Donors Choose Match

Donors Choose is once again offering a match code so that donations can be matched dollar for dollar. This match code is offered by Starbucks, MSNBC, and Morning Joe. The code is: MORNINGJOE. If you would like to donate to a project, just put in this code when you are checking out and your donation will be doubled. If you want to donate to my project, click on the banner below. I would love to have some more leveled readers for my classroom!

Freebie Friday: Addition Story Problems

The view from my classroom door this morning!

Here is another activity that I created to go with our life cycles unit. I hope you all have a great Friday! 

Addition Story Problems

This activity sheet focuses on the Kindergarten Common Core Standard K.OA.2 (solve addition and subtraction word problems, and add and subtract within 10 by using objects or drawings to represent the problem). I read the story problems aloud to my kinders and they drew a picture to represent the story problem in each box. Then they wrote the addition problem to go along with their drawing.

Please leave me a quick comment if you download this freebie!

Summer Plans Linky Party

Lori at Fun for First is having a linky party about our summer projects and fun plans. I love linky parties so I had to join. It also got me thinking about setting down some concrete plans since we only have 26 school days left! Woo Hoo!!

Summer Projects:
1) Create some activities for my newly opened TpT store

2) Create some of the cute ideas I have pinned on my Pinterest boards

3) Wipe down the baseboards in my house 

4) Dive deeper into the Common Core standards 

Summer Fun:

1) Going on a vacation with my sweet husband (unsure of where at this point)

2) Spending some time with my toes in the sand at the beach with a great friend in June 

3) Read some of the great books I have been hearing about

Learning About Life Cycles

I have created a few more things to use during my insects/life cycles unit. During this unit, I start by teaching about insect life cycles and then work my way into other animal lifecycles like frogs and alligators.

To end this unit, we go on a field trip to learn more about animal lifecycles. This field trip lets the kinders learn about pond animals and their life cycles. They also get to visit a butterfly house and go on a row boat ride of the swamp. It is a fun and exciting time!

Bug Punctuation Sort

This is an activity that my small groups will be using to practice naming ending punctuation sounds and putting the correct punctuation at the end of a sentence.

Frogs CVC words activity sheet

This activity sheet has the kids practice sounding out simple CVC words. I still have kids that are struggling with hearing all the sounds in words. This is an important skill for their writing so I wanted to give them more practice.

Frogs Long Vowel Sort

This is a game I created to use with my small groups. It has frogs that the kids sort onto the correct long vowel log. It could also be introduced whole group and played in a literacy center/box.

I hope you can use some of these activities as well! If you download them, please leave me a comment! They make my day!

Freebie Friday: Addition Sheet with Counters

TGIF! Let's just say that I am thoroughly exhausted from the week back at school after Spring Break. Monday was pretty calm, but the kinders have gotten their speed back as the week moved on. To top it all off, today was Kite Day at our school so we had 125+ kinders attempting to fly kites on the playground without any wind. Just imagine all the complaining I got to hear! It was rather exhausting exciting!

In other news, I created and posted this freebie to TpT. This activity sheet is downloadable from my TpT store. If you are not already following my TpT store, I would love it if you would. Also, please rate anything that you download. Thanks so much!!

Bugs Addition Sheet with Counters

5 Things I'm Loving in April

Jodi at Fun in First is having a linky party about 5 things you are loving in April. Spring is my favorite time of year so this is the perfect linky party for me to join!

1) Over 100 followers! I am so excited. I never thought I would have this many followers in the seven months since I started my blog. The encouraging comments you have given me have meant so much to me.


2) Pinterest! I am loving all the new pins that I find daily. I only wish that I had access to Pinterest at school, but it is blocked...YUCK!

3) The spring weather! It has been nice and warm here in SC and mostly sunny. The warmest day we have had so far was 91 degrees but most days have been between 70 and 85 degrees...perfect spring weather!

4) Flip flops! I love being able to pull mine out of the closet. They are my go-to shoes for spring and summer! Now my feet can get some sun and I can show off my cute pedicure!

5) Only 31 days of school left! I love this group of sweet kinders but I am looking forward to summer break too.

Spring Break Recap & The Opening of My TpT store!

Today was my first day back at school after having last week off for Spring Break. I had a wonderful Spring Break! I went to Easter services with my family. 

Me on Easter Sunday

I got some much needed rest and of course didn't get to do everything on my to-do list. I spent some time with family and friends, did some shopping, and read a new book I have been wanting to read for months. To top it off my hubby and I spent the weekend at the beach. It was fabulous!!

In other news, I have finally opened my TpT store after much persistence from my friends and family. I have posted a free addition sheet with counters that I made for my kinders to use today as we came back from Spring Break.  


While I was on Spring Break, I created and posted my first unit to TpT called Lovely Ladybugs. I used Scrappin Doodles clipart and I have to charge for my unit to be able to use it. I hope you will hop over to TpT and check out my unit. It is specially priced for the until Friday April 20th for $2.00. After that, it will be $4.00. There are literacy and math activities included in the unit. Please click on the link below to go to my store. I would also LOVE it if you would follow me on TpT! It would mean so much to me!

Going Buggy

When we come back from Spring Break, we will begin our life cycles unit. We are beginning our unit with insects. I absolutely can't stand real insects but love teaching about them...CrAzY right?! Here are some activities that I cooked up so far this week to go along with our insects/life cycles unit.

Bugs Subtraction activity sheet with counters

This activity sheet is similar to the one I created for Easter. It has counters at the bottom that the kids can use to subtract or they can do it without the counters if they are ready. 

Bugs Counting activity sheet (up to 20)

This activity sheet is a simple one that has kids practice counting sets up to 20 and writing the correct number. Recalling a number is a skill that some of my younger kinders are still have trouble with.

Here are some activity sheets I created when I was teaching first grade. I hope some of my first grade friends will be able to use these! 

1 digit addition bugs activity sheet (sums up to 18)

Bugs ABC order activity sheet

Tag! I'm It!

Today is my first day of Spring Break! It was nice to have the day to myself to do some things I haven't gotten done over the past week and thanks to Erin at Creating & Teaching I have been tagged!

Here are the questions from Erin that I need to answer:

1. Meals or snacks? Meals usually because I don't have a lot of time for snacking, but during summer break I find myself snacking more often...

2. Soda or water? I LOVE sodas but I try to limit myself to 1 or 2 per day and I do drink several bottles of water per day so I would say both!

3. Mountains or beaches? Mountains are where I love to be but the beach is much closer to home so I go there more often!

4. Cats or dogs? Dogs (my hubby is allergic to cats)

5. Chocolate or Vanilla? Vanilla...strangely enough I am not a big fan of chocolate...

6. Starbucks or Dunkin Donuts? Neither...I am not a coffee drinker!

7. Movie theater or renting? Renting. We are an hour away from the nearest movie theater so I don't go very often...

8. Pool or ocean? Pool usually because it is closer to home for me.

9. Car or SUV? SUV but a small one...

10. Early bird or Night Owl? Early bird...I get so much more accomplished in the mornings and by mid-afternoon I am DONE!! I love to do important things in the morning because I am freshest then.


Here are my 10 tags in random order!
Kindergarten Hoppenings
Mrs. Lee's Kindergarten
Kindergarten Korner
Stickers, Scissors, and Smiles
Sprinkles to Kindergarten
KinderZoo
Traditions, Laughter & Happily Ever After
Pocket Full of Kinders 
Criss-Cross Applesauce
Rowdy in First Grade 

Here are my 10 questions for you:
1 - What is your favorite dessert?
2 - What is your favorite theme to teach?
3 -  What is your favorite color?
4 - What ice cream flavor is your favorite?
5 - Where is your dream vacation spot?
6 - How many school days do you have until summer vacation?
7 - What is your favorite thing to do on the weekend?
8 - What current fashion trend are you loving right now?
9 - What are you looking forward to doing this summer?
10 - Which kind of jewelry do you prefer (gold or silver)?


~Just in case you don't know the rules, here's what you do. You answer my ten questions on your blog. List 10 questions you would like to have answered and tag 10 more people. Be sure to leave a comment on their blog that they have been tagged.

What I'm Loving Wednesday

Here is what I am loving today!

1) My spring break is only 2 days away!! YAH! I can't wait for some rest and relaxation. A beach day is definitely in the forecast!

2) Easter! I love this special time of year!

3) Blogging! I am loving all the new people I am meeting in this wonderful virtual world!

4) Hugs from my sweet kinders! I have a couple of kinders this year who hug me every chance they get. They always bring a smile to my face!

5) That my Donors Choose project got fully funded! Thanks to some generous donations and a matching grant, my kinders and I will be getting new leveled readers. I am so very excited and they are too even though I don't think they really understand yet...

6) That my little blog now has 98 followers! I can't believe that I have almost a hundred followers in just the few months that I have been blogging! WOW! You all are fantastic!

So what are you loving today??

Whew...Monday is OVER!

Well today was definitely Monday in my classroom. We had our 3rd nine weeks awards programs this morning which disrupted our normal schedule. Today our temperature outside set a new record of 91 degrees which made recess very interesting. My kinders were ready to come inside almost as quickly as they got outside. I am just so glad to say that the school day is finally OVER! Now we only have 4 more school days until Spring Break! Thank goodness!

This week I am doing Easter activities with my kinders. I am using the activities I have shared with you this week. My kinders loved the Easter syllable sort they did today during small group time. I hope you all are having a great start to April!

BTW: This is where I am dreaming of being! I plan to spend some time here next week on Spring Break!

Currently for April

Here's my April Currently that Farley puts on each month. Isn't it always fun? Thank you Farley for this fun link up.