Eek...

I have been such a bad blogger! I have felt like I run all day at work and don't want to do anything else when I get home. It has been a little crazy lately with my Kinders.
Yesterday we went on our first field trip to the corn maze. We had a great time and got lost in the little area that we got to go in. Check out the website at http://sweetseasonfarms.com/ . My husband and I are going to go tomorrow to do the whole 7 acre maze.
Today was Science Day/Country day at school. The kids were crazy, but we had a lot of fun doing different activities with our pumpkins. We weighed them, felt the inside of one, measured the circumference, experimented with them sinking or floating and decorated them. I will post pictures soon (they are on my moms camera) of our crazy, hectic fun day!
Tonight we are going to the Hay Maze with some friends Nicole and Brandon. We may possibly go bowling afterwards. We are pretty excited! A local school does a fundraiser every October and has a huge hay maze. Rem and I went in it last year and it was a great time! It may even be SPOOKY tonight. I do not like to be scared so we will see how it goes :)

Bad blogger

I have been such a bad blogger. I feel like I am so crazy I don't have time to blog!
School has been good. I have some challenging kiddos, but we are working through it. I also have some super sweet ones :)

I took a few pictures of our centers from last week during math. We have been working on the numbers 1-5 (writing, recognizing etc) I use these cute rhymes I found online last year.

Go straight down and then your done, that's the way you make a one.
Candy cane with a shoe, that's the way you make a two!
Around a tree, around a tree, that's the way you make a three.
Down and over down some more, that's the way you make a four.
Short neck, belly fat, Mr. Five wears a hat.

Here are some of the pictures we took.

They made One Kite and wrote the word 1.

Roll the die, move that many spaces.

Put the numbers in order and then put cotton "popcorn" on each number with that many

Also, Zero the Hero visited us on our 10th and 20th day of school. The kids love her. I made her out of a sock and made a cape for her. I got this idea when we have a make and take workshop at our school. Love her :)

10 years later...

It is hard to believe that is has been 10 years since 9/11. I remember exactly where I was when I heard the news. I was in 10th grade, in between 1st and 2nd block. I remember hearing people saying that a plane crashed into the world trade center. My next class was yearbook, and all we did was stare at the TV in disbelief. 9/11 was a day that changed all of our lives forever. God bless our military, firefighters and police officers. I am proud to say I am an American.

Wow...

I haven't blogged in awhile! School started last Monday (the 22nd) and it has been BUSY! The weekend before school started we traveled to Louisiana (about 7 hours away)for my friends wedding reception. It was not a good weekend to go seeing as school started on Monday, but we had a blast.

After a long weekend we left early Sunday morning and came home. 

I have 19 kids in class right now. Due to class size being 18, we are all over by 1. We will have a new teacher starting next week and 4 of my kiddos will go on to the other class. It will be nice to only have 15 kids! 

Also, Limeades for learning. started yesterday. Please vote for my project! 

Kindergarteners Can Read Too!

www.limeadesforlearning.com

I just voted for this project at LimeadesForLearning.com. Limeades for Learning is a partnership between SONIC and DonorsChoose.org that supports public school teachers across the U.S. Just visit the site now and vote daily. SONIC will fund projects with the highest votes each week, Aug 29-Sept 30.

Back to School

I started back to school on Monday. In our county we have a week to get ready until the kids come. The kiddos will start on Monday. My room is finished as of today! Yay! I just have to work on lesson plans. We have orientation tomorrow night, so I am excited to meet the kids. I took a few pictures of my room (with my phone so they aren't the best). I will take better pictures tomorrow.

This is my listening center area. The colorful desk was given to me last summer and my husband and I redid it to make it colorful and into a listening center. You can see the original one HERE!

The container on top is my pointers for the kids to use when they "read around the room". To the right is my blender of blends. I found the original on Tales of a Teacherista!

Close up of my cute shelf that was given to me. 

This is in my reading area. These two cute chairs were given to me when I first started teaching.

My super cute behavior tree my mom made me. The kids will "climb" the tree with their gorilla to get treasure box. Each day they are on green they will move up the tree. After 5 greens they get treasure box!

The board on the right is my calendar and Question of the Day graph that we use daily.

This is pretty hard to visualize just looking at it. This will house pictures for the kids reading and math centers. The zebra, lion, gorilla and giraffe on the left will be the different groups. When I know which group the kids will be in I will write their names on it. I will velcro the picture of the centers each group will go to so they know without asking. I will take a picture of it in use once school starts :)

My Chicka Chicka Boom Boom board my mom made. It is pretty hard to see. It says "Chicka Chicka Boom Book Look Who's in our Room". The letters going down the tree have each kids name on them. I cut out the beginning letter of their name and wrote the rest on the letter. 

This is my reading small group table. My mom purchased the green entertainment center from a local thrift store for $20.00. We painted it green and put in a shelf to house my reading materials. I love it!

This is the view from my room standing next to my reading table. I am very excited with the way my room turned out. As I am looking at these pictures I see many things I forgot to take picture of. Cubbies, word wall, whole group reading area, Etc. Those will come later :)

Cubbies

My dad and I took on the mission to build some cubbies for my classroom. I previously had hooks on the wall. They are close together and too tall for many of the smaller kids. It just didn't work! It took us 2 days to actually build them and another 2 days to varnish them. I forgot to take a finished product picture so I will have to do that tomorrow at school.

 My fabulous dad helping build them!

This is the closest picture I have of them being done. We still had to add another row in this picture as well as the back. 

Acts of Kindness

Today my grandmother and I went to a fabric store to purchase some heavy duty upholstery to make chair covers for my kiddos. The place we went to is closing (the couple that owns it is retiring) so all their upholstery was $2.00 a yard. My mom made me some chair pockets last year, but they fell apart because the fabric was too thin. This year mom wanted to buy the thicker stuff in hopes that it will make it more than one year. We get there and there wasn't much to choose from. I found a blue pattern that I liked and it ended up being only 7 1/2 yards. We thought we needed around 10 yards. I found another one that I liked as well and had the man cut me off 10 yards. We figured since it was so cheap we could buy more for next time they needed to be made.
 The whole time I was talking to the couple about teaching, they asked what grade I taught, how long I had been teaching, what I was going to use the fabric for etc. Basic talk, nothing special.
When he had finished he said he would put it in the car. I stayed behind with his wife and asked how much. She said nothing. I was confused and asked again. She said "I know it will be put to good use". I was so happy I gave her a huge hug and almost cried right there. I walked outside and gave her husband a hug and told him how grateful I was. All he said was "I can't thank my kindergarten teacher". It's amazing how nice some people are. I am extremely grateful for this sweet couple.