming weeks because it does not scream Easter, but rather is a colorful spring theme.  It really can be used at any time of year.

This game can be played 4 ways.  It can be used with addition problems, subtraction problems, 10-frame number identification, or mixed problems.  It is simple to play and could be done independently by students after they have been trained.

This is the game board without the answers covered.  I'm loving it right now.  And for those of you that know me.... of course I had to get some butterflies on there.  I think games are such a great way to learn.  I use lots of games in my classroom.  Young students need to have FUN in school!  This is a print, laminate, done! set that will provide many no prep lessons in the future.  Gotta love games!

If you would like this game for your classroom, you can get it on TPT.  Just click on the image or link below:

Birdies-in-the-Tree-Addition-Subtraction-and-Number-game Teachers Pay Teachers

Happy Spring!
Happy Teaching!