6 Ideas for Making Ten

I'd love to share with you 6 ideas for using our free Let's Make Ten addition poster with your little learners! This printable teaching resource can be found in our store and is provided in color and blackline. 

I made it primarily to be a reference poster/visual as you guide students through the combinations that total 10 - 1+9, 2+8, 3+7, 4+6 and 5+5. Ask students to make the groups with counters or other math manipulatives.

Here are some other ways to use it:

1. Matching Puzzle

• print 2 copies of the color poster
• laminate
• cut the snakes out of one page
• encourage students to match the snakes to the other poster which can be used as a puzzle base mat

2. Clip the Dots

• have students use clips, clothespins or pegs of different colors to show the 2 numbers on each snake
• this will help emergent students with 1:1 and counting in addition to making 10
• great fine motor activity too

3. Make 20

• extend your advanced learners by asking them to take 2 snakes to identify the numbers needed to 'make 20'

4. Play Dough or Buttons

• in similar fashion to the clips, ask students to place play dough balls, buttons or math manipulatives directly on the snake to build each combination

5. Get Creative

• let students paint or color the blackline version to show each pair of numbers
• circle dot stickers would be fun too

6. Hole Punch

• combine counting and fine motor
• great for tactile learners
• cut the blackline page into strips
• let students punch holes in the snake to show one of the numbers in the combination

We hope you love these additional ways to get even more value out of using one of our favorite freebies!

<

SHARE:

Addition, Free Teaching Resources

Free Printable To Do List

I'm so happy to be able to share 2 new printable to-do lists with you! They are in the free library of our Pond Coloring Club ready for you!

This beach themed 'seas the day' page is divided into boxes, enabling you to create a mini list for each day of the week.

And on the you cone do it page you can create a stack of tasks and scoop one off at a time!

Another happy addition to my office space and perfect for your classroom are our new sunshine printable accents! If you have a drab corner of your learning space that needs some instant warmth - just print, trim and display our suns!

Included in the printable file are various options including happy word cards too! 

They are over in our store ready for you if you'd like to take a peek:

Have a wonderful day and thanks so much for stopping by the blog!

SHARE:

Classroom Decor, sun, Teacher Organization

Sweet Ice Cream Screen Wallpapers

Today, I'm adding a new screen wallpaper - Sweet Ice Creams - to my screens and would love to share it with you. A new screen wallpaper is a fast and inexpensive way for me to feel renewed and refreshed. I like to change them up each week or so.

Thank you for letting me know that so many of your students love a new background on their board or devices in the classroom each week! I hope this new design brings a big smile to their face.

Simply download the images from google drive below. Store them on your camera roll and choose them for your screen saver and/or wallpaper.

Ice Cream Screen Wallpaper
Ice Cream Screen Wallpaper Phone

{These are for your personal use only and cannot be redistributed or shared}. 

If you're looking for some ice cream or summer teaching ideas, you may like to take a peek at our category page over on the website!

We hope you love the new screen wallpaper, be sure to pop back through some old posts for more screen happiness!

SHARE:

wallpaper

Let's have a sweet summer bulletin board

To make this super sweet summer bulletin board with your students, have each of them make their own ice treat and use our word cards to create the title.

 You will need:

• one page craft template per student (free here on our blog)
• paint, crayons, markers or pencils
• scissors
• glue
• word cards (free here on the base of this post)

1. Ask students to color, cut and glue their ice treat using colors of their choice.
2. Print the word cards on colored paper or card.
3. Assemble all the pieces on your bulletin board.
4. Read the title with your students, pointing to each word and encouraging reading skills. 

Find the cards in Google Drive: Let's have a sweet summer header word cards.

We'd love to provide more support for you over these busy weeks as you end the school year.

• summer themed teaching ideas
• free coloring and activity pages
• free sandcastle craft
• more bulletin board ideas

Note: We used Pond Unicorn font for the word cards.

SHARE:

Bulletin Board, Summer

Summer Countdown Coloring Pages

If you're counting down the days left in the classroom, we have some new coloring pages you may like! 

In the free club we've added a shark page. Each day your learners can color a fish as they countdown from 10 to 1!

And premium members have access to an ice cream scoop page! Students will similarly color a numbered section each day to see out the last 10 days of school. 

If you'd like to know more about our Coloring Club, you can find information on the dedicated website. Feel free to contact us with any questions you have.

<

SHARE:

Coloring Page, End of School Year

sh words with Shark

Make learning to read sh words fun with an engaging display in your classroom or learning space! 

Sh is a consonant digraph made by writing the letter s and h together. We have chosen words for our display that contain sh in the initial and final position and have additional single sounds - making them great for beginning readers. 

We created crinkly blue water for the display by scrunching blue tissue paper and pinning the words to this.

Your learners will love seeing the shark they create lined up ready to help with the reading! They can make their own with paper scraps or use the template in our craft pack. Find the shark paper craft  in our store.

To create the heading and word cards for this display, use our free bonus file available here in Google Drive: Let's read sh words with shark.

If you'd like more ideas and resources for teaching with a shark theme, find our growing collection on the website.

SHARE:

Craft for Kids, Digraphs, Reading

cvc Rhyme Wheels

Our cvc Rhyme Wheels can be used by your students to build banks of words that rhyme. 

They:

• take a card
• say the word in the center
• change the initial sound to create rhyming words as they go around the circle looking at each picture 

Students can write the new words directly on the laminated wheel or create a word bank on a sheet of paper or mini whiteboard. 

This activity encourages:

• single letter sound knowledge
• blending cvc words
• identifying rhyming words
• building vocabulary
• writing cvc words (early spelling)

More ideas:

• ask students to build the words with magnetic letters or tiles instead of writing them
• play a class sounding-out game - sound a word from a focus card (c-a-t) and ask students to identify the word you have made
• encourage students to create additional words for each word family

Find more cvc word resources over on our website page.

SHARE:

cvc words, Literacy Center

Fast prep Addition Game - Chick Fill It Up

 

Our Chick Fill it Up printable math center for kindergarten and first grade is an engaging way for students to practice addition within a 20 frame. 

They will play with a partner, spinning and adding counters to their side of the game mat until they reach 20. With each spin and addition to their frame they can see a new total and recalculate how many more they need to make 20.

Simply team with counters and a paperclip for spinning! We've added a worksheet for students to follow-up their play with some written work.

Find this game in our TPT store!

SHARE:

Addition, Spring

Ideas for B and D Reversals

A few weeks ago, over on Instagram I showed you some additions we made to our free bed craft and poster for helping students visualize the formation of a b and d when writing. The bed posts showing how to position the downstroke.

Some of my followers shared their favorite tips after I shared another of mine:

Lips Match First Stroke of Written Letter

As well as the bed analogy I like to tell students to think about how their lips are positioned when saying 'b' as opposed to 'd'. 

• for b, we start with a closed, straight line mouth (and write the straight downstroke first)
• for d, we start with an open, rounded shape to our lips, and we also write the round circle shape of the d first. 

Make a Bed with your Thumbs

• as shown in the photo above, make a bed with 2 thumbs up

Belly and Diaper

• some teachers tell their students that b has a belly, d has a diaper, drawing faces and turning the letters into characters

Alphabetical Order

• a few teachers shared with me using the alphabet for support, they teach students to say a, b, c (draw the c first), d (add the stick)

Magic C

• tell students that magic c turns into a d, they write a c and then add the downstroke

Broomstick and Donut

• a follower shared with us that she tells students that there is a broomstick first for b and a donut first for d

If you have another favorite way to teach b and d, please share by letting us know through our contact form, and I'll add it to this list!

Our free printable includes a blackline and color version of the bed poster, craft, and word cards. You can find it in our store.

We recently added some coloring pages to the coloring club with a b and d focus too. We're sure your students will love them!

 

Help dog dig for all the ds!

Help bee find the b flowers.

We hope your little learners love these supports to help them remember which way to write their bs and ds!

SHARE:

Handwriting, Letter Formation

Comprehension Strategies

Our Comprehension Strategies printable pack provides you with visuals to support the encouragement of a range of comprehension strategies in early reading. This poster will not help your students learn to visualize, but you can use them as you teach them about what they are doing when they read. 

Helps students learn to visualize through your shared reading experiences - read a book with them and pause to talk about visualizing. Do this often. Reflect back to Rocky the Raccoon and remind them that good readers may pause to visualize or visualize as they go.

As well as Rocky, we have:

• Spinner Spider - make a connection
• Iggy the Inferring Iguana - infer as you read - predict, conclude, reflect
• Digger the Dog - find details and main idea
• Questioning Owl - ask questions and look for answers
• Fix Up Bear - stop and fix it
• Jabber the Reteller - retell in your own words

The prompts are provided in the following formats:

• Page Size Posters
• Printable Pennant Banner
• Strategy Sticks (circle prompt to add to stick or ruler)
• Blackline coloring page for students to take home

I've also included a one page display header 'Our Comprehension Strategies' so you can make a title for your learning or reading space. Giant bright printable letters spelling R-E-A-D-I-N-G I-S T-H-I-N-K-I-N-G are also provided for your classroom wall. A student bookmark is also included for reference.

Simply choose the pieces you would like to include and print, cut and clip to a line or bulletin board!

Perfect for early readers, these strategies and printables will be fun, engaging and make your learning space adorable!

<

SHARE:

comprehension, Reading

Comparing Quantities - Kindergarten Math Centers

Before multiplication and division (repeated equal groups) are considered in kindergarten or first grade you should be confident that your students are confident comparing the quantities of groups. 

Our Math Pack 8 will help! This is a pack of 5 math activities to complement your math program, engage students and focus on key sequenced skills. 

This bundle will help students learning to:

• understand more/less
• compare using a linear arrangement
• compare using the collection model
• compare using 'groups of 2'
• determine 'how many more/less'
• draw more than

Each of the 5 small-group activities has:

• detailed instructions
• playing cards/boards/templates
• a worksheet (either a recording worksheet or a fun-follow-up)
• a cover page to help you organize your resources for future reference

These activities can be used in a structured game rotation program, as math centers or in guided math. Once taught, they also make fantastic 'fast-finisher' activities for revision of key concepts.

Let's take a peek at each of the 5 activities:

Let's Compare

Students will label picture collections with greater than/less than/equal to words and symbol cards

Collecting Shells

Students will determine more/less with pictures of collections as they collect shells in their bucket.

How Many More?

Students will determine 'how many more' by direct comparison of picture cards (arranged in rows of 2 - good intro to odd/even).

Train Tracks

Students will order numbers in a linear arrangement to determine more/less.

Peas Please

Students will draw 'more peas' to make a group that is 'more than' the picture collection.

You can find these games, activities (Math Pack 8) and more information about our entire kindergarten math center collection, over on our website page.

SHARE:

Math Center, number sense

Picture Matching Cards - Farm Animals

Visual Discrimination activities are an essential for pre reading. Students will look carefully along the row of pictures on our Mouse and Friends cards and find the two pictures that match. 

The pictures presented on each card may differ in:

• color
• size
• orientation
• internal detail

Teach students to 

• look at the first picture
• point to each picture from left to right across the card
• return to the first and sweep their finger across the line again, identifying the picture that is the same
• identify the match with a peg, counter or dry-erase marker

These cards can be used along with our free rhyming text Little Farm Mouse, or independently. 

SHARE:

farm, Visual Discrimination

New Coloring Pages

Over in our Premium Coloring Club library we've been steadily adding new pages to the collection for months. We're so happy you love them! Here are just a couple of our latest favorites.

Bird Pairs

On this page students can find the matching bird pairs and color them the same.

Bubblegum Roll and Color

Your little ones can roll a standard six sided die and find a matching gumball on their page to color. Make it a little harder by giving them a number die where they will match pattern to numeral.

Find these pages and many more, over in our Pond Coloring Club!

SHARE:

Coloring Page

cvc Find the Word Worksheets

Help your students with early reading skills with our fast-prep cvc worksheets. 

They will sound out, read and find cvc words. There are 20 worksheets provided, each featuring 10 words.

Students will use their letter-sound knowledge of the alphabet to locate the words - all are horizontal to encourage reading skills.

Some tips and ideas

•  read the word list with students
• encourage them to sound-out, identifying each single sound
• draw a line under each sound as you say them with students
• talk about new vocabulary

• use a paper screen to partition off sections of focus for your emergent-readers
• show them how to point across the line, looking for an identified letter
• show them how to return-sweep to the next line, as they do in reading a book

• find each word by shading or looping the words

• the worksheets can be placed in a plastic sleeve and used with a dry erase marker to conserve paper

We hope your learners love these new activities- you can find them in our store today!

SHARE:

cvc words, Emergent Readers