A Little Review Helps the Skills Go Down!

Good evening all!  Hoping that your week has been treating you well.  We had a professional development day on Monday, which translates into this teacher had the whole day to her self for getting things done in the classroom!  LOVE those kind of pd days! 

Anyways, I decided to plan some much needed review into workstations this week in both math and literacy.  My little owls have been lacking confidence lately and I wanted these skill review stations to push them past this little funk.

I was able to take a few pictures of some of the literacy workstations today.  Math will have to be a different post. 

The first pictures are from our writing workstation.  I have been really working with the little owls on their sentence building and sight word recognition.  Since we are focusing on those skills, I put them together into a little page called Shooting Star Sentence.  The little owls have to use the star word in the star in a sentence and then draw a picture to match.  We have done this with 3 different words thus far and some words are definitely easier than others.

I was extremely happy when I saw this work.  She has some great spelling going on and what we call a "strong sentence."

Loved how the picture matched the sentence perfectly.

This work was from a new student.  I am pleased with how well she is catching onto our routine and my expectations.

 

 

The next picture is from the alphabet workstation.  This workstation is my own addition to literacy workstations.  I like the idea of having a constant alphabet letter focus through the whole year.  (One that is just for letters and not for forming/working with words.)  Here the little owls roll a die, figure out what letter the number corresponds with, and then string the letter onto a plastic thread.  Basic, yes, but the little owls were fully engaged and working on math, literacy, and fine motor skills.  All in ONE workstation!!!!

 

 

 

The last pictures are from my word work workstation.  We have started playing around with word families and the idea of switching out the first letter to build new words.  The little owls used magnet letters, the snake mat from Deanna Jump, and a basic recording page.  They needed to be able to read the words back to me later on.

 





 

 

If you have any questions, please feel free to ask. 

 

~Erin

 

*Hoping someone understands the title of this post and that my humor was not lost in cyberspace.  :)

It's That Time of Week!

Five for Friday linky party time!  I can't tell you just how much I adore this linky party.  Keeps my camera close by me all week and gets me reflecting on the happenings of the week.  If you would like to join in on the fun, head over to Doodle Bug's blog and link up!

 

 

Let's start with Monday and work our way through the week, shall we!?!

 

 

1. On Monday, I left early because I finally got ahold of the nasty cold that was travelling around my classroom.  I have, unfortunately, passed it along to my little man.  He is currently sleeping in the recliner and he sounds so stuffy.  Poor guy!  :(

 

 

2. Skip ahead to Wednesday, we took a whole school trip to a Milwaukee Wave soccer game.  So fun!

 

 

 

3. Last night we got hit with a snow storm.  It, of course, started right at the end of the school day and lasted until midnight.  Enough time to plow the roads and have everything up and running for school today.  Man, do I want a snow day!

 

(This picture really doesn't do it justice!)

 

4. Today, I got this lovely piece of writing from one of my little owls who is just struggling.  I was so proud!

 

We were writing a sentence using one of our star words.  This was our first day doing this in a literacy station so the word was "I."  Her paper says, "I luve im (my) hs."  She has come such a long way these past couple of weeks.

 

 

5. I have been using old bulletin board boarders as quick letter identification games with my little owls who need some extra practice.  I had attended a pd years ago and this was an activity mentioned.  I decided to try it out!  I put letter stickers on the pictures and the kids start at different ends of the boarder.  They take turns rolling a die, moving their little stone, and identifying the letter.  If they get the letter right, their stone stays but if they get it wrong, I correct them, and send their stone back to the beginning of the boarder.

 

 

 

There's my week in 5 random pieces!  Enjoy!

 

~Erin