Letter Bear Game

This month the incomparable Dr. Jean has posted a fun activity to help us prepare for the upcoming school year.  One day she posted directions for playing "Letter Bear."  I made a game to go with her video so that you can print and download.  Grab it for free in my TpT store or you can download here too.  Here is the link to the Youtube video that tells about the game.

Milk Bottle Cap Game - Learning Letters and Letter Sounds

I have been collecting milk jug caps forever and wanted to make a letter game. This is my version of some that I have seen online.  

First I collected a ton of bottle caps (thanks to my daughter who is a milk lover)!

I printed out the letters and cut them out.  You can get your own letters by clicking below.

Then I modge podged the letters to the tops of the bottle caps.

I did 3 coats.  

Then we played the game!

I also made a version for matching beginning sounds to pictures.  You can see the versions and grab your own copy here. 

Parent Communication

I started this blog as a way to communicate better with families and other teachers.  I communicate with them in many ways but I love to make sure they always know how to contact me.

A question was asked in a kindergarten group if I share business cards with parents.  I do but I also make these.  I print and laminate and attach a magnet to the back.  I place in a basket and pass out to parents at "Meet the Teacher" day.  You can make some too as there is an editable version in my TpT store.  Click the picture to download.

Super Cheap Dry Erase "Boards"

I saw this idea a while ago somewhere on the internet.  I've been wanting to try it for some time now. I don't know about you but all of my dry erase boards seem to be in really bad condition, don't wipe easily, marker stains and so on.

I bought these plates (4 for $1 at my local Dollar Tree) to try as dry erase boards!  Take a look:

I wrote on the plate with a dry erase marker.  I didn't even use a "real" Expo marker.  

Then I erased with one stroke:

This is what it looked like at the end :)

I am a HAPPY teacher!  I spent 6 dollars and have 24 dry erase "boards!!"

How Many Days Have We Been in School? Counting Days in Kindergarten

How do you count your school days with your class?

Sometime ago I found a picture of a classroom where the teacher used ten frames to count how many days of school had gone by.

I looked and looked to find a place to buy some but couldn't find any so I created some and added them to my Teachers Pay Teachers store.  Recently I have been updating them to include posters for recording the date and the number of the day.

Click below to see the many choices of the counting days ten frames and posters I have in my store!

Teacher Summer

End of Year Gifts

Every year I struggle to find an inexpensive gift to give students at the end of school.  This year I added these to bags with books in them for them to take home.

Grab them for free here and here at my TpT store!

Happy Summer!

ABC Parade

Whew!  It's been such a long time since I have blogged!  I have tons of pictures and ideas so I need to get busy soon!

Since summer is coming we decided to have some "learning fun" to celebrate the end of Kindergarten!  Today we had an "Alphabet Parade!"  It was so much fun!!

We used letters printed from an anchor chart product from Cara Carroll and Alphabet Hats from Simply Kinder.  We used four pieces of cardboard stapled together to make our "costumes."  Then we walked around our school singing alphabet songs!  So fun!

Day and Night!

We have been learning about Day and Night in our classroom.

We decided to wrap up our learning by doing several activities in centers.

We watched a short movie and labeled a day and night diagram.  Even though I didn't get a picture of it in action, here's the recording sheet we used to go along with the "Day and Night" video we watched.






We also made a pattern of day and night and did some simple research on the differences between day and night.

Happy NewYear!!

Welcome to 2016!  We wrote "resolutions" for the new year and made these cute New Year people.  The idea came from A Cupcake for the Teacher!