Higher Order Thinking?

Happy New Year! I don't know about everyone else, but my school is pushing Rigor, with higher order thinking questioning.

This is what we were doing last year at this time. I thought my students were doing great. They were reading, writing, and finally could color! Got to have color.

Now I am rethinking what my students should be doing at this time of the year. They are mostly still 5 and 6 years old. They love school and learning - but am I pushing them to the higher level of learning. I am looking at the questions that go along with the Bloom's Task Wheel that everyone in my school has. 

I need to get to the top of the wheel (pyramid) more, but with little Ks who are just now beginning to APPLY the knowledge they have learned, it might be more difficult than someone looking in might think.

How do you get your Ks to climb to the top of the Bloom's chart? I would love some feedback on this.

Snowman Craftivity!

We had so much fun making our snowmen yesterday. Our school is about 6 miles from the coast, so most of my students have never seen snow. They love reading about snow and they loved making these snowmen from my Winter Math and ELA 135 Pages of Printables!

The snowmen are so big and just look great as my 'window curtain.' In the Winter Printables packet, this is only about 5 pages of 100, but I decided to make the snowmen with lined chart paper rather than the white paper I suggested in the packet. I wanted to have a writing activity that didn't take too long so I could get these up!

Some students wrote more than usual. What I was most impressed with is how my students' coloring, glueing and cutting skills have improved since the beginning of the year. I know that isn't at the top of most State Standards checklists, but it does help when a student can concentrate on coloring and then apply those details and descriptions to their writing.

My students were so involved with this activity! I know some teachers will know what I mean when I say I am so proud of their cutting skills!

I didn't edit any of the writing. They read what they wrote to their table buddies and I displayed all of their work.

Yes, this is such an improvement over what was done at the beginning of this year. And this child was so proud of her work! She cut around the lines, and colored with pizazz! She was following directions until she came to the mittens!

You can see the chart paper here. I say to use two sheets of construction paper and let students cut the corners to make a circle. We were out of white art paper and bulletin board paper, so I improvised and I really like this! I think I like the chart paper the best. It isn't too heavy for hanging and students loved writing on the chart paper.

Can you tell how focused my little ESL guy is? He didn't even realize I was taking a picture. I think coloring gives ESL Kinders a sense of accomplishment. They are trying so hard to learn English and may feel behind the others. A coloring project like this really gives them a chance to soar to the top of the class. 

I love my students faces when they are involved with a project. I took about 40 pictures, and could look at them all day! 

If you are interested in Winter themed activities for ELA and Math, the Winter Math and ELA Printable Packet contains 135 pages of ELA and Math printables. I like to call them processing sheets.... all engage students!  There is measurement, Emergent Readers, a Counting Book, writing, Artic Animals.... and of course the snowman!

Thanks as always for visiting my blog! I hope you enjoy looking through my students pictures. I am so proud of them! (I have to add one more of their snowmen!)

Okay, that's it! Thanks for being patient with all my pictures! 

A Tad Behind, But Here Is Our Native American Writing!

We spent more time that I thought we would on our Native American unit. There was just so much to do and my students were really enjoying this! (And isn't that the whole purpose of teaching a unit!) By the way, most of what I used can be found in my Native American Writing Unit on TPT. There's a huge sale tomorrow and my entire store is 20% off, plus the 8% TPT gives you. So that is almost 30% off every item in every store on TPT that is participating! 

https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Native-American-Writing-and-Craft-Unit-Vocabulary-Graphic-Organizers-1544013

We made canoes and teepees. My students love using markers and I usually don't let them because the colors bleed through on paper. This activity was great. The idea came from Pinterest! The original idea just had a canoe and painted paper plate. We used the grass and a teepee to add a little more to the activity. I also used a blue paper plate instead of painting the plate. Gluing these with the glue gun was a difficult task! You  had to hold the canoe till the glue set or it would fall over.

After reading a few books and watching Scholastic news, I had my students use this anchor chart to show what they knew about Native Americans. I have to give my students background information at the beginning of a unit before they can start their Know/Wonder/Learned charts. They know a lot more than they think, but it has to be sparked a little!

I think my students loved the headbands the best. They spent a lot of time on these. I let them wear these headbands the entire week when they were writing or crafting! (Not on the carpet though, too many little ones couldn't see!) We also made paper vests and wrote sentences using the words in my Native American Writing Unit on TPT. In art students made patterned bracelets that were colored in using construction paper crayons. Love these!

We made our Anchor Chart. We had read many of the books and studied using Scholastic Online's Thanksgiving Unit with videos of Native Americans. I give my students post-it-notes and they write/draw and color what they are learning. They love this! 

We used the writing from my Native American Writing Unit on TPT to complete our writing about Native Americans. 

These were hung outside our room for all to see! We try and hang up writing samples from our classroom since we are focusing on writing and academic vocabulary this year. 

There's a lot more included in my Native American Writing Unit. I didn't take pictures of the Emergent reader and Teacher Read Aloud. There are vocabulary picture cards and so much more included. It would take two weeks of instruction time to go through everything included. I think with first graders, who already know how to read and write sentences, this unit could be completed in one week.

My students are working on writing what they are saying. This takes a while. We are doing a great job on coloring which is also an important part of being a Kindergarten student!

Well, now comes the Holidays! Hold on tight for this fast ride!

Veterans Day!

Veterans Day was an all day event in  my Kindergarten class. Having lived at the coast for only three years, I wasn't used to being in a non-military community for a holiday like Veterans Day. I took the time to talk about our military, to watch Discovery Education videos about our military, and to share some of my family experiences being a military 'brat.' I gave my students time to discuss and share with their shoulder buddies and also in front of the class. Most of my students knew about the military only from play and cartoons.

We wrote letters to my nephew, David Cody who has just joined the Army. I am so proud of him, but at the same time I am sad because I know what a sacrifice this will be for him as far as being away from family and friends.

With my Kinders they have to have some kind of connection before they can even begin to write. I was hoping our day of talking, watching, discussing, and sharing would prepare them for their afternoon writing activity.

I believe by coloring they are beginning the writing process. They are thinking about what they are doing and getting their thoughts together.

As they finished, I hung their work out for all to see.

Tuesday we started another activity and I took down their letters to my nephew, David Cody and got those ready to mail to him.

I thought they turned out great.

It is nice to see Kinders beginning to understand a little about the world around them.

They made connections to our military which was different than just TV shows or cartoons.

They thought about a real person, my nephew, wanting to help his country.

Some just thought about fighting, but we talked about helping children all over the world.

If you would like my Veterans Day Writing Activity, https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Veterans-Day-Writing-Craftivity-for-Kindergarten-1560777. It's $3.00 on TPT, but can be used for many years to come. On the pictures there is a year, that has been taken off.  Please leave me some feedback and consider following my TPT store for new product notification!

Science and Social Studies Vocabulary Word Walls

Most schools are now requiring Science and Social Studies Vocabulary Word Walls. We have always had Word Walls for ELA and Math. The Science and Social Studies words can be a little more difficult because these words are usually harder to spell.... so harder to recognize for the younger students.

Here is a picture of my Science and Social Studies Vocabulary Word Wall.

I don't really have a lot of room for so many Word Walls, but they are required and my students use them in their writing. My Kindergartners would not be able to recognize these words though if it wasn't for the pictures. They use the School Tools pictures a lot in their writing. This is included in my School Tools packet on Teachers Pay Teachers (link.) Lots of other activities and printables are included also.

My Science Vocabulary Word Wall was put up after we did whole group lessons and other fun activities with this packet. (link) This deals specifically with K.P.1.1 in the Common Core curriculum. These are words that my students need to know, the pictures help.

Notice I had to use one of the center cards! I let my students use these cards at their seats whenever they need to for writing. It really helps them to see the words along with the pictures and sometimes the cards turn up in a journal instead of in the baggie where they can be found!

This is one of the whole group cards that I use to teach and show what the words mean.

****** After writing this post, I realized I should have just made Word Wall Cards with the pictures! So I have included those in this packet. If you have already bought this from my TPT, just go to your purchases and download the updated version.*******

Hope all is well in your neck of the woods! We are on our countdown to Winter Break... I love those words! I try not to think about it though because I want to take my time with my students and not rush through their Kindergarten Year.

Have a great December!

How Do You Display Student Work?

We have to have student work displayed in our hall and classroom. I love to do this anyway, but it is a requirement at our school. I wrote about how I display my students work on a previous post.

I thought maybe someone might be interested in  how I display my students' work in the hall. In a previous county we had a pretty strict Fire Marshall and things could not be hanging all over the place (I think it was only 60% of a wall could be covered??)

This is what I came up with a few years ago. I like the way each student has their place on the wall!

I usually only change it once a month, but in the past I have changed it weekly.

I didn't notice till now that one of the little spider webs is crooked!

How do you hang up your student work? Leave a comment below with a link to a pic! I would love to see how others display their students' work!

I have my  Student Work Topper on TPT. I printed my original Toppers pictured above in black and white and then took Sharpies to color in the WOW's (I do this a lot!) No color at the time and I had to finish this! The TPT packet has color and black and white Toppers, plus 10 different describing words! And instructions! Check it out if you are interested in displays! (Click on the picture below for a look!)

Thanks for the visit!