Chinese New Year

It's almost time to teach about the Chinese New Year! Do you teach this in your classroom? A few years ago, I created a unit filled with activities for this and recently I decided it needed to be updated! I redid the entire pack and I feel like it's so much better! If you've already purchased this unit, go grab your brand new pack. You can find it here.

You'll find pages like these:

But my favorite part is the animal sign posters.

Still haven't created a title, so that's why there's a big blank space. 

You can check out the packet here, or head over to Facebook for a chance to win! 

Winter Language Arts Centers in action (upper grades)

Hi y'all! I've had these winter language arts centers finished up now for a few days, but I had uploading issues so I'm just not blogging about it! :) I'm showing these on Life in Fifth Grade, but I decided to post here because I know not all my followers are 1st grade and they would work wonderfully for grades 3-6ish. 

Y'all probably already know this trick, but I recently realized you can use velcro to close your centers. Love!

You can find these centers by clicking below :)

Teaching Alliteration

I absolutely love teaching figurative language! We studied alliteration before we got out for Christmas break and the kids loved it. We did a snowy alliteration activity for our door, but I forgot to take a picture to show y'all. Here's the chart I made as a refresher for my 5th graders.

You can find lots of reproducible activities that are ready to print and copy! No prep needed. There's also a set of task cards as seen below.

You can find the unit by clicking the pic below :)

Eskimo Pattern Freebie

Hi y'all! Is it freezing where you're at??? It's been way too cold for Alabama. We had a snow (cold) day yesterday and a two hour delay today. I simply can't wait for summer to be here. I'm just not a fan of winter. 

Today I wanted to share with y'all a fun little winter craft that I did with my sweet 1st graders a few years ago. I figured now was the perfect time to do it since the weather's been so cold. If I still taught 1st grade, this would definitely be on Friday's plan! Maybe some of y'all can use it :) You can find it here.

Be sure and check out my newest post on Southern Belle Inspired. It's my first product review :)

Stay warm, friends! :)

Displaying Objectives

It's a snow day everyone! My favorite kind of Monday :) :) :) Since I'm currently snuggled under a fuzzy throw, I thought I'd share with y'all how I've been displaying my objectives this year. It's been working really well for me so maybe it will help y'all too. These objectives are for my fifth grade class, but the way I display them will work for any grade. I teach reading/language arts/spelling, so that's why there's no objectives for math, science, or social studies. I have one objective and one essential question for each day. When I start planning for my week, I start out by writing the objective for each day of the week. This helps me plan activities for the day and I'll know that if I have a surprise observation, my objective and essential question directly correlates to what I'm teaching. 

I struggled early this year with finding a way to displaying every common core standard that we would be covering each week. I don't know how it is with other reading series, but with Scott Foresman Reading Street, there's a TON for each week. After talking about it with our instructional coach, I decided to use the target skills and strategies. These are laid out nice and neatly for each story on the very first page of each TE of Reading Street (Common Core Version)

I sectioned off boxes on my whiteboard and labeled each box. Each week I write the target skills and strategies and also include the CCRS in each box. 

I use to display my objectives on this pocket chart, which I LOVE. It fit perfectly between my target skills and strategies and my SmartBoard, but it was just too much trouble to drag out the sentence strips, write the objective and essential question for each day and place them in the pocket chart, then change them out each day. So, I sadly took the pocket chart down and simply wrote the objective and essential question on the white board next the the titles/headings. It doesn't look as pretty, which I'm trying to forget about it because it is MUCH easier this way. 

I've started writing my essential question on this little pink white board that's magnetic. I can quickly write the question and display it and the kids know exactly where to find it since it sticks out. 

(I used my beloved Cameo to create the title)

Maybe this helps you get a little idea of how I display CCRS correlated objectives and target skills in my classroom. It's working really well for me so maybe it will for you too!

Happy Monday!

#LAeveryday2014 Week 1 Recap

Find out all about #LAeveryday2014 here and remember to follow me on Instagram (msleslieann01). This week didn't feature a whole lot of school because I'm trying to savor EVERY last drop of Christmas break, which was entirely too short. :)

{Day One}

I started off 2014 by having a dinner with my sweet family. Here's my gorgeous cousin, Emily

{Day Two}

Back to work bright and early with a faculty meeting

{Day Three}

Friday night was SOO cold, so I decided to stay in and catch up on my magazines 

{Day Four}

Fedex surprised me with a Saturday delivery. I decided to pull a Carrie Bradshaw and order myself a new pair of shoes. Too bad I ordered the wrong size :( They are gorgeous though, so hopefully it won't take them too long to return to me.

{Day Five}

Sunday morning. Perfection. 

Week one was short because the new year started on Wednesday, but I'm going to do weekly recaps every Sunday so next week will have all 7 days :)

Follow along with me on Instagram (msleslieann01)

New Year's Resolutions Activity and Winter Centers

Cara's 100th Day people are quite possibly my favorite craft ever and I always loved recreating them for New Years and having the kids write resolutions. Here's a couple of pictures from an old post so you can get an idea :)

I did this activity with my 5th graders today. I didn't remember to cut out the hats with scrapbook paper so they didn't turn out near as cute, but I LOVE reading their resolutions. After actually talking about what resolutions are and examples of common ones people always making, we wrote our own. As I was looking back through my first grade resolutions it's so neat to see how different 1st graders think than 5th graders! :) Here's the 5th grade version:

If I had remembered scrapbook paper this would have look precious with this great garland I found after Christmas for 75% off! It worked great for the hats. 

After we each made our own resolution, we decided on a few class goals that we wanted to work hard to accomplish this semester. I created a chart with each of my three classes, but forgot to take pictures of that! :) 

1st/2nd grade friends, don't forget to check out my Winter Math and Literacy Centers. These were created last year, but I'm working on some new ones right now for upper grades. Here's a preview of the activities

Click here to get my Winter Fun! math and literacy packet. Below is a preview of what all is included. 

Y as a Vowel word sort

 Odd and Even Sort using number words

 What's the missing number center activity

 Number order activity (can be used greatest to least or least to greatest)

 Which Number is Greater? Can also be used for Which Number is Less?

 Number/ Number Word Match Activity **An oldie but a goodie! I love this activity. My kids ALWAYS need help with recognizing number words

 Long/Short Vowel Sort

 Beginning Blends Activity

 Syllable Sort

 Synonym Match Up Activity

 Antonym Match Up Activity

 Sentence or Question Sort

Happy Weekend, y'all!