Do Spiders Dance?

It is fairly well known that honeybees do a special dance outside their hive to tell the other bees that a new field of flowers has been found! How they do that is a complete mystery to me! I got to thinking about spiders and asked myself, “Do spiders dance?” Well, thanks to the internet that question will not go unanswered!

Come to find out there are a few kinds of jumping spiders who do dance, mostly to attract a mate! Peacock spiders (appropriately named, I think) do a spectacular dance that a helps a discerning female tell which of these “dancers” possess the best physical qualities that will result in some strong offspring.

Spiders are truly AMAZING to learn about. We love studying them with our students and have created some great SPIDER products ! Click this LINK to see them all at our TPT store.

All About Spiders

This 70-page packet is all you need to teach a Spider unit! It comes loaded with a Shared reading book, informational text, photos, Beginning Readers Interactive printables, a vocabulary chart and themed writing paper and more. Try out a sample of this product (see below). Find the complete product HERE.

Non-fiction Beginning Readers – Spiders

Need more guided reading books to provide that “just right” level of text? Here is our set of 8 readers that focus on spiders. There are both colored and black/white versions, lots of interactive printables that extend the learning, teaching charts, and information to build background knowledge. Your students will LOVE reading these books that promote natural language, use predictable text and have great illustrations. Non-Fiction Spider Readers

Spider Songs

Here are 2 very familiar Spider songs that we have used as a basis for teaching some literacy skills. There are poem/song charts with pocket chart cards that illustrate each line, 2 No Prep Readers, some photographs that illustrate The Itsy Bitsy Spider and a fun game to help teach the most important high- frequency word ever…THE! SPIDER SONGS and ACTIVITIES

How about a Freebie?

This free download is a mini-sampler of the larger product called “All About Spiders”. This sampler has a beginning reader featuring the lyrics of the song, 2 of the 6 beautiful photograph cards, and some of the Interactive printables that are part of the whole product. Download the FREE Spider Sampler here. FInd the full product – ALL ABOUT SPIDERS at our TPT store.

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Leaves Are Falling Song and Activities

Don’t you just LOVE all the fall colors? The Northeastern states are always packed with visitors looking to catch the peak color of the changing trees. I grew up in Michigan and have to admit I miss seeing the trees turn those brilliant colors…but hated the bare limbed trees….Don’t miss all the raking though!

We wrote a song about falling leaves. Easily sung to the tune Are You Sleeping? AKA Frere Jacques, it comes loaded with Beginning readers and a path games with word cards (with EDITABLE cards so any words can be added). Themed writing paper, Math BUMP games and math practice sheets are also provided. Check out this wonderful addition to your Fall-themed studies! Leaves Are Falling

Fun BUMPER Game…played just like Math BUMP but with words!

This MOST popular game is one our students LOVE to play! Choose one of the 4 mats and either the cards or the Word Spinner. A player places one of their 10 Unifix cubes on the mat matching the word they just turned over. Play passes to the next player. They turn over a card (or spin the word spinner) and place their cube on their word. Once a player turns over a word that has the opponent’s cube on it they get to BUMP that cube off and place their cube there. Students LOVE to BUMP…..all in good fun, of course! When a player gets a word that has THEIR cube on it, they add a second cube and “Lock” that space. It can never be bumped off. Play continues until one player has placed all of their 10 cubes on the game mat. Children beg to play this again and again. FALL FRIENDS BUMPER

Non-fiction Beginning Reader- Leaves

Can you EVER have enough reading books for your students at that “just right” level? Our readers come in two levels of difficulty AND have supportive Interactive printables to extend the learning. Teaching charts and informational text is included to build background knowledge before or after reading the text. FInd these Leaves Readers HERE. A COMPLETE set of readers focus on 4 additional fall themes: Apples, Crows, Pumpkins, and Scarecrows. FALL Beginning Readers

How about a FREEBIE? Here’s a No Prep Reader about LEAVES!

This is an BONUS packet of 2 No Prep Readers that goes with the complete set of Fall-themed No Prep Readers. Find this FREEBIE HERE.

Here is the COMPLETE set of 10 more Fall themed NO Prep Readers.

Here’s to a Happy colorful fall!

The post Fall Activities for Kindergarten and 1st Grade appeared first on JK Curriculum Connection.

Maybe you’re lucky enough to live near an aquarium where you could take your class on a field trip. I’ve been to the Monterey Aquarium in California and would have loved to take my class there…but alas, it was just a bit too far away. Hey, with all the content on the internet you can actually take a Virtual field trip to the ocean! Check out these! Zoo Tours: Monterey Bay Aquarium  or KidVision Field Trip

Adding a new theme- Oceans!

Thinking about adding an Ocean unit of study to your 1st or 2nd grade classroom? Well, you should and this 145-page Ocean Packet will provide the base of everything you need to kick it off! Loaded with informational text about whales, dolphins, sea lions, lobsters, jellyfish and soo much more your students will be engaged by the text we wrote specifically to teach them fascinating facts about sea life! There are body part charts of lobsters and crabs. The life cycle of a Hermit crab or the Food chain of the Orca with interactive printables will have your students applying the information they learned in many different forms. There is a big section where the concept of Fact vs. Opinion is practiced in a variety of ways so your students wil begin to understand the difference. So many helpful activities are included you’ll jusr have to check out the extensive Outrageous Ocean Life product and Preview.

Here are a few comments from teachers who have used this product.

“What a comprehensive packet. This has everything I need to do an ocean study with my kiddos. Love the manatees! I really like the fact and opinion pages. It will give my students great practice.”

“Thanks for this product! This has been a wonderful addition to my ocean unit. A great resource for my special education students. The kids enjoy this and will continue using it. This is a time-saving resource that has helped my students catch up on skills they have missed. I would recommend it.”

Kindergarten Packet for Ocean Study

Need something for your Kindergarten classroom to kick start your Ocean study? This packet starts with an innovation of the familiar “1, 2, Buckle My Shoe” but is Ocean themed! Beginning Readers, games, writing papers, pocket chart cards, and even Math practice pages are included. Check out “1-2 An Ocean For You” !

Tricky Sharks Game

This is our MOST popular gsme format for practicing High Frequency words. We’ve even included cards with “AR” and EDITABLE word cards so you can customize them to fit the needs of your students! If you need to learn how to play Tricky Sharks just check out our FREE game packet that has a video tutorial on how to play this fun game. Download the free Tricky Robots game there too and try it with your students!

No Prep Readers

Here are some easy No-prep Readers for Kindergartners or beginning 1st graders. Simply print the page, fold, and it’s ready to read. Each of the twelve booklets come with an interactive printable to extend the learning. Click No Prep Ocean Readers to view it at our TPT store.

Time for a FREEBIE!

Here is a fun little poem we wrote about ocean life in the sea! Included is a poem chart in color and B/W, directions on adding movements to each sea animal, a vocabulary chart, writing templates and photographs of the ocean critters written about in the poem. Find it here on our FREE Resources page! (Lots of other freebies are there too!) Check them out!

Take a deep dive and add an ocean theme to your classroom this coming school year! You’ll be glad you did!

The post Outrageous Ocean Activities! appeared first on JK Curriculum Connection.

February is the month to celebrate Presidents’ Day. For a long time only George Washington’s birthday was recognized on February 22. In 1968, the holiday was adapted to also honor Abraham Lincoln. This Federal holiday was moved to the third Monday in February and sometimes Presidents’ Day considered to be a celebration of all U.S. Presidents!

Two Presidents Singable

We like to use this time of year to teach about the 2 most famous presidents, Washington and Lincoln. Because we LOVE to sing with our students we had to create a song. It is sung to the tune Three Blind Mice. Of course there is a mini movie included to help you and your students sing this song. Two Presidents covers many facts about these 2 famous men. There are writing papers and Sorting cards with photos to help students learn their differences. Many other activities are included in this 71-page packet.

There is a FREEBIE that has two short songs, one about George and one about Abe! This freebie has song charts in color and b/w, and some money activities. The George Washington song is easily sung to the tune Itsy, Bitsy, Spider while the Lincoln poem is sung to Yankee Doodle.

Here’s some meaningful ways to revisit the poems over several days in the pocket chart or with the student copy. (The pictures for the pocket chart for Washington is included in the FREEBIE. Those for Lincoln are found in the FULL product) Glue the clipart images of Washington to the end of a short dowel and use it to track across the poem as you sing together.

One day look for high frequency words such as the, and,he, we, and go, another day search for one, two, or three syllable words, a third day hunt for rhyming words such as name and fame. Use Magic Windows or colored pieces of a plastic folder to highlight features on the song. Plastic clothespins can also be used to clip above the words as they are “spotted” by the students. After looking for words on the big pocket chart you can have students circle words with different colored crayons on their Take-Home poem pages. (We usually include these pages in a year-long Poetry Notebook.) Activities such as these provide multiple readings of texts but with different purposes. Repeated readings help develop fluency.

Money

We honor some of our U.S. presidents by putting their pictures on bills and coins.  These two men get BOTH a coin AND a bill! Since recognizing money is part of our curriculum we have created some math activities with pennies  and dollars.  These provide a great way to count by ones and tens to 100. There are several recording sheets to go along with these counting activities. All  of this is in our February FREEBIE for you to use and enjoy in your classroom!

George Washington Craftivity

Here is a sample of a craftivity this is easy to make. Including print on the back of art work connects the art work with literacy. Glue the Washington Song page on the back of the craftivity.

American Symbols

This 80-page packet, 1-2 American Symbols for You, is an excellent way to introduce American symbols to your students. The Shared Reading non-fiction book uses real photos to support the text. This packet works well with any Presidents’ Day, Fourth of July, or American history units. It is LOADED with photos, math worksheets, BUMP Math games, Beginning Readers, Interactive booklets, themed writing papers, and much much more! (This is one of my favorite packets to teach!)

Favorite Books to teach about these Presidents

Here are some of our favorite books to build background knowledge. Most likely many can be found in your school library but they are also available at Amazon.

Happy February! It is flying by quickly! Enjoy the day off to celebrate Presidents’ Day!

The post Celebrate Presidents’ Day in Kindergarten and 1st Grade appeared first on JK Curriculum Connection.

February is LOADED with classroom fun! Groundhog’s Day, 100th Day of School, Presidents’ Day and Valentine’s Day….whew! All these in the shortest month of the year!

Valentine’s Day activities and passing out cards are highly anticipated in Kindergarten and 1st grade classrooms. The thought that goes into selecting that “just right” Valentine to give each classmate can take a LOT of time. I remember sitting down with my niece when she was in first grade to help her prepare her Valentines. What I thought might be a short 30-minute session turned into over 2 hours as she pored over the text of every card, analyzed every cute graphic for its underlying meaning, considered who on her list would be best suited for this card, then wrote their name and hers on the card…then repeated this entire process over and over and over again for each of the 30 students in her class (yes, California has a LOT of students in their classrooms!). My niece analyzed the picture and the words and made comments like, “Oh, Annette really likes unicorns. Is there a unicorn in my box?” Of course, there wasn’t so the search began again for a second choice for Annette! Endless!

Well, we hope our products will be quick to prep and fun to use in your February studies! This Literacy packet, 1-2 a Friend For You, has a book based on the familar poem, 1-2 Buckle my Shoe. It also comes with 2 Take-Home books, Pocket Chart sentence building cards and pictures, a vocabulary chart and some writing activities. Click HERE to find this great resource at our TPT store.

Great Game for Learning High Frequency Words

This game format is one of our students favorite games! They LOVE swiping cards from other players when they get a SWIPE cards. This game comes with 40 words with vowel digraphs such as “ou” and “ow”. These cards have cute monkeys on them. Add in the “candy” and “sad monkey” cards. Stack the cards on the playing mat (included) in the center of the table. The first player takes a card from the pile. They read the word aloud. (If they do not know it, someone tells them and they repeat it). They keep that card and play moves to the next  person. When a player turns over a ”CANDY” card, he can SWIPE a “Monkey” word card from another player (plus keep the ”CANDY” card). Game continues until someone gets a ”SAD MONKEY” card that ends the game. Everyone counts his or her cards. The person with the most is the winner! EDITABLE cards are included so ANY words can be inputted and used to play so your students are practicing the skills they need at this time of the yesr, Click SWEET MONKEY SWIPE to see this at our store,

Word Hunt FUN

This is a great way to repeatedly practice reading High Frequency words with the whole class. Words are put in a pocket chart and animal cards are placed BEHIND the  word cards. They must be completely hidden from view  and NOT be able to be seen through the word cards. Divide the class into 4 “teams” and have each team choose which of the 4 animals they will try to find!

Select a team or student from team to start. They can call out a word OR come up and point to a word and read it. Reveal the animal hiding behind the word card. If it is one of the  animals that team is trying to collect, they get to keep the  animal. If it is NOT what they are seeking, hide the animal back behind  that word card. Play passes to the next team. When a  team successfully finds one of their animal cards both the  word and the animal cards are removed from the pocket chart. Continue taking turns reading words and revealing the hidden animals. The  game ends when the student or team has collected all 4 of their animal cards.

This February Word Hunt comes with EDITABLE cards so ANY words can be. used! Your students will LOVE playing this game over and over again! After several times playing this it can easily become a learning center run by an adult volunteer!

February Readers

One can never have enough “just right” leveled books and these NO Prep Readers cover February subjects including Groundhog’s Day, Presidents’ Day and Valentine’s Day. They also come with an Interactive printable to extend the reading. Print, fold and go! They are super easy to use!

Free Singable- Chocolate, Chocolate

Here’s a FREE song that celebrates all things chocolate! There is a colorful chart, take-home chart, writing booklet and pocket chart cards. Click CHOCOLATE! CHOCOLATE! to download this free song at our JK Singable store.

January is FINALLY over and February fun awaits with holidays and celebrations! It just seems to fly by! Enjoy this fun month!

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Add some Fun Songs to your classroom this Halloween

When I think of Halloween songs the only ones that come to mind are The Monster Mash and Michael Jackson’s Thriller! While neither of those are easily sung by Kindergartners or 1st graders (and we love to sing with our students!) we came up with some songs that are truly singable and kids love! Music is great for creating connection and especially helps develop language fluency. I can still sing Sur La Pont D’Avignon that I learned in French class in the 7th grade and we all seem to know the words to Frere Jacques or La Cucaracha!! Are you ready to add some fun singable songs to your Halloween celebration? Here goes!

Our first song is called Halloween Friends Go This Way and That! It is sung to the tune Did You Ever See a Lassie? If you are not familiar with that tune, no problem! All our songs come with a “mini-movie” that shows the pages of the book turning while we sing the songs! This gets the print in front of the students so they see the words while singing the song! A nice added bonus we think! This product also comes with math manipulatives and mats and some story problems. Your student can create the problems to solve on the mats or generate problems of their own and record them on the recording sheet. Writing is inspired with the included writing papers (in color & b/w) as well as a Vocabulary Word chart to spark some ideas! Click HERE for Halloween Friends!

Ten Days of Halloween is a great song that is sung like “The 12 Days of Christmas”! This fun song comes with stick puppets and ACTIONS that will have your whole class engaged in singing this song! Your students can perform for their classmates or invite parents in for a mini-concert of songs and poems! Also Included is a path game with High frequency word cards and EDITABLE cards so any words can be added. Click HERE for this song packet.

Another song with goodies! Five Trick or Treaters!

Going trick or treating is such fun and this song celebrates that event! Five Trick or Treaters comes with a mini-movie and stick puppets for performing the song. A Path game uses “R” blend words and comes with EDITABLE cards so ANY words can be added. There are also Sorting Mats for “R” blend words and a few worksheets for practicing these words. Click HERE to see this one!

Halloween Night!

The last of our featured singables is this one called Halloween Night. This is easily sung to the tune The Ants Go Marching. There is a BIG BUILDUP to its surprise ending! Your students will LOVE performing this for their own classmates or entertaining another class just to see the surprised looks on their faces when they get to the last page! Included are 3 BUMP Math games that are great for practicing addition skills. They come with EDITABLE mats so other numbers can be programed in and harder skills can be practiced. Complete directions are included in case you’ve never played BUMP games with your class. Students LOVE “bumping” the other players off their numbers while practicing their math skills….all in good fun, of course! Click HERE to get this fun surprise ending song!

Here’s a FREEBIE Song to add to your repertoire!

Look Who’s Here is sung to the tune The Itsy Bitsy Spider. Besides the Shared Reading book and mini-movie, there are some reading worksheets that practice High Frequency words here, is, & a, words used in the song. Some cute writing paper and and a class book cover or bulletin board sign round out this packet. Click HERE to get this FREEBIE at our TPT store.

The post Halloween Songs for Kindergarten & First Grade appeared first on JK Curriculum Connection.

History of Scarecrows

Scarecrows have been around since ancient Greek times! Their version of a scarecrow was a wooden frame covered with nets to protect their huge wheat fields that grew along the Nile River. Farmers would hide among the wheat in hopes of catching the quails that were feasting in their fields. About 2500 B.C, Greek farmers carved wooden poles into the image of one of their many gods who they thought would scare birds away and protect their vineyards. Scarecrow images evolved over time until farmers in the Middle Ages started using old clothing and stuffed shirts and pants into something that resembled a man. Birds figured it was a real person so they stayed out of the fields. BUT, the trick is to move the scarecrow every few days or the birds will soon figure out it’s not a real person and they won’t be scared any longer! Nowadays many farmers use sparkly strips of colored ribbon that blow in the wind and reflect sunlight to deter birds from eating their crops.

Scarecrows have become a Symbol of Fall

Somewhere along the line scarecrows became associated with fall and the harvest. Decorations fill homes and stores and there are often Scarecrow making contests held all over. Scarecrows can be menacing or even pretty cute! The birds don’t know the difference! We love to incorporate scarecrows as one of our classroom learning themes and have created several products based on this symbol of fall.

How about a Song about Scarecrows?

My Colorful Scarecrow uses color words in the song so it fits right in at the beginning of the school year. It is sung to the tune “The Itsy, Bitsy Spider” and comes with a mini-movie that has the pages of the book turning as we sing the lyrics. Show this on a big screen and your students will be happily singing along in no time! Lots of “colorful” activities are included in this packet. View the song right now! Click MY COLORFUL SCARECROW to find it at our TPT store.

A Trip to the Pumpkin Patch

You may be lucky enough to have a Pumpkin Patch close enough to take a field trip to and pick up those cute child-sized pumpkins! If you can’t get to one you can take a “virtual” trip with this fun product. It has a song, easily sung to the tune Here We Go “Round the Mulberry Bush. If you can’t sing it comes with a mini-movie where the pages of the book turn while we sing the lyrics. Show it on a big screen and your students will see the lyrics as they sing along. It is another exposure to print! Click PUMPKIN PATCH to link to it.

How about about some Math practice with 10-frames?

Ten-frames are very useful tools for students developing number sense and place value. Ten-frames provide a strong visual representation of number and how numbers work and relate to each other. This packet provides colorful ten-frames using acorns, pumpkins, and leaves with mats, number cards, recording sheets and much more. There are 3 BUMP games that are so much fun to play. EDITABLE versions are included so you can change the numbers to meet the learning levels of your students. Full instructions explain how to play this popular skill-building game. Click 10-FRAMES to see it at our store.

Here’s a FREEBIE

Our No Prep Readers are popular with Kindergarten teachers. Simply print, fold, and your students will be reading these one-page practice readers. This Scarecrow reader is part of a bigger set of 10 readers. Click SCARECROW FREEBIE and Set of 10 READERS to see these beginning readers perfect for fall.

The post Scarecrows – A Great Learning Theme for Fall appeared first on JK Curriculum Connection.

Yo, ho, ho and a classroom of fun! Pirates make a great theme for any time of the school year but did you know that September 19^th is “International Talk Like a Pirate Day? Way back in 1995, John Baur and Mark Summers of Albany, Oregon, came up with this “holiday”. During a raquetball game, one of them twisted an ankle and, in pain, said, “Aaarrr!” The rest of the game they talked like pirates. After eliciting the help of syndicated humor columnist, Dave Barry, in 2002, the “cannon” ball got rolling and the rest is history! “Talk Like a Pirate Day” has become an International “holiday” (although I’m pretty sure the banks don’t close for this one!). Have some fun and use our resources shown below with some common phrases to get you started “talking like a pirate” in your classroom!  Refer to the children as “mateys” or “scurvy dogs” (if they’re being naughty) and call out “AVAST, me hearties” when you want them to pay attention to something!  

Need Some Pirate Beginning Readers?

Your students will enjoy developing their early reading skills by engaging with these fun Pirate-themed NO PREP readers. Each of the 10 readers is a 1-page foldable and comes with an extension printable to extend the learning. The illustrations clearly support the simple patterned text. Just Fold and Go! With 10 different books from which to choose you will have a great variety of reading experiences. Click HERE to see these at our TPT store.

Need More Readers?

As students advance in their reading skills, they will find this set of PIRATE Beginning Readers enjoyable. The books come with several supportive printables for each book such as “Build a Sentence”, Vocabulary Charts, “Interactive printables, etc. There are 5 book “topics” written at 2 different text levels to equal 10 books. These books were purposely written with a variety of High Frequency words so your students will get repeated practice with these words. Again, the illustrations clearly support the text so the non-High Frequency words such as treasure, pirate and chest can be easily read. Click HERE to find these Readers.

Need a Pirate Song (with some Readers too)?

If you want to enjoy teaching with a Pirate theme for more than just one day we have a great song called Pirates, Pirates. This song is easily sung to “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star.” It comes with a colorfully illustrated book and a mini-movie that shows the pages of the book turning as we sing the lyrics. Show this on a big screen and your students will be singing along in no time! There are additional Beginning Readers included, interactive printables, a path game, a craftivity, themed writing papers and charts on how to “talk like a pirate”! Click here for Pirates, Pirates!

Here’s a Freebie of Beginning Readers!

Download this free set of Beginning Readers to see an example of our work. There are 3 versions of this book (colored, black and white, and Interactive black and white) and 2 additional interactive printables that practice short vowel words. Click HERE to download this exclusively from our website. There is also a download button at the bottom of this blog post.

Other Pirate Themed Products

We LOVE using Pirates as a theme in our classroom so we have created a LOT of products. Here are just a few of our favorites. Whhaaaattt??? we love them all! Click this link to see ALL our Pirate products at our TPT store! Note: The “1-2, Yo, Ho, A Pirate Crew” has several pages on how to Talk like a Pirate”! Sooooo fun!

The post PIRATE Beginning Readers appeared first on JK Curriculum Connection.

Camping in the classroom is sooooo much fun! Well, you don’t really sleep over at night, you know! Having a camping theme, either at the end of the school year to spark some enthusiasm for learning, or using camping as a Summer School theme is great fun! I used this theme for several years while teaching summer school. I called it Camp Learn-A-Lot but other names can be created. Maybe Camp Read-a Lot or Camp Learning Fun might work for you. Put out a small pup tent to use as a reading nook in the corner of the room to set the scene. There are lots of websites such as Oriental Trading Company that have decorations, stickers, pencils, etc. to add to your classroom camping theme.

Activities to Do

Just like real summer camp you can start every morning with a camp routine like saluting the flag and singing a camp song. “Going on a Bear Hunt”, “Five Little Speckled Frogs” or “The Campfire Song” sung by SpongeBob Squarepants are good ones. You’ll find lots more by easily searching the Internet and YouTube! There are oodles of craft ideas and activities on Pinterest to help extend your classroom camping experience!

“A-Camping We Will Go” Song and related Resources

We love to sing with our students and so have created several camping songs with loads of related literacy resources. One of our favorite products is the song “A-Camping We Will Go”. It is easily sung to the tune “A-Hunting We Will Go”. Don’t know that song? Well, we’ve included a mini-movie with us singing the lyrics as the pages of the book turn! Easy peasy! A Beginning Reader, Themed writing papers, Resource photographs, picture word cards, and Vocabulary charts are also included. Grab it by clicking HERE! We have several more songs like
“Did You Ever Go A-Camping?” and “Five Happy Campers”. They also come with loads of reading. writing and math activities and printables. Save some money by purchasing a BUNDLE of camping products HERE!

Beginning Readers with a Camping Theme

One can NEVER have too many “just right” levels of books for students to engage with text. Here are some Beginning Readers with 2 different levels of text difficulty. These too come with interactive printables that extend the learning. Click HERE to find these.

More Easy Readers

Need some easy readers for students just learning to lift that print? These Easy, No Prep Readers were created just for them. Print, Fold and Read! There are 10 different books so you will have plenty to work into your camping theme! There are also some interactive printables that go aiong with the books. Grab these HERE.

And……What is Camping without S’mores?

One great way to end your classroom camping experience is to celebrate with s’mores. These can easily be made in a microwave. Just place the bottom graham cracker on a plate, top it with a square of chocolate, and add a large marshmallow. Pop it into the microwave for 12-15 seconds. When you pull it out, place the top graham cracker on top and squish it down! You can only make 1-2 s’mores at a time but with about 3 a minute you can make quite a few in just a short time. Provide LOTS of napkins because these treats are MESSY! But they are SOOOOOOO good and really, what is camping without s’mores? Grab this Math 10-Frame Freebie that is s’more themed!

Another FREEBIE! Starry Starry Night High Frequency Words

Create a “night sky under the stars” with High Frequency word STARS by printing ANY words your students need to learn! Add the words you’d like on the EDITABLE stars, print them on yellow paper, cut them out, and staple them to your classroom ceiling! Turn out the lights and lay on the floor. Now shine a flashlight on each of the words as the students call out the words! This is so much fun! I left my words up for the next school year and students were always looking up at them and trying to read them! Click HERE to get this Free product.

Now who’s ready to go to camp? Me! Me! Me! Give this a try for the remaining days of any school year or during Summer School! You won’t be sorry!

The post Camping in the Classroom appeared first on JK Curriculum Connection.

Young children begin the path to literacy long before they are able to  “read” or “lift print” on their own. Before conventional reading and writing  skills emerge, Emergent Readers demonstrate their knowledge of the alphabet, gain a sense of what words are, and a develop the concept that stories have  beginnings, middles, and ends. They also hone their listening and  retelling skills and phonemic awareness (the ability to hear and manipulate sounds in words). It’s a complex process but with the right tools Emergent readers’ vocabulary  and language expression will grow rapidly.

Lots of Books at just the Right levels!

Beginning Readers progress at different rates. What does that then mean for teachers? It means they need a LOT of books at just the right levels for their students to read.  These specially written books are usually not available at a library or  bookstore. Occasionally a book club like Scholastic Books will offer a set that  are at the right level but there is still a real need for more and more titles.

We experienced that need in our own K and 1st grade classrooms….JUST NOT  ENOUGH BOOKS at the right levels! So….we set about writing our own! These books use High Frequency Words with natural language that are clearly supported by the illustrations. Wider spacing between words aids students as they successfully  “finger match” on the words as they read. Some of our readers for the very beginning students have “dots” under each word where the student can touch as they read. Two of these sets with the supportive “dots” are shown below.

Fiction Beginning Readers

We started out by writing fiction sets of readers. They use cute graphics and clipart to illustrate the simple text. Most of the text is based on predictable patterned sentences focusing on High Frequency words. Two of our popular sets are these Dinosaur Readers.

There is a Set 1 and a Set 2.

Non-fiction Beginning Reader Sets

While we wrote several sets of fiction we wrote even more Non-fiction! We found that our students really gravitated to the Non-fiction books. Themes used in class like School, Farm Animals, Bats, Pirates, Penguins, Spiders, and Insects inspired us to write sets on these topics. Our Non-fiction Beginning Reader Sets come with a colored version that has  actual photographs of penguins, bats, farm animals, insects, etc. Students LOVE  studying the details in these photographs. Being conscious of the fact that  teachers often (er, ALWAYS) have to print their own COLORED copies of  things, we made BLACK & WHITE books with the same text but illustrated with realistic clipart. That way a teacher can print them on a school machine and every student can go home with their own copy. They love coloring the clipart and reading the books over and over again. Hey, that’s exactly what  we want them to do…read and reread to develop fluency and see those High Frequency Words over and over and over again..and learn them! These Readers are great additions to your Guided Reading  groups! We found they worked very well for our students.

Here is a picture of just a few of the Non-fiction sets we have written so far.

Click on a word to find each of these sets at our TPT store. BATS SPIDERS FARM

Here’s what one happy repeat customer said about our Readers, “I love ALL your sets for Kinders. I am excited to use these in class!”

Free Reading Book and Resource Pages

Want to “try out” one of our readers? This will give you an example of what comes with each reader. Click {HERE} to find a FREEBIE Reader at our TPT store. Click HERE to grab the COMPLETE Set of Farm Readers!

We hope you find these resources just what you need to give your students plenty of experiences with “just the right” level of texts.

The post Beginning Readers for Kindergartners and 1st Grade appeared first on JK Curriculum Connection.