Merry Christmas Everyone (A little late!)

I know I haven't been on my blog lately. We have been very busy. I hope that all of you had a wonderful Christmas with your family and friends. Mine was fabulous! My hubby and I were able to spend some quality time together as well as with our families. We were also able to plan for next Christmas as we are expecting our first baby. This is part of the reason for my absence on the blog. I have been rather tired and sick, but I am so excited! We will get to meet our little bundle of joy in June 2013. Now I have lots to look forward to this summer.

Friday Freebie: Ordering Numbers 1-20

Ordering numbers from 1 to 20 is a skill that can be difficult for some students so I work on it all year. In this activity, I have my kinders color the stockings in a pattern of their choosing. Some go for more difficult patterns (ABCD or AABBCC) while others stick to the simpler patterns (AB or ABC). Either is fine with me now that patterns are no longer addressed in the Common Core standards. This is just a fun way to get them interested in the activity. 

When they have finished coloring, they have the cut apart the squares. Then put them back together in order on a sentence strip. This can prove to be difficult for some and fun for others. I just walk around and help those who seem to be having more trouble than others. 

Here is the sheet if you would like to download it. 

Ordering Numbers up to 20

After today, we only have 3 more school days next week until the beginning of our Christmas break. I am so excited about having 2 weeks off to spend with my family.

UPDATE: Some people were having trouble downloading this activity from Google Drive so I put it in my TpT store. Click here to download it from TpT.

12 in ‘12

I am linking up with Kristen at a Teeny Tiny Teacher and Miss Kindergarten for their 12 in ’12 linky party. This sounded like such fun I had to join in. Here are my favorites from 2012.

 

 

12. Favorite movie you watched: Well I hate to admit this but I didn’t go see a single movie this year. I definitely have to go to the movies this year.

11. Favorite TV series: Elementary – This was a show my hubby picked to DVR, but I have found that I enjoy watching it just as much as he does.

10. Favorite restaurant: Longhorn Steakhouse – This has become my favorite restaurant over the past few years. It is so good!

9. Favorite new thing you tried: TpT – I just opened my store back in the spring and I have loved creating new units and things to share with other teachers. I am still amazed that the things I create to use in my classroom are being used in other classrooms. I haven't made tons of money but I have met some wonderful people and gotten some great feedback from other teachers.

8. Favorite gift you got: My new pair of Danskos. They are so cute.

7. Favorite thing you pinned: I don't think I could pick just one thing. I have pinned so many cute things this year. I am officially a Pinterest addict.

6. Favorite blog post: Dr. Suess is on the Loose! This was such a fun day in my classroom and I loved sharing all the ideas with my blogging buddies.

http://kinderkidsfun.blogspot.com/2012/03/dr-seuss-is-on-loose.html

5. Best accomplishment:

4. Favorite picture: This is a picture of my hubby, me, and our nieces and nephew. We love them so much and have a great time when we are with them.

 

3. Favorite memory: Spending part of my summer vacation at the lake with my hubby. We were disconnected from technology and got to spend quality time together. It was GREAT!

 

2. Goal for 2013: Spend more quality time with my family.

1. One Little Word: Grateful…for everything I have been blessed with.

Christmas Bucket List Update

Here is an update on how my Christmas Bucket List is going.

1 - Watch Christmas movies
I have been loving all the Christmas movies on Hallmark. I have been DVRing the ones that look good and then watching them in the afternoon. They are so good!

2 - Look at Christmas lights

3 - Try a new Christmas recipe

4 - Make Christmas cookies

5 - Do some RAK (random acts of kindness) for my friends and family

6 - Read a Christmas book

7 - Go shopping with my mom for Christmas presents
My mom and I went shopping last week and bought quite a few presents. It was great! We got lots accomplished!

8 - Listen to Christmas music
I have been doing this one every day on the way to and from school. It has been so nice to sing Christmas carols in the car.

9 - Wrap Christmas presents
I have wrapped almost all of the presents I have bought. 

10 - Make some Christmas crafts

Friday Freebie: Christmas more/less game (K.CC.6)

This is a more/less game created with the theme of Christmas. My class has been working on the CC standard K.CC.6 comparing two sets and this game has been great to use with my small groups. Each child got a mat and two sticks of 10 Unifix cubes in two different colors (10 of each color). Then we drew a candy cane card first and they put that many Unifix cubes of one color on the top row. Then we drew an ornament card and they put that many Unifix cubes on the bottom row. Then we compared the sets to see which had more and which had less. For example, the candy cane had less than the ornament because the candy cane had 2 and the ornament had 8. To make it even more challenging with my higher level thinkers, I had them tell me how many more one set had than another set.

In the spirit of holiday giving, this game is free on TpT. I hope you will hop on over and download. Please leave me some feedback! Thanks so much!

Christmas More/Less Game

In other news, I missed the big TpT Cyber Monday sale last week so I am throwing a weekend sale this weekend (Friday through Sunday) and offering 10% off all the products in my store. Please head over to my TpT store and see if you can find something to use in your classroom.

My Teacher's Notebook shop has a 20% sale this weekend (Friday through Sunday) if you would prefer to shop there! Thanks for your support!

My Christmas Bucket List

I saw this idea on another blog and thought it sounded like a lot of fun. It is also a good way for me to plan out the next few weeks with some fun Christmas activities.

1 - Watch Christmas movies
2 - Look at Christmas lights
3 - Try a new Christmas recipe
4 - Make Christmas cookies
5 - Do some RAK (random acts of kindness) for my friends and family
6 - Read a Christmas book
7 - Go shopping with my mom for Christmas presents
8 - Listen to Christmas music
9 - Wrap Christmas presents
10 - Make some Christmas crafts

Now I have 20 days to get all of this done! I better get busy!

New on Tpt: December Math Journal Prompts

I have just posted my newest set of Math Journal prompts for December. I am sorry I am a little late getting these out. There are 13 prompts in this set. They are $3.00 for the set. Click on the picture below to purchase.

Here is something to make you smile today. Jingles (our classroom elf) found his way on top of our treat jar this morning. My kinders were worried they would be able to get a treat if they did well because we can't touch him. It was the major concern of my kinders all day! I guess we know that I didn't get too much out of my kiddos today.

December Currently

I know I have said it many times but I love linking up with Farley for her monthly Currently party. It is always so fun to think about the month ahead and our plans. Well this month when I hopped over to her blog, I was in for a HUGE surprise! I found that she had decided to randomly feature 3 bloggers and guess who was one of the bloggers! ME!!! WOW! I was shocked! So I must send out a big thank you to Farley for featuring me. It meant so much!

Now here is my December Currently:

Now let me explain my RAK (random act of kindness). I always do things for the office ladies and janitor at our school at some point during the school year, but this year I decided that I would surprise them each day during the last week of school by leaving them a little treat. I have 3 fun days to plan and I am hoping they will enjoy it. I am going different people to deliver the treats and then on the last day I will deliver them.  

Now head on over to Farley's blog to link up your own December Currently! 

Happy Monday everyone! 

Christmas Planning

Last week, our kindergarten team sat down and tried to map out our next 2 1/2 weeks before Christmas break. This is always such a busy time for me at school as well as at home. It seems there is never enough time to get everything done. I wanted to share with you some of the ideas we are planning to do with our kinders.

This week we are planning to start by making a countdown to Christmas Santa with his beard being the countdown. This is an old pattern that a teacher had where you put a cotton ball on each day until Christmas eve. It is always fun for the kids to make and I make one to hang up on our calendar board.

We will start working on our Rudolph ornaments on Tuesday. These are the traditional ornaments made from the 3 popsicle sticks. They are always a favorite and they turn out so cute. Usually we start painting one day and then do the finishing touches the next day.

I have also had a request for the tags to go on the snowman handprint ornaments for this year. I updated it with the correct year. I hope you can all use it!

2012 Snowman Handprint Tags

I am sorry I don't have more pictures to share with you right now but I promise to take some this week. Happy planning!

Oh How Pinteresting!

I am once again linking up with Michelle at The Vintage Apple.

Since I am starting my planning for Christmas in my classroom, here are my couple of my favorite pins this week:

http://pinterest.com/pin/39688040436633598/

These are adorable ornaments made with the students' thumbprints. I have done a similar reindeer ornament but never the snowman so I am thinking this may be cute to add to my collection.

http://pinterest.com/pin/39688040435840129/

These are cute ornaments to make with the kiddos. Our kindergarten team is planning to make these this year on the shatterproof balls.

Friday Freebie: Thanksgiving Counting Sheet

Happy Friday friends! I feel terrible for being such a bad blogger lately so I am sharing a fun freebie with you this Friday while I am heading to my graduate class.

I created this counting sheet to use as morning work with my kinders but you could also use it as homework or a math review. 

You can download this activity sheet on TpT. Please leave me some feedback if you download. Thanks so much!

Now if I can get through the 2 days next week, we will have 5 days off for Thanksgiving! Can't wait!! 

New on TpT & TN: GingerCuties Unit

Since I started working on my GingerCuties unit last weekend, I haven’t been able to stop working on it. I have loved creating everything in this unit! I love gingerbread men and knew I wanted to use this clipart to make a useful unit for my kinders. This unit has both language arts and math activities aligned with the Kindergarten Common Core standards.

Language Arts:

·       My Gingerbread Man writing paper

·       Trace, write & glue sight words activity sheet

·       Gingercuties beginning sounds activity sheet

·       Matching uppercase & lowercase letters literacy activity

·       Gingercuties beginning sounds literacy activity

·       Gingercuties beginning sounds cut & paste activity sheet

Math:

·       Matching numbers to sets center game

·       Gingercuties  tens frames match center game

·       Count the gingercuties activity sheet

·       Roll & Race to 50 gameboards (color & B&W)

·       Tracing & writing numbers to 20 activity sheets

·       Sequencing numbers 1 to 10 activity sheet

The unit is available for $5.50 in both of my shops.

TpTstore                             TN shop

MIA & November Currently

I am so sorry that I have been MIA for the past few weeks. Lots has been going on in my life and this month has been CRAZY! Last week was a 4 day week (Election Day) and this week is also a 4 day week for us (Veteran's Day). Next week we only go to school 2 days because of the Thanksgiving holidays. Needless to say my kinders have been very active! I am also taking a graduate course right now with plenty of coursework. So in the crazyness of all this, I have neglected my little blog. I hope you will all forgive me. I promise to try to get back on track.

So in an effort to get back on track, here is my November Currently.

 Hop on over to Farley's blog to participate in all the fun!