Halloween Party Fun with Oriental Trading

I don't know about you, but I love to celebrate Halloween.  I think it is just the fun of dressing up and being silly that makes this holiday near and dear to my heart.  I always like to try to do something fun with my class each year for Halloween.

Lucky for me, Oriental Trading had everything I needed AND MORE!

I decided to do a party with a game rotation this year.  Basically, my students are going to be in groups and rotate through 5 games/activities.

The first game they will get to play is Fall Bowling with these adorable candy corn bowling pins.  I mean seriously.....how cute are these??

The next stop will be a photo booth because who wouldn't want to have some fun taking some silly pictures?  I chose to get the Halloween Photo Stick Props.  We had some fun with the props as you can tell!

After taking pictures, my students will get to try to hit a bullseye on the Ghost Dartboard set.  This is great for little ones because it's velcro and they just throw the balls.  Nothing dangerous on it like darts just soft balls that won't break or hurt anyone or anything if someone's aim is off.  Perfect for a classroom party!

Their next stop will be Pin the Nose on the Pumpkin.  These game even comes with a blindfold.  It will be perfect for my students.  They will each take a turn trying to pin the nose.  I have a feeling that there will be lots of laughs at this station.

Last stop of the party will be the Halloween Spoon Game.  My students love a fun racing game and this will be a hit!

At the end of the party, I like to give my students a little goody bag.  Since I know they will be getting more than enough candy when they go trick-or-treating I like to give them something non-food.  I was so excited to see so many options from Oriental Trading.  I got my students Pumpkin & Ghost Glow Necklaces, Mini Halloween Icon Prisms, and Mini Jack O'Lantern Bubble Bottles.  There were so many other items I could have picked out too.

If you are looking for some fun items for your classroom for a fall party, check out all the fun things Oriental Trading has here.  And GUESS WHAT???  They also have costumes!  If we dressed up at our school, I would have totally been a Pink Lady because Grease is one of my favorite movies ever!  Check out their amazing selection of costumes here!

Looking for a deal at Oriental Trading?  Check out their coupon page for the latest sales!

How do you celebrate fall and/or Halloween in your classroom?  I would love to hear about it in the comments!

*Disclaimer:  I was sent products of my choice in exchange for writing this post, but all opinions expressed are 100% my own!

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Pumpkin Fun!

This week has been all about pumpkins in my room.  It is the first theme of the year that we have "gotten into" if you know what I mean.

Today was the big day.

You know the one.  Where you bring in an actual real live pumpkin.

I brought in a small assortment of pumpkins.

My students were shocked with the pumpkins that were colors other than orange.  It was one thing to see it in a book, but to see it in real life is a whole different ballgame.

We used the orange pumpkin to do some investigations.  First we knocked on the pumpkin to hear what it sounded like.

Then they felt the pumpkin to see what it felt like.  {It was so fun to hear them use vocabulary like rind and ribs as they felt the pumpkin!}

We cut the top off so we could peek inside.  I always love how excited they get when they see this.

Of course, we had to get our hands in there and see what the inside felt like.

As they were feeling the inside, I also gave them the task of pulling out some of the seeds.  I plan on roasting them this weekend, but wanted some help getting them all out.  My kiddos were more than happy to help!

Once we finished investigating the pumpkin, we went and drew a picture of a pumpkin in our science notebooks.  We also labeled our illustration.

We are just starting our math centers this week.  I know some people have been doing math centers for a long time, but my kiddos just weren't quite ready for them yet.  This has been a fun and easy center to introduce math centers.

Students worked in pairs.  One student pulled a pumpkin number card out of the bag.  The other student used manipulatives (Halloween erasers from Target $ Spot) to show that number on the ten frame.  Simple, easy, and very little prep.

Once the student made that number with the manipulatives, the other student had to check their work.  Then the partners switched roles.

I have to share my proud teacher moment.  The little guy in this picture below is extremely low and has made little progress thus far this year.  Today, he counted three little bat erasers.  This was a major victory for him and you better believe I showered praise all over that sweet kiddo.  Makes it all worth it right there.

We are having a fall break this year which completely threw off my units that I normally teach.  I couldn't decide if I should do bats or spiders next week.  Instead I let my kiddos decide.  I gave them a little voting card.  They circled their choice, we tallied the results, and bats won!  They were so excited to have a choice in what they are learning.  I plan on doing this more often throughout the year as a result.

Do you give your students a choice in what units of study you do?  If so, how do you let them decide?  I would love to hear your thoughts.

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Number Sense Game {freebie included}

Last week was all about learning our numbers in math.  This week I wanted to focus on number sense....more specifically 1:1 correspondence and counting objects.

I decided that we needed some hands-on engaging activities to practice these concepts.  My kiddos were absolutely loving dice so I came up with a game for them to play using dice and teddy bear counters {although you could really use any object you wanted to}.

Students were paired up.  One student had a die and the other student had a bag of teddy bear counters.

Step 1:  Student A rolled the die.

Step 2:  Students count the dots on the die to know what number they will be working with.

Step 3:  Student B gets out that number of objects.

Step 4:  Student A counts the teddy bears to check Student B's work.

Step 5:  Student A praises or coaches Student B.  {We practiced a lot with this ahead of time.  What do we say when our partner gets the answer correct?  How can we coach our partner to get the correct answer?}

Step 6:  Student's switch jobs.  Now Student B will roll the dice.  Students will then go through all the steps again.

Once the students had played the game for a bit and I had a chance to go around to check on each group, I had my students complete a practice page so I could see what they could do independently.

On the practice page, I realized that my students did pretty well with counting, but struggled with writing the number to match the objects.  They could say the number, but writing it was a whole different struggle.  We will continue to work on that skill this week.

Tomorrow, we will do this activity again except we will be using some fall objects.....leaves!  When it is time to practice independently, my students will complete the worksheet below.  I am leaving it here as a freebie for all of you!  {Just click on the picture to download it!}

You will want to check back later this week because I have a fun surprise in the works.  I hit some personal milestones and I want to celebrate with YOU!

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Fall Math Centers

I can't believe that last Tuesday it was so hot that we had an early release day.  This Tuesday definitely feels like fall.  I had to wear a sweatshirt to my son's soccer practice tonight.  I am not going to complain though because fall is probably my favorite season.....football, warm apple cider, leaves changing colors.  I just love it!

This week we are focusing on the season of fall.  We started with our first schema chart.  The kiddos were a little off topic, but that's o.k.  (I really don't know what frogs had to do with fall, but we wrote it down anyways.....at least he was thinking!)

We started implementing Word Work into our literacy centers.  My little kinder babies did a great job with this new literacy center.

You can download this for free in TpT store by clicking on the image above.

I introduced one of the favorite math centers this week too....measurement with non-standard units.  This week it of course has a fall theme.  They did a great job!  It was definitely a proud mama moment.

I am very slowly introducing math centers, much the same as I am doing literacy centers.  The only difference is that students are "exploring" with different math manipulatives while I am working with one group at a time introducing the new center.  Most of the math centers I use throughout the year are the same just with different numbers or concepts.  This way it is easy for the students to get right to work on the center.

Here are some of my little sweeties exploring with their math manipulatives.  I love walking around and listening to what they are doing and saying.

If you are interested in my Fall Math Centers, click on the link below.

I will give away the math centers to one lucky follower.  All you have to do is follow my blog and TpT store.  Comment below with your email address.  If you "like" my Facebook page, you can earn an extra entry.  Post a separate comment with your email address for liking my fb page.  I will choose a winner Wednesday night before I head to bed.  :)

Congrats goes to Carrie H.  Thanks to all who entered!  Carrie, I will be emailing you shortly!  :)

Good luck and have a great week!!

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Reader Bundle Sets

Oh my goodness friends...I have been working on quite the project for a couple of weeks now.  I have bundled my emergent readers by season.  In the process, I also created a lot of new readers that for the time being will only be available in through the purchase of a bundle.  Here is what I came up with:  {You can click on any of the images to get a better look at the products}

This set contains 5 different emergent readers with simple text for back to school.  

This set contains 12 different fall themed emergent readers.

This set contains 12 different winter themed emergent readers.

This set contains 12 different spring themed emergent readers.

This set contains 5 summer themed emergent readers including an end of year memory book.

Then I also decided to bundle all my bundles together and you can purchase all of my readers in one large bundle.

This has been a labor of love for sure.  I LOVE using readers with my class and try to do a couple a week if possible.  The students later use these during literacy centers when they have to read to self or someone.  It's great because I know these books are familiar and easy to read.  They also get to read these books when they finish work early.

Leave a comment below with your email address and I will give away one of the season bundles to a lucky follower.

Hurry because I will be choosing someone tomorrow night!
Giveaway is over......Congrats goes to #13 Kindergarten Squared!

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