Unit 5 Scott Foresman Reading Street Questions of the Day

Click the pic to get the Unit 5 Questions of the Day for the Scott Foresman Reading Street Series. Freebie! :)

Phonics Tales Freebie Posted and some classroom happenings

I've just posted the freebie packet for Phonics Tales. Click here to get them. I'd love to hear from you if you can use them in your classroom! Hopefully there are no errors in it, but if you find some, just let me know and I'll fix them. :)
And I thought I'd share a few things we did in our classroom last week (or I should say the last three days since we were only there Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday)
We made New Year's resolutions.***I plan on using these to compare and contrast our holiday with the Chinese New Year when we learn about that.
This is one of my *favorite* activities. I can't take credit for this adorable idea though. That would be the fabulous Cara!

Aren't these adorable??

We also started talking about plot. This is a comprehension skill that we haven't talked about before so I thought our 3 day week would be the perfect time to get a jump start on covering next week's skill. We used the story The Three Little Pigs. Here's the chart we made to help remember what plot was.

We also made our own little pigs

Then came my kids' favorite part. We divided into three different groups and each group made a house. This really helps teach teamwork and how to work together. They *loved* it.

And for you Reading Street Teachers, we are on Ruby in Her Own Time next week. I love this story! I'll be back with some other things we are doing, but I thought I would share how I'm teaching plot. I found this great strategy a few months ago and a lot of you might already be familiar with it but it was new to me. It's the SWBS model:

To practice this method, I plan on completing this chart with my kids next week .

Hope everyone is having a great weekend! Don't forget about my Roll Tide TPT Sale happening now! 

I'm having a sale! And Eskimo Patterns Freebie

In honor of the new year, I'm having a sale at my Teachers Pay Teachers Store! Everything is 15% off! Click the link below to visit my store.

Ms. Leslie Ann's Store

Hurry! Sale ends January 1st!

I've also just added the patterns for the Eskimos as a freebie! Click the pic below to get them. Thanks again to everyone who has purchased units from me or follows my blog. Y'all have helped make 2011 a truly FABULOUS year! :) :) :)

Unit 3 Reading Street Questions-Freebie!

Just uploaded the questions of the day for Unit 3 of the Scott Foresman Reading Street series. They're on my Teachers Pay Teachers store, but they are free! I'd love to hear from you if you use them! :) Click the pic to get them.

Elf Patterns!

I just posted the patterns for the elves on Teachers Pay Teachers....it's a freebie! Merry Christmas!! I'd love to hear from you if you are able to use them in your classroom :) Click here to get them.

Dinosaur Patterns Freebie, Counting Turkeys, and Ed and Edie!

I have finally uploaded the dinosaurs patterns! Sorry it took a little while! Click the pic to get them. I've uploaded them onto my teachers pay teachers store, but they're free. I've found it's easier to download from TPT instead of Scribd. 

I found this gem of a book today in our classroom library. So wish I would have discovered it last week. It would have been oh so helpful!

If you haven't yet gotten to the Big Circle in Reading Street, be sure and pick this book up! My kids loved it and it would have been wonderful to use at a poetry center during this story. I may even extend our dino study into this week so we can use it :)

Need a quick activity? A handprint turkey is always a hit! We made these while we counted by 5's and 10's.

And lastly, one of our phonics skills this week is ending -ed, so I created Ed and Edie. I made the married couple "ai" and "ay" via the fabulous Abby's blog last year and it helped my kids understand that sound so much better! 

********Don't forget to enter my 1000 followers giveaway! I'll pick the winner tonight, so there's still time to enter!

Author's Purpose Graphic Organizer Freebie!

I'm almost to 1,000 followers (currently @ 999!!) so I figured a freebie was in order! Click here to get a graphic organizer for Author's Purpose. I use this at my comprehension center with my leveled readers, but it can be used with any book.
***I'll do a giveaway when I hit 1,000! :)

Pattern for Frank...Free on TPT!!

I've just uploaded the pattern for the inferring with frank craft onto my teachers pay teachers store. It's free though! Click the pic to get it... I'd love to hear from you if you download it! :)

*** I didn't realize that I had already deleted the file for the writing part, so I wasn't able to include it. Sorry!

Scott Foresman Reading Street Unit 2 Questions of the Day

I've uploaded Unit 2 questions of the day from Reading Street (1st grade) to my TPT Store. They're free, but I had upload problems with Scribd, so I had to upload them to TPT. Click here to get them :)

Witch Pattern...Freebie! and Room on the Broom Mini Unit Coming Soon!

Here are the patterns for the Cute Little Witches. And below is a sequencing activity for the story Room on the Broom. It is in my Room on the Broom mini unit that will be available on Teachers Pay Teachers later on today :)

Let me know if you have download problems!

Dress

Hat

Head

Witch Pieces

Room on the Broom

Isn't this a great Halloween read? My kids loved this book! I thought it fit perfectly for teaching Sequence. We read the story and created an anchor chart to help remember was sequence was. Then we did a follow activity to identify the sequence in the story. 

This activity is included in the Room on the Broom mini unit. It will be on Teachers Pay Teachers later on today.

Initial Blends Flash Cards...Freebie!

Here are the initial blends flash cards :)


Initial Blends Flash Cards

Pattern for the Fox...scarecrows coming soon!

Here's the pattern for the fox from yesterday's post. I'm working on the pattern for the scarecrow, so hopefully it'll be up tonight, although it's the Emmy's tonight, so I'm not promising anything!! :) :)

Fox Pattern 1

Fox Pattern 2

Changing Endings Center Activity Revised

#3 had a mistake...Thanks to Pam for catching it and letting me know! :) It's now fixed and can be uploaded below! 

Changing Endings Revised

Changing Endings Center Activity...Freebie!!

Here's a center that I'm using next week. 

Download if you can use it! :)

Changing Endings

100th Post Means a Freebie!

In honor of my 100th post on Life In First Grade, I'm uploading one of my newest centers, Autumn ABC order cards. Let me know if you have any download problems! :)

abc order

Roll A Sentence Template

Here's the Roll A Sentence template if everyone who would like a copy :) It had a mistake in the pic, but it has since been fixed! Enjoy! :)

Roll a Sentence

A My Name is Alice....Template Freebie!

Have y'all ever heard of the book A My Name is Alice? It's by Jane Bayer and illustrated by Steven Kellogg. It follows along with the alphabet, naming different names, places, things, and animals. ***Just realized it will also be perfect for studying nouns too! Today we read this book and did an activity with it. The kids loved it and did a great job on it. Check it out!
***The template we used is also below.... FREEBIE!

IMG

Free Behavior Chart Printables!

Happy Back to School! Here's the signs I made for my behavior chart if you would like them. The clipart is from Lettering Delights. It's called School Pals.

**I should have explained the frog part of my behavior plan from last year. I forget sometimes that y'all aren't in my classroom! :) :) I had some frog sticks that I had gotten at a teachers supply store. If a child was doing something good, they got to put a frog stick in their pocket of cards. At the end of the day, those who received a frog got to go in the prize box. I'll follow the same rule with this system: If they move up to fabulous pink, they go to prize box every afternoon. Super simple, but effective (at least for me!)

Use these if you like! :)

Behavior Plan

Short i Packet Freebie!!

At the beginning of the year, after the ABC review, we cover short vowel sounds so I've been creating packets to go along with these sounds. So far, I've gotten short /i/ done. :) And after spending a good bit of time on it, I realized that the file size is too big and will not upload to Teachers Pay Teachers. There may be a way to downsize the file, but I'm just too tired to mess with it and try and figure it out. So....I'm uploading here as a freebie. :) :) Or at least I think I am as this is only the second time I've tried to embed a document that's uploaded onto Scribd (I think that's the name of the website?). Let me know if there are any download problems if anyone tries to download it and I'll try to do it through Google Docs. :)
***As, thank you so much to everyone who comment or emailed me about Readers Workshop. I downloaded Reading with Meaning by Debbie Miller onto my Nook and I am loving it! I've also started Math Work Stations by Debbie Diller, which is extremely eye opening in the way I've been teaching math. I highly recommend these two books (especially the first!) if you haven't already added them to your teacher book collection.

Short I Packet

Testing, Testing, 1, 2!

After one of my sweet followers told me how to upload documents on here using scribd, I have been trying to figure it out. I think I have it, so I'm testing it out by trying to upload this graphic organizer that I created last night. I used it in my comprehension center today and it worked really well. Download if you would like it and if you have problems, just know that I'm trying to fix them... It's a work in progress! :)


Here it is (hopefully!) :)
characterplotsetting