Publishing Party!!

So after using the template in my last post to create some amazing picture books,

my first graders and I celebrated this accomplishment with a "Publishing Party."  When our kids went to lunch and recess, my colleague and I decorated our rooms with streamers!  This first publishing party was a surprise.

 Then on each child's desk, we put their finished narrative writing, a medal with their name on it (made of paper, template below), and a slip of paper for other children to leave comments about their writing!  Click on this picture to download the medals and comment sheet for yourself!

When the kids came in they were excited, surprised, and confused!  We sat all the first graders down and told them the procedures for the publishing party!  The directions were to take their narrative story, their comment sheet, and a pencil, and they could walk around and "hand up pair up" with as many other children as possible to share their narrative and get comments!  My colleague and I participated of course, and I got to hear each child's story and leave a comment.  We also had other teachers come in.  Overall, it was a huge success!  The kids were engaged in their learning and reading for about 45 minutes!  Wowowow!  We loved it, and we will definitely be doing this again next quarter!

Vintage Teacher Guest Author!

Hey everyone!  Pam at Vintage Teacher has made me a guest author on her blog!  If you are not a follower of Vintage Teacher, click the link and follow her because she has some excellent ideas!  Also check out my Writer's Workshop picture book idea she posted.  My kids did this last week, and they created some AMAZING picture books by just doing one page a day!  We stapled them together at the end for a publishing party.  I will have the publishing party downloads available later this week!  The template download for the picture book is below here as well as on Pam's blog:

PublishedPictureBookTemplate

More Fall Addition Fun!

What a crazy week!  I have 3 days left until parent teacher conferences and some fall break!  Working year round does have its perks :-)  With the mad rush to the end, I was trying to find something quick to post!  My kids always need more practice with missing addends and counting backwards, so I combined these skills into one practice page! Click and enjoy.

>>Images provided by Scrappin' Doodles<<

Apple Picking Addition

My firsties have been working so hard on their addition facts, and we can't get enough addition games!  My colleague and I have found so many wonderful addition games in the blog world, and I am going to contribute one now!  Below is the game "Who Can Pick the Most Apples".  It is a card game that is played like war.  The directions are in the download.  Just click on any picture below to download this game for yourself!

Scrappin Doodles

So I have been hesitant to post some things that I have created before really understanding and looking at the Scrappin Doodles new license policy!  I bought a license, which is now posted on my blog.  I also have to credit them and make sure that I do not post anything for free that is not in a locked pdf format.  Done and Done!  To celebrate my new license, here is a letter template using some cute little Scrappin Doodles artwork!  I read my students a "Berenstain Bears" camping book to build some background knowledge.  Then we wrote letters to our "eighth grade buddies" who were leaving to camp for three days on their outdoor education trip.  Whatever you decide to do with this letter template, enjoy!

*Artwork provided by Scrappin Doodles.

Pizza Box Portfolios

Hey everyone! I sure enjoyed my long Labor Day weekend. I did not post since I was definitely taking a break from all labor. Starting school in July gets rough right about now! I am loving my "Pizza Box Portfolios" that I use in my classroom. My colleague came up with this idea a couple of years ago, and I love it! Each child has a pizza box that is their portfolio for the year. I have them stacked with their name on a label on the front. I have a lesson where I show them the rubric below to help with what goes in their pizza box throughout the year. I saved about 4 items of their work, and then introduced the pizza boxes around the third week of school. They had to sort which projects they thought would go inside. Some of them didn't have any that were neat enough! This was a great lesson on what work should look like as well as on portfolios. Now, if they do a great job on something, they can walk over to their pizza box and stick it in there themselves!

Each child keeps this rubric in their pizza box all year as a reminder!