Valentine's Day Party

Happy Valentine's Day! We had a fun filled day full of festivities. We started with a Valentine Graphing activity using boxes of conversation hearts.

Then we made Valentines. These were super easy for my kinders! I printed out the sentiment and heart outline onto card stock. We used pink and red construction paper to make the mosaic on the heart. 

And of course we had plenty of treats! I've never seen so much sugar in one place! We had a milk and cookies party.

My Valentines blessed me with plenty of treats too. They are too sweet! Hope you have a great Valentine's Day! 

DIY Valentine's Box

I wanted to share this quick project I made tonight using Carta Bella paper, my Silhouette Portrait, and a Sonic drink carrier.

I have been saving this drink carrier and knew it would be perfect for Valentine's Day. It was easy to decorate and just the right size for holding all my treats.

Here is a look at the front and side. The papers you see are from the Carta Bella Devoted collection. I found those on clearance a while back. My name, the heart stamp, and the hearts on the side were cut from card stock using my Silhouette.

This is what the back looks like. I used an adhesive tape runner to glue everything onto the cardboard. 

This project would be great for kids' last minute boxes this week! 

100th Day of School

It's hard to believe that yesterday was our 100th day of school. We had so much fun celebrating being 100 days smarter :)

During calendar we have been counting scoops of ice cream each day to get to 100. On the 100th day the kiddos got to make their own giant ice cream cone. We counted by tens and drew ten sprinkles on each scoop. My kinders' cutting skills need some work, but they loved building the ice cream cone!

You can download a free ice cream template from Michaela Almeida.

Then we colored an owl picture and compared it to the picture the students colored on the first day of school. It was so funny to see their faces when they saw the difference. Several of them couldn't even write their name on their paper at the beginning of the year. It was an easy way for them to see some of the progress they have made.

During writing time, we completed this freebie from Two Pink Peas in a Pod. My favorite answers was definitely, " If I had $100 I would buy a scratch off ticket." My student said those were fun ;)

Finally, we made our 100th day snack. I set out 10 cups with 10 different ingredients. The students counted out 10 from each cup to make a snack with 100 items. We had raisins, Cheerios, rice chex, chocolate chips, mini vanilla wafers, goldfish crackers, Cheeze-Itz, marshmallows, M&M's, and pretzel sticks.

Each student went home with a mini 100 Grand bar and a "I'm 100 days smarter" sticker. I have to say, this has been one of my favorite days of the year so far. Only 71 left to go!

Math Freebies

I called this the week of the math freebies. I finally downloaded/printed/laminated all of the awesome freebies that I've found on Pinterest. I have no idea how teachers did it before Pinterest. 

Here are some of the freebies in action during centers this week.

 Arctic Addition: Choose a card with an addition problem, solve the problem, and cover the answer. A great color version is also available.

Snowflake Tally Marks: A simple cut and glue sheet. Great practice for this new skill.

Hot Chocolate Subtraction/Addition: This is technically Christmas themed, but the kids didn't really notice. We had been practicing addition and subtraction with marshmallows anyway, so it fit right into our unit.

Here is a compiled list of where you can get the freebies I used this week. Kuddos to these creative teachers!

Arctic Addition by Rowdy in Room 300

Snowflake Tally Marks by The Printable Princess

Hot Chocolate Addition/Subtraction by Khrys Bosland

Oh and one more! I don't have pictures of it, but we use these cute penguin mats to practice addition stories today. The kiddos used goldfish crackers to tell their stories. It was during one of my observations and worked great!

Penguin Mats by Kroger's Kindergarten 

I spend way too much time on Pinterest, so follow me on there for ideas by season/theme and subject.

https://www.pinterest.com/casey_harlan/

Morning Work

I haven't been up for blogging much this week since I've been fighting off stomach problems, but I'm finally feeling better. When my kinders came back to school after Christmas Break I started them with a new system for their supplies and morning work. It took a lot of set up work at first, but I am very happy with how it is going now. Maybe these suggestions will help another first year teacher.

When I first set up my classroom I had table baskets of supplies simply because that's what I saw most of the other teachers had. I also printed out morning work for my students to work on each day after they were dropped off. This resulted in a lot of fighting over supplies, a lot of time searching for work, and an overwhelming amount of morning work papers stuffed in seat pockets. 

Now each student has their own supplies pouch and morning work journal.

  

Each supply pouch has crayons, a pencil, and an eraser. The students no longer fight over supplies and they have to take responsibility for their supplies. If they break their crayons or tear the eraser off their pencil then they are the ones that have to deal with it. 

I don't have to take planning time to find morning work or sort through papers each day. Students automatically come in and get their morning work journal. They know that they have to write the date, draw a picture, and write about it. This makes the morning work differentiated to students' ability levels as well.  

Before, my students would finish the morning work I had picked out in two minutes. Now they can work the entire time they are in the classroom before the bell rings. This is really important for our school because we have some students thirty minutes before the school day begins. If students do finish their work, they are allowed to read a book. 

These simple strategies have worked really well for our class! A little change can make a big difference in your classroom's environment and productivity. 

January Birchbox

I was so excited to get my January Birchbox because it had 7 samples!! I had the normal 5 samples, plus an extra shampoo and conditioner. You can see that this month's theme was 2015- Let's Do This!

I love that the samples are a good size and allow for multiple uses. Here is a closer look at what was in my box this month. Please remember that Birchbox sends samples based on your personal beauty profile, so not everyone receives the same items.

Dr. Jart+ Premium Beauty Balm 

I knew I would love this sample before I even tried it! If you read my Best of Birchbox 2014, you know that I love Dr. Jart+ and currently use the Black Label Detox version of their beauty balm. The premium version is just as great and is jam packed with benefits: primer, moisturizer, SPF, and treatment serum. 

Davines Oil Absolute Beautifying Potion

This was my first time using a hair oil and I like that it tamed my frizz and fly away baby hairs. You can use this on damp or dry hair. It also improves hair shine. So far I've been happy with this product.

Davines Shampoo and Conditioner

These were my least favorite samples. I felt like they were heavy for my fine hair and left my hair with a weird texture. I didn't really like the smell either. It just smelled like soap to me.

Harvey Prince Sincerely 

I was pleasantly surprised with this sample. Typically, I'm not crazy about perfumes but this one has a very unique smell. It is a blend of Indonesian clove bud, Indian tuberose, and Japanese orange flower. I like that it has a sweet scent without being overwhelming. I would consider wearing this fragrance in the future. 

Naobay Body Radiance Lotion

I've been using this lotion for two days on the backs of my arms (one of my skin trouble spots). My arms feel hydrated and the skin feels soft. I feel good about using the lotion because it is made almost entirely of natural ingredients and comes in a packages made of sustainable cardboard.

theBalm Stainiac

I was a little nervous to try this lip stain because it looks very red before you put it on. However, it didn't go on as dark and you can add layers of the color. You can see the color in the picture below. I wore a little lip gloss over it. I would like to try the additional colors that it is available in. 

After using my Birchbox products!!

If you are interested, feel free to use my referrall link:

 https://www.birchbox.com/invite/growandenjoy

January in Kindergarten

We have been enjoying lots of winter activities this week in kindergarten. Our hot chocolate subtraction mugs and The Snowy Day art are currently on display.

We had used marshmallows for a Christmas project, and of course I bought way too many! This hot chocolate project was great for using some of those marshmallows. I gave each of the students 6 marshmallows to start with. They then had to roll a die to see how many they got to eat. We used those numbers to create a subtraction number sentence.

We also read The Snowy Day this week to introduce personal narrative writing. Then we drew our favorite parts of the story. You can see that we are working hard on labeling our illustrations!

On Friday, we took a break from our personal narrative writing to learn about Martin Luther King Jr. Day. If you haven't discussed it yet, here are some great free resources!

The King and His Dream Video

This was just the right length and amount of info for my kinders. We watched the video and then made a graphic organizer about what we learned.

As we were reviewing sentence structure, we did a shared writing piece about what we could do to fulfill MLK Jr.'s dream.

Download this FREE writing paper from Kathy Romano and Christina Murphy.

We also colored a picture of MLK Jr. for our hallway display. You can download several FREE coloring pictures from Fern Smith's Classroom Ideas.

I can't believe January is almost over! It will be time for Valentine's Day ideas soon. Enjoy the long weekend!