F is for Fighting Fires

Whew! The wild weather should be called MILD weather today. We mostly got some on and off rain showers. Thank you to those of you who kept us in your thoughts.

To continue to make light of the "situation"... one of my facebook friends posted this picture:

Hurricane Isaac 2012

Having the day off helped me to finally finish Treasures centers for Fighting the Fire (Unit 1, Week 3). Click the pic to get it from my TPT shop.

Skills covered:
Main Idea
Short a/Long a
Nonfiction writing
Word Family -ell
Science (Black Bears)
Social Studies (Community Helpers)
Sentence Subjects
Fluency practice through poetry

Here is a simple (we're still basically first graders after all...) activity from this packet that can be used in any classroom. It helps students identify subjects and predicates.

Silly Subjects

 It's back to school tomorrow for us! I'm ready. =)

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P is for Putter

Mr. Putter and Tabby Pour the Tea makes me teary every time! I've posted center resources that go along with this story in my TPT shop.

Here is a freebie that can be used with any fiction story.

Story House

Happy Monday!

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D is for David's New Friends

Wow! I've gotten quite a few new followers thanks to Mrs. Simpson's Fabulous 15 Giveaway. Welcome to all of you!

For those of you who don't know, we use Florida Treasures at my school and I have made centers for Unit 3, Week 5 to Unit 6, Week 5. Click {HERE} to read the post on how I run my centers during our mandatory 90 minute Reading Block.

During the summer, I'm going to start at the beginning and make centers for each story. I just finished Unit 1, Week 1 David's New Friends. (I'm currently loving Miss Law's cute fonts.)

I've also been asked to explain how I'd use the centers each week. I think that some/most of the activities can be used in classes that don't use Treasures. If you can hang on to the end of these centers posts, I will include a freebie from the unit.

Click picture to go to Teachers Pay Teachers.

Each unit also comes with a student To-do list, teacher planner list, and center menu to display on your board.

Here are some activities:

Poetry - using Just 4 Teachers Poetry Pack

Social Studies

Science - use nonfiction texts about baby animals

Grammar Sort

Word Work (2 sort versions)

Vocabulary

Writing (planning page)

Reading - use with any fiction books in your library

 Here's a freebie of the Reading center:

 Book Look

I hope you find some of these things useful. =)

 
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S is for Stirring Up Memories Centers

Center Resources for Stirring Up Memories are now on TPT. Click the picture to see.

Here is an Articles freebie that is included in this packet.

Appetizing Articles

And Ginger Snaps Clip Art is having an awesome giveaway!

Happy Easter to those of you who celebrate it!


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M is for Mice and Beans Centers

Spring break is half over! Ahhh! It's okay, I guess. I've been trying to relax.

I did crank out another week of centers. Click the picture to get the Mice and Beans center resources. I just love that story!

Here's a freebie from the unit.

WhatsInsideAdj

I'm off to shop for my Easter baking! Happy Thursday!


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T is for Top Ten {Freebie}

My darlings love making lists.

They also help me find the lists that I've lost around my classroom, but that's normal right?

They are going to be so excited when they see that I've created a specific list for them to make each week.

These Top Ten lists go with the 2nd Grade Treasures series, but can be used in any classroom.

Click the picture to get yours for free! Let me know what your darlings think if you use them.

Have a happy Monday! I'm going to try to do at least one thing on my Spring Break to-do list. It is much longer than ten.

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M is for Moon

The Moon center resources are now available. Click the picture.

Also, there is still time to enter my HOPE giveaway!

Have a great Thursday! Two more days until my Spring Break.



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R is for Reading Block

I've had a fellow Treasures user ask me to explain how I use it in my classroom. Some of the things I do might work for other programs as well. I wish someone could have broken it all down for me back when I was new and using Houghton Mifflin.

So here goes!

For those of you who use Treasures as your Reading curriculum, you know there is A LOT to get into the 5 days "suggested" plans. I feel that as teachers, we know what our students need and have the right to pick and choose which things to really focus on and which topics to quickly cover.

We have a mandatory 90 minute Reading Block, so we have to be creative on how to get all of the skills/standards taught.

This is my focus wall that keeps us on track.

The Whole Group portion of my time is usually the same every week:

Monday - Phonics skill and activity, Oral Reading cards
Tuesday - Vocabulary Words/Story
Wednesday - Read Main Selection with comprehension graphic organizer
Thursday - finish Main Selection if needed/Vocabulary Skill
Friday - 3rd Selection with Text Feature/Literacy Skill/Weekly review

This is an example of the Vocabulary page we do on Tuesdays:

We turn those words into a word splash:

We take pictures of our things on the board on our iPad.

We draw little picture clues and relate it all to the topic. Do you see the double lines on "muscles". My darlings had two different connections to the word and topic. The dotted line was their connection that aroma and scent mean pretty much the same thing. (And that came from my lowest darling!)

I also use the free smartboard lessons for each week that the wonderful Mrs. Fox created a few years ago. I hope I never lose mine, because she was asked to take hers off her website. Boo.

After Whole Group comes Centers.

Now, this is where things get crazy fun. I found that the center flip-books provided with the series were leaving some serious gaps in practice for skills. This post by Serenade to Second Grade inspired me to created some Treasures specific centers.

This system was born:

This is what it looks like on my board. Students pick their own partner each week (with my discrection of course) and do two centers each day. I just simply take off the top center card and push them all up. The top one goes to the bottom. There is always an empty center since I have 10 centers and only 18 kids.

The colors of the sign borders match the center bucket that holds all of the materials. The colors also match the skill on the Focus Wall. The colors around the student pictures match what reading group they are in. (Call me color-coding crazy...I know!)

The front of the folders have Must Do/Can Do directions on them.

Students have a center folder (color of reading group) and a To-Do list which I initial at the end of center time (while they work on the grammar skill...Writing time needs its own post!).

I've created files for each of the stories since Unit 3, Week 5 (aka the week we came back from Winter Break) and they can be found in my TPT store. UPDATE: Over the summer, I will be working on the beginning and catching up. Stay tuned!

I hope that helps some of you "bored" Treasures users to jazz it up.

I will work on a post for what I do during Reading Groups and Writing/Grammar.

Let me know if you have any questions! I love to answer questions!


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L is for Leprechaun Invasion (Part Deux)

Last year was a little lame. It just so happened that St. Patty's Day was during Spring Break. The leprechauns did not invade.

This year, those pesky leprechauns were back.

With their messy silly string again! (Where do that get that stuff?!)

Not as many kids made leprechaun traps as they did two years ago. But, they were still pretty cute. We set them on Friday before we left.

Pretty clever use of an old cereal box.

Pennies glued down inside.

This silvery wrapped box had a trap door under those "clouds".

This one had a rainbow made out of colored paper that was dipped in water.

The sign had reverse psychology..."Do NOT climb the ladder!"

This girl's description: "When the leprechaun jiggles the box, it will slam down on his head and knock him out. But don't worry...there's a little bed for him to lay on while he waits for me to let him out."

Exclusive Hotel for leprechauns

This is Stella's second version. The regular shoe box one was "too predictable".

The leprechaun was going to fall inside and then trip and trip and trip on the beads. He would then get so tired of tripping that he would just sit down and wait for us to get him.

The leprechauns left a piece of gold in all the traps to make up for the Silly String.
They also had these little leprechaun guys from First Grade Fanatics. 

What a mess!

They also had us go on a scavenger hunt...They must love A Cupcake for the Teacher as much as I do. =)

Can you see the treasure there under my throne?

I loved hearing all of the stories of what the leprechauns did at home. My favorite was from Mr. Genius.

"I woke up on Saturday and the COUCH was in the CAR. The leprechauns put the COUCH in the CAR."

What?!

And gone are the days of an apple for the teacher. Well, I should say a whole apple for the teacher. One little darling left this on my desk today. Mmmm.

And before you go...The Ugly Vegetables center resources are up on TPT. Click the pic to go there.

Countdown to my spring break...8 days!


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