Adorable Preschool or Kindergarten Math Game

I was perusing around Pinterest this morning and found this adorable game.  I put in the title Preschool or Kindergarten, but it really can be used for older students as well.

Fun fine motor math game

It in from the site called "Pre-K Pages" and I so wish I was in the classroom right now to try it.








What little ones would not LOVE this??  By squeezing the tennis ball, the student is strengthening those all important hand muscles needed for fine motor activities and writing.

Common Core Posters

I hope you like the new posters I made for the Kindergarten Common Core Math Standards.  I tried to make them bright and colorful to draw attention in a quick and easy manner by the reader.  I think they will be a fun addition to your hallway or classroom bulletin boards.

You can find them in my TpT store by clicking on the link: Common Core Posters

If the posters are popular, or if anyone wants, I can make them for other grades as well.  Each domain has it's own background, so it is easy to find which ones go together. Plus, there is a blank of one each so you can write any of your own that you need!

I'd love feedback from anyone who wants to leave it, either here or in my store; I am still new to the process so all constructive criticism, good and bad, is welcome.  I want to make products that meet the needs of my fellow teachers!

I spent my afternoon today visiting a local winery; it's "barrel tasting" weekend around the state and each winery is offering a taste of two wines that are still in process.  It's neat to get to try them now, then to go back when they are ready and see the difference time can make.  Hope you all had a nice Saturday!

Kathy

Literature-Based Activity

Thought today I'd share an activity I did with my three 2 yr old classes and two 3 yr old classes. Those ages are not quite right at this point in the school year. My older 3s all turned 4 by March, and my oldest 2s were all 3 by March as well. But the school I teach at we call the kids by their age groups in September...not what age they currently are. Make sense? Okay...on my way to work each morning I pass by the most beautiful field of red flowers. They look like the poppy flower the veterans give out when you make a donation. I can't get a close enough picture of them to show here. I may drive by over the weekend and see if I can pull over to take a picture.

This past week some yellow flowers have started blooming as well. These flowers inspired me to bring out one of my favorite books :

After reading the story, we sang a cute song that I heard on an episode of Barney when my own kids were small. It's called "Five Little Butterflies." I made a flannel board set of butterflies and flowers for them to fly around.




The kids LOVE counting backwards for me as I "pick" the flowers off the board at the end of the song.







Our activity for the lesson was picking carrots from my carrot garden. I have a carrot pattern, probably came from a Mailbox Magazine at some point, that I copied on orange construction paper. I then wrote a numeral from 0 to 15 on each carrot & laminated them. Added cute little green toppers and instant carrot garden. I asked the kids to sit on the outside of the circle time rug, and scattered the carrots upside down in the "garden." Each child got a turn to pick a carrot, tell the class what numeral is on the carrot, then they replanted it. They had so much fun!!! Even my youngest students, who are all mid 2yo now, had fun picking carrots. If a student did not know the numeral, they were able to ask their class for help.

My oldest class had 15 students in attendance that day, so they each kept their carrot instead of replanting. They then lined them selves up in number order! I held the extra carrot to fill in the spot.








Edit: I tried to go this weekend and get a picture of the beautiful field but there was no where to pull over to get the shot. We decided to go into the public area and walk along the trails. I was hoping to find a way over to the fields but storms prevented us from getting that far. Only got a tiny bit wet on the way to the car! But I was able to find one lonely red flower along the way - I am sure this flower is what is making my drive such a beautiful one!

"Breaking" 5

Tuesday the Pre-K classes did a one-day lesson on "breaking" numbers. AKA decomposing numbers.  The same person who I got the "making" number post-it idea inspired this lesson as well.


Before the lesson, I prepped the chart.

The first class is the younger of the two, so I wrote the facts up.  The second, older class has one without the facts.

Six students were chosen to place a post-it in each square, each student completing a row.  To get more involved, two additional students were chosen to "break" the row of 5.  The squares are pre-drawn so they can "see" what is missing.  Similar to putting an "X" on the ones we are breaking off in the original lesson I read.  One student broke off a piece of the row, and another fills in "how many are left." (The older class wrote the whole fact.)

Just as an introduction, I showed them how we can reverse the addition and subtraction sentences to make them "family." Using the language that will be oh so important in Kindergarten!!



Their hands-on activity was using cube trains to break apart the numbers.  The older class wrote on individual white boards while the younger class just used the manipulatives.  I was able to get a picture of the chart, then the battery on my camera died.  But you get the idea!

Kindergarten Workstations

I am very excited. I had 4 pages views a couple days ago!! If you are stopping by please leave me a comment and say hi!!!

Here is a snippet of my kindergarten math workstations for Tuesday.  I only see them once this week since we were off on Monday.

This is the chart they work off of.  Our mini lesson (cute pic of a teacher reading to the kids) was a review on how to use the chart.  We have a couple new students that joined us from the after school program next door that closed last week.  So I wanted to make sure they could follow along with us.

The students had 3 "MUST DO" activities: it is up to them to make sure they visit all 3 color coded tables in the time allotted.  Most days they do really well with this, others need a bit of reminding (like the girls when there is a cool art-type activity, some can stay the whole time at the one without realizing it.)

Yellow was a review of base 10. 

The students had to find the base 10 card that matched the number on the recording sheet.  They had to figure out what the number was, record it, then find the match to check if they were correct.

Activity from: Anna at Crazy for First Grade






Green was a cute ladybug game. 

This was a quick activity.  There is a 3 on the green chart card, showing the students that only 3 may be there at one time.

Activity from somewhere in the blog world.  The author did not put her name on the pages. :( If I see it again I will link back!

Blue was a review of positional words. 

This is an old activity from Mailbox Magazine.  The students had to cut and collate the books, then used red stamper to put thumbprint ladybugs where the words on each page told them to.









They also get two "May Dos," activities that are only to be done if they complete all their "Must Dos" or if all the must dos are full.  One is play oriented, building with blocks.  The other is for my hanging pocket chart.  I have a spot on the wall that I can attach ziplocs with velcro.   I switch up what is in the bag, and it only gets put out when the kindergarteners come.  Otherwise my 2s will destroy it. :)  No more than two students may work here at the same time.  Hence the "2" on the red packet chart.

Here are two students working together to put pictures in order from 1 to 100.




If you get through ALL of the above, what can I do then Ms. Kathy?  The chart tells them.  Most often it is to get a book from the Reading Center.  I keep a large selection of Lego magazines & catalogs so the boys love to get through their work to get the chance to look at them.

Then we gather together again at the end to talk about our time together.  This system works really well for my students.  I can use it for all workstations OR I can use it for teaching.  There is a picture of ME when they have to come to me for their small group lesson.  I have them split into groups so I call the group names or use a timer/bell to facilitate the change.