Parent Teacher Conferences

This week, we had two days of parent teacher conferences.  On Thursday, the kids left at 11:40, but I was there until 7:00 pm.  That was a LONG day.  My mouth is sick of moving by the time my last conference is over.  :)

THE BIGGEST help for parent teacher conferences is the sheet I use to gather my thoughts before my meetings.  It has a place to write things to "glow" on, things to "grow" on, long term goals, and how parents can help.  This year, I added DIBELS goals for the entire year, so parents can see the DIBELS expectations throughout the year.

I have a non-editable version in my Teachers Pay Teachers Freebie, but I like to type my sheets.  So, I brainstormed and found a way to give you this sheet without violating my clip art agreement.  :)  

Please read the following:

• You will need Microsoft Publisher to download and open this document.  
• If you want to keep the same fonts, you will need to purchase Cara Carroll's fonts.  In my opinion, her fonts are amazing, and buying this one set will make you want to purchase the other two sets.  I just wanted to give you that warning.

If you would like to download my parent teacher conference sheet, please click here.

I hope your parent teacher conferences go well (mine were awesome!), and this sheet helps you remember everything you had wanted to say.  :)

Have a fantastic weekend!

Breaking Numbers Into Tens and Ones

We're working on double digit numbers this week.  Those teen numbers are so tricky for kids.  Anyway, I wanted them to get an early grasp on the meaning of place value and tens and ones.  One of my co-workers created these cool ten frames that we use during calendar to track the number of days we've been in school.  We add a dot at calendar each day.

Well, I thought something similar would be a great reinforcement for learning the teen numbers.  So, I whipped out the good ol' laptop during the last few minutes of lunch, and I came up with a little book to keep track of the numbers 10-20.  When you are putting them together, please keep them in the order I have them, because the verbiage is a little different on a few of them.

All you need to do it copy the pages back to back, staple, and cut in half. 

 Click here to download your freebie.

Also, don't forget about my "Three for Three" giveaway! Three people will win any three products from my Teachers Pay Teachers store.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Have a great Tuesday!

It's a Sale and a BIG giveaway!

Is anyone else SUPER excited for the Teachers Pay Teachers sale that starts tomorrow?  Holy smokes!  My wish list is at 98 items right now.  I know... I'm going to go broke tomorrow, but it is less broke than I would be if I bought them at full price.  :)  All of my products are 20% off today, and will be 28% off tomorrow and Monday.  Stop by to add to your wish list.

Every time I receive a notice that one of my products has sold, I am seriously so excited and honored.  I've tried all of my products in my own classroom, so I know they work (and if they don't work, they have been tweaked so they will work).  Maybe I'm just a nerd, but it makes me feel like I am making a difference beyond my own classroom. OK... I just read it back to myself and it's been confirmed that I am a nerd.

I remember when I first started my Teachers Pay Teachers account, I was so excited to have one follower.  Now, I'm at 160.  I'm nowhere near Deanna Jump or Cara Carroll, but I'm going to celebrate 160.  So, I have decided to throw a giveaway.  I am going to offer any three products to the top three winners.


a Rafflecopter giveaway

The giveaway will run until next Saturday.  Hooray for free stuff!

From the bottom of my heart, thank you for stopping by.  I am so honored someone wants to listen to what I have to say, and wants a chance to win some of my classroom resources.  :)

Have a fantastic weekend!

Sorting by Size

We have been working on sorting all week.  We sorted Goldfish by color on Wednesday, but that was a bit of a mistake, because all I heard was, "Mrs. McCleary, how do you write the number__?"  Lesson learned... keep it in March for Dr. Seuss's birthday.  My class LOVED it when we did it last year around that time.

Today, we sorted by size.  Now, we had sorted by length last year (Do you remember the longer/shorter pin on Pinterest with the paper strips?), but I didn't feel that was really sorting by size when I compare it to the sorting assessment that is given in the first quarter.  So, I made a new sheet this morning.  Yes, I made it just minutes before my little ones stepped through the door.  If you use this activity, make sure they keep track of the small cupcake.  Several of those mysteriously disappeared as we were cutting.  :)

This freebie is available as a Facebook Fan freebie.

Also, ALL of the products in my Teachers Pay Teachers store are 28% off on 8/18 and 8/19.  Woohoo!  Get those wish lists ready!

Thanks to Krista Wallden (one of my favorite illustrators of clip art, and a SUPER nice lady) for this beautiful button!

Oooohh.... I am SO excited for the big sale!  Happy shopping!

Tickets Out the Door

Everyday, I seriously am in awe of my cute little kinders.  Seriously, they are such cool little people, and they are so stinkin' smart.  Now, I taught fourth grade, I student taught in second grade, and I had my practicum in first grade, so I've seen where my kinders will be headed.  In my opinion, this gives me the ultimate advantage as a teacher; I can plant the seed of knowledge early (because I know what they will be studying), so they can remember (hopefully) that they've heard that term before or seen something like that before.  I throw terms and fancy words at them, and cross my fingers that they stick.

So, here we are in the fourth week of school, and my students are telling me that rectangles have two sets of parallel sides.  Then, they go on to explain how they know they are parallel sides.  Again, I am in awe of these kids each and every day.  They are my sponges.

I always use my Kindergarten Math Tickets Out the Door after we finish calendar.  They have questions that cover each kindergarten math standard.  I keep them on binder rings by topic, so I can quickly flip to questions that cover the concepts we are currently studying.  Right now, we are working on flat and solid shapes.  This is the ticket I read to my student and showed him today.

My little peanut answered all of my questions and explained his thinking.  I swear... these kids are amazing!  I am so impressed with my kiddos.  I just had to brag about them.  :)

If you are interested, you can check them out in my Teachers Pay Teachers store.  Click here, or on the picture below.  I also have a Kindergarten ELA version as well, and they are just as fun.  Click here, or on the picture below.

Have a fantastic day!

My New Kissing Hand Chester Craft

So, I'm a little late with this post.  School has been in session for three weeks now.  It's just been so stinkin' busy that I haven't found time to post about my first day of school craft.  Every year, we read The Kissing Hand (as most other kinder teachers do).  We had a semi-lame coloring page to go along with the craft, so I decided I was going to do something different this year.

I called upon the artistic skills of my husband, and now I have THE CUTEST Kissing Hand craft.  Can you tell I'm excited?  Anyway, I am a stickler for not wasting paper.  Construction paper is expensive and I hate wasting trees (as can be seen when the kinders "rat out" their classmates for putting paper in the garbage).  I also like when I can copy parts of the craft on construction paper, which saves me time.  So, when I make my crafts, I put the pieces that are black on one sheet, the pieces that are pink on one sheet, etc.  That is the way this craft is designed.  Hooray!

I wanted a way to stamp the kinder's hand to see how teeny tiny they are when they first come to school.  I also wanted to add a heart that stands for the kiss and love from home.  Just in case that proved to be too much for me to handle, I wanted a couple of back-up options.  Surprisingly, I was able to stamp twenty-four hands very quickly using the stamp, baby wipe, "Go back to your seat" method.  Everything ran very smoothly, and I was SO happy with the results.  They even cut most of the pieces on their own!

Click here to check it out in my Teachers Pay Teachers store.

Flat vs. Solid Shapes

We are working on learning flat and solid shapes right now.  I like to review concepts during my students' bellwork, so I made a quick sorting exercise.  Since I teach kindergarten, the activity has to be easy and self-explanatory since I don't have many readers this early in the year.

I am starting something new, and giving access to this file to my fans on Facebook.

Click the Facebook link on the side to "like" my page, and gain access to this and future freebies for fans!

What in the world is a grammar wall?

Man, alive!  Have I been busy!  My brain has been swimming with things to do in order to get ready for my little peanuts.  Now, we've been in school for almost two weeks.  Things are settling down a little bit with my 26 kindergarteners.  You read correctly... 26.  They are a pretty easy going group, so I think we'll be just fine.

One of my big projects this summer was to make a grammar wall for the ELL kids at our school.  While half of my class was tested last year (we have a high population of kids that are bilingual), none of them qualified for services.  There is a new testing procedure this year, so we're all set in case any of our kids qualify for services.

How are we ready?  Well, we have a new grammar wall.  When I first heard about a grammar wall, I had no idea what to add to my wall.  I searched the internet, and saw what I had to make.  Truthfully, I think it would be a great resource for any classroom.  In the file, there are color coded cards for you to organize the words.  My fabulous co-worker found these center pocket charts (from Lakeshore) that match each part of speech (besides suffixes and prefixes) as well.

So, I'm going to add it as my first freebie of the school year.  Click here to download.  I know this will be an awesome addition to your classroom.  :)