Veterans Day Resources and Activities for Kinders

Veterans Day is approaching quickly! How can it be November already? 

We've had warmer than normal weather here in Illinois, making me just a bit in denial about what month it actually is! 

Anyway, I wanted to share some resources and activities that you can do with your littles in the upcoming week in celebration of all Veterans who have and do serve our country.

A great way to introduce Veterans Day to your kids is with this short six-minute video of Michelle Obama & The Penguins of Madagascar: 

Continue to reinforce what Veterans Day means with a Build-Your-Own Veterans Day Emergent Reader that will allow you to pick and choose which pages you include for your students. 

There are 21 pages to choose from. Here are what some of them look like:

Have your students work on the words "We are..." or "I remember" or mix each page up and alternate!

Here are some other Veterans Day themed picture books that you can use as read alouds. Hero Mom & Hero Dad are my personal favorites, along with The Poppy Lady. But they are all very good.

If you love FREE resources, you can print out my Veterans Day Roll-Add-Color sheets. There are three available. Simply give your students a pair of dice. Have them roll the dice, add the numbers together, and color the area in the picture that has the answer. 

I've also marked down my Veterans Day BUNDLE of Activities, which includes two different emergent readers, Veterans Day mazes, Posters & Pocket Chart Pieces, Color-By activity sheets, ABC Order Practice, & more! 

The ABC Order Activity Sheets that are included in the bundle are kept very simple, with none of the words repeating the first letter. I highly recommend this activity for your more advanced students or as a fast finisher activity. 

 Students can also get some number practice in with a Counting Poppies Math Emergent Reader. There are two versions of this math reader so that you can choose which better meets the needs of your kiddos! 

 I found some adorable craft ideas on Pinterest that your littles can create. 

These Paper Poppies are easy to make and serve well as a visual reminder of why we celebrate.

 Another one I really liked is a little bit messy, but the kids will remember it forever...hand-shaped flags! This is a good one to bring parents in to help with. You can even make it into a card to give to a Veteran.

A BIG Thank You to all Veterans out there. We look forward to celebrating you on November 11th! 

Thanks for letting me share these activities with you. I hope your littles love and enjoy them. I also hope they make your teacher life & prep just a tad bit easier!

PIN ME FOR LATER!...

Til next time,

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Bek

Gingerbread Man Emergent Readers, Scented Play Dough Gifts, Crafts, & more!

The Gingerbread Man is one of my favorite units of the year! I'm going to give you a handful of gingerbread ideas today, including: three Gingerbread Man emergent readers that you can use with your kiddos, a recipe for some Gingerbread scented play dough, a video from my favorite YouTube channel for kids, & a couple of simple crafts.

**This post may contain affiliate links.**

Let's start with the emergent readers first. One of them covers the fairy tale story itself, one uses manipulative printouts to practice positional words, and one teaches students the directions left and right.

1) The Story of The Gingerbread Man

2) The Gingerbread Man Positional Words Practice

 Students won't even realize that you've snuck some positional word practice into the lesson as they work on building their reading skills with this interactive emergent reader! 

A printable Gingerbread Man manipulative moves around on the pages of the book.

Activity mats are also included to use at your centers. Glue corresponding mats back to back and laminate them so that on one side students will have a guide, and on the other, they will be able to practice on their own with the manipulatives. They are a great way for students to self check what they know!

 3) The Gingerbread Man: Left or Right?

This fun Gingerbread Man reader will take students visually through the story while practicing right and left directions. It also focuses on the sight words "my" "little" "is" "to" "the" "of" and repeats them on every page of the book.

Have your kiddos trace the dotted arrows on each page so they are focusing on which way each direction goes. 

The last page lets them draw a picture of themselves, as the Gingerbread Man stands to the left of them.

All of these readers can also be found in a large Gingerbread Man Bundle of 21 math and literacy activities that includes 230 Gingerbread Man related pages to print for your kiddos. Wow!

Here's a sneak peek at some of the other activities included.

There's over 230 pages total to print!! 

Cool School is one of my favorite YouTube channels for Kindergarten. Here is Cool School's version of the story of the gingerbread man!

Also, here is a recipe for making gingerbread smelling play dough. I especially like the Christmas gift idea! Check it out:

Here are some cute Gingerbread Man crafts that are easy to set up and simple to do. 

I like the tray idea for this first craft. It's way less messier than putting the items into individual bowls or cups!

I love this next one... A gingerbread man ornament craft. Simple enough to do individually at a center!

Thanks for letting me share these with you. I hope your littles love and enjoy them. I also hope they make your teaching life just a tad bit easier! 

PIN ME FOR LATER!... 

-Til next time

       

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Bek

Doodle It Phonics: Interactive Drawing Notebook & Phonics Interactive Poetry Notebook

We're all about doodling lately. Are your kiddos into it, too? Doodling with regular pencils. Doodling with scented pencils. Doodling with scented crayons, and those Mr. Sketch gel crayons and markers of all kinds... Basically any type of writing utensil they can get their hands on, they're using it to doodle! 

**This post may contain affiliate links.**

So I thought I'd meet them where they're at with their interest in doodling, and find a way to sneak some fun phonics practice into their doodle time. Which leads me to introduce Doodle-It Phonics! A doodling notebook that draws (haha, bad mom joke!) a kid's focus and attention to phonics while letting them exercise and explore their creative side at the same time.

Doodle-It can be used as individual worksheets, or it can also be glued into a composition or regular notebook to create an interactive book that students can flip through time and time again. It covers a wide range of phonics. It includes Alphabet, CVC & Rhyming, Digraphs, Blends, & Long Vowel practice.

There are two ways you can have your learners doodle... they can use guided doodling version, or they can jump right into it and try it on their own. The guided version helps them write words and shows a picture so that they can see a visual of the word and either doodle their own version of the object or doodle one like the picture. They can doodle the word as well! Instructions and examples are included in the download.

You decide how you want to use this resource. You can use the 180 pages here and there as you need them, or you can pick and choose what sounds you're currently working on and create a spiral or stapled notebook for students to hang on to. If you use a 3 prong folder, you can continue to add to it all throughout the year!

You'll notice that on the guided doodling version, students have the option to repeat the picture already shown, or they could also draw their own. At this age, some students don't know where to start when it comes to drawing, so I wanted to make sure that even reluctant drawers had a starting place...even if it meant just attempting to doodle the picture already shown. 

Get Doodle-It HERE.

Another interactive Phonics notebook that I use with my kids is this Phonics Poetry Notebook that includes original poetry from my good friend from Let's Learn S'more. 

This Phonics Poetry Notebook gives kids a hands-on approach to learning and practicing their reading skills. There are four versions included for each focus. One version has students writing in the various vowels, diphthongs, blends, or digraphs. The other doesn't. And both of these come in either a less-ink, color-me option or a full color option.

Students cut these out on the solid line and glue them in a composition or spiral notebook, which allows them to continually review prior ones completed! Woohoo! 

Labels are an option that are also included to put on the cover. 

Here's what's covered in this book. Pick and choose what you need:

The Phonics Poetry Book is also available in a Poetry Books Big Bundle:

The bundle includes five different types of poetry books that you can mix and match or do separately. 

Get the Poetry Books Big Bundle HERE.

Well, that's a phonics overload for today. Thanks for letting me share these with you. I hope your littles love and enjoy them. I also hope they make your teaching life just a tad bit easier! 

-Til next time

       

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Bek

Bats - Nocturnal Animals Differentiated Readers {Plus a FREEBIE!}

With fall upon us and Halloween right around the corner, I'd like to show you some differentiated 'I Am a Bat' emergent readers. And then I have a FREE DOWNLOAD you can try out if you haven't already! 

**This post may contain affiliate links.**

While you really can use these readers at any time of year, I tend to do them around our Halloween and Nocturnal Animals units. I have many animal readers in this series, but I'm only going to highlight the bat readers today! 

So this is what the cover looks like. It's the same for all three levels of the reader. 

Here's what it looks like full size. Each page of the book comes two-to-a-page so that you can easily print the books using the collate and staple options on your copy machine. Then use a paper cutter to quickly slice between the books and just like magic, they're already assembled for you!

Meet your students right where they're at with three differentiated levels to choose from. Your kiddos can highlight any sight words, chunks, or blends that you are currently working on.

Learn some unique facts about bats that many people don't know!


Learn what they eat and how they sleep.

The last page is one of my favorites. It's included in all of the readers of this series. Students write down a list of the favorite things they learned while reading the book! It's a great way to incorporate writing practice. This picture is from a set of rabbit readers, and I just happened to have it handy to show you. This is how the bat books end as well.

Let me show you two ways you can get this bats reader set.

You can get this differentiated reader by itself here:

I Am a Bat Emergent Readers

 Or you can get it in a bundle with other readers:

Nocturnal Animals Emergent Readers

Six readers, all about nocturnal animals, are included in this bundle.

Remember reading that book when you were a kid, about the old lady who swallowed a fly? Well, guess what? She swallows a lot more things now, including bats! My students LOVE when I pull this book out. I made some activities and centers to go along with this book.

There was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Bat Activities

 Now, let me show you a FREE DOWNLOAD you can get right now that will give you an opportunity to try those differentiated readers out!

This is the I Am an Alligator set. 

It's set up exactly like the bat readers, only your students will be learning about alligators instead! Oh my! 

Try this series FREE right here:

I Am an Alligator Differentiated Readers

Don't forget to leave a rating. I enjoy reading your feedback and hearing what you think!

-Til next time

       

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Bek