Sunday, August 28, 2011

Early Math Freebie

 Why am I sitting on my couch this beautiful Sunday morning instead of sitting in church with my hubby? I'm not feeling my best this morning. You see, I am training for a 5k race using the Couch to 5k Running Program. This program is supposed to get you off your couch and running a 5k in 9 weeks; I'm in week six. The program starts with interval training (alternating running and walking.)

Thursday morning it had me running 8 minutes without stopping, but Saturday it jumps to 2 miles or 20 minutes! I was a little nervous as I have never even run a mile without stopping (even when I was in high school sports.) Surprisingly I ran for a solid 20 minutes without keeling over, however that turned out to be only 1.8 miles. I was a little disappointed that I didn't complete the full 2 miles, so I decided to try again this morning. BIG MISTAKE. The program states not to run outside of the training schedule, but of course I knew better. (My body, however, did not.)  I got dizzy and light headed. I just felt week all over. I came home, and instead of getting ready for church I plopped down on the couch and started blogging.

So I made this apple seed numeral match game that is appropriate for kindergarten or some of your lower firsties. Feel free to use it if you can.

 

Thursday, August 18, 2011

Freebie Friday (I Mean Thursday)

School started a week and a half ago. I have sorely neglected my Blogroll, but I have sincerely enjoyed being back at school. I have the most delightful class this year. I didn't realize what a rowdy bunch I have had for the last two years, so even though my class is MUCH larger than usual it still seems calmer. Last year at this time I had 10 first and second grade students for my reading and language arts block.  By the end of the year I had 12. Right now I have 17 (which is sure to be 20 by the end of the year as more kiddos qualify for special education.)

Despite my class size,  I am loving my group. I keep telling them that I have a secret: I have the best class in the whole school, which they of course think is great. I also have a hilarious new student. He is very low, but super sweet. You are sure to here many funny things that he says throughout the year.  The other day I asked him what month it was. He told me Monday. When I reminded him that Monday was a day of the week he said, "Ah, man! I missed it again. My mom's gonna fire me!" I lost it.

I hope that your first days of school have been as enjoyable as mine. So here is a little back to school gift from me to you. By request, it's a short vowel word sort. I did include a recording sheet for the kiddos. I hope you like it.

 

Tuesday, August 16, 2011

Special Education Teachers Only Need Reply (sorry gen-ed)



Data collection is a very important part of my job. My school has six six-week long grading periods, and I am required to send progress monitoring data home to parents each grading period. With IEP goals individualized, I am struggling to collect data on my students in a way that does not eat up valuable instructional time.  Does anyone out there have a  method of data collection that works particularly well for you?

Tuesday, August 2, 2011

Back to School Letter Sort Freebie

Are you guys squeezing out your last bit of summer fun, or are you hard at work preparing for the upcoming year? I must confess that I have hardly been in my classroom at all, and I go back to school on Monday! Yes, that's right peeps! Monday! The first two days are professional development, and since I am a resource teacher I won't have students until Thursday.

As much as I love teaching, I am seriously in back to school denial. To help get me in gear I made a little back to school freebie for ya! It's a capital-lower case letter sort. So go heat up that laminator.