Groundhog Day Activities for First Grade!

Hello First Grade Gallery friends!

I'm just checking in to say hi with a greeting for Groundhog Day! I'm still here! My first grade peeps, you know you always have a special place in my heart! Once upon a time, a few short years ago, there were very few blogs to be read. Now, every day it seems a new fantastic blog begins and well... I follow so many, it's hard to keep up with them all! Maybe you feel the same way.  It's also hard to find the time to post here, there and everywhere!

Did you have fun celebrating Groundhog Day?

 I used to love those special days with my firsties! 
There's nothing like a holiday in first grade! 

 This little guy is a favorite project I do with my class every year.

You can make him with a bunch of circles and some rectangles for the teeth!
 Easy peasy!

 

 Please stop by soon and say hello!
You can keep up with my latest adventures at Creative Lesson Cafe!

 I'm also blogging with some of my sweet friends at a new collaborative blog, Primary Powers!

Click on either of the buttons to head on over!

 So Phil says six more weeks of winter...We can do this!

Fall Sequencing Fun!

Happy (almost) Fall one and all! I've had lots of requests from my first grade teacher friends and SLPs for more sequencing sets so I thought I'd make a fun activity for a favorite Fall read aloud! 

I just LOVE this book!

If you are new to sequencing sets, all you do is print the picture cards, ordinal number cards and number cards on cardstock and laminate them. They may be used as retelling sticks or placed in a pocket chart for center time or a whole-group activity.

I have displayed them on a whiteboard to rearrange as we read the story and also as a cut and paste onto construction paper sequencing activity. My second graders will use the writing pages to complete a written summary using transitional words and phrases.

Lucille Colandro's Old Lady... series of books are perfect for thematic units!

 I hope you will love this set my friends! 

 You can click on the pictures to see it at my shop.

  Because it's new, it will be just $1.50 for the next 24 hours! 

Speaking of OLD LADIES...tomorrow is MY BIRTHDAY! Ha! Boy, those numbers are getting up there quickly! 

How does this keep happening?

It's a work day of course, so nothing special is planned, but I think a Starbucks run at lunch with my teamies is on the agenda and maybe dinner out if I'm not too beat from fun Friday hoopla!

You have a fun Friday too!

Saying Goodbye~End of the Year Poem for Parents Freebie!

Ending the school year is bittersweet, especially when it means saying goodbye to the children and families we have grown so close to. Parents trust us to care for, nuture, inspire and protect their precious little ones. During the year, we help them to grow in every way. This sweet little poem is something I like to print on colored paper to send home on the last day inside my student's keepsake boxes!

 Isn't it so precious?

There are a few different font options too!

It is sure to bring tears to your parents' eyes when they read it!

 If you would like a copy, you can download it here! 

For my teacher friends who start in a month other than September, or don't end in June, leave me a comment and I'll post a revision for you!

 You'll want to check back again for the link!

:)

End of the Year Projects~ Keepsake Pizza Box and Memory Book!

Boy this year just flew by! I can't believe that next week we start our end of the year projects! I am sitting here this evening printing the pages I need to make our oh, so cute pizza boxes! This is a tradition of mine and I consider it and the contents inside (like a DVD of class photos) to be my gift to the students and families! 

My mom did a lovely job coloring this example for the photo shoot, don't you think? She had fun making it! Mom comes in every year at this time (and weekly too) to help me. She assembles the boxes and passes out all of the children's treasures I have been saving.

One project from each month and all sorts of goodies like pick sticks, cubby tags and other special items get sent home in the box. The kids have a blast looking through all of their crafts while remembering all of the fun themes we had throughout the year! The parents go crazy when they come home and absolutely LOVE the boxes!

I took a trip out this weekend to Gordon Food Service to pick up some small white boxes. I was happy to walk out of there with 50 boxes for $15.00! Local pizza places will often donate boxes too if you smile and tell them you are a teacher! 

What else is in the box? When you lift the lid, there is a cute page of ABC's through the year. I type up some special things that we have done during the year that begin with that first letter. Inside is a sentence completion page about the year too. I always personalize a special poem for each child to include. All of those pages are in the Pizza Box Craftivity. 

NEW THIS YEAR... I thought it would be really cute to add a slice of pizza to the box in the form of a shape book! 

Presenting...Slices of my Year Memory Book!

As we look back at the year, we will use the brainstorming sheet that is included to generate some ideas for writing on each page of the book. 

There is one page for each slice, or month, of the year! 

Here is how my example turned out:

 It looks good enough to eat! I printed mine in color, but there are black and white covers for the students to color too. Covers are created for Kindergarten, First, Second and Third Graders.

FLASH FREEBIE ALERT!

This brand new item will be free for the next two hours! 

Head over to my store and grab a copy to try out with your class! 

I hope you like it! :)

I like looking back with these kinds of activities as much as the kids do. 

We always end the year feeling wildly accomplished!

Simple Science Experiment~ Dancing Raisins

We had some good fizzy fun with our first "official" science experiment and introduction to our Being a Scientist unit! We dropped some raisins in Sprite and the magic of science excitement filled the room! Head on over to my Creative Lesson Cafe blog to read all about our Dancing Raisins! This is a super simple and fun experiment that would be perfect for firsties!

What are some of your favorite science activities for first graders?

Clock Flowers!

Hello First Grade Gallery friends! Was it the best Teacher Appreciation Week ever for you? I sure hope so! I wanted to share a fun activity we worked on for our May bulletin board! We practiced telling time and made a project at the same time! See how cute they turned out!

I did this with my Second Graders to review time to five minute intervals, but you could easily modify this for your Firsties. The flower pattern is from Amy Lemons time unit. I hope she doesn't mind, because I didn't see the new revision :), but I changed up the craft a bit to make it more of a math station activity to review for MAP testing.

First, I printed some rainbow arrows from Jen at Teaching in the Tongass to use as clock hand manipulatives. I also printed a sheet of digital clocks from Teacher Gems.

I had some great task cards from Rachel Lynette all copied and so I decided to do a scoot activity where each station required the students to model the time with the flower clocks and then use the recording sheet to write the correct answer. I am going to be working on additional sets of task cards because my class just loves to SCOOT! I'll let you know when they are ready!

Once we finished the scoot, whichever task card was on the student's desk was the one they had to show on the clock project. They glued down the clock hands and wrote in the digital time. The digital clock is glued to one leaf.

The kids had a fun time with telling time and now, we have a colorful May Flowers bulletin board!

Life Cycles in the Classroom and a Giveaway

Hello First Grade Friends! Spring has finally sprung and it's time for me to begin some favorite science themes in the classroom! LIFE CYCLES!

I wanted to share some cute new items I've been working on that you may enjoy for your lessons and activities in the coming weeks like this butterfly flap book project!

This PowerPoint would be a great introduction for your unit and will go along perfectly with the project! 

I found some super photos of each stage I know your students would enjoy seeing!

 I usually project my PowerPoints on the SMARTBoard so the class can get a better view not possible with a read aloud. 

You can see more at my TPT store here, or by clicking on any of the images, if you are interested.

I also added a flap book for the life cycle of a frog.

There is a companion PowerPoint for frogs too!

Do you hatch chicks in your school? 

If so, you might like this cute presentation as well!

For more ideas for spring, follow me on Pinterest!

 I am always adding fun finds to my boards!

You can find more classroom photos, posts and social media links at my other blog~ Creative Lesson Cafe!

Remember to follow by email or Bloglovin so you never miss a post, giveaway or flash freebie!

I sure hope to see you there as well!

Share it to Win it! 

Share something from this post or one from Creative Lesson Cafe! 

Then, leave me a link to your Pin, blog post, Facebook Like or like on Bloglovin in the comments and I'll select one winner for a winner's choice from my Kidsrcute store!

Happy Spring!

 :)