ALL ABOARD! The Money Train

So my littlest woke up with pink eye this morning! Ugh! I can't think of anything worse. They feel absolutely fine, but you can't go ANYWHERE or do ANYTHING outside of the house. (not to mention my eyes all of a sudden feel very itchy! :)) Of course we are super busy this weekend, and we even have a wedding for a good friend tonight. Oh well...I'm grateful we had a great spring break without it!

Anyways, I'm writing venting about the littlest because he gave me the idea for this next unit. He is obsessed with a train song from the Disney Channel. He actually says, "too too train" and it's SO CUTE! I attempted money with my sweet seconds earlier this year and it was a DISASTER. Not a good idea. At all. So I knew I wanted to revisit it after spring break. One day my littlest was singing his song, and it just hit me! What a great idea for a money unit....TRAINS. So that is when I created:

I thought it would be a fun way for my kids to review/learn money as a train of coins with the values increasing with each car. I'm super excited to get started on it next week! I already have most of the pages printed, copied, and stapled for Monday. I included posters, worksheets, matching games, word problems and more. Here is the preview:

I hope this might get some ideas churning in your head if you are approaching money soon. If you are interested in what I made, you can get it in my TpT store HERE.

Lucky Lengths Makeover

I just wanted to let you know my Lucky Lengths (the one with a St. Patrick's Day theme) packet has had a total makeover! It's almost embarrassing to look at the items you create when you are a beginner, isn't it?! This one definitely needed a change, so if you have already purchased it you can just download it again for the new look. If you are interested in the packet, you can get it in my TpT store! Here is a sneak peek at some of the new pages:

Christmas Packet

Just dropping in to let you know I finished my Christmas Math and Literacy packet! Most activities are geared to second grade, but you could use them for first or third! I included grammar activities, book activities, and math practice with place value and coins. This WILL be on sale for the Cyber Monday & Tuesday TpT sale! Click on the pictures below to link to my store.

I specifically used 4 books and created quizzes and activities for each one. The books I used are:

"If You Take a Mouse to the Movies"
"Snowmen at Christmas"
"When Santa Lost His Ho, Ho, Ho"
"Merry Un-Christmas"

Here are some of the pages printed off on my table:

We are getting into the Christmas spirit at my house today! The decorations are coming out, and the tree is going up! :) I LOVE LOVE LOVE this time of year, and I hope you all enjoy your day!

Place Value Time

I'm so grateful for the weekend! I'm NOT so grateful for being sick all night. I think I ate something that didn't agree with my stomach, and let me just tell you it was a loooonnngg Saturday night. I think I've only slept about 2 hours. I'm having to stay home from all church activities today, which is annoying, BUT it's allowing me to have some work/blogging time as I'm snuggled up in our big chair.

I visited place value in math last week again. We began the week before, but I just don't think my kids "got it." Do you know what I mean? I just don't want to move on until they truly understand (what's the point?)  Since we were working with folktales, fairy tales, and fables in reading, I thought I would try to branch this out into math. Introducing Place Value Bears:

I came up with a story that closely resembles Goldilocks and the Three Bears, except a turkey is the main character, and the Three Bears represent the ones, tens, and hundreds. The turkey is hiding from hunters, and runs into the cabin for safety. He sees a bowl with ONE kernel of corn, TEN kernels of corn, and a HUNDRED kernels of corn. Of course he chooses Daddy Hundred's bowl to eat. Same idea with a pillow. We even made a Venn Diagram to compare this story with the original Goldilocks and the Three Bears.

Then we made these:

And these:

The kids colored their own copy of the story and put them into their math notebooks for reference:

And this:

They also sorted numbers onto these:

Overall, it went REALLY well, and I think most of my kids are getting it! If anything, it's been a great reference when I'm redirecting kids to the right answer! They totally get the concept of daddy, mommy, baby. I'm spending one more week on place value to nail down the other concepts (word form, expanded form, etc.) If you are interested in these activities I used this week in your classroom, you can get them HERE.

Yee-Haw It's a Cowboy Round-Up!

Hello! I'm about to spend some quality time with my awesome husband watching a movie, BUT I wanted to quickly show you my new product I posted last night.

Several activities to accommodate your rounding to the tens and hundreds unit! If you are interested, you can get it in my TpT store here.

Place Value Olympics!!

I am crazy about the Olympics! Whenever the Olympics are on, you will always know where to find me and my husband....on our couch!! There is not an athletic bone in my body, but I love watching these athletes fulfill their lifelong dreams! Most nights I'm bawling my eyes out in celebration for these people who sacrifice so much for that one special moment!! I just love it!

So while sitting on the couch one day, I decided I MUST create something with an Olympics theme! The first thing that came to my mind was place value. I probably thought of this first because it is usually the first thing I teach, and I thought my kiddos would have the Olympics fresh on their minds!

Sorry these pictures don't have a border around them! I'm not quite sure how to fix that on blogger! 

It is full of activities working through the hundred thousands. It covers expanded form, standard form, word form, comparing numbers, and ordering numbers! These are the posters and sport theme for each one: 

I chose an archery theme for expanded form! The idea is for the kids to "pull back" on the bow to pull apart the number.

 Standard form has a swimming/kayak theme

Word form has a cycling theme

Comparing Numbers has a gymnastics theme

Ordering Numbers has a tennis theme

I'm SO happy with this packet, and I know it's going to be really fun for my kiddos in about a month or so (I can't believe we go back so soon! ah!). I also made a point NOT to make this packet specific to the London Olympics, so it can be used over and over again. I'll even use it next year for a fun Olympics theme:) Here are some of the things in the packet:

Place Value Chart with swimming lanes

This is a class game where the teacher will call out what number belongs in which box (value).

There are several worksheets throughout the packet (at least one for each category). Most of them are with expanded form.

I Have, Who Has game for Word Form

Ordering Numbers practice

In this game, students will each get a card with a number on it. They can tape it to their shirts, or just hold it in their hand. They will order themselves least to greatest or greatest to least! You can switch around the cards each time so students will have a different number each time. 

If you are interested, you can take a look at it in my TpT store HERE

or

You can get this in my Teacher's Notebook store HERE.

Craziness

Are any of you experiencing "the craziness" this time of year??!!! I feel like I'm in it full swing! We have state testing next week, tons of paperwork, ARDs, RTI (and any other acronym you want to throw in there). It's also that time of year where changes are coming with people moving around or leaving! To say it has been stressful is an understatement. I actually have the opportunity to POSSIBLY move grade levels! I'm excited and scared at the same time! Third grade is all I've ever known, and the thought of doing something different makes me so nervous! However, I would love a change of pace and I would also like to have experience in more than just one grade level.  Change is just so scary, but it can be so rewarding, you know?

Anyways, enough about me and the stress!! I updated my Lucky Lengths measurement packet. I initially created it with a St. Patrick's Day theme, but I decided to change it up so it can be used all year long! You can see it here in my TpT store. It is the exact same packet with different graphics:) I hope you enjoy it!

Graph of the Week

  We are on spring break, and I'm SO GLAD to have this time off with my two boys! It's been great hanging out with them at home the past 2 days, and we have had a lot of fun playing inside/outside/upstairs/downstairs...I'm just loving every second! Until last night. Sitting in the chair late at night, I felt a huge pull in my lower back. Since then I have barely been able to move! I have tried to rest on the couch, but having two active boys makes it VERY hard...especially when one is teething and just wants to be held:)

  However, the nicest part of being laid up on the couch is all the blog hopping I get to do! I've loved reading tons of teacher blogs this morning, and I feel so inspired! So while my boys are napping, I have decided to post about how I do my Graph of the Week with my kiddos.

  Graphs are in my curriculum, but I usually don't have to spend too long on them because we work with them every single day! I can't explain it, but the kids LOVE graph of the week. Every year they get so excited when I announce it's time for our graph. Here what our schedule looks like:

Monday: We choose the title for our graph. The graph always begins with "Favorite..." Some ideas to use are ice cream, fruit, author, character, vegetable, cookie, movie, sport, subject, etc. At the beginning of the year, I give them the topic for our graph every week. As the year goes on, I let the kids have more input (this can turn into some pretty interesting graphs!).  We also gather information this day. If the title is "Our Favorite Fruit Graph," they tell me as many fruits as they can think of while I write them down on chart paper.
  Once we have all the fruits listed, they lay their heads down on their desk and close their eyes to vote for the fruits they like. (I have them close their eyes because I find they will vote for any fruit their friends will vote for, and our graph will not be accurate). With their eyes closed, I call out the list of fruits, and they raise their hand if they like the fruit. At this point, it doesn't have to be their favorite fruit, they just have to like it, and they can vote as many times as they like. Once I've gone through all the fruits, they are allowed to open their eyes, and we cross off the fruits that have the lowest votes. We will cross off information until we are left with about 5 or 6 fruits for the graph. I know this is long and sounds confusing, but it is really easy!!

Tuesday: This is our "quick day" for the graph because for some reason it always turns out to be a pretty heavy Language Arts day, and time is short. On Tuesday, they put their heads down and close their eyes again to vote for their favorite fruit from the list we created Monday. They may only vote ONCE, and whatever they choose is what they will be drawing on the graph.
  In the picture above, you can see where the final list is written in red, and I put tally marks next to the names of fruit. I try to keep Monday and Tuesday's information on the same chart. It doesn't look very nice, but it's a great reference for the kids to see how we got from point A to point B.

Wednesday: We create the graph! I draw the outline, and the kids draw a picture representing their vote. Even though oranges did not receive any votes, I believe it's still important to include it on the graph! The kids always copy the completed graph onto our Graph of the Week worksheet, or in their math notebook if I have accidentally run out of copies (this happens more than I would like!! haha)!

Thursday: The kids write down two questions about the graph. They turn these questions in, and sometimes I use them to create the quiz for Friday! Here is the paper we use for writing the questions, and copying the graph:

**Get a copy of this paper (free) here

Friday: The kids take a quiz on the graph. I create it very quickly based on questions from the kids, or questions I think are appropriate. As the year continues, we will expand our graph and quickly poll other classrooms on their favorite fruits. When we do that, I will ask questions that compare the graphs on our quiz. Sometimes I will ask them to create a bar graph to match the pictograph's information, and other times  I will create questions where each piece of fruit represents more than one student. I basically just add more things in that will be asked of them on their benchmarks and state testing.

I know this post is long, but Graph of the Week never takes up more than 10 minutes at the beginning of the math lesson, and the kids truly love it!

Rounding Poem Freebie

Every year, I use this rounding poem with my kids. We spend one week saying it over, and over, and over, and OVER again:) All the practice pays off, though, and they usually remember the poem the entire school year! It also makes rounding SO easy because it works on rounding to tens, hundreds, thousands, etc. Here is the poster I give my kids to keep in their math journals:

Get the rounding poster HERE for free!

graphics for poster are from scrappindoodles.com
font from kevinandamanda.com

Farmer Fraction

This was such a fun way to review fractions! My kids haven't experienced anything with a farm theme since kindergarten, so they had a blast talking about the farmer and animals! We have already studied fractions this year, but I wanted to create a review that wouldn't require me to hear "ughhh, not again!". I actually saw some smiles as the farm animal pictures went up! It's just that time of year where we have to go back and review, review, review! I was pleasantly surprised at all they remembered, and they were happy to work with fractions in a different way!

I just uploaded it to my TpT store tonight, so you can check it out here.  The packet includes activities, worksheets, printables, posters, etc!!

Beanbag Toss Measurement Activity

This year, our winter has seemed much more like spring! The weather has been beautiful all throughout January and February with a few cold fronts in between. Last week, the weather was so nice, I took advantage of it and brought my kids outside for a measurement activity. This is actually an activity I mention in my Lucky Lengths packet here.

I borrowed beanbags from the gym, quickly typed up a recording page, gathered up clipboards, rulers, pencils, and headed outside! The kids had to find a partner, toss the beanbag, estimate the distance it was thrown, measure the actual distance, and then find the difference between the two measurements! They rotated who tossed (I stressed the word "tossed") the beanbag, and they both had to help measure the distance. I told them their goal was to have a smaller number between their estimate and actual length each time. The kids had an absolute blast, and it led to a lot of great conversations when we got back to the classroom. I had them write about their experience and conclusions on a sheet of paper when we finished!

Here is a link to the recording page for the kids to write down their measurements.

Here are my kids completing the activity. Sorry for the blurry faces, but it's the easiest way for me to wipe out their faces for privacy! 

Lucky Lengths

I wanted to create something with a St. Patrick's Day theme since March is steadily approaching (that seems almost impossible to believe!!). I decided my kids needed more practice with measuring. I kind of flew through that unit because we were running behind, and I wanted to make sure they had SOME knowledge of measurement before they were tested over it on the district's benchmark test. So I created this Lucky Lengths packet with posters, sorting activities, and measurement book to boost their measuring skills and knowledge! It's available in my TPT store here.

Happy Measuring, and hooray for President's Day off!!