School is Cool ~ Back to School Activity

It's not 'Back to School' down here in Australia. 

We are in the middle of our school year.

I thought I might share an activity that I have added to my 

Kissing Hand pack.

I love making Chester 
(you can see my activity HERE)
 with my little ones but I especially liked this activity because it brightens the classroom at the beginning of the year.

For the first half of the day, I do Reading Recovery. 

After that I take classes Kinder to Year 2.

 I did the same craft activity with all the classes but changed the writing activity.

For the pattern around the edge, 
I had the students do a 2, 3, 4 or 5 colour pattern. 

There you are... Maths!

I did this writing activity with Year 1 and Year 2

I changed the Worksheet for my Kinders.


Most of the kids played it safe with a 2 colour pattern but
 I was impressed with the 5 colour pattern that this little kinder did.

 I have added this activity and more to my 

Kissing Hand pack available on TPT

For my other activities about the kissing hand go HERE.

If you have already purchased this pack, you can download it again to get the extra activities.

 

Happy Teaching

Swap, Share, Give ~ A Linky From 'Down Under'!

There are many talented teachers all around the world and I consider myself so lucky to make many friendships and connections through the blogging world.

Today I get to link up with my special and very talented Aussie friends for this Swap, Share, Give Linky from Down Under.

The lovely Bec over at Books Bugs & Boxes is hosting this linky.

What is it?

Swap
Each of us (Aussies) have partnered with another Aussie
and swapped a product. 
We try out the product and share it with you to let you know how it works and what we thought of it.

Share
A present for you...we offer you a product for free.

Give
This is the BEST part. We will be giving away all the awesome products that we have swapped. 

* SWAP *

I am teaming up with Shanyn from 

Coffee Kids and Compulsive lists.

Shanyn has so many amazing products in her TPT Store, it was hard for me to choose one.

I chose 

Building Better Sentences 

and WOW what a fantastic product!

Do you struggle to get your students to write sentences that are not

B-O-R-I-N-G?

You probably spend time on it every day.

Well this product is just the thing to help.

Shanyn has put together a collection of worksheets to help your students think about the sentences they write.

 She has broken the activity in three easy parts,

Simple   Bigger   Better!

 We started with a Simple Sentence. 

I see my teddy.

We talked about making the sentence 

Bigger  by adding more information 

 I see my teddy on the bed.

Then we made the sentence Better by adding adjectives.

 I see my shaggy brown teddy on the bed.

Here are some the sentences my students did using Shanyn's worksheets. 

I must say I was impressed with the results.

Building Better Sentences 
would be a fantastic activity for a writing station.

And what makes it even better, it's

 NO PREP!

Easy peasy, just print and do.

Thank you for sharing this great product with me, Shanyn.

* SHARE *

Learning About Numbers to 10 Freebie.
Here are some No Prep Worksheets to help your little ones count and recognise numbers to 10

You can download your free copy HERE

* GIVE *

Would you like to win a copy of Shanyn's Building Better Sentences pack?
Enter our Giveaway to win a copy of this pack as well as a copy of all the products swapped! 

Simply follow each of our stores 

It's that easy!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Corduroy

I have always loved Teddy bears. 

I still have a teddy that I got when I was eight years old. 

He looks a little shaggy but he takes pride of place in my bedroom.

I love doing a Teddy Bear theme with my children at school. It is always so much fun. I enjoy it as much as the kids. 

I know I am still a kid at heart.

This year I did some fun activities for 

Corduroy 

and 

A Pocket for Corduroy 

by Don Freeman. 

We did a Text to self connection for Corduroy.

In the story, Lisa wants her Mum to buy Corduroy but her Mother tells her that she has already spent enough money.

So Lisa went home and got the money from her piggy bank.

I used this as an opportunity to discuss with the children about working and saving to buy the things that we want.

We talked about something special the children would like to buy and what jobs they could do at home to earn some pocket money.

I loved reading some of their responses.

We also made Corduroy. 

I let the children choose the colour of the overalls for their Corduroy.

After we read A pocket for Corduroy, 

the children gave their Corduroy a pocket and put his name in the pocket.

After reading the stories, 

we noticed that Corduroy has a favourite saying,

I've always wanted...

We did this text to self connection activity.

The children wrote  something Corduroy always wanted and then they wrote something they have always wanted.

We did lots of other fun activities. 

I have just posted my Corduroy pack on Teachers Pay Teachers if you would like to take a peak HERE

By the way...

There is a big Back to School sale happening at TPT on 

August 4th & 5th.

You can get up to 28% off so now is the time to go shopping.

Happy shopping 

and

Happy teaching!