Leap Day Frog Directed Drawing

I have great news! If you have the Directed Drawing Fun Bundle, I added another 12 projects (3 drawings) to it today for you! A Leaping Frog will be ideal to draw to help celebrate Leap Day or when you're encouraging students to write abount animals.

Leap Day is an extra day (February 29) added every four years to keep our calendar in sync with the Earth's orbit around the sun. When I think of Leap Day I think of frogs and their remarkable leaping ability. Did you know that some frogs can jump up to 20 times their body length? That's like a human jumping over a two-story building!

Research some more facts about Leap Day, the sun's orbit or frogs and encourage your students to write after they've drawn their frog. Use a writing page from the printable pack or from this set of writing scaffolds. 

If you'd like to give your students more structured direction - set them a writing task:

1. The Life Cycle of a Frog
2. Fun Facts About Frogs
3. How Frogs Help the Environment

The frog drawings can also be used as the beginnings of art projects too. Provide big art paper, crayons, pencils or paint and guide your students through the basic shape sto start their project. They can add more detail, change aspects or create a unique background as they become more confident. 

More tips for drawing activities with kindergarten:

• demonstrate some simple and age-appropriate background elements - spirals, waves, clouds etc
• let your students select their own choice of drawing materials, including crayons, markers, pencils, and colored pencils
• provide a dedicated drawing time on your timetable and keep consistent expectations to help make students grow in confidence over the weeks 
• encourage children to explore different drawing techniques, such as scribbling, coloring, and shading to add to their art project
• use additional open-ended prompts to stimulate creativity, such as "What else could be in the pond with frog?"
• display children's artwork on a classroom bulletin board or display area, to boost their confidence
• offer positive reinforcement and praise children's efforts
• encourage children to tell stories about their drawings and model how to begin writing some of their ideas down - display these with the drawings and art projects
• make drawing a regular part of your classroom routine and week

I hope you love this new pack, added to the bundle today!

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Frog Leap Game

Here is a math game for counting and working with numbers to 30. 

Small Group Math Game: Leap Frog

Play with a small group of students, each has 30 counters to start (in a pond - round table sticker or piece of paper).

The winner is the student who has the number closest to 30 when finished.

• Roll this special frog dice: Leap Frog Dice in Google Drive
• Each player has 5 rolls.
• Counters move in and out of the pond. 
• They follow the instruction on the dice roll -removing or adding counters to their pile. 
• On ‘your choice’ they can choose any of the sides of the dice to follow.

After everyone has had 5 rolls, count and compare numbers - putting each number into position on a large classroom number line to see who has won and compare the totals. 

Optional:

• use the Frog Leap Five Frame to score the 5 turns - each time a student has a roll they can put a cube on their frame, keeping track of how they are progressing in the game. 

I hope you enjoy playing this fast-prep and engaging math game with your students!

• find the printable five frame frog leap cards and more in the Math Kit here
• find more ideas for Math Warm Ups here
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Fraction Robot

 

Are you looking for ways to make lessons on fractions more engaging for your students? Here are 3 easy ways to get started:

• Use manipulatives. Fraction circles, fraction bars, and other manipulatives can help students visualize and understand fractions.
• Connect fractions to real-world examples. Have students find fractions in their everyday lives, such as in recipes, on clocks, or in measuring cups.
• Make fractions fun. Play games, sing songs, read stories and do crafts that incorporate fractions.

3 Reasons Why Visuals Are Important in Math

• Visuals help children understand abstract and often-difficult concepts. For example, a child might have difficulty understanding the concept of addition until they see a visual representation of two sets of objects being combined to make a larger set.
• Visuals help young children develop spatial skills. Spatial skills are important for math and other areas of learning. Visuals can help young children develop these skills by providing them with opportunities to see and manipulate objects in space. For example, a child might play with fraction blocks to help them understand how parts combine to make a whole. 
• Visuals help young children make connections between math and the real world. Math is often seen as a subject that is separate from the real world. However, visuals can help young children to see how math is used in everyday life. For example, a child might create a picture that combines shapes or separate parts to make a whole or a new shape. 

Find our fraction robot craft in the store HERE

Find sequenced learning games and activities for introducing halves HERE

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Shamrock Craft Update for St Patrick's Day Activities

Your children may like to learn more about St. Patrick's Day during March. It’s a day to celebrate the patron saint of Ireland, Saint Patrick, and all things Irish. It is a day to remember the history and culture of Ireland, and to have some fun!

If you have the shamrock craft from my store for some of your activities, please know that I have revised it to include another option for you! 

The new option has no cute face to cut and paste, but a line pattern to trace - providing you extra fine motor practice and a new dimension for a classroom display. 

I hope you love this new update!

• find the craft in our store
• find more ideas and resources - including worksheets and math games
• reach out if you'd like some help

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Craft for Kids, St Patricks Day

Writing Letters of the Alphabet

Are you teaching your children the letters of the alphabet? Three pracrtical activities to start include:

Using magnetic letters. 

Magnetic letters are a fun way for children to learn because they can be easily manipulated and arranged. They are easy to hold, switch around and incorporate word making into activities. Children can use magnetic letters to spell their names, talk about the sounds, and for playing games.

Singing the alphabet song. 

The alphabet song is a classic way for children to learn the alphabet and order. It is a fun way to start your day of learning and there are many health benefits of singing too!

Reading alphabet books. 

Alphabet books typically feature a different letter on each page, along with pictures and words that begin with that letter. Keep them in your home or classroom library to talk about letters and the order they appear in the alphabet.

Once you've completed some initial letter formation activities and your children are ready to practice writing neat letters for handwriting practice, you may like to use our sound street activity cards.

On each card students will write letter in upper or lower case and practice alphabetical order from different starting positions. They can use dry erase markers directly on the cards or copy the line into a writing journal or book. 

Find them over at TPT.

Learning the letters of the alphabet is a fun and exciting adventure. Children can explore the world of words through books, songs, and games. Have fun with these cards and let me know if I can help create another activity perfect for your classroom!

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Ten Frame Tracing Pages

New to our store are some School Koala Tracing Pages. The set includes 10 school themed pictures to trace and color along with ten 10 frame pages to ignite some leanring about numbers, counting and making ten.

Hop over to TPT to learn more!

Here is a koala rhyme your students can say for counting to ten:

Up in a gum tree. Look! A furry sight,
Let’s count koalas in the moonlight.
One, two, three, up so high,
Four gray koalas looking at the sky.


Five, six, seven, counting in a row,
The eighth asleep on a branch below.
Nine and ten, counting all night,
Funny little Koalas dreaming of daylight. 

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Pattern Page for Practice - Turtles in the Ocean

Do your students know that turtles can swim backwards! Their powerful legs and webbed feet allow them to move backward as quickly as they can move forward. 

They have stamina too - turtles can hold their breath for a long time. Some turtles can hold their breath for up to 10 hours. This is because they have a special adaptation that allows them to slow down their metabolism and conserve oxygen. 

If those two fun facts aren't enough they will love discovering that turtles don't give up easily. They can swim long distances. Some turtles, such as the green sea turtle, can swim over 1,000 miles in a single journey. These turtles use their flippers to swim and can reach speeds of up to 20 miles per hour.

Turtle have power, flexibility, stamina and persistence - everything your students need to practice for writing too! Daily pattern, fluency or handwriting practice not only supports the overall writing program you teach (students learning to write), but it will help:

1. Develop Fine Motor Skills for other areas: practicing for writing requires the use of small muscles in the hands and fingers, essential for many other everyday activities.
2. Enhance Cognitive Skills: writing encourages children to think critically, organize their thoughts, and express themselves effectively, all of which contribute to cognitive development.
3. Promote Creativity and Imagination: as they draw and write, encourage them to verbalize, talk about what the patterns look like or describe the movements. They can build on these ideas for writing words, a sentence or story eventually. 

Here is a page of line practice for your students to complete - in a writing journal or as a background for a turtle craft or art project. 

You can have your children make a turtle craft using this page from the Pond Coloring Club - it's available to Premium Club members. They will 

• trace
• color or paint
• cut and glue to make their turtle

While turtles are often known for their slow pace, you can remind students in their daily writing practice that they are actually quite strong creatures. They have powerful jaws and claws that they use to crush food - and so they will too develop a strong pencil (or crayon) grip for writing.

If you'd like more page ideas for developing pre-writing and handwriting movements and skills follow along on my Youtube channel. 

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Making Ten With Turtle

Rainbow Turtle is a math puzzle-style game in our Rainbow Addition number bundle. Students will match 2 sides of the turtle to make 10, reviewing the paired combinations that they need to know well as they progress further in math. 

Along with the puzzle cards I've included a math craft where students can draw shapes on the turtle shell to show an addition. 

Playing games that use pictures of numbers is ideal for kindergarten because: 

1. It helps them understand the concept of numbers. When kindergarten students see numbers as pictures, they can more easily understand what they represent. This is because they can visualize the numbers and connect them to real-world objects.
2. It helps them develop number sense. Seeing numbers as pictures also helps kindergarten students develop number sense. This is because they can see the relationships between numbers and how they can be used to create different amounts.
3. It makes math fun. Kindergarten students are more likely to be engaged in math when they can see numbers as pictures. This is because it makes math more concrete and relatable.

You can use the cards in structured turn-taking math games or add them to an independent learning center and let stduents complete them like regular puzzles. Print a few sets so there are lots of options to look through. 

As a kindergarten teacher, you have the power to make math fun and engaging for your students. By using games and play, you can help them develop a strong foundation in number sense, make math enjoyable, and promote social and emotional development.

So don't be afraid to let your students play with numbers! It's one of the best ways to help them learn. Find this game in the addition bundle over in my store. 

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Scribble Hearts

For Valentine's Day your children might like to draw some hearts and scribble them with crayons or paint them to create a lovely artwork. 

First show them how to draw a simple heart - using some handwriting fluency movements - an 'm' (2 hops) and a 'v' (down and up):









For more fine motor practice in February use our heart tracing pages, available in a printable pack of 25 over in our store:

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Play to Ten - with Cupcakes

Your students can discover more about numbers within 10 with the engaging play mats in our printable resource pack. With 20 different game mats and 16 play ideas - there are so many ways to play. Your students will build essential math skills and be excited to play each day!

Here is one idea for using the cupcake themed mats. Choose from the mat with white dots or colored.

Your students will make numbers on their mat to match a roll on the dice (use a 10 sided dice), from a set of counters featuring only 2 colors.

After making their number, encourage your students to talk about 

• what 2 numbers combine to make the total - e.g. 5 blue and 4 pink make 9
• how many left to make 10 - e.g one more would make 10

After playing this math game several times, your students may be ready for making numbers to 20. Simply play with 2 cupcake mats and a 20 sided dice. 

• Find some Math Warm Up ideas here
• Find the printable game mats over in my TPT store
• Learn about my newsletter community - it’s free

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Valentine's Day Crafts

Find 11 lovely craft projects for Valentine's Day that can be printed on just one page each in our Sweet Hearts One Page Craft pack! 

All the crafts include a heart shape to cut and use to create. 

• choose your project
• print one page per child
• provide pencils, crayons, scissor and glue
• decorate your classroom for February!

Writing papers are included too! Find this pack in my TPT store today.

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Craft for Kids, Valentines Day

Hug-a-bug Math Warm Ups

Use the Hug-a-Bug cards from your Math Kit to play this exciting number warm up.

• each student has a bug card and a set of counters
• write a number from 1-6 on your teacher bug card
• reveal the number briefly to your students
• close the wings to cover the number
• have students count a set of counters to match the numeral on their bug card
• open your bug wings and have students check their counter collection and that it correctly matches your numeral 

I hope your students are excited for math today and that this math warm up idea helps you feel supported and excited to teach. If you’d love more ideas for math and early-years learning be sure to join my newsletter so you don’t miss out!

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Time to Play

Math warm ups are ideal for using small pockets of time to layer additional learning into your math program. Review previously taught concepts, consolidate understanding and build fluency with extra practice. To make warm ups and mini lessons practical, classroom management is essential. 

While your small group (4-6 students) are working with you at a focus table with Math Kit equipment, have the rest of your class working on independent activities or at centers. Remind them not to interrupt your table with a signal. 

Add a Math Kit cat (included in all the resource files) to a craft stick and put it up when you're at play. Tell them 

When the cat is straight, we wait. 

Place it down flat on the table when you're available again. 

Having the ability to manage your class quickly and with a regular routine will help you get more of these play times (and important math work) into your day. 



I love helping get your children excited to learn - I hope this math warm up idea has helped you! 

• find more math warm ups here
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