Five for Fraturday!

Good Morning, Bits and Bobbers! Kerri here…

Once again I am linking up with Kacey for her Five for Friday link party. Of course, I couldn't get my rear in gear to get this done last night, so I am late to the party AGAIN. Oh well, at least I made it!!

This week we made Snowflake Art and wrote a snowflake poem together. It was super fun! We also got .00001 inches of rainy drizzle (the closest we will ever gets to actual snow and it's not even remotely close at all!) on Thursday, which made my kids turn into Looney Tunes since they haven't seen a drop of rain since December 20th, NO LIE.  

They came back from lunch screaming and running around like wild banshees, not to mention they tracked about a pound of dirt and grass into the classroom from their feet. Seriously? We desperately need some rain so my kidlets can actually get used to it!!

The sweet people at Teacher Created Resources were kind enough to send me some classroom decor in their new line that is Chevron themed! OHEMGEEE!! Chevron! I am sooooo in love with Chevron!!

I had so much fun using these classroom decorations in my classroom. Check it out…

These Chevron Welcome letters are perfectly perfect on my Tacky the Penguin bulletin board!

I re-labelled all of the bins in my classroom library so they are finally all matchy matchy, thanks to the cute chevron labels that came with the Welcome bulletin board set!!

These name tags fit perfectly onto my drawers that house all of my units and centers for each month! I love the black and turquoise together!! 

I am still deciding where to put up this border….Hmmmm..

If you are interested in winning at $150 gift card to Teacher Created Resources, click the link to enter their Chevron Classroom Pinterest Giveaway! $150 can buy ALOT of CHEVRON for your classroom!!

It was Kindness week at my school this week! In addition to completing all of the activities in this Kindness pack that I created…

Our entire school got to do some pretty awesome acts of Kindness throughout the week. Check them out…
We all made Kindness quilts and hung them up on the fence so the kids could read them all...

Our students wrote letters for kids in the hospital during recess and lunch…

Our students also raised $250 dollars by selling lemonade for the Mckenna Claire Foundation, which supports Pediatric Brain Cancer research…

The kids made over 350 rainbow loom bracelets to give to children in need during their recess. They even brought their own loom kits to school to do it!

All of our students also worked hard to complete their Great Kindness Challenge checklists, by performing random acts of Kindness around the school…

My class wrote kindness stories about our favorite TOSA in the whole world, Mr. T, and presented them to him as a book. They were so proud!!

Overall,  it was a wonderful week and I think the kids really tried to embrace Kindness! 

We are working very hard in class on writing a proper paragraph. The kids call it their hamburger story. I introduce them to this chart…

This thing is so old and ratty! But it is a great visual...

Then, I use markers to turn my modeled writing into a "hamburger story" (Don't judge my printing/writing. This was done spur of the moment and it is NOT pretty!!)…

Then, they used this model to write their January writing samples, and they were all successful in remembering to write an opening sentence, 3 juicy details, and a closing sentence! YAY!! 

We will now work on expanding our details and making them even more juicy.

So, Lindsay and I are REALLY and TRULY presenting at the Southern California Kindergarten Conference in less than a month! WHAT THE WHAT????

We decided that since this is OFFICIALLY happening, we needed our very own FANCY SCHMANCY business cards…

Aren't they gorgeous???

We are also having a GINORMOUS Blogger's Bash on Friday February 28th, which anyone can attend, even if you aren't signed up for the conference…

We're all making baskets to give away, and everyone who signs up to come with get a goodie bag filled with fun stuff, including a CD with a bunch of our products on it!! We hope a bunch of you will sign up to come! Click on the picture above to get all the details and sign up!!

Have a happy Saturday, Friends!!
XOXO Kerri B

WInter Words Photos, TPT SALE, and some Writing FREEBIES!!

Hi Peeps!! Happy Saturday! Kerri here...
Geaux Saints! I just had to say it. Actually, I am NOT a football girl, but my husband's whole family is from New Orleans and he was born there, so by marriage I am a Saints fan, I guess. He and his dad are busily watching the game as I write this! Too many turnovers, Saints!! (WOW! I just impressed myself with my football lingo! HA!)


I finally got around to taking pictures of my kids doing their Winter Words Writing Books, which they do every Friday as a Lit Center. We are working superdy hard on being more descriptive when we write, and I am quite proud of how their writing is coming along, AND they really SUPER love this center! Check out their work...

You can pick yours up by clicking on the picture below, and what the HEY, why don't we just say that I am throwing a MLK, Jr. Weekend SALE!! Everything on sale until Tuesday!!...

You can also get this little number...

AND this one...

I also have some writing paper FREEBIES for you! Snowman, Penguin, and Martin Luther King, Jr. themed. We will be making our Martin Art project this week, and also copying this song/poem onto the writing paper in our "very best printing!" to go with it. Our music teacher teaches the kids a really sweet song called "Sing About Martin" (have you heard it?) and we are going to use these words as our poem:

Sing about Martin,

Sing about caring,

Sing about peace,

All around the world.

Sing about Martin,

Sing about loving,

Sing about peace,

All around the world.

Click on the pictures below to download your writing papers...

Enjoy your 3 day weekend!! I know I'm gonna, fo' shizzle!!

Winter Writing Freebie!

Happy New Years, Ladies and Gents!! Kerri here...
I hope you all had a wonderful New Years Eve and New Years Day!! I have to go back to work tomorrow, so my New Years Day has been filled with Target shopping, laundry, newsletter writing, etc. Not exactly relaxing, but it will be good to be back in the swing of things again.  We had SOOO much fun last night watching football and some motorcycle jumping thing (the boys) and playing Pictionary and Taboo (the girls!) At midnight, we went outside and it was wicked foggy, which was weird and wacky.  All the kids lit sparklers and ran around like maniacs! See exhibit A...

And Exhibit B...

I hope the neighbors weren't TOO annoyed with all our shenanigans!! All in all, it was fantabulous and I cannot believe it is 2012 already!!


I have a little FREEBIE for your Lit Centers! My firsties will be working on writing Super (who, what, when, where, and maybe even why) Sentences when we go back tomorrow (is it really tomorrow?? I think I'm in denial still!!), so I created this little chart for them to use to get their Super Sentence brains working....

They choose one word from each column to create an excellent, fabulous, maybe even a little silly, SUPER SENTENCE!! I also created this little diddy so they could make their own little book of super sentences...

BTW, I am LOVING this font called "Fontdinerdotcom Sparkly" from www.dafont.com! It is so much fun! 
Anyway, back to the center directions. I plan on having my kids use the chart, choose a word from each column to write  SUPER sentences in their little books, and then illustrate their sentences. Easy Peasy lemon squeezy!! If you click on both pictures above, you can get your very own copy of the chart, AND the cover + writing paper for the book! TADA!! Instant writing center!!
For those of you who get to sleep in and watch the Rose Parade/Rose Bowl game tomorrow, well PIN A ROSE ON YOUR NOSES! :)
Just kidding...enjoy every last second of your break!! I will try not to be TOO jealous!

Getting Ready for Santa

Hey there folks!  Lindsay here . . .

I have been TERRIBLE at keeping up with the blog these past few weeks.  Here's a recap of my life in November: I cried and cried about leaving Jack and going back to school (can you say GUILT?), I met my sweet students and got so excited to be back teaching again, and then had my first whole week back at school last week . . . and I. Am. Exhausted.  Between those middle-of-the-night feedings, waking up at 4:45 to start my day, and jumping back into the crazy kinder routine, I am one tired teacher momma!!  It really is great to be back though, and I have a super sweet class this year. 

I really can't believe that it is already December already and that Christmas is right around the corner . . . For those of you who haven't yet, you MUST check out Kerri's Magic Elf unit on TPT . . . I started it with my class last week and  it was the cutest thing!  Here is a picture of our elf, Winkle, on Day #1:

After we read Winkle's Day 1 introduction, we had a great discussion on what the "true meaning of Christmas" means.  And one of my kiddos reminded the class ALL DAY to keep their voices down so they wouldn't scare "TWinkle". Love it!

As we have been getting ready for the holidays in my class, I decided to have my students write their Christmas lists for Santa.  Although some of them are still working on mastering their letters and sounds at this point of the year, many of my kiddos are really taking off in their writing, and spelling phonetically with confidence and delight!  (Isn't teaching Kinder the best when it all starts to click and they just take off and write, write, write?!)  Using the template below, my students wrote the three things they wanted to ask Santa for, and drew a picture to go along with each one . . . ya know, to help Santa make sure to get the right thing!  I love Erica's third wish from Santa - a pretty flower.  How sweet, right?

(click below for link to worksheet)

To go along with our letters to Santa, here are our sweet Santas that we made in art. .  The kids did great, even in spite of the fire drill that we had right in the middle of the lesson . . . grrrr!

And (drumroll please), here are our Santas and letters across our room!  The kids are so proud of their great work! 

Hope you are enjoying these last few weeks of fun with your kiddos before the holidays.  Don't forget to get your Magic Elf packet this weekend if you haven't already - its not too late!!!

Okay, okay . . . and just had to share this cuteness with all of you.  Here is Jack at three monthes - all ready for the holidays! (Proud mommy, can't you tell?!)

Signing off for now!

Lindsay