Turkey Family Project

by

Have you ever added a turkey in disguise project to your Thanksgiving unit? In the past, we have always done a simple “Decorate the Turkey” family project. Students decorate the turkey and have fun finding items around the house to decorate those feathers. Some items have included  Froot Loops, sequins, stickers, and colorful pom poms. The turkey projects are usually very colorful and students have come up with some neat ideas.

Well, I have heard of disguising a turkey before, but I had never tried it until this year. My son had to do a “Disguise the Turkey” family project. When I asked him what disguise he would like for his turkey, he immediately said “BATMAN!!” We used construction paper, feathers, and colored wiggley eyes. It came out adorable! Here it is:)

Here is a close-up:)
Oh, wait. I published this post by mistake last night.
THIS morning he wanted to add a CAPE to his Batman Turkey:) 
Ha, ha. He wore his Batman shirt to 
school today, to match 🙂 Sooooo, here is the complete project.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With:

Trace, Color, Build Thanksgiving Words and a Freebie!

by

Trace, Color, Build Thanksgiving Words is an activity that you can add to your Thanksgiving thematic unit.

Click on the cover to find out more
Find the Spanish Thanksgiving activities here.

Before place these in a center, you can start out by allowing your students to brainstorm a few words that have to do with Thanksgiving. You do not have to make a long list. Just add a few words to a small chart and talk about the words that they came up with on that day/week (make another small list the next week, and so on). Your  small chart might look a little like this first picture. (Another idea is to  make a chart according to the categories that are mentioned at the end of this post.) I only added six words to mine. You can talk about the first sound in each word. Then, take each word and sing it along to the BINGO song as you spell it out. The longer words will become a little tricky, but you can come up with a smaller word to replace it.

After that vocabulary has been introduced, you can pull out my Trace, Color, Build printables with those particular words from my packet. Model and practice completing this activity so that students can work on it independently in a center. If your list has a word that is not in my packet, do not worry. Just give them the words that ARE in the packet:)
This is a sample of one of the printables. 

This is what it will look like after the students read it, trace it, and rainbow color the target word.

Students will then cut the bottom part that contains the letter tiles.

Next, students will place the letter tiles in correct sequence before they glue the target word.
The word is written on the printable a few times, so this will be a good visual for lower grade students.

Now, they can add a dot of glue inside each square.

Finally, your student will place the pieces in the squares.

This is what the completed work will look like:)
Get your free Thanksgiving activity sample here:)
It includes one English and one Spanish printable.
Enjoy!
The words in this packet include:
Food words: 
turkey
pie
apple
pumpkin
corn
cranberry
grapes
squash
gravy
potatoes
butter
banana
celery
peas
carrot
bread
orange
fork
spoon 
table
dinner
Family words:
father
mother
brother
sister
baby
grandma
grandpa
cat
dog
family
The First Thanksgiving Words:
pilgrim
(Native American) Indian
cornucopia
crops
hat
cabin
Mayflower
fishing
hunting
Squanto
Fall words:
scarecrow
acorn
leaf
basket

   

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With:

Thanksgiving Literacy Centers

by

November is finally here. I love Thanksgiving! I just finished my Thanksgiving Literacy Centers pack. Wow! It is 150 pages long. I like to use thematic centers to introduce new vocabulary and to keep students interested in learning and practicing their basic skills. What I like about this pack is that it includes 52 thematic words. You can use them to talk about family, food, and the first Thanksgiving.
Click on the picture to find out more:)

Some of the activities include:
1-  Alphabet Matching Cards
2-  I Have, Who Has Alphabet Game
3-  52 Picture/ Word Cards
4-  Clap the Syllables
5-  Beginning Sounds
6-  Writing thematic words that can be used
to make a mini-book
7-  Letter Tile Mats that will be used to count the number of letters in a word
8-  A few math games
9- Turkeys- Can/ Have/ Are
You can find the Spanish Thanksgiving unit here.
   

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With:

Treats for Our Sweets

by
Welcome to Kinder Alphabet. I hope that you are having a lot of fun finding goodies along the way. Teachers need some treats too, right? As you can see, some teacher friends and I have teamed up to bring you many Sweet Treats. Make sure to visit every blog for your freebies.
I have some Thanksgiving Printables to get you ready for November. I hope that you enjoy them!
You can get the Spanish Thanksgiving Printables here.
Happy Halloween!
   
Your next stop is at 
A Special Kind of Class



Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With:

CVC Fun, Fun, Fun!

by
Are some of your students ready for CVC words? We have been having fun with some new activities. We are using CVC Bingo Mats, CVC Playdough Mats and other CVC Word Work Mats to help us notice patterns in words.   We have mainly been working on -at words, but I went ahead and created complete packs with words that end in -at, -an, -en, -et, -ig, -it, -ot, -ug, -in, -un, -og, -ad, -op, and -ap.
The first activity that we used can be found in this CVC Playdough Mats pack. 
We used this mat by looking at the word, sounding it out then rolling out the letters for the word. Instead of just using alphabet stamps to make the word, we explored using other manipulatives such as alphabet magnets and alphabet dice. This has been a fun activity. 
Another activity that has been super fun is this CVC Tic-Tac-Toe pack that I came up with. I was actually trying to make a different type of game when this idea came to mind. I just had to hurry up and put it together to see how it would work and I love it. This is not a competition game like the regular tic-tac-toe. It is meant for one student to use independently. It has been a favorite around here!! We have game mats and the corresponding picture/word cards for each of the 14 word families.  Beginning readers can use the word cards along with the the game mat. Students who feel confident with a specific word pattern will not need the picture cards! Look at the picture below to see how well it works. We write each word in a different color and cross out the word and the picture in the same color. The vowel is given in the center of the mat. Students simply finish making the words. I love to see the look on a child’s face when he feels successful!  Did I mention that I LOVE this activity? I love it!
Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With:

Emergent Reader

by

Early Emergent Readers depend on the use of high frequency words and repetitive patterns to support their reading efforts. This is an “I can” flip book that can be used as a supplement to help your students identify and read the sight words “I” and “can”.  It includes 4 picture/word cards to create this mini-book. We used it this past week and focused on pointing to each word.

Oh, and I also have a sequencing activity for the numbers 1-20. 
It’s a cute monster theme that your students might like:)

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With:

Wonderful Giveaway

by

Greetings friends! We are SO EXCITED to surpass 1,000 followers on Freebielicious.
All of the FANTASTIC Freebielicious authors have teamed up for a giveaway like no
other. We will pick three winners, one from each category. Giveaway ends Sunday
night at 8:00 p.m. EST. GOOD LUCK and no matter what, EVERYONE WINS at
Freebielicious!! 

*YOU MUST COMMENT ON FREEBIELICIOUS BLOG TO ENTER THIS GIVEAWAY!! MAKE SURE YOU LEAVE YOUR EMAIL ADDRESS TOO. 
GOOD LUCK!

Check out these awesome donations!

Good Luck!
Now, HEAD OVER TO Freebielicious to enter. DO NOT ENTER HERE. YOU MUST ENTER ON THE FL BLOG! 🙂
Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With:

Literature Connections

by

Hello. I am stopping by to post this request. These are the printables for making literature connections. They include: Text-to-Text, Text-to-Self, and Text-to-World connections.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With:

The Quietest Pencil Sharpener: Review

by
I had the opportunity to review The Quietest Classroom Pencil Sharpener  by ClassroomFriendlySupplies.com.  Wow! If you love SHARP PENCILS, this is the pencil sharpener for  you 🙂
It was nice to come home to this little box at the front of our door. I had been waiting for this product and was very excited to take a look at what this famous pencil sharpener is all about.

 This is what I found when I opened the box. You will find two items in this clear box. One is the pencil sharpener and the other item is a c-clamp to attach it to a table.

I was very impressed by the retro look. We used the C-clamp to attach the pencil sharpener to our table.       The kids were excited to try out this manually operated device. We got all of our pencils out and lined them up nicely to get started with each one. Then, we used it the wrong way. We put the pencil directly in the pencil sharpener and tried to sharpen our pencils.
We were getting dull pencils like this one. 
 Or very sharp pencils that had the tips breaking off later. 
Then, we saw the online video that demonstrates how to sharpen pencils with this product. All we had to do was open the top part of the device. I will attach the video demonstration so that you can see what I am referring to. Also, the sharpener was a bit wiggly, but I think that we used it on the wrong type of table. After watching the video, I noticed that the device wiggled less when I used it appropriately. I also held the top of the sharpener, instead of holding the pencil itself for extra support.  The results were amazing!! You will be able to sharpen pencils quickly and quietly. I recommend this product to teachers and office workers. As a kindergarten teacher, my only concern is that the pencils are probably too sharp for younger students. I am always afraid that the little ones might get hurt with sharp pencils. Even if you do not allow your students to use this, you can use it for yourself. One thing for sure, your pencils will always be nice and sharp when you write your lesson plans and during meetings. Many teachers love this product and use it regularly in their classrooms. If you do not mind the extra sharp points in your particular classroom, this sharpener is for you. But, you better hurry. This product is so popular that it keeps selling out.  The good news is that the company makes their best efforts to restock as quickly as possible.
Here is the video of the pencil sharpening demonstration.

Note: I received this free pencil sharpener in exchange for an honest review:)
Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With:

Phonics Fun

by

Now that my son is in Kindergarten, his interest in reading, writing and numbers has increased tremendously. He likes to get started on “homework” as soon as he gets back from school. I keep running out of ink just in the activities that I make for him at home. So, I decided to create these bookmarks to focus on specific skills that we need to work on. They have been so useful and I am able to save on paper and printer ink too:)

Letter Identification Bookmarks: One of the things that we have been working on is letter formation and identification. This is what he is able to do with these bookmarks: First, he names the letter. Then, he follows this sequence to complete his work: Color it! Trace it! Write it! And at the bottom, he needs to find the uppercase letters in the left box and circle them. Then, he needs to find the lowercase letters in the box on the right side and circle (or color) those too.
Alphabet Fonts Bookmarks: I made these just for fun. I want to see if he is able to identify letters and their basic formation. He sees words written everywhere and sometimes does not recognize certain letters that are not written in a basic primary font. I call these “grown up” writing and are only meant to be used as exposure to other font types that are used on cereal boxes, toy boxes, store names, etc. 
Alphabet Dictionary Bookmarks: These bookmarks serve as mini-word banks that can be used as a reference when reviewing letters and beginning sounds. These visual cues will help students become aware of letter-sound relationships. First, he colors the first letter in each word. Then, he says something like this: The letter “C” says /k/, /k/, /k/.  Cat, Cat, /k/, /k/ /k/. We have a lot of work to do with beginning sounds, but he is eager to learn. I can’t wait to hear him read soon. 
Beginning Sounds Bookmarks: This can serve as independent work or as a quick assessment. Students will identify the words that begin with the target letter. Then, they will circle the corresponding pictures. I also included two more options for early finishers who might be a little more advanced. They will name the remaining pictures that were not circled and identify the first letter in those words.  Another option is to label the pictures. 
Label the Picture Bookmarks: These are good for differentiating instruction. Students who have developed reading strategies will be able to read the 4 words in the word bank to determine how to label each picture. Some will be able to label without looking at the words provided 🙂 We are not at this stage yet, but I have them ready for him!
Kinder Dolch Sight Words Bookmarks: This is a color it. Circle it. Write it. activitity. Coloring the crayon background makes the sight word stand out. Students can trace the word with their finger as they sound out each letter. 
Alphabet Playdough Mats Bookmarks: This includes uppercase and lowercase letters and a picture to represent the beginning sound of the letter. I did not get a chance to cut these bookmarks apart. I put them in a clear sleeve and my son used playdough to trace each letter. I asked him to name the letter and give the sound each time he traced a new letter. It was so cute to hear him say “R”, /rrrrrrrr/ each time he worked on the next letter on the mat.  
Sight Word Playdough Mats Bookmarks: These include the Kindergarten Dolch Words. This will help students identify the sight word and sound out each letter as they trace the word with playdough. It looks like we will have to use the sight word activities a lot right now. This is one of the things that Angel really needs to work on. 
Rainbow Writing for Sight Words Bookmarks: Each letter can be traced with different colors or color each letter in a different color as they read the word. Angel loves using watercolors to paint the words too. They can be decorated any way you want. Coloring the background just makes the sight word stand out. These can be saved to make a book of sight words.
Alphabet Sequence Bookmarks: I also included some very simple alphabet sequence activities. The student can trace each letter as he chants the alphabet and then write the missing letter in the sequence. I made two sets. One is in uppercase letters and the other is in lowercase letter. Right now, Angel looks at the alphabet line to see which letter is next. Later, I am going to put a copy of these in a sleeve to use as a quick assessment or staple of them together to make it into a book.
Alphabet Match Bookmarks: These are very simple like the alphabet sequence bookmarks above. I added all the uppercase letters with a space next to them. We will be working on writing the matching lowercase letters on the spaces. I also made a set with lowercase letters where the uppercase letter needs to be written on the space provided.
Oh, boy. We have a lot of work to do. The good thing is that learning does not stop at the end of the school day. It continues at home as well. Angel is eager to learn and I am loving it! 
Is this something that you could use? Just click on this Phonics Fun link or on the first picture at the top of the post to see it listed in my TPT store.
Here are some bookmark freebies for you 🙂
Oh. We also use this alphabet chart. I point to random letters first. Then, if Angel is able to name the letter correctly, he can circle it. It’s so much fun to see his progress. Click on the title link to get your free copy. I also included the 100’s Chart that we are using right now.

Alphabet and 100’s Chart by KinderAlphabet.com

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: