Lil FREEBIE for ya!

Last year my school district purchased a subscription to Book Flix.  I LOVE this site!  If you are not familiar with the site, it has about 70 popular titles that your students can watch/listen to as You Tube type videos.  There is also a non-fiction title that accompanies the first title.  That story can be read aloud or read silently.  I can't say enough about the site.  It is really great for ELL students and building backgrounds.  Here is a link to the website and a free trial.  Before we bought the subscription, I was able to access the site through my local public library website.  See if one in your area has it available.  You will not be disappointed ;)



Thanks for stopping!

Kristi

Wow! It's been about a minute since I last posted.  What can I say life has definitely gotten in the way.  In June I was diagnosed with breast cancer.  I suppose you could call it a "mild case" as I only needed a couple of lumpectomies and will start radiation next week.  I was determined to make sure this didn't ruin my summer, and I succeeded!  I had so much fun with my friends and my family, it was awesome.  I also really, truly took a break from work.  I didn't take any classes, I didn't go to any workshops, I didn't make anything for my tpt store, I barely even looked at pinterest, I only did my contracted summer work....like I said, it was awesome!!

I'm thinking this was a pretty great philosophy as I feel so ready to tackle this school year.  We just finished our first week back (3 days with kiddos) and I feel so on top of things.  I'm more organized and ready to roll!! 

I'm posting this project I made last year for September 11.  I work with really young kiddos, K and 2 ELL students.  I really don't talk about it with my K students, but I can't ignore it with my 2nd graders.  This was too big of a life changing event.  That being said, I am very careful about HOW I discuss this with 2nd graders.  The story Fireboat by Maira Kallman does such an awesome job of giving a sense of chaos of that day, but doesn't focus on the horror.  It is also an inspiring, true story.  My students love it!!



Some other great selections are: New York's Bravest by Mary Pope Osbourne, Fourteen Cows for America by Carmen Agra Deedy, and The Man Who Walked Between the Towers by Mordicai Gerstein.  There are TONS of other books about this topic, but these are some of my favorites.  New York's Bravest and The Man Who Walked Between the Towers, aren't even about 9/11, but they briefly mention it at the end of the stories.  They make great springboards for a discussion.  There are activities for these 4 books in this activity plan.    New York is my favorite place in the world to visit, so I am always reading books about it to my kiddos. Let me know if you have any other books you enjoy!

Have a great school year!!!

Wow, I have seriously been delinquent about posting on this blog!  The weather here has been, in a word: horrible!!!!  If anyone reading this blog can find me a teaching job somewhere warm, please let me know ;)  Right now it is blowing snow and cold and miserable.  Okay, no more whining about the weather, I truly can't stand whiners!!

I digress.  One thing I love about this time of year is Valentine's Day.  I didn't love Valentine's day as a single gal.   However,please don't be under the impression that I married some Casanova who spoils me rotten on V-day!  I married the "run to Target on my way home from work" guy, who helps himself to a handful from the bag of Twizzlers he bought me.  True Romance!!

I love Valentine's day because when I pull out my decorations, I know that spring isn't tooo far away, kinda like the end of the winter tunnel.  I also love checking out pinterest for some really cute Valentine's to send my kids to school with.  I figure I only have a couple more years of sending Valentines, so go big or go home!

I'm attaching links to a couple of my fave Valentine Activites from my TPT store.  If you haven't read the story Somebody Loves You, Mr. Hatch please do so immediately!  It is so cute, and it gets me a little choked up as well.  There are activities to go with The Valentine Bears by Eve Bunting, another super cute V-day book.

Enjoy!  Stay Warm!!

Kristi

Last Day before Winter Break!!!  So totally excited to have 2 weeks to totally kick back.  Even though I'm sure I'll be spending some time working on ELA  stuff for next year.  Much more fun to do that in pajamas with no make-up on!

Today we had an Ugly Sweater Day for the teachers.  I know,  that seems redundant :)  But I figured out why teachers wear ugly seasonal sweaters....little kids LOVE them!!  I got more compliments on my Christmas bulb blinking earrings than on anything I've worn all year.  And one of them was broken!  It was a fun day.  I love occasions like that, that bring the whole staff together for a laugh.

I'm attaching photos of a bulletin board I did for December.  I got the idea from this gingerbread house activity I purchased from Primary World on TPT.  My kiddos loved it and I thought it turned out really cute.  For the gingerbread house in the center, I just traced one projected onto butcher paper.  The only bummer is that it was too big for the laminator, I don't think it will survive the take-down :(

Just a little tip on buying student gifts.  I finally wised up and bought them in August when school supplies are dirt cheap.  I gave them crayons, glue, and a glue stick.  All-in-all less than $1.00 each when bought in August.  Stores should totally do back-to-school pricing again in Dec. or Jan.  They would clean up.  All that stuff needs to be replenished at some point during the year.   Plus, my kiddos were totes grateful :)  Such sweeties!




That is all for now!  Have a great Christmas!

Kristi

I'm really on a roll now! 

One week closer to winter break!  Ahhhh!  My children have no school tomorrow for a teacher institute, so I decided to take the day off.  I am throwing a Christmas Party for the 2 of them and their friends.  I'll be entertaining about 15 8-10 year old boys for a couple of hours.  I have lots of things planned, but we will see how it goes.   I used to volunteer to be the party mom for my kids' classes, but then I realized I hate taking a day off from working with kids, to work with a different group of kids.  But here I go again :)  My kids are really looking forward to it, so hopefully it will be fun.

I'm posting this free little reader I made last year to go along with the story, Mr. Willowby's Christmas Tree.  Super cute story, I did it with firsties last year, but I think it would be fine and dandy for kinders or 2nd as well.  What the heck, it's free!  I hope your kiddies enjoy it.  Here is a link to the book on Amazon.  141 Reviewers can't be wrong!!



:)

Kristi

Blog #2...not too shabby! 
 
We are working on creating a unit on weather, storms and seasons for second grade.  It is a ton of work, but also super exciting.  I spend a lot of time looking for materials to use, which means lots of time on 2 of my fave websites: amazon and teacherspayteachers :)
 
I found this book, The Story of Snow by Mark Cassino.  It is a great non-fiction read about how snowflakes are formed.  It has great pictures and just the right amount of words.  Its tough to read non-fiction books aloud when they are super long.  I see the eyes of my kiddos glazing over.  This one is very good and I learned a lot of new info too!
 
My only boo-hoo is that I don't know if I will get to do this with my kiddos since we will be in the midst of language proficiency testing :(  BOO!!  At any rate, I thought it was pretty cool.
 
Check it out here
 

   

 

 

Thanks a bunch for stopping by :)

 

Kristi

My first post on this blog :)

In order to get the ball rolling on this blog, I'm going to share something easy I worked on this week.

SECRET SANTAS!  I'm on the social/morale committee in my building and love creating fun little things to brighten someone's day in the building.  Teachers here (just like everywhere) are overworked and feeling the pain of implementing CCSS (is that a 4 letter word yet?!).

Anyways, I used to think of Secret Santas as just one more thing to do during an already crazy month.  Plus one year I drew the name of the only male participant who listed his hobbies as wordworking...wtf do you do with that?  I vowed I wouldn't ever do SS again, but got dragged back in when I started in a new building.  I didn't want to seem like a Scrooge.

This year we made a little survey for participants to fill out.  This way the Secret Santa had a few hints about their pick.  You can pick it up for free at my tpt store .

I also made this cute little packaging, which was inspired by something my PIC (partner in crime) found on Pinterest.  I don't have the original link, please let me know if you know who originated this little cutie.  Little side note, I numbered each participant on a sheet of paper, and wrote their number very tiny on the outside of their folded survey.  That way I could make sure no one picked themselves before they 'unwrapped' their package :)  It was a hit!

Thanks for stopping by my blog!  Enjoy!!