Well this past week was a complete blur! I'm finally sitting down to share a bit more about our first two weeks - for more frequent photo updates, check out my instagram!! We've been practicing our calendar routine and learning some basic school vocabulary: We practice the days of the week, months of the year, counting to 30, the vocabulary on the calendar squares (bus, school, backpack, books, girl, boy), weather, and our preposition song once a day. I've been reading "Mon ecole" to them every day, and they repeat each page after me. I have also recorded the book so my kids can practice at home! We then review the vocabulary playing "SMACK". I choose two students to stand in front of the board with fly swatters. Then I say a word, and whoever smacks it first gets another turn. The other student passes their swatter on to another classmate. Now that they're familiar with the words, I let a third student call out the word (instead of doing it myself). Next week they'll be making their own copy of the book and taking it home to start building their own French library! We learned how to say "je m'appelle" and labelled our self portraits with colour words! They used the colour posters in the classroom to help label their clothes. We're also working our way through making our own colour books! We are doing one colour a day. We started our first social studies unit and have been talking about rules at school and rules at the park. We also talked about what happens when we don't follow rules. We brainstormed different consequences to breaking different rules around the school and at recess. Our song this week was "Bonjour, comment ca va?" We practiced it all week and then it went home in our French duotangs to practice over the weekend. We practiced saying "Comment ca va?" to a partner, and the possible answers they could give. We took turns sharing our mini conversations with the class! As we filled out the lyrics page, we talked about things that make us feel each of the possible answers from the song. Mlle Lawson replies "ca va bien!" when she has a starbucks in her hand ;) Each week I type up a page to go on the back of the song/poem page that gives parents a few QUICK activities to complete with their child at home. The entire thing could be done in less than 10 minutes, so hopefully it doesn't add stress over the weekend. Here's the one that went home this weekend: This week we also started very simple colour centres. I showed them our word wall cards for colours. I attach them with shower curtain hooks from Dollarama and then hang them on 3M hooks by the carpet. They used whiteboards to write the colour words. We use black mittens from Dollarama as our erasers! We also practiced matching our colours to the words! I gave them a visual dictionary page with the colours to help them check their work when they were done! TIP for your centres - use numbers or letters on the back of each set so you can quickly sort them! I have 3 sets of colour bang cards in different containers, and they somehow end up mixed up. You can quickly flip them over and sort them! It took me wayyyy too many years to figure this trick out!! After years of fighting to erase my whiteboard, I've now got it completely figured out. I used expensive expo whiteboard spray for a while, but once you start using that you can't go back to a regular whiteboard eraser because it leaves a film on your board. SO we have spray bottles of water and microfiber cloths from Dollarama. Once you've removed all the build up and residue from your board with the cloth and water, you probably won't need to wet the cloth at all. Life changing!! Next week we are focusing on classroom objects and continuing on with colours, calendar, weather, and our rules unit for social studies. We will be starting to talk about fall changes soon, too! Enjoy the rest of your Sunday!
Video tutorial and 7 pages of free printable worksheets to help kids learn the colors in french, and to read, write and spell 12 french colors.
I did the research so that you don't have to! Here is a list of 10 free resources that are perfect for distance learning in Kindergarten.
I've created this blog post to share my plans for the first day of school for Grade 1 French Immersion. Here you'll find a full day's worth of activities.
As French Immersion teachers, we know how valuable it is to sing. It’s a great way to practice pronunciation, vocabulary and get our students excited about learning French. This list has a range of easier to harder songs. I taught some of these to my kindergarten students and also to 2/3s so it
Learn more about French phonics lapbooks: each set focuses on one letter-sound pair with lots of hands-on practice for lapbooks or interactive notebooks!
In grade 2 and 3, the lengthy calendar routine isn’t necessary. Older primary students can still have a morning routine that is purposeful, consistent and effective without repeating the same old things. Note: I use the same structure for a straight 3 class. How long is it? My morning routine
What's your routine for teaching reading and specifically French sound blends in grade 1? Here's an overview of mine. September to Decembe...
In grade 2 and 3, the lengthy calendar routine isn’t necessary. Older primary students can still have a morning routine that is purposeful, consistent and effective without repeating the same old things. Note: I use the same structure for a straight 3 class. How long is it? My morning routine
Salut! Hi everyone! If you teach French, you know how tough it can be to find resources for your classroom. Of course, I'm talking about QU...
I did the research so that you don't have to! Here is a list of 10 free resources that are perfect for distance learning in Kindergarten.
This product is in Spanish (only). This is a great product for Spanish immersion, bilingual education, bi-literacy or Spanish language schools. Many of these activities could be put together in a packet or could work on individually. Ideal for students in grades: 1, 2, 3 learning about Roberto Clemente in Spanish or about Hispanic Heritage Month. 40 Pages of Roberto Clemente in Spanish: 1- Student Cover page for packet (folleto) 1- Roberto Clemente K-W-L 1- Roberto Clemente era, tenia, queria chart 2-Roberto Clemente web graphic organizers 1- Describe Roberto Clemente 1- Busca palabras/ sopa de letras 1- Orden alfabetico de Roberto Clemente in Spanish 1- Roberto Clemente- Who? What? where? When? Why?- graphic organizer 1- Reading passage about Roberto Clemente 1- Escritura- Si Roberto Clemente estuviera vivo le preguntaria... 3- Looks like, sounds like, feels like- sheets 1- Esrcitura: Carta a Roberto Clemente 1- Venn Diagrams (Roberto Clemente/yo) 1- Mini-poster for classroom (cartel) 8- Vocabulary sheets- definition, draw it, write an example 1- Timeline of Roberto Clemente- Corta y pega 1- Questions with multiple choice 1- Pair painting to the correct word 2- Coloring sheets 3- Ascrostic poem (poema acrostico) sheets This could be used in the classroom for whole class lessons, individual seat work, centers, fast finishers, as homework, etc. Could use for Hispanic Heritage Month in September or October or for a writing or social studies units on influential people. No prep needed. Just print. Roberto Clemente en espanol para septiembre o octubre o para el mes de la herencia hispana o el mes de la hispanidad.
In grade 2 we have been working on our science liquids and solids unit! Here are some pictures of what we have been up to... Science word wall: Here's an experiment that we did for absorption... I found this little guy at Dollarama. We put him in a cup of water and watched him grow over the week! We also looked at things that mix and dissolve. I found these little cups at Dollarama and we used them to split up the different things for each group. It was fun! Do you have any cool science experiments for this unit? I'd LOVE to hear about them! Leave a comment below :)
What's your routine for teaching reading and specifically French sound blends in grade 1? Here's an overview of mine. September to Decembe...
Here are some pictures of my class during "Daily 5" with Spring activities! Bang! is a favourite of theirs - they pull a card from the bucket and can keep it if they can use the vocabulary in a sentence. They try to collect the most cards by the end of the game. If they get a "bang!" card, they can pull another card. Sometimes we also play that they have to put all their cards back into the bucket. Bang: Here they are testing my spring "freebie" on TPT. They have to sort the cards into the correct order to make the correct sentences! These cards have pictures that match the word wall cards/flashcards I use with them. They can write sentences on the laminated cards: Here are two of their desks! They LOVE writing on their desks. They can draw a picture and write sentences to describe it. We are working on different strategies for sounding out words and for editing (P.O.M.M.E.S.). Here is a puzzle game for vocabulary acquisition/reading practice: Last but not least, some Read to Self :) What do your students love to choose during Daily 5?
For younger kids, here are some French classroom name writing practice activities you and your students will love! They'll have fun writing their names.
Sight word knowledge is instrumental in learning to read. In this post, I'll be covering how I use French sight words to teach reading.
This summer I read the book Guided Math by Laney Sammons. Chapter 3 was all about using Math Warm-Ups. A quote that stuck out to me was, "Participating in a variety of brief mathematical activities during the first 20-30 minutes of the day leads students to make subtle mental shifts into the world of mathematical awareness and learning." (Laney Sammons also has a book called Daily Math Stretches for K-2 that sounds interesting, but I haven't checked it out yet!) This is why I've always tried to start my day with calendar. We practice so many important mathematical skills during calendar time. This year something new I want to try is to do a short math stretch after calendar as well. First let's talk about calendar. I am just itching to get back into my classroom to get everything set up, but my school doesn't open until August 24th! So for now, I've been trying things out in the hallway of our house. Hubby doesn't even ask questions anymore when he comes out of the bathroom and there's a September calendar hanging on the wall. He knows me well. lol. The other night I decided that I redid every single label and poster in my room to match my chalkboard & brights theme EXCEPT my calendar! Why hadn't I thought of my calendar?? So I got to working on monthly sets of numbers, month headers, and a variety of other posters I use for my calendar routine. Here's a peek at my hallway calendar display: And here's a close up look at my September calendar. (PS. I have a few blue pocket charts that I want to try dye-ing black this week... but in case it doesn't work out well, I bought a new black calendar pocket chart from Scholastic. I love how it looks!) This is what my calendar looked like the week before I left for maternity leave. Things will look completely different, but the math will stay the same! I always lead the calendar routine for the first month or so, but then my leader of the day takes over. Here's a little break down of what we usually do: *flip the number over on the calendar and count the numbers either forwards or backwards *look at the monthly pattern and make the same pattern with out bodies (clap, snap, stomp, etc.) *tell what day of the week was yesterday, today, and tomorrow *add a straw to our collection and count the straws *colour in a ten frame and count the squares *check the weather and fill in the weather graph *add any loose teeth or birthdays to the charts *sing a calendar song or watch a calendar video (such as Harry Kindergarten) We also do a calendar journal to go along with out calendar routine. It keeps all students on task and engaged with what's going on! You can read more about it {here}. Here is what I have planned for my weekly math stretches... On Monday I will read aloud a picture book that goes with a skill we are learning. I started blogging about some book ideas with my Math Book Monday series. The two large tubs in the picture below are filled with math books. I have an addiction and it's time that I start utilizing them more! lol. We will discuss the math seen in the book and usually do some sort of activity to go with it. I hope to continue this blogging series again once school is back in session! I can share more about the books we use and the activities to go along with them. On Tuesday we will do a number of the day activity. I've done this before as a math centre or activity before, but this time I created a cute set of posters that I will hang down the side of my big white board. I will laminate the cards so we can use them with dry erase markers. I created little number cards from 1-20 so each week we will pick a number, veclro it to the number of the day card, and show many different ways to represent that number! We will practice even/odd, number words, tally marks, one less/one more, ten frames, number lines, place value blocks, dice dots, counting forwards and backwards, drawing pictures, number bonds, part-part-whole, and writing number sentences! So many skills in one simple activity! I also created a matching recording sheet so that sometimes I can have students complete the worksheet as we do the posters together, or they can fill one in as an early finisher activity! (I will only be using numbers 1-20 with my students, but the pack I created has options to go up to 100 or 120!) On Wednesday we will practice our estimating! Some days we will practice estimating the amount of objects in our Estimation Station. Other days we will do some measurement activities. I have been collecting some estimation ideas on Pinterest. Check out my board below! Follow Amanda Ross (First Grade Garden)'s board Math - Estimation on Pinterest. On Thursday we will complete a "What's Next?" activity. I will have five different patterns displayed on the board and we will have to decide what two elements come next for each pattern. This activity is perfect for practicing repeating patterns, counting forwards, counting backwards, and skip counting! Plus it will reinforce shapes, colours, and sizes too! You can download a blank PDF of this activity {here}. On Friday we will do a data collection activity. Graphing isn't an outcome yet in our Grade 1 Math curriculum, but the skills that we use when analyzing the data sure is! We practice tons of counting and comparing numbers. Sometimes we will do a whole glass graph or somethings I might let them do a survey and graph activity, like I blogged about {here}. I have pinned tons of ADORABLE graphs on my Pinterest board too. Follow Amanda Ross (First Grade Garden)'s board Math - Graphing on Pinterest. You can check out any of these math products at my TpT store to help you get started! Well that's it for my math stretch ideas! :) Stay tuned for more in my daily schedule series.
Teach your patterning unit without the need for boring worksheets. Yes you can teach patterns for grade 1 with pattern activities and some pattern worksheets for grade one. Pattern activities for Kindergarten and pattern activities for first grade will keep you students happy and learning.
Measurement concepts benefit from hands-on learning! Help your K-3 learn non-standard units of measure & how to use a ruler. Get 20 ideas for measurement today!
Word walls miss a key feature we want our students to master: spelling patterns and sounds. That’s why I use a French sound wall in my classroom. Learn about what it is and how to set it up.
Building a classroom community lies at the very heart of what we do as teachers. Yes, we’re there to teach curriculum, but students are more likely to
Even though I have been teaching for several years, I'm always on the search for Free French back to school activities. Here are my favourites!
Thème LES MONSTRES - 10 Petites histoires/énoncés simples à lire pour vos jeunes lecteurs débutants. - Les 10 courts énoncés/histoires peuvent être dessinés sur le IPAD ou être imprimés en version PAPIER également
I did the research so that you don't have to! Here is a list of 10 free resources that are perfect for distance learning in Kindergarten.
I LOVE using centres with my students! My students love them, and will choose many of the centres to play during indoor recess instead of lego and other toys. It rained this week and one of my boys chose to build with magnets on cookie trays! Setting clear routines is the most important part. Take the time to teach the games to your students so that they understand how to play properly. If they haven't mastered the French vocab, then you will have behavioural and focus issues come up. With younger students, make sure you practice the game as a whole class many times before you introduce it as a centre. Set-up: I use the cards from my "j'ai fini" board as the centre rotation cards, as the centres are all things they can also choose to do if they finish their work early. I recently updated the file to include centre group cards, so you can write their names on the group # cards to set up your groups before they come to class. Normally my "j'ai fini" board is set up like this: Since they're on magnets, it's really easy to move them over to the other side of my whiteboard to set up the centres. I line them up vertically and put the group # cards beside them. I have each centre set up on a table group (except bug in a rug, they play on the carpet). I review the rules of each centre with them, and the CLEAN UP rules. We talk about what each centre should look like when it's been properly cleaned up. They get started at their centres, and I work with my small group at my table. When I'm done with them (about 10 minutes) I ding my bell. This means clean up and come back to the carpet. Once they're all back at the carpet, we look around to check that the room is cleaned up properly. Any groups who wrote on whiteboards are able to read a sentence they wrote to the class. This is our sharing centre. Then I move the centre cards on the whiteboard down one spot, and tell each group where they are going for their next centre. Here are some of the centres I do: 1. Bang game: Put all the vocab you’re practicing in a container. Students pull out a card. If they can say it in French (or use it in a sentence, to make it harder) then they can keep the card. If they pull a card that says “bang” then they get another turn (or lose all their cards, your choice!) You can use any empty yogurt container or plastic tupperware. Just make sure they can't see through the container! Some of my students like to play bang and then write the words they won on a whiteboard! 2. Bug in a rug: Lay out the vocab in a grid. One student hides the “bug” under a card, while the other students close their eyes. They guess in French which vocab card it’s hidden under. Whoever finds the bug gets to hide it next. This game requires an honest conversation with your students about why cheating will ruin the fun of the game! 3. Go fish: You can print any of the flashcards you're using in class. Copy them 2 or 4 per page to make them smaller. 4. Word building: Magnets on cookie trays! My students use our visual dictionaries or word wall strips to choose their words/sentences to build. These awesome magnets come from wintergreen. This set is much cheaper, but you'd likely need multiple sets. The cookie trays are from the dollar store. Ideally you want small magnets so they can fit more words on the cookie tray. 5. Sentence building: Print squares with a variety of sentence starters, numbers, colours, and objects. Students then put the words in order to build sentences. You can extend this by having them read their sentences to a partner, or write their sentences on a whiteboard/in their journals. 6. "Pictionary": One student draws on a whiteboard, the other student has to guess what they are drawing. 7. Matching: Picture to the word. My students use our visual dictionaries to check their work over when they're done! 8. Cootie catchers/fortune tellers with a partner. 9. Bingo - 1 group member can be the bingo caller, others put tokens on the words that are called. I use these as the bingo tokens. 10. Writing on whiteboards - 11. Hunting for sight words - 12. Cube game - Roll the cube and answer the question. Extension - write the question! I bought the cubes here, and write different prompts on sticky notes to slide under the plastic. 13. SMACK game - One student says the word, whoever smacks it first gets to say the next word! 14. Spin and graph sight words - 15. Stamp the sight words, themed vocab, or sentences! 16. Write the sight words - I bought salt from the dollar store and added a few drops of food colouring, then gave it a good shake. Students use a sharp pencil to write words in the salt! 17. Read and clip - 18. Spinner games - I use these in centres to give my students prompts for oral communication or writing. They can spin the spinner and either say a sentence or write a sentence. They can review vocabulary in partners (one spins, one says the word). 19. Working with Mlle - The BEST part about centres is that it means I can pull small groups to work with. Do you have any centres you love? Feel free to share in the comments :)
Make teaching French writing effortless with this French procedural writing unit for Grade 1, Grade 2 and Grade 3! This pack includes 9 French writing lessons, including teacher-guided modelling and writing tasks. Your students will feel immediate writing success when you follow this mini unit because students can work at their own level, making differentiation easy peasy - even for students who have limited letter sound knowledge! Click here for a preview.
Students will love finding out about food chains from 7 different habitats with real pictures, worksheets, manipulatives, and a craftivity.
It's Five for Friday time again, so I'm linking up with Doodle Bugs on a Saturday because I'm always running late like that :)! I have lots of pictures
A 1 page rapport de livre for primary or junior French Immersion. Could be used for core French classes too. ...
If you had to ask me what my favourite resource that I’ve created is, I would probably have to say the Math Problem of the Day or “Le problème du jour”. Made in an interactive notebook style, it is always a popular time in my classroom! Why use “Le problème du jour” in your […]
The last few weeks have been so busy! Report cards went home, and student-led conferences are all finished! Below are some pictures of the work my grade 2s have been doing with reading sounds. We start each sound by reading a short silly story together. Then we brainstorm the other words we know with that sound. After that they take a clipboard and go on a hunt of the classroom for more words with that sound. They like to check the books in our classroom library for sounds as well. They also use our sound word wall for more ideas. Here are some pictures of some of the centres that we have done: After they finish the folders (above) or the matching games, they take an ipad mini and record themselves reading each of the words. After reading them through once, they try to come up with sentences containing each of the words. This also gives me a video that I can use as a check-in to support them with their reading. After a week of exploration in the different centres, then my students write and illustrate their own silly story. They also practice reading and writing with the sheets below: It's been really great to see the progress that they've made so far! With the change in the Ontario French curriculum as of September, I will be doing these same centres in the spring with my grade 1s. What does your sound program look like?
This week we made our mini books! Literally... I photocopied them 4/page so we had teeny tiny books! This was a selling point for my grade 1s, as they thought mini books were very exciting. The mini books followed the same pattern as the book I have read to them for the past few weeks. We practiced the vocabulary many different ways before I had them write their own book. The dot at the end of each sentence is for the colour: "Dans ma salle de classe, il y a 4 gommes roses", "Dans ma salle de classe il y a 3 crayons oranges". So... I came back from Thanksgiving weekend to find my classroom covered in mouse droppings. We had a few visitors move into our hallway of the school!!! Some of my students wrote this into their books! They thought it was quite funny! Technically, it was in our classroom... My students are REALLY excited to read their books to some of the older French Immersion students at our school!
