The Pigeon HAS to Go to School!: Ideas, Activities, and a Freebie for this Back to School Favorite

Last summer I added Mo Willems' The Pigeon HAS to Go to School! to my classroom library.  Of course, this addition was a no-brainer.  Willems' books are always super popular, especially Pigeon books.

Just as predicted, my students loved this book.  It is the perfect length for the beginning of the year, when attention spans are extra short and students need a little break from all the procedural training they are receiving.

Since I knew this book would be a hit, I decided to make it the centerpiece of back to school.  I created some basic "Pigeon themed" math and literacy activities, as well as a simple craft.  I used these activities intermittently during the first week and was able to glean some great info about my new students' basic math and literacy skills, as well as their fine motor skills and listening skills. 

One of the Pigeon themed activities was a number/number word/counting mini book. Students traced and wrote the numbers 1-10, as well as the number words 1-10.  Then students illustrated a picture to go with each number.  We broke this activity up over a couple of days.

Students took part in a listening activity.  Students had to complete a picture according to a series of questions/statements that I read aloud.  (If you've every made a glyph with your students, this activity feels really similar.)

Students also put together their first puzzler for the year. This puzzler focused on number representations. Students cut and glued the puzzler pieces to tell what number is represented in the box. By the end, students have a completed picture that they can color.  
I use various puzzlers throughout the year. This the Pigeon puzzler is a great introduction to how to complete a puzzler.

Students loved making their simple, one-page craft Pigeons. All that was required was the Pigeon pattern (I used white card stock), scissors, and glue.  The class Pigeons made a really quick and cute back to school bulletin board.

In addition to these activities, students worked on counting/cardinality, geometry, place value, number bonds, handwriting, the alphabet, rhyming words, sight words, and more. The Pigeon HAS to Go to School! is a perfect springboard for a variety of skills. 

For a math freebie (from the printables featured above), click on the picture below. This freebie provides practice with ten frames, counting, and number identification.

If you have not added, The Pigeon HAS to Go to School! to your classroom library, I highly recommend it. There are so many directions you can go with this book. More importantly, your students will love it and be totally engaged.  What a great way to start the year, by reading a book that students truly enjoy. :)

For more details about the all of the Pigeon inspired activities I used with my students, be sure to click on the picture below. 

Of course (like most), I'm not certain what this year's back to school days will look like. Whatever the setup, I know I'll be using The Pigeon HAS to Go to School! to help me kick off the year.

Thanks for stopping by.

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Bright Beginnings: Back to School Math and Literacy Centers

As you all know, teachers work during the summer.  We are gathering materials, revamping pacing guides, redoing classrooms, attending workshops, reading professional books, and hitting the Target dollar spot (hard).
Summer is the perfect opportunity to reflect on what worked and what didn't work.  It is a time to really think about how to implement a new strategy.
Yes, friends...teachers work during the summer.

One project I've taken on this summer is revamping many of my monthly literacy and math centers.  I've been using these centers for the past three years and loved having them as a resources.  But, now it's time for a little (and in some cases big) makeover.
I wanted to give you a peek at the progress I've made this far...
First up is my back to school math centers...

These math centers include practice with numeracy, counting, early addition, ten frames, tally marks, and more.  Below is a sampling of the updated centers in my Bright Beginnings {10 Back to School Themed Math Centers}.

The companion literacy centers, Bright Beginnings {10 Back to School Themed Literacy Centers} have been completely updated as well.

These literacy centers include practice initial consonant sounds, letter discrimination, cvc words, syllables, rhyming words, sight words, and more.

These center sets were created for my first grade class.  However, they would be great for beginning of the year second graders (that might below level) or perfect for high flying kindergartners.

If you already own these centers, be sure to download the updates.  If you are interested in adding these resources to your back to school collection, you can click here for more details.

I hope you are having a wonderful summer.  Thanks so much for stopping by.

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A Peek at My First Week of School

The first week of school...

It's exciting.  It's nerve racking.  It's busy.  And boy, is it TIRING!

The first week (or three) are certainly not a normal picture of how things flow in the classroom during most of the year.  My main focus is helping students get comfortable with me, each other, and how we do things in class.  

While it's tempting to go ahead and dive into curriculum, I think it is really important to take plenty of time to teach your students routines and procedures that will follow them the rest of the year.

With that being said, here's a peek at some of what went on during the first days in our classroom.

I made little Welcome to 1st Grade goody bags, which I totally forgot to give out one first day.  So, my new firsties got their treats on the second day of school.  Oh well...

During the first few weeks of school, I do lots and lots of read alouds.  My young learners need breaks during the day.  Read alouds are a wonderful way to break up the time.  Plus, I love, love, love read alouds!

Two favorite books during the first week of school is Tad Hills' How Rocket Learned to Read and Rocket Writes a Story.  I used these stories to help introduce Read to Self and Work on Writing during our Daily 5 launch.

Speaking of the Daily 5, we spent loads of time working on Read to Self.  We usually start Read to Self on the first day.  But, this year, we started Read to Self on the second day.  To date we are at six minutes of sustained Read to Self.  We have more work ahead of us for sure.

As part of our launch, we continuously reference our Daily 5 I charts.  There is link to the free set of my Daily 5 I charts later in the post.

As part of the launch, I really love using my Daily 5 Trace and Read Mini Books.  These books reinforce the procedures we are working on in class.  Plus, students can work on them independently.

In math we began working on numbers to 120.  This week and next week, we will focus on number representations.  I made cut and glue bubble maps for students to show their understanding of ways to represent numbers to 20.

In addition to our practice with number representations, we also worked (as a whole group) on the first week of our Calendar Connection.  As the year goes on, the daily Calendar Connection activities will be independent.  But for now, students need guidance in how to correctly complete the tasks.

The back to school packet we used (pretty much) all week goes along Melanie Watt's book You're Finally Here!  My students love this book.  We did math and literacy activities inspired by You're Finally Here!  We also made cute You're Finally Here! bunnies to hang outside our classroom.

Even with all this craziness going on, I had to get started my beginning of the year assessments.  These assessments will take a few weeks to complete.  To be honest, the individual screenings are tough to fit in this time of the year.  But, they are really worth it.


Below are my lesson plans for the first week of school.  You can maybe get a better picture of how things fit together.  Click on the plans for a free copy or just to get a better view.

Here are links to some of the resources listed in the lesson plans:  Daily 5 Owl Themed I Charts, Daily 5 Trace and Read Mini Books, You're Finally Here! Math and Literacy Activities, Fun With Firsties (by Abby Mullins), Calendar Connection, and Student Data and Goals.

I'll leave you with one more resource that I stumbled upon this summer, Scholastic's 20 Back-To-School Tales.  This dvd has wonderful stories on it.  It is a life saver if you need a few minutes to turn in your lunch numbers or get a dismissal list in order.  Best of all I got it on Amazon for around $5.  (I know...pretty exciting;)!)

I guess that's about it.

If you are still on summer break, enjoy and know that many of us are totally jealous of you.  If you have started back to school, I hope you have a wonderful year.  

Thanks for stopping by.

What's In Your Data Binder? (An Assessment FREEBIE)

I've just completed my fourth week of the new school year.  Four weeks that are always so jam packed with establishing routines and procedures with my new first graders.  Weeks that are also full of assessments . . .  formal assessments, informal assessments, assessments that can be administered whole group, and some that have to be given on an individual basis.  The info that I gain from these assessments is so important to me.  It gives me a starting point for my instruction.  It also gives me data that I can share with parents as we progress through the year.

Like many of you, all this info goes into a giant binder.

This binder has a tab for each student and most of the materials (such as extra recording sheets and various flash cards) I need to complete assessments.

Some of the data I include in this binder is:  letters (naming, writing, & sounds), sight words, running records, STAR scores, numbers to 120 (naming and writing), time, fractions, shapes, place value, and math fluency.

I collect some of this data through whole group whole group assessments.  However, a good deal of the assessments are one on one.  It certainly is a challenge to fit them all in, but totally worth it.

My data binder also houses student goal and achievement pages that help guide our data chats.  Students keep track of certain skills and set goals for themselves with these pages.  Students love it when they get to color in a prize ribbon for mastering a skill.

If you are interested in a closer look at the assessments and recording sheets I have in my data binder, click on the picture below.  I have put everything together into a packet that you can have for FREE.

I hope some of you can get use out of this packet, even if it's just inspiration.  Thanks for stopping by and have a wonderful long weekend.

Best.

Back to School Math Ideas (Plus a Free Math Center)

While everyone is heading back to school, I thought I might share a few math activities we've been working on in class.  I really like to use the first three or four weeks to review and lay the ground work for the rest of the year.
We usually spend a lot of time on numeracy by counting, writing, and identify various representations of numbers.
One way we practiced these skills is by using Wikki Stixs.  There are so many ways to use Wikki Stix and the kids love them.  We made number bonds on white boards using Wikki Stix.

We made part part whole mats using white boards, Wikki Stixs, and counters.

We made ten frames using white boards, Wikki Stix, and counters. 

Using Wikki Stix was a great hands on way for students to create these models.

We also used Wikki Stix to practice memorizing the touch numbers.  

We always spend the first weeks of school putting the touch points on the numbers (over and over again), mostly with pencil and paper.  Using Wikki Stix to form all the dots and circles that go on touch numbers is a perfect ways to mix things up a bit.

Beside getting Wikki With It (where is the smiley face button on my keyboard?), we also started our first Calendar Connection Journal.  It is a supplement to our calendar math time.  Students have to work with calendars, counting, number representations, and graphing.  This month we'll work on most of the activities together.  Of course over time students should will become independent with these tasks.

We also used bubble maps to work with numbers 1-10.  Students had to decide which bubbles were ways to show each number.  Representations included addition & subtraction equations, ten frames, touch numbers, pictures, dice, tally marks, and number words.

I bagan introducing our math centers for the month.  I must admit, my goal was to have them up and going by now.  However, my new class, as a whole, is not quite ready.  So, I'll continue to introduce them to the group and know that we'll get started with them eventually.

If you are interested in math centers for the first months of school, check out my Bright Beginnings  {10 Math Centers} and September Smarties {10 Math Centers} packets at my Teachers Pay Teachers store.  They are filled with centers that are perfect for this time of the year.

If you would like to try out a center from my Bright Beginnings packet for free.  You can click on the picture below.  Ten Frame Turtles is a basic ten frames matching activity that will help students start memorizing ten frame patterns.

I hope some of these ideas are helpful.  Thanks for stopping by.  Happy Back to School Season!

3..2..1...Blast Off

The first three weeks of school, don't count on me cooking dinner and plan on lots of laundry piling up.  Let's face it, it's just that time of year.  It's go time at school and a lot of other things just get put on the back burner.  

What has been getting done?  Well, we are totally into our Daily Five launch.  We basted off on the first day of school and haven't looked back.

Lots of mini lessons and modeling sessions and starts and stops have marked our days.  I made plans of how I would pace the launch and those plans went out the door after day one.  But that is OK, we are making progress.  Even though we are not quite following the pace of the launch plans laid out in the 2nd edition of The Daily Five.

On the first day I had all of the book boxes packed and ready to go for Read to Self.  I modeled three ways to read a book.  We discussed our I chart and expectations.  Students then modeled the correct way to do Read to Self and I modeled the incorrect way to read to self.  The students told me all the things I did wrong (you know they loved doing that).

After our mini lessons, we Read to Self three whole minutes.  We've gained steadily since then and are now up to 11 minutes.  To be honest, not everyone is perfect every time.  But I'm really happy with our accomplishment.

After a couple of days, I started model writing on chart paper at my easel.  The writing was very simple, one to two sentences.  I modeled what to do if you are writing and do not know how spell a word (sound it out the best you can and then underline it).  I modeled this same lesson for three days.  We also discussed our Work on Writing I chart.  After all the modeling and discussing, my young authors finally got their hands on their journals.

With our Work on Writing time I'm trying out a little something new this year.  Instead of composition books, I'm making monthly journals.  Students will keep their journals in their writing binders.  Eventually, the binders will contain lots of topics and ideas for students to draw upon as they write.  Each month students will turn in their monthly journals and get a new one.  I plan on putting all of them in their end of the year portfolios.  

We started Read to Someone at the beginning of our second week of launch.  I was really unsure of how it would go.  Read to Someone can be awesome, but it can also be a disaster when students decide to socialize or not cooperate with each other.
After going over our Read to Someone I chart, my TA and I did some modeling of poor Read to Someone behavior.  Again, the kids loved pointing out all of our mistakes.  Then two of my girls that came from a Daily Five Kindergarten class, modeled perfectly the correct way to Read to Someone.
We talked about how to pick books and share books with a partner.  I also addressed how to decide which partner reads first (make a deal or every body's favorite, rock paper scissors).
On a side note, I assigned partners for the launch and they do not change.  I also placed students in their special spots around the room.  At this point taking those choices away allows us to focus on the core behaviors for successful reading with a partner.
We are now up to seven minutes on Read to Someone.

Word Work and Listen to Reading will come later this week.  I usually do not spend much time launching these components of The Daily Five.  Mainly, I take time explaining how to use the materials and technology.
Although we are not formally working on Listen to Reading, my firsties have been able to listen to lots of read alouds during these past couple of weeks.  Read alouds are my number one favorite thing to do, especially at the beginning of the year when you need to keep everything moving along.
Below is a picture of some of the books we've read so far this year.  They are mainly related to back to
school, class rules, and The Daily Five topics.

By the end of this week we will wrap up our launch and I'll be really glad when it is over.  But I have no doubt that the time we put in now will pay off all year long.
Thanks for stopping by.