This fun sunglasses craft is perfect for the end of the school year or the beginning of the year! The sunglasses template paired with all of these wri

This post contains affiliate links. If you purchase through these links I receive a small amount of money at no additional cost to you. Last year I saw a great post from Heidi at Heidi Songs about using her sight word videos with white boards. It was a big hit with my kiddos last year and today I decided we were ready to try it with this group. They LOVED it! It's a super simple activity that gets them connecting with the videos in a whole new way. Total engagement......very little effort. Win-win! To keep them from writing/ erasing/ writing/ erasing.....you get the idea....I simply didn't give them an eraser and told them not to erase with their fingers. We wrote each word one time and we kept going until our boards were full. That gave us about 13-15 songs which was a full 20 minute activity. They were sad when it was done! I gave them a tissue when we were done to erase really quick (handing out erasers drives me crazy, a quick tissue for each pair makes for fast clean up). Here is a video example from last year. If you don't own the videos you can get them HERE. I also have the alphabet videos which we use at the beginning of the year. There are a ton of engaging videos to get you singing and moving in your classroom. We love the math videos too! We can't get enough of Heidi Songs in our classroom! How do you mix things up in your classroom? If you want to remember to check out Heidisongs save this post for later!

As teachers, we have an unending to-do list. One task that can easily swallow up our time if we let it, is grading. We all understand the importance of knowing where our kiddos stand in their learning

Heather and Michael share a very organized, extremely stylish 600 square feet with their three daughters, Lennon (4 years), Georgie (2.5 years), and James (15 months). The home's style is "cozy, thoughtful, not fussy, and somewhere between minimal and collected."

Magic words for my two year old daughter.

It is the first week of kindergarten! What do I teach? I get this question all the time! I am so excited to put together this page together for you. I’m sharing our favorite first week of kindergarten read aloud stories and the free coordinating printables I made to go with them. Plus I will s

Spring is a wonderful time of year to enjoy, explore and learn about the natural world, from new growth, buds and blossom of plants to animals nesting and raising young. Here are 30 fun and easy sp…

Got a talkative class? Check out these 5 ways to quiet the chatter!

These "quiet critters" are amazingly effective!

How to make an outdoor chalkboard - a really fun addition to your yard that the kids will love! Perfect for your fence or backyard.

Grab our free, clickable Mega List of Themes and Skills for Pre-K & Kindergarten Lesson Plans to see what themes/skills I cover in my classroom all year!

Classroom management and thinking through how my classroom will run is more important than the decorations and arrangement! Do you agree? My classroom has several different strategies set up; and as needed, I will adjust accordingly as my students arrive and I learn their needs. Today, I have 8 Classroom Management Tips for you to […]

Distance learning is tough for art teachers. Tough, but not impossible. It just requires a little more thought and flexibility on your part for planning art projects. If this is your first time experiencing it, give yourself some room to make mistakes.

learn how to make a rock climbing wall for a children's inside play room. You will find detailed instructions with lots of pictures to make your own.

The first week of school generally consists of getting to know one another, in addition to discussion and practice of classroom procedures and routines. We also got our creative juices flowing by creating summer reflection writing pieces, squiggle stories, and "All About Me" mini-posters. Students are getting to know one another and me, and we are learning to work together to build a successful and positive classroom environment. On Wednesday, I wrote out six questions, all having to do with how to make our classroom and ourselves function to the highest level, on six pieces of chart paper. Students, in groups of three, spent two minutes at each chart, collaborating and responding to each question on a sticky note. After all groups visited each chart paper station, I hung all of the charts up and we discussed each answer and noticed some very interesting trends. Here's the finished product, which you can click on to enlarge: Inspired by Life in 4B To tie into the previous activity, I was inspired by my wonderful teammates, Mrs. Fadden and Ms. Mattox, to develop at class pledge with my students. We reviewed our responses to the above questions, and then we put all of the ideas together to form a cohesive paragraph that we have all agreed will help us to remember why we are here at school and what our common goal is. Below is the rough draft of our class pledge (which I will type up, make pretty, and have all of my students sign): Since we were able to develop a class goal (to achieve success in third grade), I also had each student determine an individual goal after reading the story Matthew's Dream by Leo Lionni. I displayed our "Hopes and Dreams" for third grade near the classroom door, so that we can refer to, and revisit, them throughout the year. Lots of students are interested in learning how to sharpen their cursive skills, multiplication and division skills. I was very impressed by the number of students ready to take on our 40 book challenge! More on that later! Here's our class display of our hopes and dreams for third grade: Lastly, I read a book called Have You Filled a Bucket Today? The premise is that everyone carries an invisible bucket everywhere they go. When your bucket is "filled" you feel happy.When your bucket is "empty" you feel sad or upset. People can fill buckets by lending a helping hand, smiling, being kind, including others in games, and more. People can empty buckets by teasing, being ungrateful, acting disrespectfully, and more. I encourage my students to recognize the actions of bucket-fillers by writing them quick note and sticking it in their bucket display. This helps make everyone feel good. When we feel good, we want others to feel good. Therefore, kindess is passed from person to person. This is our bucket-filling display, complete with ways we can fill buckets and ways we can empty buckets: I look forward to more of these types of meaningful activities that promote teamwork, kindness, and achievement with your child!

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.

Crossing the midline activities for kids. What on earth are those? Sometimes in the educational world we start speaking a slightly different language than 'normal' people. Not that teachers aren't normal ... though ... you do need to be a little insane to work with small children all day long, don't you? Anyways. I had

How Do I Stop My Toddler from Throwing Things! Each day many people submit reader questions to be answered on our Toddler Approved Facebook page. Parents often ask for tips regarding toddlers who throw sippy

Homeschooling with Little Ones Underfoot and Keeping Your Sanity is not easy, but it can be done! Here are a few tips.

Don't know what to eat during the first trimester? This list of healthy meals and recipes will help you plan! This is not your typical list, friend.

In this detailed tutorial, we're sharing how to make busy boards for your toddlers, both for in the house and in the car! No power tools needed!

How do I Teach Preschool at Home? What does my preschooler need to know before kindergarten? Find it all here! Plus a Free Printable Preschool Routine

FREE printable preschool assessment sheet for teachers and parents to record children's progress. We also reviewed the Mother Goose Time preschool curriculum which is an all-inclusive, low-prep monthly program that is conveniently delivered in a fun box full of hands-on learning and discovery.

Spending the first week of school teaching classroom expectations and procedures is essential for a successful year. Glue is a tricky school supply for many little learners and there definitely needs to be instruction dedicated to teaching learners how to use this tool.Glue BottlesWhen learners are not taught how to use their glue correctly things

46+ weeks of free preschool lesson plans | free preschool at home lesson plans | preschool theme ideas | preschool spring themes | preschool summer themes

Super simple kids craft which literally take just 5 minutes to make these (not so scary) Pipe Cleaner Spiders, perfect for Halloween!

If you're new to homeschooling, you might think you need to know all about everything. Here's what first time homeschool moms need to know.

Hey fellow unschooling families! As we eagerly prepare for another enriching year of child-led learning, I can’t help but feel a rush of excitement and curiosity for the journey ahead. Unschooling …

There are so many ways to make the moment you tell your parents you’re pregnant a memorable one. The look on my mom and dads face when we told then I was pregnant was priceless. It’s a moment you won’t ever forget and you can make it even more special with one of

This printable math worksheet is a super fun way to practice addition and money skills. It also makes a great follow up for a restaurant math center activity. Your students can pretend that they have their own little place that serves junk food for lunch (because it's no fun to serve broccoli and kale at a fake resta

Never planned to homeschool, now wouldn't trade it for the world

Happy Friday!! Are you all excited for the weekend?! I sure am! I wanted to share with you something that I've been working on this summer. It's my new printable Preschool Planner! I love this

I have done some sort of "morning work" with Emma since she was two but had a hard time staying consistent. There were so many skills I wanted to work on and it felt very overwhelming! It also felt like I was trying to do too many things and there were always supplies everywhere! I finally

If you are new to homeschooling & want to set yourself up for success, here are some dos & don'ts as you get started your first year homeschooling.

Don’t you just hate it when you finally get the hang of a reading or math program, and your district (or admin) decide it’s time to start using something new? I mean you’d think they’d know better than to mess with a teacher’s software… When that happened at my school, we were told to “trust the process” The only problem with that is that while the “process is going on”, we’re in the trenches having to figure out how to make things work. When my school first switched to i-Ready, it took me a while to get the hang of it. But after a few months, I figured out a system that worked well for ME + MY KIDDOS So, if you’re feeling frustrated, just like I was in the beginning, please know that YOU•ARE•NOT•ALONE! Hopefully, by the end of this post, you’ll have a few new ideas to get you started. The first step is to set up student folders You’ll need a folder for each student, printed iReady labels, and a copy of the iReady student recording sheet. (If you’re interested in a free copy, simply enter your email in the form down below […]