The Starry Night (1889) “This morning I saw the countryside from my window a long time before sunrise, with nothing but the morning star, which looked very big,” wrote Van Gogh to his brother Theo,…

I’ve been thinking a lot about identity recently. The question ‘who am I?’ has come up repeatedly over the years, and every time it comes round again I find something I’ve n…

Are you postpartum? Learn how to get rid of the baby weight without going through a lot without mommy and me fitness classes. Before pregnancy everything seems pretty much under control, then you get pregnant and there starts your endless fretting. You are excited and tense at the same time because while having your own child is the most ...

Now that 8th grade graduation is behind me, I’m starting to get all geared up for 1st grade. I’ve got just 3 weeks before my family and I head off for our big summer trip, so I’m wasting no time getting going on my summer prep. Years ago a former colleague of mine put together […]

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I've been meaning to upload the photos of the finished 'birthday tracker' wall display for a while and am finally getting around to it! The kiddos have really enjoyed this design. I was unsure of my decision to mount the display at their level - afraid that they'd get too rambunctious and pull the names off - but they've done a fabulous job. In fact, it's been fun to see them perusing the names before class, during free time, etc. and they're always super careful. My assistant, Maddy, and I love helping our preschoolers find their name, as well as match the other name plates to their classmates. Most of them can recognize which circle is their own, but it's great to see them learning how to recognize/identify letters and sounds to figure out what the other name plates say! If you want to know how I created this display, be sure to check out the full post --> Safari/Jungle Theme Birthday Wall.

I have done this lesson many times, but this year the results are better than ever before. This year, we had more time to do this project...

Before diving into a plants unit or animals unit, I think it’s good to spend a little time exploring living vs. non-living. This helps learners have a clear understanding of how living things work. And that’s exactly what this free living vs non-living learning pack can help you do. By the way, you may also like ... Read More about Living vs Non-Living Learning Pack

If you’ve been following along for a while, you may remember this post, but I’ve been getting a lot of French seam questions lately so I figured it wouldn’t hurt to resurrect this tutorial from the blog archives and set it free a second time. I’m first going to do a run through of the french seam and then will show you how to apply it to the armhole. Just a few notes before we begin… 1. french seams are usually best used on light to medium weight fabric. 2. French seams require you to split your seam allowance in two parts. This tutorial is done using a 1/2″ seam allowance, but if you are working with a 5/8″ seam allowance, sew the first seam at 3/8″ and the second at 1/4″. I’ve tried to notate where this applies. With that, lets get to it! Click through to view the tutorial. French Seams on Straight Seams Step 1 | Cut your pieces from your fabric. I only made a half top for this so photographing would be easier, but yours will look normal of course. Step 2 | Sew the sides and shoulder seams with the wrong sides of the fabric together at 1/4″ (or 3/8″ if you have a 5/8″ seam allowance) and press the seam open. I like to do all of the seams at once instead of completing one seam at a time because you are much less likely to end up with one seam backwards. Step 3 | Grade your seam allowance down to 1/8″. Step 4 | Fold and press along the seam so that the right sides are together and stitch at 1/4″. Step 5 | Press both the side seams and shoulder seams towards the back of the garment and this part of the process is over! French Seaming Armholes (and other curved seams) Step 6 | First we will assemble the sleeves, this part is a bit repetitive. Sew the underarm seams with the wrong sides of the fabric together at 1/4″ (or 3/8″ if you have a 5/8″ seam allowance). Step 7 | Press the seam open and grade the seam allowance down to 1/8″. Step 8 | Fold and press along the seam so that the right sides are together and stitch at 1/4″. Press seam towards back of sleeve. Step 9 | Sew a line of gathering threads from the front notch to the back notches. Step 10 | Pin your sleeve and armhole together with wrong sides facing. Begin by matching the underarm seams and notches. Step 11 | Pull on your gathering stitches to ease the sleeve cap into the armhole. Stitch around the seam at 1/4″ (or 3/8″ if you’re working with a 5/8″ seam allowance). After sewing this seam, check for any tucks and remove them if you have any. Step 12 | Press the seam open and grade the seam allowance down to 1/8″. This will be most easily accomplished by cramming a ham or sleeve roll inside your shirt and pressing the seam around that. Step 13 | Fold and press along the seam so that the right sides are together and stitch at 1/4″. Check for any tucks and correct those if you have any. You should now have a french seamed armhole like the one below, congrats! And that’s that! As always if you have any questions leave me a note below and I’ll leave you a reply; I try to respond to all comments. Hope you find this tutorial useful!

Did you know 🤔 that ADHD is more than just disorganization, memory 🧠 trouble and struggling with time management? These monsters are here to tell you that ADHD is so much more complex than you may hear about! The general color 🎨 scheme of the monsters may be changed upon request, i.e. Boho/earthy colors- greens, blues, pastel, etc. Please message before you purchase if you would like a change in colors ✨ Print for Social Worker, Counselor, Occupational Therapy. Printed on high-quality Luster paper. 🖨 Digital option is available on my store. If you don't see it, please reach out because it may have expired due to low sales but I can bring it back if there's interest! 🤗 Please see commonly asked questions below and please don't hesitate to reach out with any questions or concerns you may have! QUESTIONS: 🙋‍♀️ For any questions about a product, please reach out and ask me! FORMAT/SIZE: 📏 Physical Prints are 8.5 x 11 inches. REFUNDS: 😔 Refunds within 7 days for physical prints. DISCLAIMER: ⚠️ Frame not included.

You’ve probably got about 80,130 things swirling around in your head that you want to do before the school year starts. It’s such an exciting time!

80 sponge activities you can do in your elementary classroom to make every minute count.

Many of you must be looking for Christmas gift ideas right now, so I thought it was the perfect time to share a pattern with you all! You might have seen these knitted hearts before. My pattern fir…

Aerial pictures, many never seen before, of the September 11 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City.

Aren’t monkeys adorable?! When we visit the zoo, my kids always insist on seeing all the monkeys. My oldest loves spider monkeys and my youngest is fascinated by baboons. If your kids like monkeys as

How adorable are these?!? This lesson took (2) art classes to finish (and I had JUST enough time to squeeze in one more lesson before the end of the year)! It’s a simple one —but packs in a bunch! …

All year in reading, we have talked about main idea with our friends, but it has only been this week that we have zoomed in on identifying the topic, main idea, and supporting details of a text. Th…

Okay, I have a new favorite reading lesson-- my asking questions lesson! When I got a chance to work with Scholastic last spring, they gave us a bag of swag that any teacher would love, and it included the book This Is Not My Hat by Jon Klassen, which is perfect for teaching a reading lesson about asking questions! (I’ve linked it to Amazon here, but I also highly recommend finding it through Scholastic Reading Club :) On my CRAFT board, we list "Ask questions before, during, and after reading" as a reading comprehension skill (although some of my kids think it belongs under Response to Text, so we concluded that it could go as either!). This is a really important skill for some of my struggling readers, because some of them never question what they read. They are just reading to get it over with! (oops- took this picture before we added it!) Asking questions before reading gives them a purpose for reading and gets them engaged. When they are looking for the answer, students read more intently. Asking questions during reading makes sure they are thinking about what they read. Asking questions after reading causes them to be reflective about the author's choices and sometimes helps them draw a personal opinion about the text. Asking questions is a great place to start students’ thinking while reading! I love teaching questioning towards the beginning of the year, because this is a gateway skill to deeper comprehension. Asking questions about the text isn't too hard to do (especially with a well-chosen text!), so it helps to build the habit of thinking as they read. It's also a great way to get students started in their reading response journals because it's a pretty clear-cut type of response that most of my students feel confident trying. I used this book with my 2nd grade group and all the way up to my 5th grade group. It's great for teaching this skill because the title and cover instantly intrigue them. Kids wonder, "Whose hat is it?" and "Why is a fish wearing a hat?" I tell them we are going to look for the answers to our questions as we read, and we start the read-aloud. As we read, I stop every few pages and ask the students to whisper to their partner something they are wondering about the story. Then, I choose a few students to tell their questions out loud. (I get 100% participation this way, and more confident kids who are willing to share!) We keep track of our questions on a chart like this- both adding new questions, and putting check marks next to our questions that get answered. (My markers are dying—ugh!) Of course, the chart I made for my partner turned out even better. (Isn't that always how it works?) She actually laminated it so she can use it again sometime (which is such a great idea, especially for us as reading specialists who might teach a version of this lesson to each grade level!). This book also makes a great review for "the three ways to read a book," or using the pictures as readers to help us understand. (Actually, you could use this book to teach that lesson, too, but I just used it as a review.) The book is being told from the little fish's point of view, and so the text only tells us so much. If students don't read the pictures, they won't know the entire plot- and they won't enjoy the book nearly as much! (Here, the text tells us that little fish doesn't think the crab will tell anyone where he went... but the illustration tells us that the crab does tell!) The younger kids, especially, love "catching" the discrepancies between the text and the pictures. At the end of the book, the text stops and we just see illustrations. Some kids are always shocked by this! And, immediately, they all have opinions about what happened to the little fish. Some think he was eaten, some think he just gave the hat back, and some think he ran away. The ending of the book is left open and never actually tells us what happens, and so my students are always left with questions about the book after we finish it! (See why I think This Is Not My Hat is such a perfect picture book to teach questioning?) With the older students, we went a little deeper and discussed the author's choice to leave the story open-ended, and debated whether or not we liked it as readers. (Reviews were very polar in my group-- most kids either loved it or hated it!) The next day during another mini-lesson, I read aloud a different book (usually tailored more towards the group's grade level) and let students practice asking their own questions along the way in their reader's response journals. Eve Bunting's books tend to work really well for Asking Questions lessons (like The Wednesday Surprise), but I also love The Lotus Seed and Chicken Sunday for teaching asking questions. And don't forget to throw in a non-fiction book-- sometimes these are the most important ones in which students need to use the comprehension strategy of "ask questions!" Once we've practiced as a whole group and shared with our reading partners, I'm able to look through their notebooks and make sure they seem like they're getting it. (Glancing through their reading notebooks- even if you don't take a grade yet- is so important, because this is the perfect time to lead a strategy group for those students who need some extra support). From here, I like to let students use Post-It notes to practice this strategy in whatever they're reading independently. I also try to fit in a little time at the computer lab (or at a computer center) using the amazing site Into The Book. If you haven't used this free site, you are missing out! For each reading comprehension skill, there are videos, a song, and an in practice activity. Usually, there are at least two, so you can do one together (especially if you have a SmartBoard or something similar) and have students complete the other independently. Their questioning lesson is a great way to guide student practice of using this strategy to actually help them comprehend. A good list of mentor text suggestions: http://www.mauryk12.org/literacy/reading%20mentor%20texts.htm A great list of resources, including some sample lesson plans for teachers: http://www.busyteacherscafe.com/literacy/comprehension_strategies.html#questioning Share your tips in the comments below or on my Facebook page here! I would love to know your favorite books for teaching kids to ask questions and what other strategies you use.

Here are 50+ things to do with toddlers, both indoors and out! These ideas are so good that you might stop counting down the minutes to nap time every day.

Dare I say it...it is almost time to head back to school. We have three more weeks before we go back. I cannot believe how fast

We really loved our time in Valencia - so much so that we already know we'll have to return one day. If you're visiting, then here are 11 essential things to know before you arrive.

Photo Source: www.kiboomu.com The fantastic thing about color-by-number activities is that they're highly versatile. Leave them on your students' desks in the morning to complete before the bell rings/morning meeting time, keep a bin of them near your desk for transitions between activities or when students complete an activity faster than expected, or even make them part of your daily math center exercises. These activities not only provide your students with a fun art exercise, they also strengthen color and number recognition along the way! We found this fantastic spring themed color-by-number exercise at Kiboomu and thought we'd pass it along! Worksheet Applications While the concept is great on its own, here are a few ways you can spice up the activity for continued use. Provide an accompanying math worksheet with simple addition, subtraction, or even sequencing questions. Completing the problems in order, students solve for the answer, look for the corresponding number on the color-by-number activity key, and color in the correct sections on the worksheet. For this activity you'll need ten problems with solutions ranging from 1 to 10. Provide students with a pair of dice. Invite them to tally up the dots after each roll, look for the corresponding numeral on the color-by-number activity key, and color in the correct sections on the worksheet. Have students continue until the worksheet is complete. Turn the worksheet into a "Roll the Scene" activity. Color, cut out, and laminate each piece of the scene {the butterfly, the sun, etc} and provide students with these pieces, along with a full laminated worksheet {that will act as a 'game board' of sorts} and a pair of dice. Invite your students to roll the dice, tally the number of dots, pick out the corresponding numeral and pieces, and place the selected pieces onto the uncolored worksheet/game board. Be sure to visit Kiboomu for the download and for lots of other early childhood resources!

You might’ve heard the phrase, “You can’t judge a book by its cover.” In reality, we all do it. If we have a hankering to find a new book, we might spend

Hello everyone! Before I announce the results to the giveaway I wanted to show you this little guy. It's a figure template that artists use to help draw the body in different poses. Now you can buy a plastic version at art supply stores but I thought I'd show you how easy it is to make one. Let's get started. MATERIALS REQUIRED: - paper, pencil and eraser - my template pattern, optional - black marker - cereal box - scissors - press or hole punch, or an awl, or even a sharp pencil - paper brads PROCEDURE:  Now you can use my pattern if you want or you can make your own. With older kids I would have them make their own. When I start a figure pattern I first draw a vertical line on the paper. This helps me gauge the size of the figure. I then start sketching the head and body. Then I start on the arms and legs. When I have it the way I want I trace around the body parts with a black marker. I then put a piece of paper on top of the one I outlined in marker. Hold them up to a window if needed and trace the figure shapes onto the new page in pencil. I choose which arm and leg parts I like the best and trace around those. Using scissors cut out the shapes you traced in pencil. Now trace your paper shapes onto a cereal box or lightweight cardboard (chipboard). For the arms and legs you DO NOT need to turn the pattern over for the second set. Cut out. With a new pattern I place the cardboard shapes into position and mark where I need the holes. Play with the positions a bit before you mark the hole. The ones you need to watch is the shoulder joint and the hip joint. It might look great in the first position you put it in but then as you move it you realize it's in the wrong place. Use your punch, an awl, or even a sharp pencil to poke your hole. If you used my pattern just follow the dots. Put your figure together using paper brads for the joints. Your template is now ready to go.   For drawing place the template on top of paper and trace out positions. If it moves too freely before you can finish tracing you can just use a little tape to tack it into position. Another neat thing you can try is using it as a splatter resist. Place on top of paper in position you want and then splatter paint on top. Then carefully remove the template and you have your image. Blot the template figure with a kleenex and then try again in another position. You'll find lots of different positions to try.  So now onto the giveaway results for "Art Lab for Kids" by Susan Schwake. I had a total 209 entries and by random draw the winner is:   Here are your random numbers: 79 Timestamp: 2012-08-24 16:29:30 UTC which works out to be Lila who left me this comment: Thanks for all your helpful pictures. Yes, quietly I thought about getting back to school today to set up a new art room in a new school with whatever supplies there is. Thanks for this resource and for sharing. That is what I do too! When I find a good source, I tend to use it all the time and don't want to give it up. Thanks for blogging about it.  Thanks everyone for entering. I can't believe all the nice comments I've been receiving! I would love to answer you all back but then I wouldn't have any time for art. I read every one of them and they make this all worth while! Take care everyone and I'll see you next week.        

Do you little {or big} learners have a little trouble distinguishing between needs and wants? That’s why I created this Wants vs Needs Learning Pack! It’s great for any time of year, but especially before Christmas! *This post contains affiliate links. **The free printable link can be found towards the END of this post. Just click ... Read More about Wants vs Needs Learning Pack {FREE}

Watercolor Autumn Leaves Clipart, Hand painted, Fall Leaf, Autumn Decor, Watercolor Leaves, Autumn Clipart, Maple, Ash, Oak Leaves, PNG ►PLEASE NOTE BEFORE PURCHASING: This is an INSTANT DOWNLOAD FILE of my original watercolor paintings. NOTHING WILL BE SHIPPED TO YOU. After payment is confirmed, a Download page will appear for you to see all the files attached to your order. You can also access your digital files at any time by going here: You > Purchases and Reviews and look for the order. To the right of the order, click Download Files. ►WHAT YOU GET: 18 different leaves in PNG format - Each element in a separate .png file - High resolution - Hand-painted watercolor - Transparent background - Instant download - No watermark ►TERMS OF USE For any personal use or commercial use, licence included into the price. You can not sell or share this files as they are. You can use the graphics in as many personal projects as you like. Create invitations, Thank You cards, Invitations; Stationary & Scrapbooking material; Planner stickers; Stationary & Scrapbooking material; Party supplies; Blog & Website design. ►------------------ YOU CAN NOT ------------------► - share, resell or redistribute any product “as is," or as clip art, part of a clip art set, digital template, digital paper pack, or digital collage sheet. - Digital downloads as-is in their original digital format - Freebies - Layered PSD files for sale. - claim any of my designs as your own work Do not hesitate if you have any questions, please contact me. Thank you for choosing my work! © AquarelDesigns

Travelling to Malta is exciting because the country is hot, sunny, and full of culture. We love Malta, so here are a few practical must-knows before you go!

Focus Wall Numbers allows you to have a number of the week, or simply have a discussion about a particular number during your circle time. My students learn about numbers every day, but I really love using my focus wall to talk about one specific number. Focus Wall Numbers includes: ✧ 21 Print & Hang Number Posters ✧ 1 Number Board ✧ 21 Number Cards With 4 Pictures This resource is great for: ❁ Circle Time ❁ Preschool ❁ Pre-K ❁ Kindergarten Similar Resources and Skills: ☞ Other Focus Wall Items Follow my store to be alerted of new products. CLICK HERE TERMS OF USE Please read my TERMS OF USE before purchasing. ZIP FILES My products are often placed into zip files. You can learn more about zip files and how to open them HERE. REVIEWS Don't forget to leave a review. You will receive TPT credits that can be used towards future purchases.redits that can be used towards future purchases.

A delicious and versatile dip - full of flavor and spice

We've put together a list of cruising do's & don'ts to help make your cruise a success. These first time cruise tips start even before you set sail.