TpT Seller Challenge: Week 3

I am joining up with Sparkling in Second, Third in Hollywood, Teach Create Motivate, and Peppy Zesty Teacherista for the third challenge in the weekly TpT Seller Challenge.  This week's challenge is called "Make Your Masterpiece" and it asks us to create a 'masterpiece' to add to our store on Teachers Pay Teachers. 

 I was very excited (and overwhelmed) by this challenge.  I did not have any products that needed to be finished, which left me having to start from scratch.  I have had somewhat of a TpT writer's block lately.  After thinking long and hard I decided to create something that I could use next year as the Reading Teacher for K-2.  I know that short vowels are something that all of the grade levels will be working with - whether as a review or as a new skill.  So I created a few worksheets for each short vowel and came up with this:

Yay!  I feel like I may have taken the first step to overcoming this TpT writer's block issue that I have been dealing with.  I am so glad that this was one of the challenges because it forced me to create something that I will be able to use next year (because what is the point of putting all of that time and effort into a product if you can't use it in your own classroom!).  Now I am in the right mindset to continue creating materials and hopefully have a head start on what I will need for next year :)

So enough of my blabbering...here is a preview of the different pages within the set.

The activities are all the same for the five different short vowels.  

• One of the pages asks that students to sort pictures by different word families.  I love to try and incorporate cutting and pasting into as many of the worksheets as I can because these are skills that my students always seem to struggle with.

• Another page has the students use the code to color each picture based on the word family it belongs in.  (There are two versions of this page - one of the options asks the students to then write the word underneath the picture while the other does not).          *Only one of the options is shown in the preview

• On another page the students are asked to read the words and paste the matching picture in the box (There are also two versions of this page - on the first option the pictures are glued on top of the word and on the second option the pictures are glued above the word).
• The final page asks the students to sort pictures by the medial sound (does it have the short vowel sound or not?).

So there it is, my "masterpiece" :)  I hope that this will help you in your classroom.  Click on the preview (or this link) to grab it for 20% off - today and tomorrow only.

Interactive Short Vowel Books

Hip Hip Hooray!!!  I finished all of the interactive short vowel phonics books (finally!)  -  I missed my deadline of the end of October by one day, but at least I made it before we change the clocks back.  I can't wait to share these with you so that you can share them with your students.  So here is the big reveal ;)

There is a book for each short vowel (CVC) and they all have the same layout.  They are also in an easy to construct layout - you just copy, staple and cut.  There are two books to a page - the pictures in this post show a constructed book.  Each book has a cover page:

On the first page (although the pages can be put in any order) the students are asked to sort cards by the word families.  There are three options for this sort: all pictures, mixed pictures and words or all words.  In the picture below, I used the mixed pictures and words option:

Then, the students are asked to sort cards by whether they have the short vowel sound or not.  There are also three options for this sort: all pictures, mixed pictures and words or all words - as you can see, I am a fan of the mixed option (:

Thoughts so far?  My students loved these two pages because they were cutting and gluing right into their little book!
On the next page, the students are asked to draw a line matching the picture to the word.  I like this page because it shows that they can read the word and that they understand what that word is.

 

The next page is similar to the previous one...this time the students paste the matching word underneath each picture.

 This next page was my students favorite page.  One sweet student said that it was 'tricky for her brain'... I love first graders!  The students have to unscramble the letters to make a word, then they have to color the picture that matches the word that they just unscrambled.

Are you still with me?  I know it is a lot but this book can be completed over the course of a few days or all in one sitting...it's up to you!
On the next page, the students read each sentence and draw a line to the matching picture.  The students colored their pictures after they matched...but I was a little lazy in my sample (:

The next page is similar, this time the students read the sentence and add details to the picture so that it matches the sentence.  My students got a real kick out of my fan - I guess drawing is not my thing!

Phew!  There are still more --the next page is a simple page in which the students fill in the blank with a word to finish the sentence so that it matches the picture.

This next page is one of my favorites - my students can always use extra practice on rhyming words!  The students read the word in the top of the box and color the pictures that rhyme with that word.

We made it to the last page!!  This one really puts the students' understanding of the phonics skill to the test because they have to read a short passage and show understanding of the passage by coloring parts of the picture.

Voila!  And those are the pages in each interactive short vowel phonics books.  The answer keys are included at the end of the file.  My students absolutely loved this little book - especially since they were able to take it home when they were finished with it.  There are many different ways to use it in the classroom - I used it as a brief review of the skill at the beginning of my small groups.

I would love to hear your thoughts!!  Based on the response to these I have hopes of making interactive phonics books for blends and long vowels (CVCe).

Hooray!  Now I am going to sit back and cuddle up with some hot chocolate - I feel like this cold weather came out of nowhere!!  Click on the picture below if you would like to grab the file - it's on sale for this weekend only.

Have a great weekend (:

Five for Friday {Linky Party}

I am so excited to be linking up with Doodle Bugs Teaching for Five for Friday!  I always love reading these posts on everyone's blogs and now it is my turn to get in on the action.

So here it goes...

 We have been working so hard on informative writing in my classroom and the students have done such a great job!  

We started off by introducing informative writing using the are, can, have layout (the kids LOVE this).  Here is the organizer that we used - click on the picture to download a few different options of the organizer.

We spent a lot of time working on brainstorming.  When the students had that down, we moved on to adding details...which started off like pulling teeth slow.  It took a lot of modeling to help the students understand that the detail had to actually give more information about the sentence it was connected to.  After weeks of modeling and practicing we were finally ready to try it out on our pumpkin writing.  And I am thrilled to say that they did a great job!  Here are a few of the writings:

(I forgot to take a picture of the second page if their writing ran over!  Oops...)

I am so proud of them and how well they did on these!  I can't wait to see how their writing continues to improve throughout the year.

This one goes with the pumpkin writing.  A first grade writing wouldn't be complete without a craft!!

We used small orange paper squares and covered a paper plate to make it look like a pumpkin.  Then, I gave each student a small piece of brown and green paper and they made a stem and leaves.  I love how each one is unique!  It was amazing to watch how carefully they worked on these.  When I modeled it for them, I just glued the orange squares on the paper plate haphazardly...not the students!  They were so meticulous about it - it was cute to watch (:  I think it brightened up our little hallway.

This one is a random 'ah-ha' moment.  

My husband and I love to play games - board games, card games, word games - you name it and we play it.  One of our favorite games is Phase 10.

Something that we always struggled with was keeping track of what phase we were on.  Until now.  Enter the paperclip tracker.  Yep, it is as easy as that!  We put a paperclip on each card and now we can just slide it down to keep track of what phase we are on.  (By the way I won last night!)

I can't believe that it is almost Halloween!

I love decorating for holidays and we started putting up our Halloween decor this weekend.  Our neighbor had a Halloween party last weekend and she had spiderwebs on all of her picture frames.  I loved how it looked (and how easy it was) so I stole the idea for my own house.

We have only lived in our house for three years, so I do not have very many decorations, but it is fun to add a little bit every year (especially when I am able to save so much at the sales afterwards).

This is something new that I have been working on...and I can't wait to share it with you (and get some feedback)!

There are so many great interactive notebooks available.  I use them weekly and my kids love them!  I am even in the process of making some of my own.  But as much as I absolutely love interactive notebooks, sometimes I just need something quick and easy.  So I created a phonics booklet.  Each page is a quick activity that allows the students to work with the phonics skill.  The students could do one page each day or they could complete the booklet it one sitting.  

Here is what it looks like:

There are 10 pages for the students to complete.  Each page has a different activity that corresponds with the phonics skill.  Here are some close ups of a few of the pages:

Here are all of the pages that are included in the book.

I would love to hear your feedback!  My goal is to have all of the short vowel phonics booklets completed by the end of the month. 

There is a peek at all of the random things from the week - enjoy your Friday!

Phonics, Lesson Plans and Cleaning

It has been a busy few weeks of school and we are moving right along.  I thought I would catch you up on a few new things going on!

Phonics:
 One of my favorite things to teach in first grade is phonics.  I love teaching students new phonics skills and watching them apply those skills to their reading.  Right now we are working on CVC words and the students are doing such a great job!  I created a PowerPoint for each short vowel and have posted them to my TpT store here.  The students love these and the activities change so it is easy to stay engaged. 

For each PowerPoint the students are asked to do three things:

For the first few slides, they are given a word and they have to pick the picture that matches the word:

 I have the students write the letter of the matching picture on their whiteboards and we check our answer - on the PowerPoint, the letters change to red as we sound out the word together.

The next few slides give the students a picture and they have to pick a matching word:

  I have the students write the letter of the matching word on their whiteboards and we check our answer - on the PowerPoint, the letters change to red as we sound out each of the words together.

On the last few slides, the students are shown a picture and they have to pick the matching word family:

 I have the students write the letter of the matching word family on their whiteboards and we check together.

At this point I have been using the short vowel worksheets here as the corresponding sheet, but I am going to work on making one that corresponds with the PowerPoint!

You can click on the Preview below to take you to the link.

Lesson Plans:
Since I have started teaching I have always struggled with a lesson plan format that fits my needs.  I have changed my format every year since I started and I have not found anything that fits my needs until this year!!  I was "Pinteresting" lesson plan formats and I ran across the format that Ladybug's Teacher Files uses.  I loved them!  I had to make a few adjustments to make them fit my needs and here is what I came up with:

I love the layout and how easy it is to glance at exactly what I am doing for the day!  I think that I have finally found a lesson plan template that works for me.

Cleaning:
I always forget how hard it is to get back into a routine once school starts again!  I am always so exhausted from working that cleaning my house gets put on the back burner.  Then, when I finally can't take it anymore, I lose my entire weekend to cleaning.  So this year I decided to get more organized!  I created a cleaning schedule that my husband laminated for me (:  Each day there are two or three simple chores that need to be done.  Then, on the far left is a list of chores that only need to be done once a month - we do these when we have a few free minutes (haha!). 
The second page is a list of chores that needs to be done each month (these are chores that only need to be done once or twice a year). 
I absolutely love it!  I think one of my favorite things about it is that my husband knows exactly what needs to be done each day - that way the cleaning never gets left up to one person.

Here is what they look like:

The first page of chores for every month

The second page of chores that only need to be done in specific months.

Hopefully all of these things will help my school year run smoothly!