The Wizard of Oz: A Class Musical

Integrate literature and music with this musical reader's theater of L. Frank Baum's classic "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz". With song lyrics written by Baum himself, your children will have the opportunity to participate in an experience they'll never forget. This reader's theater contains everything that you will need, including background information, 2 script versions, sheet music for each song, and 2 mp3s for each song (one that has vocals to help the children learn the songs and one that is accompaniment only). IMPORTANT: Because of file size limitations, some of the songs that go with this product are contained in the listing "Wizard of Oz Sample Songs" only. You will need to download both to have the entire product. Don't worry, though, the sample songs are FREE!

Rosie's Walk

In our classroom this week, we've been discussing the book Rosie's Walk. This is one of my favorite stories to use in Shared Reading. When introducing the book, I use Linda Hoyt's read aloud lesson to teach the children about foreshadowing. Today we used the pictures from this site scaled down 50 percent to make a storytelling set. Now the children can take Rosie and the Fox home to chase around, through, over, and across the whole farm.

Teaching Common Core Standards Using Fables & Folk Tales

Giants, Trolls & The Big Bag Wolf 
Common Core Curriculum Essentials!
Featuring: The Three Little Pigs, Little Red Riding Hood,
Jack & The Beanstalk, and The three Billy Goats Gruff

Land of the Giants! 

A Cooperative Art Activity.

Check out our new thematic unit featuring The Three Little Pigs, The Three Billy Goat's Gruff, Little Red Riding Hood, and Jack and the Beanstalk.

Table of Contents

Songs/Fingerplays

This Little Piggy

The Big Bad Wolf 

Scripted Literacy Lessons With Independent Options:

Up the Beanstalk: Writing Simple Words

The Three Little Pigs: Decoding CVC Words

Shake Little Piggy: Reading & Writing Sight Words

Big Bad Bingo: Identifying and Matching Consonant Digraphs

Cross The Bridge: Relating Verbs & Adjectives to Opposites

Shared Reading Whole Group Activities:

Identifying Story Elements

Beginning, Middle, End: Story Structure

Scripted Math Lessons With Independent Options:

Measuring-- Tall or Short: Comparing Size By Length

Measuring Giants and Trolls: Comparing Size 

Giants, Trolls & Wolves, Oh My! Writing Numerals

Going To Grandma’s House: Counting Forward From Any Given Number 1-100

Art Projects

Cooperative Giant

Shape Giant

Billy Goat Hat

Puppets: Story Retelling

Science Projects

The Giant’s Eyes: Using Scientific Tools

Writing

Word Wall

If I Met a Giant!

Up the Beanstalk?

The Big Bad Wolf

Geading Books

The Little Pigs

Spring Is Here!

Hooray for Spring! Time to work in the garden and enjoy the beautiful weather!

And, time to think of Springtime entering the Kindergarten Curriculum.

Check out our new "It's a Spring Thing" thematic unit. All activities are strategically linked to the Common Core Standards! The unit also includes Easter themed activities such as how to make an Easter Bunny Hat!

Common Core Assessments For Kindergarten

The Common Core Standards present learning goals for students across the United States. They represent some of the highest standards found in the nation. Furthermore, they are benchmarked to international standards. 

The Common Core Standards provide clear goals for student learning, a veritable roadmap to success. The standards not only help teachers ensure that students attain the skills and knowledge necessary for educational success, but they also help parents and students set clear and realistic goals.

The Common Core Standards do not dictate teaching methods or materials, therefore assessment is crucial to determining what skills and information a student needs. Regular assessment provides the means for planning instruction, providing intervention, and setting future goals. 

Our assessment documents are designed for assessing the common core standards in kindergarten. They list every kindergarten mathematics and/or Language Arts standard and provide an assessment for each one. Different portions of the standards are addressed separately, so teachers and parents will know exactly what a student does and does not understand about each standard.

With the adoption of the Common Core Standards, these assessment meets a critical need. In addition to thoroughly addressing each standard, they serve as an organizational tool for gathering information about the mathematical strengths and weaknesses of kindergarten students. This resource will help you learn more about your students and help you determine the focus of your instruction.

Please check them out today at our online stores.

What's The Weather Common Core Curriculum Essentials

Check out this 147 page unit today! All lessons as strategically linked to the common core standards!

Teach Common Core Standards with confidence!

The activities are clearly written, easy to use, and need limited amounts of preparation. The lessons (games or activities) included are scripted. They are written in a format that can be easily taught by the teacher or readily handed off to a parent volunteer or a classroom aide with complete confidence that objectives of the lesson will be reached. 

Shared Reading Lessons:

Clouds: Using The Books, Little Cloud by Eric Carle and It Looked Like Spilt Milk by Charles G. Shaw

Rain, Rain Go Away: Sorting Short & Long Aa Vowel Sounds

Oh What Will I Wear: Word Substitution

Scripted Literacy Lessons:

Tomorrow’s Weather: Decoding Words

Splashing Puddles: Sight Words

Blizzard: Differentiation of b and d

Raining Cats and Dogs Game: Final Phoneme Substitution

Independent Activities: 

Writing Sight Words

Scripted Math Lessons With Independent Options:

Temperature Takeover: Identifying & Comparing Numbers  

The Windy Day Mix-up: Building Mental Math Skills   

  Raindrop Recognition: Subitizing           

   The Terrible Blizzard: Practice Relating Numbers One to Another.          

Weather Toss: Collecting & Interpreting Data

                                                                                                           

                                                                                                                                                                    

      Science

Creating a Weather Science Center

Water Drops: Observing & Exploring Water Properties

Water Flows Down: Observing & Exploring Water Properties

Water Painting: Observing & Exploring Evaporation

Wonderful Water: Observing & Exploring Water Properties

Art Projects

Clouds: Extending Literature

My Weather Book: Creating a Guided Reader

Songs/Fingerplays

Little Drops of Rain

The Weather

Mr. Sun

Rain, Rain Go Away

What Will I Wear Today

Guided Reading Books

Water Changes

Writing

Weather Word Wall

My Favorite Kind of Weather

What I Know About Clouds

Getting Nonreaders to Read

In January I gave the midyear Directed Reading Assessment to my students. Most of them did well, but a few of them really struggled. Despite all that we had done, they were still not looking at print. I needed to come up with a plan of attack and this is the result. I wrote a set of books containing only sight words and CVC words. There are no pictures in these books. Instead, I made the pictures separate, and then included them, plus the letters needed to make the sight words in the book, in a baggie stapled to the back.
Each week, my target kids work on these books. A typical lesson goes like this: First, they review their alphabet sounds. Second, they practice the sight words that will be in the book by first building the words with the die cut letters in the baggie and then writing them.Next, the child dictates a sentence to the teacher using one (or both) of the sight words from the book. The teacher writes the sentence, the child reads it, the teacher cuts the words in the sentence apart, the child puts the sentence back together and then reads it again.
Finally, we spread out all the pictures and the child reads the book. All of the sight words in the book have been practiced, and when they come to a CVC word they are required to sound it out using the "tap method". For each sound the child taps on their arm, then they slide the sounds together. For example, in the word "fat" the child makes the /f/ sound on their shoulder, the /a/ sound on their elbow, and the /t/ sound on their wrist. Then they say the sounds at they slide one arm down the other, blending them together. After they have decoded the word, they find the picture that matches the story and place it on the page.

This has really been working for most of my kiddos! I've really seen a lot of progress in them. They are actually looking at and through print now!! We'll see what happens come spring DRA :)

I have available a set of six readers 

at our TPT store!

Dinosaur Math

Today we played a game on the 100 chart called Hide the Dinosaur Egg. I took the chart off the wall and turned it so the class couldn't see it, then one child hid a paper dinosaur egg behind one of the numbers. Then we turned the chart around and the children asked more or less questions to find the dinosaur egg. For example, "Is it more than 59?" Then I answered the question and covered all of the numbers that could no longer apply. In this way we narrowed down the 100 chart to find the dinosaur egg. It turned out great, although, if you decide to play the game, make sure you already have tape on the strips you're going to use to cover the chart. I didn't and it took way too long to stick the strips on the first time we played.