Integrating the Arts {With The Kindergarten Connection}

So often (and sadly so) the arts get taken out of the school day when we get put in a time crunch or with budget cuts. Music may get cut, or art, drama, and more. Kids need these important educational experiences, and while my students are still blessed to have twice weekly music classes, I know that is not the case in all schools. 

One thing I do teach on my own is art, and I often do this through integrating fun art projects that go along with our current season or theme. 

I have taught each grade from Pre-K through 3rd, and I know that each grade is unique, but also that each age in the primary grades can use practice with following directions, cutting skills, fine motor work, and also experimenting with color, lines, and other introductions to arts and crafts. 

These 10 winter art projects are perfect for the primary grades and are sure to be a hit with your kids too! 

10 Winter Art Projects for Kids

(from left to right) 

Make a fun close up winter snowman painting. // Housing a Forest 

Use oil pastels for beautiful winter tree art. // Buggy and Buddy 

These winter watercolor trees turn out wonderfully! // Happiness is Homemade

This winter handprint tree makes a great keepsake or display. // Arty Crafty Kids

Grab some construction paper and make this snowy mountain winter tree art. // I Heart Crafty Things

These salt and watercolor snowscapes are quite a wonder! // Crafting Connections

Why not learn about color mixing with snow? // Adventures in a Box

These process art snow prints are so fun and unique. // Still Playing School 

If you can head out in the snow, these snow mandalas are amazing! // Wilder Child 

Another great keepsake and a fun classroom craft are these painted snowglobes! // Crafty Morning

What's your favorite winter art project? 

Tricks and Treats {From The Kindergarten Connection}

Fall is here, and Halloween is just around the corner! It's on a Monday this year too, which is kind of like every teacher's nightmare.

But we are here to help make Halloween more exciting this year with some tricks and treats for you! (As in, teacher tips and free resources - yay!)

Teacher Tricks

In thinking back on this past school year, I settled on my top 3 tips that either made things easier for me, or more fun for my students.

1. Spray Paint Your Magnetic Letters

This fabulous organization trick was sent to me by TeacherKel (find her here on Instagram!) and she allowed me to share her fabulous photo setup with my readers.

Use spray paint (check labels of course and be sure you are doing so safely) to color code your magnets for word work centers.

No more mixed letters - the individual sets will stay organized!

2. Fun Pens in the Writing Center

If you have a writing center, write the room, or anything of the sort, fun pens or unique writing tools are essential! 

It increases interest and engagement instantly, and provides kids a break from traditional pencil writing. 

I got these fun pens from Scholastic, but you could pick up some on Amazon, the dollar store - anywhere you see them. 

3. Color Sort Your Extra Crayons

The teacher before me had a ton of these small microwave meal trays (because we all know teachers save everything, and I was glad she did!) but any small container or drawer set would work. 

I put crayons in them on a shared shelf space. If anyone needs a color they don't have, they can just run over and grab one. 

No more, "I don't have a pink!" or color searching chaos. 

Teacher Treats!

Treats and freebies are always fun, right? Well, I have a fun freebie for you that is perfect for fall!

Turkey Ten Frames is great for a quick and fun math center. Head over and grab your copy by clicking the link or photo below.

Grab Turkey Ten Frames Here! 

Sensational Science Activities for Kids! {With The Kindergarten Connection}

Science can be super fun, and I know I love when I discover new and exciting experiments to try with my kids. These sensational science experiments for kids are gathered up from a few of our own Elementary Entourage family and others too, and they are sure to be a hit with your kids as well! 

Fizzing Beginning Sounds Science Experiment - The Kindergarten Connection

We spend a ton of time identifying beginning sounds and learning to read - why not mix it up with a little science experiment fun? Make your sounds fizz with this super cool activity. 

All About Plants  - Kooky Kinders

Kooky Kinders always has such fun ideas for Foodie Friday! This science activity is a snack too! View her All About Plants Post, and grab the printable to sort your snack too! 

Dancing Worms - The Kindergarten Smorgasboard

I don't know many kids (if any) who would say no to a science experiment involving gummy worms! 

States of Matter Fun - Mrs. Thompson's Treasures

Sometimes things are just better with a snack! Explore states of matter with a variety of fun activities, including using cheerios to represent solids, liquids, and gases! 

Multicolored Flower Experiment - The Kindergarten Connection

Did you know you can turn flowers multicolored? This fun experiment is always a hit and one to get some "oohs" and "ahhhs" out of kids! 

Elephant Toothpaste - The Kindergarten Smorgasboard

Great for dental health month - or anytime really - this experiment is sure to cause a reaction not just in the bottle, but in your kids too! 

Planting With Kids - The Kindergarten Connection

Do you garden with your kids? Grab some soil and plants (and this free printable too) to get started with a super fun plant unit! 

Some more exciting science experiments to try with your kids from other fabulous bloggers:

Gummy Bears Science - Creative Lesson Cafe

Burning Money - Playdough to Plato

DIY Rain Clouds - Toby and Roo

Dancing Raisins - Gift of Curiosity

Magnetic Slime - Growing a Jeweled Rose

Happy Teaching! 

Spring Into....CVC Word Family Poems!

Gathering great resources for the classroom is something many teachers do all year long, not just at back to school. Now that spring is here, it can be time to refresh or give some new life to our teaching day, and we at EE are so excited to be able to give away some brand new resources to a lucky winner!

In Kindergarten, we work hard on learning to read! We unlock reading through mastering our letters and sounds, and then we move on to master blending and reading CVC (consonant, vowel, consonant) words.

Being able to read CVC words fluently helps kids see and become familiar with patterns in words, especially when looking at word families or word chunks (cat, bat, hat, mat, etc)

Word family poems are quick, fun, and simple way to practice building up fluency with CVC words!

There are 23 printable poems in the set, each one focusing on a different short vowel word family. This allows students to identify the patterns and rhymes in the poems and to get repetitive practice with reading them. 

The poems are made up of CVC words and beginning sight words, so they not only work on identifying word families and patterns, but build up sight word fluency too! 

You can choose to read the poems one at a time and then send them home for additional practice, or you can choose to collect them in a poetry notebook so that your kids can read them over again during Read to Self time or in small groups.

The great thing about them being printable is that there are tons of options - you could even send a set home and keep one at school!

The entire set of CVC poems is available HERE in my TpT store. You can also find it combined with alphabet and CVCe poems in the Phonics Poems Bundle. 

Know what's even better? You can WIN it, along with tons of other resources but entering the Rafflecopter below!

Happy Teaching!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Why I'm Lucky to Teach Kindergarten! {With The Kindergarten Connection}

I have taught Kindergarten through 3rd grade, including a year in a multiage classroom of 1st-3rd grade. I have loved each of those experiences, but my heart truly belongs in Kindergarten!!!

There are so many reasons why I feel lucky to teach Kindergarten. I have to say I feel even luckier that I teach in an amazing place where play is supported as part of the learning process. Learning through inquiry and play is a daily part of my kindergarten classroom. 

I know not all kindergarten teachers get to play in their classrooms (which seriously makes me sad) so I am truly so lucky that I do! 

We still have rigorous standards to meet and we are a Common Core state, however we know that kids learn through play. They are never, ever "just" playing! 

Each afternoon my kids engage in intentional play of their choosing. I support them during this time with social development as well as learning opportunities to connect our classroom learning to real life experiences. 

Our play may look like play dough, board games, kitchens, dolls, cars, and so much more.

Sometimes we are even exploring live critters! For instance, recently we had snails in our classroom. I loved that I could have them out for students to learn about and explore not just during our science block, but during our play to learn time as well! 

Play is so important for kids socially, developmentally, and academically too. They are constantly learning and growing! 

I feel so incredibly lucky to be able to give my students these experiences. I am so happy to teach kindergarten - it truly is a great place to be! 

Read Alouds We Love! {With Alex from The Kindergarten Connection}

I am obsessed with children's books. I have been hoarding - I mean collecting - them for years now, and my collection has grown to over 2000! Some of my favorite ones are ones that are engaging, make my kids smile, and are just good fun!

It was super hard to think of just a few of my favorite books, but after spending some time in my classroom library this past week thinking about it, I found a few that I can say would definitely be on my favorites list! 

First up is The Very Cranky Bear by Nick Bland. This book never fails to crack up my kids as the animals do their best to cheer up Bear, who really is wanting to hibernate! 

Another book that really gets the laughs going is Dogzilla by Dav Pilkey (also the author of Kat Kong which is just as funny) Mice must unite to save the world from the beastly terror of "Dogzilla!" 

I love wordless books. They are so great for teaching kids the strategy of "reading the pictures" which is especially helpful as most of my students come as non readers. This book, Tuesday by David Weisner, contains flying frogs and many shenanigans that keep their interest and make them laugh too! 

If you are looking for books on friendship, Owen and Mzee is a fabulous one, and is a true story as well! The text is long, but I often paraphrase it or showcase the photos to my students. They are always fascinated that a tortoise and hippo would be best friends! 

Doesn't the cover of this book even make you smile? Children Make Terrible Pets by Peter Brown is the funny, engaging story of a bear who finds and wants to keep a kid as a pet - which is a funny twist on stories we usually read! This book makes my kids laugh and is a much requested one in my classroom! 

We LOVE Tieks Giveaway! 

Not only do we love books, but we love Tieks and teachers too! We want to show our love and appreciation by giving away a pair of Tieks to one lucky winner! 

Enter below! 

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New Year, New Procedures {With The Kindergarten Connection}

While a new calendar year doesn't mean a new school year just yet, it can sometimes feel like it when we return from break!
It's time for some new (or reviewed) procedures to get us back into the routine for a successful second half of our school year!

In my classroom we spend a ton of time in the fall building up our stamina. We work on being able to do things independently for a good amount of time - things such as Daily 5, math workshop, writing workshop, etc. By the time we hit mid October we are usually at about 15 min of stamina, which is great for my kinders!

However, returning from winter break can make the stamina go down again, so I introduce a new way to build it back up with a 10 day stamina challenge! 10 days is a great amount of time for us to build it back up again and get back into the swing of things. I find it to be a great boost for my kids when they return from break.

I use this stamina graph inside a dry erase pocket and usually keep it on our board or under the document camera. We check it out in between rounds of Daily 5 to see how we are doing each day and to set some goals.

There is also a version that is black and white if you want your students to have their own copy - that can be fun for keeping them accountable and learning about graphing too!

It goes up to 30 minutes so that other grade levels can use it, but my kinders usually do best about 15-18, so that is our goal!

Want to use the stamina graph in your own classroom? Grab your own copy HERE.
Happy New Year!

An InLinkz Link-up

Positive Parent Communication {With The Kindergarten Connection}

Communicating with parents is so important. After all, when teachers and parents work together and are on the same page, it can make a huge difference in a child's education! 

I communicate with my kindergarten parents in various ways. Some of those ways include:

• emails -I send some personal ones as well as a weekly update one to all families.
• blog - I have a private classroom blog that parents can access.
• newsletter - I send a monthly newsletter.

Those ways are great and keep parents up to date about classroom happenings, but I also think it is important to send home some things that are more personalized.

So, I also love to send home positive notes! 

Kids work hard in school and a LOT happens that isn't just academics. They are of course learning how to read and write, but they are also learning how to navigate friendships and be part of a classroom community!

When something great happens at school, like when someone is a kind friend, helps someone, or even when they are doing something great in reading or math, etc - I love to acknowledge that with a fun little note home!

These notes print four to a page, so I just have a stack of them already cut, and then I can write something positive in the box and put it in the child's folder at the end of the day. 

It means a lot to the child, and gives them something positive to share with their parents too! 

Download the Notes! 

Want to send home some positive notes to your kiddos too? Grab these cute notes, run off copies and keep them on hand for those great, celebration worthy moments!
Grab your copy HERE.

How do you communicate with parents?

Why I Love TpT and Blogging {with The Kindergarten Connection}

Teachers Pay Teachers and blogging have played a major role in my life over the past year. 

I never imagined that my decision to take the leap and "give them a try" last year would lead me to where I am now! 

The decision to blog came about because I simply love talking about teaching and sharing teaching ideas. I would always read blogs and talk with teachers, so I thought "maybe I can take this to an online platform too!" So I took the risk and dove in. I am so glad I did. 

My blog has evolved quite a bit in the past year, and I am constantly learning new things. I love every minute of the journey! It allows me to connect with teachers from all over, share ideas, and learn from others! 

The decision to create and offer resources on TpT came about around the same time as blogging. They seemed to go hand in hand for me. I love creating things and I love finding things that work well in the classroom. 

TpT has been an amazing creative outlet for me, as well as a place for me to find awesome resources for my students (I buy a ton on there too!) I think it is a fantastic place for teachers because we all bring such different styles and expertise. I am definitely both a seller and a buyer on TpT! 

In addition to helping me chip away at graduate school loans, TpT has opened up so many wonderful doors for me. It has allowed me to make so many online friends, and then meet them in real life too! 

I had an AMAZING time meeting my online friends in real life this summer at the TpT conference!

I got to spend time with my online friends and also meet new ones! It was great to meet people that I had only talked to via email or FB, or that I seemed to "know" from Instagram. Meeting them face to face was great!

As I begin another year on TpT and another year with my blog, I look forward to learning even more and meeting even more friends! I am also thankful that I am strengthening current friendships and that I have a support system in my fabulous bloggy and TpT buddies! 

The Elementary Entourage has been goings strong for an entire year! While I haven't been part of this group that long yet, I can say that I already feel like part of the EE family and I LOVE this group! I am so happy to be part of it!

We are celebrating out blogiversary by giving away a complete blog design from Laugh Eat Learn Designs! You don't want to miss out on this! Be sure you enter below!

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An InLinkz Link-up