Congrats & a quick freebie

I really appreciate your stopping by and leaving a comment.  What is it about them?  They make my heart sing!  Thanks, again and I hope your kiddos enjoy the activities!

We spent most of last week discovering all that happens during a butterfly’s life cycle.  We have a good time in math, but reading is my passion, so you’ll probably find that most of my posts will relate in some way to what we’re doing to build better readers in our classroom. Our story this week was realistic fiction, so we made several extensions by learning about other bugga buggas as well.

If you’ve got Dr. Jean’s Kiss Your Brain CD, there’s a hoppin’ tune on there called Insect’s Body that will get your firsties up, movin’ and learning the parts of insect in a snap! We found ourselves humming to the tune long after the song was over!  We use Houghton Mifflin’s Journeys Reading series in our district and I LOVE IT! It has so many working pieces that are wonderfully aligned to help all little readers grow.  The leveled readers are especially nice because they easily lend themselves to making lots of text-to-connections AND connections to science and social studies.  It is also a heavily researched series with the development of the leveled readers guided by Irene Fountas. (Notice the last name?) I could go on and on about it for days….I just love it! With all of the authentic literature built into it, using it for balanced literacy is super easy!  Did I say how much I love it?  Anywho……on to the point……

Below is a pic of a little investigation that we did during small group this week.  We completed the “What am I?” riddle page after completing guided reading and saved the “I am a_____!” page for completion later in the day during science.  The completed pages were stapled together as a riddle to “lift the flap” and see if your guess was correct after reading the written clues.  The kids were really intent on making good illustrations and did a great job! You’ve gotta love a 2 for 1 lesson! Click here to grab your copy!

                      

Clipart courtesy of DJ Inkers.

Well, I’ve got to run because my daughter’s hair beckons.  She’s got quite the thick mane so it takes some time to wash and primp to get all of her girliness up to par.  I hope you all had a great week.  Enjoy what’s left of your weekend…someone seems to have put them on fast forward as we get close to wrapping up the school year! 

We’ll be heading into the lonnnnnnngest month of the school year come Monday!  Must….keep….going!  Does April seem especially long to anyone else or is it just me? PLEASE keep the ideas flowing bloggy buddies! Thank you to my 82 new friends! My goal is to reach 100 followers before the last day of school…..so, if you like what you’ve seen so far, share with a friend!   The more the merrier….have a great night and a super “SONday”!