Diggin' into Writing!

So, this week my friends and I are sharing what we do with Writing.  This is one of my favorite things to talk about.  I have my kiddos write about everything we do!  When I was teaching Kindergarten a couple of years ago, my assistant use to tease me about how excited I would get about a writing idea:)  Boy! Do I miss her now that I am in first grade.


This is our Word of the Day calendar that I start my mornings with.  Each student is also given a copy.  We go over the word, and they write it in their notebooks along with a definition and a picture of the word.  I encourage them to use these words in their stories during Writing Workshop.  At the end of the month, they will circle 5 of the words and write a monthly story that will go in a class book.  They love to go back and reread their stories.

Just click on the picture to see more or to purchase.

I would let my students pair up to discuss their words.

 This is a sample of what I did with each month's stories.

This is a sample of one of the writings one of my kiddos did using the November calendar words.

I also had them divide into groups for a mock election, indoor recess vs. outdoor recess.  This is a great activity to do for persuasive writing.

This group did just a good job that one of my little guys said."I want to change my mind because I agree with these girls."  Mrs. Beckner, they did a good job because they made me want to change teams."  How cute is that!





I had to show ya'll how much progress that my students made in writing.  These are samples from our May Calendar Words.  I was so proud of my kiddos!

This one was written by one of my ELL students.  I just love what she said,"Culture is when you do your own thing."  I just really hear her voice in this writing.

This is our class mascot, Quality Quentin.  My students love writing about him and his adventures at their homes.  He takes turns going home with "Quality Students"

I teach them the Quality Student Song at the beginning of the year and they learn what quality behavior is, and Quality Quentin helps us:)


After we do the song, we begin to work on the pages in their books that are in our Back to School Bundle.

This bundle has our Quality Student song included as well.

The cool thing about that was when this student chose to write about a quality student during Writing Workshop.  They wrote some of the words from the chorus of the song.  This was the second or third week of school.  We do sing the song and discuss it's meaning daily for a couple of weeks.

 Then my students wrote a big book about what quality students do.

 I just love how this ELL student did his page!  He didn't have much english but he definitely got some of the lyrics from the song.  He told me that this was him dancing to the Quality Student song.

 This page was written by  the little guy you saw reading Quentin's Journal.  I love the glasses!

This little guy has a mohawk and he drew all his pictures of himself like this.  I didn't realize that until I asked him"Is that your party hat?"  He informed me that it was his hair.  Lesson here is: I will say"Tell me about this part of your picture."

My kiddos love Quentin and they enjoy writing stories about him!

This is a chapter book that was written by a couple of my girls during Writing Workshop.  I was amazed at what they did!  I am only showing ya'll a few of the pages and they are not in order but I think you will get the idea:)

I do a lot of singing and dancing in my classroom because I feel it is very important to keep my kiddos moving as they learn.  After we learn a song, I like to have my students write about it.

This is the big book we did after we learned our Community Helper song.

The song is included in our Community Helper Bundle.  We also included the Quality student song as well and a daily lesson plan.

 I taught my students our "Goods and Services" song and then they wrote about their own goods that they created.

This is what my students wrote after we learned our "Direction Salsa" song.

My kiddos wrote these cute stories after we sang the "Spend a Little Save a Little" song.  The piggy bank template is included with the song.

This is a fun Fall Writing Activity to do:  Students collect leaves,do leaf rubbings and then write about it.

My students did Animal research and made these dioramas and wrote about them.

We made these cute paper plate animals and wrote books about them.

 All throughout the year, I had my students write about their experiences in First Grade and then they compiled all the pages in a book.

 I invited kindergarten classes to our room and my first graders shared their books with them.  It is a great opportunity for the kindergarten students to learn about First Grade and my kiddos loved to share!

 You can purchase just the individual songs in our dollar store.


I hope you got some fun writing ideas!  I could share so much more, but I better stop so ya'll can look at some other great ideas:

Go to http://wherethemagichappensdaily.blogspot.com


Check us out on Wednesday.  We will be guest blogging on Teaching Momster's Blog about Math Centers and Games.

The Beginning of the Year

The Beginning of the Year 

 I have this display of Quality Quentin on my wall outside of my classroom.  I take pictures of my kiddos to put on the little glaciers.

They are greeted by Quality Quentin when they enter the classroom.

 I read Quentin's First Day.  It is a book about how scared Quentin is to go to school and how Mama Penguin makes him feel better by teaching him the Quality Student song, so he knows how to behave at school.  You can get the book in our store.

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Back-to-School-ELA-book-Quentins-First-Day-808786


Then we sing the Quality Student Song and act out the letters of "Quality"  This song is included with the book. You can also grab just the song for FREE:)

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Quality-Students-Mp3-Song-450741

 After we have read the book and sung our Quality Student song, we will pass around Quality Quentin and each of the kiddos will say their name and what a quality student is.
"My name is Jon, and a quality student listens to the teacher."  We have these class meetings every day the first few weeks of school and then we will have them weekly.  My students really learn how a quality student acts.

I also talk to them about how they can earn these Quentin Dollars when they are Quality Students.  They also can lose them if they are not being quality students.  They get to go to the store when they earn 10 and they can save up 20 to get larger items.  The cool thing about this is they are learning about saving money to purchase something bigger.  I also had students to use their dollars to buy gifts for family members.  One little girl even asked about getting something for her brother's birthday but didn't have enough dollars, so I loaned them to her and was able to give her a mini lesson on loaning money from a bank.  It was great! And she was so proud and happy to be giving her brother a present that she felt like she earned.  I use these dollars now as my behavior system because it is so much easier and it takes away the pressure from the kiddos when they were changing their signs.  It is a free download in our store.  I just run them off in grayscale.

 I also use this as a class incentive.  We will vote on an activity that the class wants to do and when we get enough Quentins on the igloo, we will do the activity.  The kiddos love seeing the number of Quentins grow.  You can get these in our Back 2 School Bundle.  It is at the bottom of this post.

 The parents are very good about helping me with donating items for our little store.  I just ask for parents who can to sign up at the beginning of the year to donate.

 As you can see, they love the Quentin Dollars!

This is our September Word of the Day Calendar that we use at the beginning of the year.  My kiddos are given their own calendars so they will know what the word of the day is and the calendar has a pattern for the kiddos to follow.  They get so excited when they see Quentin on the pattern pieces!  We have these Word of the Day calendars for every month.  I am finishing August and then we will be bundling the whole year for a discounted price.  We hope you will follow us so you know when it is posted:)  Here is the link if you just want to try the September calendar.

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Word-of-the-Day-September-Calendar-829261

 This is something new that we just added to our Back 2 School Bundle.  You can also get this sample pack for free.  http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Freebie-Back-to-School-Sample-Pack-with-Quality-Quentin-1305041




Our Back 2 School Bundle has everything you have seen, the book, song, puppet, pocket chart poem, plus a whole lot more to get you ready for the beginning of school with Quality Student behavior.  There is also a Mandy and a Mama Penguin puppet for your kiddos to help act out the book.






This is just one of the printables in the bundle.

This is a book that the kiddos can illustrate themselves.    I just love their own pictures!  it makes each book unique:)

This is the cute Quality Quentin hat that is in the bundle. It has a word family color code.

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Beginning-of-the-Year-Newly-Revised-752399

We hope ya'll got some ideas that will help you at the beginning of the year.

Please comment on what you like to do at the beginning of the year to get your kiddos ready for a successful school year:)

Have a great week!

Check out these great blogs for more ideas for your year!

http://wherethemagichappensdaily.blogspot.com

July 4th Blog Hop

We are joining 20 other great bloggers in this terrific Blog Hop.  Lots of FREEBIES and a rafflecopter where we all went in to give ya'll a chance to win one of the 4 $25 TPT gift certificates and a $15 Target card.  Good Luck!

We would like to remember any of ya'll that may be in the military or know someone who is and say "THANK YOU"  for everything you do for our wonderful country!

This is our sample pack you can grab as a FREEBIE from our store.  It is a short poem about being a quality student. It has pocket chart cards and a Quality Quentin puppet you can use to act out the poem.  Please remember to leave us a nice comment at our store if you do download this and you will get store credit if you do:)  We also hope you will follow our blog so you can read about all the activities we blog about.  We do a FUN FRIDAY where we share classroom activities and offer discounts or FREEBIES.  Be sure to watch for those:  We appreciate all the support!

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Back-to-School-Sample-Pack-with-Quality-Quentin-1305041

You will get a Quentin puppet in your FREEBIE for your kiddos to color and cut out.  Just glue on a craft stick or paper bag.  We put dotted lines around him to make him easier to cut out.

This is a book about Quentin's First Day of School and how Mama Penguin helps him by teaching him the" Quality Student Song."  Our kiddos just love acting out the letters of "Quality" as they sing and dance to the song that is included.

This is just one of the cute printables that is in the bundle.

There is also sheets that your kiddos can illustrate from the Quality Student song.


This is a big book I had my kiddos do after we learned all about Quality Students.  They loved going back and reading it throughout the year.

 This was done by one of my ELL students who couldn't speak much english at the beginning of the year, but he loved singing and dancing to the Quality Student song.   He wrote words from the song on this picture.  He said that this was him dancing to the song:)  How cute is he!

You can get this book, rocking song , word family sheets, read around the room cards for letter sounds, printables and more.  We are offering the whole bundle for more than 50% off during the Hop. July 4-6.  Check it out.  Link under the picture.

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Back-To-School-With-QuentinLiteracy-Pack-752399

We also have other bundles and products with Quality Quentin.  If you want to check them out, just go to our store and look under Custom Categories and click Quentin the Quality Penguin.  There is a fun book with Quentin in the pumpkin patch about being a quality student in our Fall Bundle.

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Sol-Train-Learning


You can get all of the rest of  our products on sale for 20% July 4-6.  We also hope you are following our store so you can be notified of all of our new offerings.  We are working on a great Five Senses product now that will also have a rocking song that we are recording now, so look for that:)  

Happy July 4th!

Please leave us a comment about what you would like in Back to School Products.  We value your opinion!

And as an added bonus, all of the participating bloggers have 'pooled their cash' to purchase 4 $25 TpT gift certificates and 1 $10 Target gift card!

The first four selected will receive the TpT gift certificates and the 5th winner will receive the Target gift card!

Enter here, or on any of the participating blogs:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Just click on this link and follow all the other awesome blogs so you can grab more FREEBIES:)




                                         

An InLinkz Link-up

Fun Friday: Messy and Educational

Hello teacher friends,

So Fun Friday has moved into Slow Saturday given my current pregnancy hormones and yucky feelings :).  Since it's Summer for a lot of us, I decided it would be fun to share an outdoor activity that teaches the kids about abstract art and the modern artist, Jackson Pollack.  It also involves process art, which is very popular in early childhood education.

This is also a great activity for recycling unwanted clothes or extra rags.  I put rubber bands on various clothing items and also stuffed a few to make "ball" shapes.  The kids threw, slung, flicked, and smacked paint onto this giant butcher paper canvas.

They loved being told they could be messy.  All the paint was washable, but I do recommend messy clothes.  It was all over them.

The kids walked across the wet paint on the ground and accidentally created footprints!  It was a really cool effect.

Once the project is finished, you can use pieces for picture frame mats, wrapping paper, or you can put it on your bulletin board as a backdrop.