Fantastic First Day

We had a fantastic first day.  Okay, my only criteria for it to be a "fantastic first day of first grade" is that everyone gets home safely, no one has an accident (the kind that requires a change of clothes from the nurse), and everyone eats lunch.
That all happened!!!!!
And I only had one crier......
and almost all of my students brought in supplies.......
and all 18 were total sweeties!  I could not be happier with the day.
(So happy that I am not even going to complain that 2 of my team members only have 13 or 14 students compared to my 18.)

We did not get to half of the activities I had planned.

The kids really enjoyed the First Day Jitters activities that we found on found on blogs, TPT and Pinterest.  Especially the Jitter Juice!  The cute Before and After Reading pages came from 1st Grade Hip Hip Horray!

Here is our Going Home Graph.  Making sure all of the kids get home the correct way is my main goal for the first day.  I ask each student several times throughout the day and make sure it matches what their parents told me at Meet the Teacher.  This is a cute way to double (okay, triple) check it!


I hope you all had a great first day, too!
Meredith

Classroom Pictures and WINNERS

Here are a few pictures of my classroom.  It is not completely finished, but it is ready for Meet the Teacher Day tomorrow!

Teacher/Carpet Area

View from front of the room.

Reading Area (Work in Progress.  Hopefully the left side will be finished before Monday!)

Left side will be for our monthly Growing Patterns

Science, Math and Reading Boards for I Can statements and Vocab

Table Bins inspired by Randi at Teach it With Class

Shapes, Colors and Rules

Calendar Math Area
The signs above it are my birthday signs that can be found at my TPT store. 

Teacher Area (All of these awesome organization ideas were blog and Pinterest inspired!)

If you want to peek into some other classrooms checkout Swimming into Second's Linky by clicking the pic below!

And now for our WINNERS!!
Oriental Trading Gift Card:  Illiana Reyes
Target Gift Card:  Heidi
Amazon Gift Card: Nichole Falkowski
Congratulations Ladies!!  I will be emailing you your e-gift cards tonight or tomorrow!
Thanks everyone for entering!
Meredith

Last Chance

Tonight is your last chance to shop at TPT's big sale!  Stop by and check out my Apple Units by clicking either picture below!

Thanks for all of the suggestions for my Halloween Unit!  Your ideas were so great I decided to send you all my Apple Units.
Don't forget about our giveaway.  It ends Wednesday!
a Rafflecopter giveaway
Meredith

TPT Sale, New Apple Units and a Giveaway (2 actually)

Visit TPT for the AMAZING Back to School Sale today and tomorrow!  (Click the picture above to shop at my store.)  I have just posted 2 new apple units....Apples Everywhere Math Unit and Apples Everywhere Literacy Unit!

Want both of them for FREE?  Leave me a comment about what you would like to see in my upcoming Halloween Units and I will randomly choose one winner Monday evening.  Make sure to include your email!

Happy BTS Shopping!

Also, don't forget about our giveaway!

a Rafflecopter giveaway
Meredith

Ten Flashing Fireflies idea & a GIVEAWAY

Have you read Ten Flashing Fireflies?

Click here to purchase the book from Amazon.

It is very cute and makes a great math lesson.

• Give 10 *quiet* students a firefly.  You can also clip it to their shirt if you hot glue a clothes pin on the back.  Tell the class if they are really quiet they will be able to hear them blinking......it's the googly eyes moving, but hey, it works;-).
• Create a "jar" for the kids/fireflies to fly into.  Tape a jar outline on your floor, use a hula hoop or just an area of you classroom and pretend it is a jar!
• As you read the story have one kid/firefly fly into the jar!  Encourage them to blink quickly like in the story.  We make our fireflies "blink" by shaking them.   Have them slow down their blinking when the fireflies do in the book.
• At the end of the story all of the fireflies are released from the jar.  Call each kid away by counting back from 10 and have them "fly" out of the jar!

Click the pic below for your FREE copy of the activity pages for this lesson.

Mrs. Lilly over at Leaping into First Grade made these super cute fireflies!  Leap on over to her new blog and show her some bloggy love.

The template for the fireflies can be found in Number Wonders by Catherine Kuhns.   (This book is WONDERFUL!)  Sadly, it seems to be currently unavailable.  (Unless you are willing to spend $180 on Amazon...yikes!)  I am hoping she is just updating it.  You might want to try to order it from you Barnes and Noble store.  Let me know if you find it anywhere for a reasonable price!

Click here to purchase the the book from Amazon.  

Don't forget to enter our giveaway!  (And PLEASE blog about it!) We are at 98 followers.  We just might have to have another giveaway to celebrate if we make it to 100!!!

a Rafflecopter giveaway
Meredith

Our First Giveaway!!!

We are super excited to be hosting our first giveaway!   The 3 winners will be announced on Thursday, August 16th.
What you can WIN:

$10 Oriental Trading Gift Card from Sunshine, Sand and Scissors
$10 Target Gift Card from Mrs. Greene's Kindergarten Korner
$10 Amazon Gift Card from Leaping Into First Grade

How to WIN:

1.  Follow Sunshine, Sand and Scissors!

2.  Follow Mrs. Greene's Kindergarten Korner.

3.  Follow Leaping into First Grade.

4.  Blog about this giveaway! This will get you 2 entry points.  (You can use the picture below and link it back to Sunshine, Sand and Scissors!)

This giveaway will end at midnight on Wednesday, August 15th.   Good Luck!
Meredith & Kim

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Roll and Color Freebies

Here are a few Roll and Color pages for Math Stations.  Roll and Colors are great practice for subitizing!  Our students loved going to this station all year long.  By simply switching out the picture and the dice and you have a new station!

Click the picture below to get your 5 freebies from TPT.  If you like them, check out the Apples Everywhere Math Unit that is coming soon!

For those of you who attended our Singapore Math workshop, the rest is coming soon....I promise!!!
Meredith

Directions Task Cards

Teacher:  Color, Cut, Glue.  Color, Cut, Glue.  Okay boys and girls, what are we going to do?

Little Lovelies: Color, Cut, Glue!

Teacher:  Great!  You may begin.

4.2 seconds later..........Little Lovely #4 is using his scissors.
You know how the rest of the story goes!

I created some Directions Task Cards to help with this.

Print, laminate and cut them out.  If you hot glue a magnet on the back you can easily use them over and over for many activities.  I included a Teacher card because a lot of times I have my students show me BEFORE they glue....you know, just IN CASE they didn't quite hear your directions....or see your example.....or notice that the nose is above the eyes on their creation.

Click the picture below to get them FOR FREE in my TPT store.  As always, I'd love it if you would leave a comment.  Posting on TPT is still new to me!

Meredith