Math, Math and More Math!

This is my first year teaching kindergarten and I am still trying to find out "what works for me." Over the summer I talked to tons of teachers, blog hopped, and spent hours on Pinterest tying to find great ways to teach math. I wanted rotations that were easy for me to plan, allowed for the kids to work independently or with a partner and also incorporated other subjects (handwriting, language arts, gross and fine motor skills science and social studies). All of the other teachers I work with in kindergarten do math tubs. Basically, they have 5 tubs that are each filled with various games that the students can work independently on. The idea is that the tubs are full enough so if the child finishes a game they can put it away and pull out another game from the tub. This is great but I really wanted MORE! Call me greedy :)

It is week 3 and here is how I'm doing...

Every morning during calendar I introduce the number of the day (the number is always the number of days we have been in school). This number is important for the math rotations!

Rotation 1 is play dough. When the kids are at this rotation they are expected to make the number of the day using play dough and use the play dough to represent the number of the day with tally marks and dots. This activity keeps them busy for a while! Once they have done this they can play with the play dough and make whatever their heart desires! Playing with play dough is a great fine motor activity, especially if you throw in cookie cutters! The kids love it! The trays are from the dollar store, great for containing play dough and it allows for easy clean up!

How great is this! It sets up the next activity perfectly!

Rotation 2 is math journals. I love having a math journal! The kids get excited about this rotation, they feel very "grown up" writing in journals! :) Gotta love kids! This is another rotation where the number of the day is very important. The kids use their math journals to represent the number of the day in as many ways as they can. I stole this fabulous idea from my sister! I love seeing how creative they get with this activity.

Rotation 3 is folder games. This summer my sister, my mom, and I spent a lot of time making folder games that related to our social studies themes. Right now, we are wrapping up our Olympics and Me theme so the kids are playing Olympic math folder games! Love it! And boy do these games get competitive in my room!

Rotation 4 is sorting. This rotation will probably change throughout the year but since it is the beginning of kindergarten sorting is a must! I found these trays at the dollar store as well! Great for a veggie tray but BETTER for sorting! I also like having books out at this rotation because some kids can sort at lightning speed and then they are bored. Having math books there and waiting for those quick kiddos is a great way to tie in literacy. My mom gave me the book idea! Thanks :) I even found some math books that had great pictures of animals (BONUS! That also incorporates science into these rotations!).

Rotation 5 is fine motor and ordinal numbers. Since it is still summer time we have been reading tons of books that relate to this time of the year. So I decided to bring in some sea shells. Oh how I wish I was still at the beach collecting these shells. I found this cup tray at target for like 2 dollars! Great deal! The students start with the shells in the first cup and then have to use the tweezers to move all of them to the second cup and then to the third. I also have math books at this rotation as well.

Off to a great start! I like these rotations because three of them will basically stay the same for the entire year. Of course I will switch out the folder games to match our theme and also change the play dough to keep the kids interested, (hmmm...maybe shaving cream or sand!) but these really are teacher friendly and EASY.

Share your fun ways to teach math here! I would love to hear them!

Please check out our store! I just added a kindergarten homework calendar for September. I will be uploading a homework calendar every month so take a look and see if it is something you would like!

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/September-Homework-Calendar-A-Month-of-Homework-for-Kindergarteners

The finished product!

Here is a look at how our classroom number posters turned out!  Love them!

One week down! And many more to go.... :)

One week down (whew)...and several more to go (ahhh)! The summer may be over but the fun never stops! This is my first year teaching kindergarten and boy am I excited! Ever since I was asked to loop up with my class from last year I have heard several kindergarten teachers talk about how the number of sight words our kindergarten kiddos are expected to know at the end of year keeps increasing. Right now they are expected to know 125 words! That is a lot! Over the summer my sister, my mom and I decided that we better come up with a fun way to teach all of these words, so we made the Star Wars Sight Words Packet. Now that we are back in school and I have tried some of these activities, I can truly say that the kids LOVE this packet!

My class is very eager and energetic, like most kids! I am always looking for ways to teach that allows them to get some of their energy out while learning! This packet has a craft where you can make each student in your class their very own light saber! YES, I said it, LIGHT SABER! Don't worry, they are inexpensive light sabers! I know, I know, how do you use light sabers to teach sight words? Each morning, during calendar, I introduce a new sight word. Once I show the class the new word and we have practiced reading it several times I get out the light sabers for Jedi Training Academy. I have this awesome button that plays the Star Wars theme song, I think I got it at Hallmark. I push this button and my class has until the end of the song to get a light saber and find a place to stand in the classroom in Jedi position. Check out this cute picture of one of my Jedis!

So once the kids are ready I pull up a powerpoint I created that has the sight words that I have introduced so far this year. For example if we are practicing the word "the", we start with the first letter and point with our light sabers to the top of the "t" and trace the letter in the air and then say "t"! Then we do the same thing with the letter "h" and "e". After the class traces and spells the word I say, "What's that word?" and they point with their light sabers and say "the"! My class LOVES this activity! They look forward to it every morning and they are so well behaved during this activity because they do not want to miss out! After we have gone through the words I push the button and they know that they have until the end of the song to put their light sabers away and meet me back on the carpet. Each day, I watch during this activity and choose a Jedi of the Day! Check out this picture of my class during Jedi Training Academy! They are getting into it!!

Check out the rest of the Star Wars Sight Words Packet here:
http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Star-Wars-Sight-Words-Teach-the-First-300-Fry-Words-and-Make-It-FUN

Has it really only been four days?

Has it really only been four days since the kids came back??? I am exhausted!  I am teaching first grade again this year (yay!), Allison looped to kindergarten with her pre-kers from last year (lucky), and my sweet mom is braving pre-k for the first time (I know I could never do it).  Needless to say, bed time has come a lot earlier than any of us would like to admit this week.

I thought I would share a few pictures from our first few days.  I wish I had more, but I am struggling to remember to get out the camera...I need to get back in the habit.

First of all, I like to start the year off with an idea from Debbie Miller's Reading with Meaning book.  My entire grade level read this book a couple of years ago and we have integrated a lot of her ideas, but this is my favorite:

We generate a list of ideas as a class and then I incorporate the list into a little promise.  The kids then make self portraits and sign their name as a way of saying that "they promise."

Next, I have some pictures of a little math activity that I do every year during the first week.  I like to start the year by building number sense and working with a number line...so why not include a little art project?!

Here we are making number posters to hang in our classroom.  You can tell, right?  Ha!  We voted as a class to make bumblebees this year (at this point they are just yellow circles with a black head).  Each kid made some and then they had to come and place them on our number cards...the "1" card has one bee, "2" has two, all of the way to "25" (this is a great way for them to see the difference in numbers and it also guarantees that we make enough).  I take the bees and glue them on white paper with the corresponding number and number word...we add a few stripes and some wings, laminate, and voila!...a beautiful kid-created number wall for your classroom (I will post pictures of the finished product asap!).

We have also been doing a little "Number of the Day" practice.  Each student has a spiral bound notebook (cut in half) that they use every morning as part of their morning work.  They have to represent "Today's Number (the number of days we have been in school) in at least five different ways.  They start off the year with the number word, dots, etc, and they end the year doing some serious algebra...I kid you not.  Here are a few of my kids sharing what they came up with.

I'll be back with more pictures soon!

And so it ends...

Well...today officially marks the last day of summer vacation.  I will miss it so.  Tomorrow morning I will be greeting 23 new little faces, unpacking supplies, running through every possible procedure I can think of, etc, etc.  The day will speed by...and on Tuesday the real fun begins!

In addition to the last day of our glorious break, it just happens to be my birthday.  So we are going to celebrate with a SALE!

Go visit our Team Fannin store and stock up!