Thanksgiving FREE Printable Unit

Do you teach toddlers, Pre-K, or Kindergarten?  If so, this unit is for you!  I compiled lots of ideas from around the web & from when I taught Kindergarten to bring you this 32-page Thanksgiving unit including crafts, math, books, snacks, & more!

To learn more about this unit, and download your FREE copy, click the picture below!

Enjoy!!!

Salute to Soliders

I just wanted to share an awesome activity that I found last year from Mrs. Jump's Class. I thought it would be fun so I had my creative assistant draw this up and my kids all constructed their own solider to salute last year. I just pulled this project out to do for next 

Thursday. I love these types of activities because everyone's is different. I love Mrs. Jump's website- it is so helpful! Here is a picture from last years class of soldiers.

Wonderful Wednesday Crafts {Under Cover Turkeys}

Hello, all!  I'm sure that everyone is starting their Thanksgiving lesson plans, so here is an activity that you may want to do with your "Little Turkeys" this year!


For several years, I did a Family Turkey Project with my kiddos around Thanksgiving.  The families had to work together to decorate a turkey & then I displayed them in the hallway!  So, why not make it into an UNDER COVER TURKEY Family Project!  It could be like an FBI project where the kids have to design a disguise for their turkey so that it doesn't become Thanksgiving Dinner!

Thank you to Miss Renee's Kindergarten Pond for the "Turkeys in Disguise" idea!  

I made an UNDER COVER TURKEY activity including the turkey template and the parent letter!  

It can be yours today for only $1.00!  Get yours today & start disguising those turkeys!!

Click HERE to purchase this activity!!!

Organize it Tuesdays!

As an elementary teacher, I have a lot of music that I use in the classroom.  Keeping music organized can be difficult!  When I started teaching, I used Cd's.  I would have to pre-load what I needed, then change out Cd's when I needed a new song.  This was NO fun.  I no longer have problems with finding the music I need!  I am so THANKFUL for my ipod!  Ipods are great for organizing classroom music.  After I got all my music on my computer, I was able to create play lists on my ipod.  I have a play list for Calendar Songs-which include weather, days of the week, months of the year, etc.  I have songs sorted by themes and subjects.  I have a play list for transitions, alphabet, and fun songs.  This is a quick way to get music.  Everything is organized, simple to use, and easy to find. My assistant loves it, because she can find things too!  If you do not use an ipod in your classroom, Christmas is right around the corner-add it to your list!

Organize it Tuesday!

Hey friends!  Hope everyone is having a fabulous week so far!  It is hard to believe October is almost over! As for getting organized this week, I am going to follow up with my notebooks.  I am glad to hear you all like this idea!  I LOVE my notebooks!  They make planning so much easier.  I am including some pictures of one of my notebooks this week.  Lets talk about the "guts" of the notebook.  I had to go through my files and get rid of some stuff.  All teachers are guilty of hanging on to way too many things.  I found that I had multiple copies of different items.  I also found that some things had been filed in the wrong folder (easy to do when using a filing cabinet that is FULL-LOL!)!  So, I went through all my materials, keeping only one master copy of each item.  I marked my masters with a yellow highlighter.  When you copy, the yellow does not show up.  Great way of keeping up with the originals!  After I weeding through my paper work, I then organized them, hole punched and placed in the appropriate notebook.  If I had a project that I made an example of I placed it in front of the papers need to create the project.  The notebook is divided on the inside by letter and theme.  There are so many options to use with this organization technique.  We would love to hear if you use notebooks to organize your materials, and how you do it!  Enjoy the picture!

                     Front Cover of "H" Book

Spine of "H" Book (just labeled with a sharpie)

                Inside tabs for letter "H" book

Going Batty!

So this week our class studying spiders and bats. I found some awesome activities thanks to Mrs. Larremore at Chalk Talk: A Kindergarten Blog. This was the first year that I did anything with bats so I had a little trouble coming up with ideas. We tried most of her activities and the kids LOVED the all! Thank you to Mrs. Larremore for sharing your ideas with teachers all around!

Halloween Activities

Hello, friends!  So sorry we have been absent for a while.  We have been doing some restructuring to the blog, but now we're back with some great ideas coming your way!  Today, I would like to give you some fun & spooky ideas for Halloween activities to do in your classroom or at home with your kiddos.  Some of the ideas came from My Delicious Ambiguity, an awesome blog full of ideas for children!  You should check it out!

1.  Hot Pumpkin:  Play like "Hot Potato," but pass a fake pumpkin instead.  When the music stops, whoever is holding the pumpkin has to answer a review question.  Take this time to review any skills you have learned up until now (sight words, letter sounds, numbers, etc).

2.  Spook-E-Do: Tell the children that each one of them will have a chance to show the others in the group a trick.  Call on a child and lead the group to chant: "Hello, (Child's Name), Spook-E-Doo. What is the trick you are going to do? Will you hop, or bend, or spin around? Stretch, or wiggle, or touch the ground?" Continue until all the children have had a chance to show their trick.   

3. Monster Freeze Dance: Play Halloween music and have the kids dance around like monsters! The Monster Mash is a great song for this game. 
When the music stops the kids freeze in their monster positions. 
The first kid to move is out, and the game continues until only one child is left.

4. Pumpkin Patch: Have children find places in the room and crouch down to look like pumpkins. Adult walks around the room saying: "Pumpkin Patch, pumpkin patch. Looking for a pumpkin in a pumpkin patch. Here's one nice and fat, turn into a jack-o-lantern just like that!". Adult stops and taps the child closest to her on the word "that" and then child gets up and joins adult by the hand. The activity repeats until all the children have been chosen. 

5. Halloween Exercises: 1. Pumpkin fists (make tight fists)
2. Boo hands (have the children stretch their hands as far as they can saying "boo!!")
3. Spiders (tapping fingers on the table/floor).
4. Smashing spiders (smash "spiders" with flat hands onto table or floor).
5. Witches hats (use pincer fingers to make a triangle, place it on your head and cackle like a witch).
6. Two ghosts flying (have the children take their hands and press the palms together and "fly" with their arms).
7. Frankenstein sitting (chair or floor sit ups with flat palms).
8. Shake the scaries out (shake your whole body).

6. Guess The Ghost: Start by having the kids sit/stand in a circle.
Have one child leave the room and take a large sheet and have another child stand and hide under the sheet. Mix up the remaining children in the room and then allow the child who left the room to come back inside. That child has to guess who's the ghost, by process of elimination they need to figure out which child is hiding under the sheet. Then that "ghost" goes out of the room and a different child becomes the new ghost, mix up the remaining children and repeat until all of the children have had a turn being the ghost.