Giveaway Winner!

Congrats to Cindy Smith!  You are the winner of our latest Giveaway!  We've already emailed out our Math POP! Task Cards pack to you!

Thank you to everyone who entered and started following our new collaborative blog iTeachKinder!
We hope you enjoy the ride!

Standards Board for the classroom

So do you want to make your kinders take ownership of their learning?? Several months ago, we visited a K class at a great school in our system. We got several ideas, but the Standards Board was by far the coolest!!

This board will help your kinders keep track of their learning as well as serve as immediate documentation for several TKES standards. Evaluators who come to observe will see immediately goals that students have mastered and ones they are currently working on. Best of all, the standards board shows you current student data to use when meeting for parent conferences or grading for progress reports or report cards.

Don't worry about confidentiality because there are no names on the standards board, just numbers. Each student learns his/her number thereby keeping student names confidential.

Check out this adorable way for students and teachers to monitor progress.

We would love to hear about what you do in your classroom!!

Great NEWS and a GIVEAWAY!

We have a very exciting announcement to make! 

We have decided to team up with some of our very best kinder blogging buddies to write for a collaborative blog! 

That means ONE blog with TONS of great ideas from several super awesome Kindergarten Teachers!

One thing we L-O-V-E about this blog, is you will know exactly what to expect each day of the week.  For every day, there is a blogging theme.  Check them out! 

We're SO excited to get started on this new adventure, and are thrilled to invite you along for the ride.  Let's celebrate with a little giveaway!  

You can win our Math POP!  Active Task Cards for Common Core Kindergarten Daily Review!  

Multiple Ways to Use the MATH POP! Task Cards!

FUN and ACTIVE Brain Breaks - Although kiddos will still be working on math concepts, these task cards have them engaged, up and moving, and are tons of fun! They give them a little break from seat work or more focused tasks.

Math Journal Prompts - Read a card aloud to the students and have them respond in their journals using words, pictures, and numbers. 

Time Fillers for Daily Math Review - Use a card when you have a few spare minutes to fill throughout the day.

EVERY SINGLE kindergarten math standard is included in this pack!

All you have to do to enter is follow us over at iTeachKinder then follow the instructions on the rafflecopter below!  

Be sure to visit the linky below to find other great K-2 teachers who will be part of this collaborative blog and enter to win their giveaways too!  Good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway 

We can't wait to get started sharing some great Kinder ideas with you! 

Clipart Credit: Melonheadz Illustrating, Creative Clips, Sonya DeHart Design

An InLinkz Link-up

America the Beautiful

We just wrapped up our "Living in America" unit!  This unit is such a perfect time to focus on nonfiction book characteristics, informational writing, and so many other standards while instilling a love of country!

I really did used to loathe this unit because it just seemed too abstract for kinders.  I thought how in the world would they learn all the facts and did they really even understand what a state or a country was!!!  Those concepts seemed too out there!  But then I realized it wasn't so much about the facts and deep concepts! This unit was so much more about WHY our country formed, HOW it was begun, and HOW it has changed. When we started to focus on the deeper understandings, everything became easier and more fun to teach. 

We found video clips from United Streaming and Brain Pop! Jr.. We researched and read lots of nonfiction books.  The kiddos talked a lot and had some great discussions with each other and more importantly with their families.  Their understandings grew deeper the more they shared with others!

And what happened was, our students began to feel a deep love and sense of loyalty and pride for their country.  Trust me, they learned lots of facts and information, but more importantly they learned the whys and hows of America...the big picture!  

This inquiry approach feels so right!  The kids were able to think deeply about the hows and whys and hopefully as they study America's history over the years, they'll begin to see trends and how it's all related.  And many of the same struggles of early America are part of many other countries' stories as well.

Well...this post turned into a bit deeper place than I meant to go!!!  But I just loved watching it all unfold this year, and feel like it will stay with my kiddos over time. Not all the facts, but the whys and hows!

In the meantime... Check out these amazing informational writings they did in the now!!!

Peace out for now!

Happy Birthday Dr. Seuss

Hope everyone had an awesome weekend!! We can't believe how fast the year is flying by!! Before we know it, it will be Spring Break, then the Statewide Assessment then time for Summer Break!!

Happy early Birthday Dr. Seuss!! We love celebrating his birthday with dressing up and doing Seuss Rotations, where each teacher reads a Seuss book then does a learning activity.

Check out our post from the past! See if there are any tips that you can use to celebrate Seuss!! Just click the image below for some "Seuss-tastic" Fun!  Happy LEARNING!!