I'm Here!!!

Hello to all my old blogger friends, and WELCOME to all my new ones! I'm so excited to see how many new friends are following my page! I know I haven't posted in a while, and I just wanted to take a moment to say HELLO! and I promise I'll be back soon! 

The school I teach for has a much longer school year than most (190 for the kids, 210 for the teachers), and to be honest, I've been suffering from a bit of "teaching burnout". School has been pushed to a back burner for a bit so I can spend some time enjoying the summer sun, visiting with friends and family, and soaking up all the extra time I can with my husband. His official deployment orders came in :( and he'll be leaving for 13 months in September. The deployment has been pushed back so many times I was starting to hope maybe they would just cancel it altogether, but unfortunately that's not the case. I'll be posting more about his deployment and what I'm doing (and what I'm doing with my students) to prepare. 

I'll be back soon with some posts about some of my preparations for back to school, and my FIRST GIVEAWAY! In the mean time I'll be checking out some of my favorite blogger friends sites, and enjoying my short summer vacation. I hope you're all doing the same!

Take the time to thank your friends and family in the military for their service, especially this holiday weekend. Thank their families as well. Deployments and leaving home hard on the soldiers, but having them gone is hard for their families too. Remember, this is the land of the free because of the brave.

Share Our Strength's No Kid Hungry Campaign - Take the Pledge!

With summer almost here, I sometimes find myself worrying about my students who receive free lunches. I wonder how many meals they'll get over the summer break. Will the be nutritious? Will they have anything at all? I was watching one of my favorite Food Network shows tonight when the commercial below came on. If you've wondered this as well, and want to do something to help, No Kid Hungry is a great place to start.

No Kid Hungry™is an unprecedented, five-year effort designed to end childhood hunger in America. Our nation has the food and programs in place to end childhood hunger, but consider what we are up against: The stigmas and embarrassment that surround hunger, the challenges presented by access to healthy food, and the struggle to connect children with the resources they need to thrive. For 25 years, Share Our Strength has been confronting hunger head-on to break down these barriers. Together, with your support, we can put an end to childhood hunger. 

I've taken the pledge. Will you? Click on the button below to take the pledge and see what else you can do in your area to help end childhood hunger.

www.nokidhungry.org

My First Button!

I am so excited this morning! Since I started blogging, I've loved looking at everyone's buttons and adding some of my favorites to my page. I've never been able to figure out how to make my own, though. This morning I woke up with a little extra motivation, and decided to Google how to make one. I used two different sites to help me: Blogging With Amy was super helpful in showing me how to create the button, but her code creation directions were a little tricky. Oikology 101's creation directions weren't quite clear enough for me, but her code creation was fantastic! Thank you to both wonderful bloggers for your help! I definitely recommend stopping by both of their blogs if you're thinking of making a button for yourself as well! I'm even thinking about making one or two to use as my first giveaway if I can get up to 50 followers. (That will give me a little more time to practice.) What do you think?


The only thing I'm not sure about now is if my button will work when someone puts it on their site. Could someone give it a try for me please? :)

Happy Blogging! :)

Gift Card Giveaway at Miss Snowden's Blog! :)

Want to win a gift card to Target, Wal-mart, or Staples? Stop by Miss Snowden's blog and enter! :)

Super Spelling Ideas

Over the years I have tried several different ideas for my spelling center. Each year I add and change some of the activities to meet the needs of my students. Below is a list of some of my and my student's favorites that I feel really benefit them. Some of these I've come up with on my own, some I've borrowed from other teachers. Hopefully these help you with your own students as well!

1. Alphabet Macaroni Spelling - I have a large bin with alphabet macaroni noodles. Students get to spell their words with the noodles. I have them lay them out and then put them away when they're done, but you could also have them glue the noodles to paper as well.

2. Alphabet Stamps- I've accumulated 3 sets of alphabet stamps throughout the past few years. I have my students use the stamps to stamp out their words. (They love this one because they get to use the stamp pads!)

3.Spelling Staircases- Students use our markerboards to write their words one at a time as stairsteps for example:
s
st

sta

stair
stairs
stairst
stairste
stairstep

4. Glue Letters- This is one of our new favorites. I filled 5 Ziploc freezer bags about 1/3 of the way full with white glue and add a few squirts of tempra paint. Mix the glue and paint together. Squeeze out all of the air and seal the bag shut. I then taped the bag shut with packing tape to make sure my students don't try to open the bags. Students then lay the bags flat on their desk and write their spelling words in the glue using their fingers.

5. Rainbow Words- Students first write each of their spelling words in pencil, then they trace over each word with 3 different colored crayons to practice spelling them. I have a worksheet I found years ago that I use, but you could easily make up your own as well.


6. Sign Language Spelling- At the beginning of the year I teach my students how to sign each letter of the alphabet as we review their sounds and learn their spellings. By Thanksgiving, most of my students can sign the entire alphabet. For spelling, I have my students sign a word to their partner, then the partner has to decide what word they're spelling.

And last but not least - Spelling City!

Have you used Spelling City in your classroom? What a fantastic resource this website is!

Description from the site:

"SpellingCity is a free, interactive educational website that enables students of all ages and learning differences to practice their spelling and vocabulary words at home or at school while playing a variety of exciting learning games, all of which are compatible with interactive whiteboards and most of which are also printable!"

I've been using this website for the past few years, and this year became a premium member. The site provides so many resources for my students to use both at school and at home to help them with their spelling. You can also print word lists and other worksheets to use with your students.

If you've never been to this site, I reccomend checking it out!

Click the link below to go to the site:

What spelling activities do you use in your classroom? I'd love some new ideas! Do you use any of these already? Leave some comments below please! :)

Buzzing with Excitement!

We're finally counting down the last few weeks of school in first grade! As of today, we only have 19 days left. Every year my students and I make a "countdown board" outside of our classroom so we can all count down the days left. This year I decided to go with the same bee theme I did last year, because it turned out so cute!

I was a little pressed for time this year, so I had students do a follow the directions assignment and complete the "Buzzing Bonnie" bee pattern below that I found in one of my Carson-Dellosa books.

The countdown hive is simply a pattern I drew and cut out on a large piece of yellow construction paper, then lamintated. I wrote "Days Until Summer" on the laminated hive with a Vis-a-Vis Marker, and we use a dry erase to change the number each day-- super simple!

We've also made this bulletin board using a paper bee pattern that I created that I have my students follow. I promise to post the template for the bee pattern I created, and for the hive later this afternoon when I'm near a scanner.  :)

Do you do a countdown with your students? What does yours look like? Do you do a countdown for any other special events with your students?



Contest from First Grade Fanatics!

Are you thinking about the end of the school year yet? Some of my blogging friends have been posting their countdowns to summer which are much shorter than ours is! As of Monday, we'll officially have 20 days left of school. Today we completed a bulletin board with a countdown for our hallway. "We're Buzzing With Excitement for Summer!" I forgot my camera yesterday, but I'll be sure to share it next week! It turned out so cute!

As for now, I'm planning some activities for my firsties for the last week of school. First Grade Fanatics has the perfect memory book I'm planning to have them complete!  You can enter their contest here-> Memory Book Giveaway! or purchase a copy from their TpT Store. Good luck, and happy blogging! :)

Kristen

Penny Wars!

We just finished what is quite possibly one of my and my students' favorite fundraisers that we do all year, and I just had to take a moment to share with all of you.

This is an awesome way to raise money for a good cause. This year our Americorps members ran it, and the money earned is going to relief efforts for Japan. I'm so proud of all the staff and students at my small school. We raised over $2,000!

If you have never played, here are the rules: 

The object of the game is for each team to collect as many pennies as possible during the “war” while 

simultaneously “sabotaging” the other teams.  Of course, the ultimate object of the game is to give the 

students an opportunity to raise money to support a project that helps others.  

Each team collects coins in a see-through, narrow-necked container labeled with each homeroom teacher's name. Large water jugs are ideal, but one-gallon plastic milk jugs will also do the job.  

The containers are kept in places with adult supervision.  Home rooms, the school library, or a location in view of the office staff are good choices.

Students bring pennies to school and put their pennies in the container that belongs to their team.  Their 

team receives one point for every penny in the container. 

But it gets more complicated.  Students may sabotage the other teams by putting “silver” coins (nickels, 

dimes, and quarters) into the containers of the other teams.  Each silver coin subtracts points from that 

container by the value of the coin.  A nickel subtracts 5 points from the total, a dime reduces it by 10, and a quarter by 25. Dollar bills also work and subtract by the value of the bill. $1 reduces it by 100 points. This is where strategy comes into play.  This is why the game is so much fun. 

Containers may be emptied and counted daily or they may accumulate until the last day of the contest. 

The pennies and silver coins are counted separately.  The total monetary amount of the silver coins is 

deducted from the total number of pennies. 

Some groups prefer for the totals for all classes to be posted daily to encourage friendly competition. The 

totals (for pennies, silver, and points) may be posted as tallies. A chart, blackboard, or whiteboard, in a 

central location, would work well for these postings. 

Other groups like to keep the results a secret, and to not count the coins or reveal the standings until the 

last day.  This leads to lots of speculative strategies and tactics. 

Either way will work—you should decide which way is best for your group, and then stick with that 

process through the entire Penny War. Typically the Penny War lasts for 1 week.

We've had a blast with this for the past few years. Each year things change a little. Once we played where all the jugs were in the cafeteria and students put their coins in upon arrival. My favorite has been the past two years where the bins are right outside of each homeroom teacher's door. It gets the staff in on the fun too!

If you haven't done this, I definitely recommend it!

Have you ever done this fundraiser at your school? How are your rules alike/different from ours?

Giveaway!

Lorena from Little Treasures is hosting a giveaway for having 50+ followers! Hopefully one day I'll have that many followers as well! Be sure to visit her site, become one of her followers, and enter! You can win an adorable personalized teacher sign or a $25 gift card to Scrappin Doodles or Thirty-One Gifts!

Click her button below to enter!

How did we ever survive without...

I am a spoiled teacher when it comes to technology, I'll admit it. If there's a technology piece for my classroom I want, usually I can get it. I have a class set of awesome digital cameras, a mini document camera, 4 desktop computers for my students plus a laptop for myself, a set of SMART Remotes, and a SMART Board with a projector.

I'm not telling you all this to brag, I promise. I'm telling you all this because this week I realized how dependant I've become on my pieces of technology.

On Friday when I came into school I began my day like always:
I typed in my morning message as usual on my computer, but when I went to turn on my SMART Board something awful happened! The projector made a loud hissing sound and then shut off. My light bulb burnt out! Because the bulbs are apparently expensive, my school district does not keep extras of these bulbs on hand, so they've had to order me a new bulb. I've been SMART Board-less for the past 3 days :(

I've spent the past few days writing a lot of morning messages and information on chart paper, I've even pulled out my dust covered overhead projector and manipulatives for it from my closet. My kids thought the overhead was hillarious, they've never seen one before and wanted to use it all afternoon after I brought it out for math.

I've survived, but I appreciate the technology gifts I've been given even more...and I'm following the progress of my new projector bulb via tracking number every day.

Are there any pieces of technology you use in your classroom that you just couldn't live without? Leave a comment and let me know what and why below :)

Happy Teaching!
Kristen