September Week 3 - Resource Round-Up
How have the first two weeks of September gone for you? Are you kiddos getting into a routine?
I truly feel like routine is more important than schedule.
Five and six year olds don’t really tell time, and they don’t understand elapsed time either.
But they do love to know what to expect when they wake up, when they start school, what will happen after morning work, etc.
Routines are very important for children. Schedules are helpful, but not nearly as important as sticking to your routines.
If you haven’t printed my free September lesson plans yet, you can grab them HERE
My goal is to have a new blog post each week to help you plan your lessons.
I love sharing teaching tips, ideas, resources, videos, songs, books and more!
For September, you can view Week 1 HERE and Week 2 HERE
I can’t believe it is already the third week in September!
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By now, my kiddos mostly have the rules and procedures down.
I still review and practice a few minutes each day. I continually thank, praise and focus on students who are modeling positive behavior and choices. This is the backbone of my management system and it works really well.
I gave a lot of detail on this in last week’s blog post.
If you are homeschooling, I have free schedule/routine charts HERE that you can print.
There are no times on the chart, so it is flexible and more of a guide for your day.
If you put it in a page protector or laminate, your child can color the stars as they complete each step.
Because I like to focus on positive choices, these behavior and social skill charts work so well!
Each student gets a chart, and when they can consistently model a desired behavior, they can color their star on a box.
Students are thrilled to watch their charts fill up, and then they also earn an award with their name.
This also provides motivation and encouragement for children to work hard to meet these goals. The see their charts.on the wall and it is such a helpful reminder for them to practice behaviors that I am looking for.
The entire kit with the awards and poster can purchased HERE
Calendar
The last few weeks I shared where to find my complete calendar kit.
We also love our favorite Dr. Jean songs and Jack Hartman videos.
Play this video every day a couple times a day and your kiddos will master their letters sounds within a couple weeks.
I believe calendar time should be short, sweet, interactive and fun with a few different mini lessons tied in.
Every 10 minutes or so, have them stand and sing and move to an educational video like this one.
Then they can sit down and you can do another 5-10 minute mini lesson.
You will get SO much better engagement and this is just a proven way that young children learn.
We do days of the week, months of the year, the date, how many days have we been in school, etc.
Then I have a quick morning message where we work on CAP skills - Concepts About Print. Model how words move left to write, spaces between words, starting with a capital, etc.
I usually use student names in my morning message and this helps so much with engagement.
When I homeschool my children, I use a morning message as well.
I also like to tie in some review as well (like the letter we did the previous day.) I sit next to my daughter and just use a mini white board. She loves it and can’t wait to see what silly thing I write. I tell her she is a reading detective!
The goal is for them to be successful and feel like they are capable of reading!
Poetry
We memorize a poem every month. I feel memorization work is so important, and their little brains are wired for it!
I display a new monthly poem each month, and we say it every morning at calendar time.
The format stays the same each month, and each child gets these printables in their poetry folder (their poem is black white.) I find it it easier to have them bring their folders to the carpet when we are writing poetry at the end of the month (we read the poem all month but usually do the writing activities at the end of each month).
Because they see this poem displayed all month long, there is so much you can do with it - even for 2-3 minutes a day. For example, spell the world September each day, ask students to come up and point to specific letters (“I need a letter detective to find a lowercase a!”)
You can read my full poetry blog post to learn more HERE
Phonemic Awareness + Phonics
This time of year, I start my phonics block with phonemic awareness activities. One kindergarten standard is to change a given word to something new by changing the first sound.
For example, change the word cat to have the first sound /b/ (do not say the letter, say the sound.)
So children need to be able to substitute the /c/ for a /b/ and tell you the new word: bat
In this video, she uses the children’s names.
This is a great place to start since they are already familiar with their name, and this keeps them so engaged because it is personal.
Because this is phonemic awareness, all activities all done orally.
I do whole group phonemic awareness activities intertwined or right after calendar time. It all blends together most days.
I teach phonemic awareness in small groups every day.
Before I start phonics, or my next mini lesson, I tell them they need to thank their brains for working so hard (and they need to wiggle for a minute) so I play this Dr. Jean song:
They stand up, wiggle, sing and pretend to kiss their brain! It is so cute and it gives me a minute to take a drink of water and pull out my phonics cards.
We started phonics last week with introducing p, m, s, l.
My entire first sounds phonics unit is structured the same so students know the routine and what to expect.
I teach four sounds at a time. Last week we played to picture card game with the pocket charts, and I usually warm up with a similar review.
Go over two-four sounds we learned at a time, so students can decide which column the pictures go in.
Then you are ready to have students return to their seats to complete the practice activities.
Since last week we learned the letters and sounds, this week we review and apply our skills with the activities.
Tip: explain and model the activity before sending children to their desks.
Another activity is first sound matching.
Show three pictures and annunciate the first sound. Have students come up and choose the two pictures that have the same first sound.
These do not have to be ones you have taught yet, as they aren’t identifying the letter name. They just are practicing hearing the sounds.
So for this set, the students would choose box and baseball because they have the same first sound.
These are the activities we then use to practice p, m, s, l.
Just use these throughout the week…. I don’t think the order really matters.
If your children cannot write letters yet for the missing first sound activity, just write the first letter in highlighter for them and they can trace it.
We love the sorting sounds and the phonics quilts!
My entire first sounds unit is available HERE, or if you want to learn how I teach phonics for the entire year, you can sign up for my free phonics email course HERE
Tip for struggling students: if a child I having a hard time differentiating and identifying letter sounds, have them actually feel their lips as they are making a sound. Talk about the position of their tongue when they annunciate a sound and even give them a mini hand held mirror so they can see what their mouth looks like. Their mouth looks totally different when making a /m/ sound than a /z/ sound.
Don’t forget to sing this song every day with your kiddos too! You can teach them the sign language to go with it too.
Math
We move between the carpet and their desks for math. I start the year with my counting and cardinality unit HERE
In the first week of September, we practiced numbers 1-3. The next week we mastered numbers 4-6, and now we are tackling 7-10.
I do it this way for a variety of reasons, but I want to be sure they are writing these numbers with correct directionality and we work really intensely on 1:1 correspondence.
A lot of kids (and parents) will tell you, “I can count to 10.. watch!” but if you ask them to show you 6 objects, they can’t. Or ask them to count how many objects there are in a pile… they can’t.
1:1 correspondence is much harder than “counting.” So many times, I must actually work 1:1 with students and show them how to move their finger as they say the next number.
One tip for teaching 1:1 correspondence is teach students to line up objects when they are counting them. If objects are in a pile or group, they forget which ones they have already counted and they get confused.
I hand them a pile of objects, and I train them the first thing to do is put everything in a line before they start counting. This also teaches them to practice a left to right progression like reading.
It can be time consuming, but I promise it is worth the intense effort.
The first few weeks of kindergarten is just exhausting… there is no way around it!
I use Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday to really practice numbers 7-9.
Writing the numbers, counting and showing the correct number of objects.
Then we spend the rest of the week writing number 10 and practicing numbers 1-10 with hands on activities.
I model each activity with the students. I use the approach I do, We do, You do.
I model it first, then we do it together and then you can do it on your own!
I feel it is so important to NOT start with these math centers/activities on day one for so many reasons.
Until students have a foundation of numbers 1-10, these activities will not benefit them.
This is why I wait until the end of week 3 to play these games, but now we play them for the next couple weeks!
We use Unifix Cubes all year long. They are definitely a math manipulative you will want to invest in.
Now is the perfect time to have students practice ordering numbers 1-10 on a ten frame with this FREE BOOM DECK
If you’re new to Boom Learning, I have a FAQ page that shows you how to setup a FREE account!
Here is a great video to turn on and you can pull a couple children to work 1:1 with while the class is watching this.
Reading
Reading is not just decoding words.
Reading is so much more than that! I firmly believe reading is constructing meaning, and we used many skills to understand print.
Phonics is important, but it is not the only skill children should lean on when learning how to read.
Building student’s confidence is so important.
This is one of the many reasons I have a huge problem timing children when they are reading (or saying letter names/sounds) and if you’re in a public school, then you probably know exactly what I am referring to.
We want students to be excited to read! We want them to love reading.
I use topics young children are naturally wanting to read about, and I use the same pictures, words and vocabulary throughout the entire week. I do this for so many reasons - but it builds confidence and fluency.
This month all of our sentences are two words. My focus is for them to recognize word boundaries, and to say the word their magic reading finger is point to.
Our theme this week is Teachers!
For the entire school year, my guided reading consists of the same three materials:
Comprehension and fluency passage
Mini book
Sentence builder
The vocabulary and sight words, along with the theme, changes each week and the difficulty increases throughout the year.
Just like all of my resources, students love the routine and structure of my reading program.
I love that once I have them trained in how to use these resources, I do not waste precious time explaining directions and expectations.
I use these three resources throughout the week. Personally, I prefer this schedule:
Monday: introduce theme, vocabulary/sight words, I read the passage, we read it together
Tuesday: review words, we read together, they read on their own (whisper/buddy), answer comprehension questions
Wednesday: Sentence Builder
Thursday: Mini book, Review CAP skills - front cover, turning pages, holding a book properly, I read the book to them
Friday: We read the book together, buddy read, answer comprehension questions
I use these in my small groups, with all the reading levels! The beautiful thing is that you can use the same materials, and just differentiate your instruction based on their reading level.
This allows me to spend more direct instruction time with my lower readers.
I recommend keeping guiding reading lessons short and sweet 10-15 minutes or so per group per day.
The setup of this program allows you high quality instruction in a short amount of time because kids quickly learn the structure and routine, so you don’t have to waste time giving directions.
Read the full blog post and learn more HERE
Reading and writing go hand in hand, and I love this program because it ties the two together. You will get much faster results teaching reading and writing together.
It is tricky to start guided reading groups in September. What is the rest of your class doing?
To start the year, I would recommend having an aide run a whole group activity while you pull your small groups.
They can use a no prep activity (shown below) or even watch Dr. Jean or Jack Hartman songs/videos.
When I am working with my reading group, I wear a special hat.
That is a great visual that students may not come up to you. I wore a beach hat, but you can wear anything!
Kids just need a visual reminder that they cannot come up to you during this time.
Centers
I use no prep activities for my centers for so many reasons.
I love being able to just print and teach.
Centers are so tricky at the beginning of the year, especially if you do not have help.
Read my full centers blog post HERE to see my ideas on how to organize them.
I would recommend doing these activities whole group at first if you do not have an aide. Many of these no prep activities are perfect for your students to do while you pull your guided reading groups (read and write like a rock star program.)
Some are better for whole group, so just look at all of the activities for the month and separate as needed.
You can use these no prep activities really in any order you wish, so do not worry about the order I show on my lesson plans.
I sometimes switch them up. They can just be used throughout the month as centers, for fast finishers, sub tubs, etc.
I love how versatile these printables are!
HOW TO GET STARTED WITH INDEPENDENT CENTERS
When you are ready to start running reading groups while your students are doing centers, I recommend starting very slowly.
At first when they start centers, you need to model, model, model exactly what is expected. Then rinse and repeat.
I do not start working with a reading group when we first start centers.
I am up walking around assisting students so they know how each center works, where supplies are, how to stay in their area, etc.
Center rotations should last about 15 minutes, then allow 5 minutes for clean up and rotation (maybe even more time for cleanup at the beginning of the year.)
Then I spend a lot of time on reflecting on which groups/students were modeling positive behavior. This is not wasted time! Think of this as training students for their “job”.
This takes quite a while to train them, but soon enough you will have them running smoothly so you can be sitting own working with a group while students are doing no prep centers.
I use the no prep worksheets with hands on activities for my centers. I have a roundup of our favorite centers HERE and I made free organizing labels to go with them.
We have to practice a lot at the beginning of the year of how to get resources out and how to put them back. These picture labels are so helpful for children so they can see where everything goes.
If parents ever offer to volunteer, I always have them come in during center time, because extra adults help kids stay focused, on task, in their area and cleanup goes faster.
I love this timer, because it shows kids a visual since they can’t really understand the actual timer. When the hippo is uncovered it is time to clean up! You can turn on a clean up song so kids know to move quickly so they can go to the next center.
How do you keep kids on task with positive behavior?
I walk around during center time and hand out tickets to students making good choices and who clean up quickly and quietly. They write their name on the back of the ticket (or I write it for them) and then out it in our big jar. I draw tickets for prizes at the end of the week.
This is another way to focus on the positive behavior. As soon as kids see you handing out tickets, they all get right to work or help clean up even better.
Once I am working with my reading group, I have my aide or parent volunteer handing out tickets.
At first we hand out a lot to encourage positive behavior, but as the year goes on we make it a little harder to earn tickets during center time.
You an also do group tickets - the whole group must be on task working hard and then cleaning up to earn a ticket at the end. There are so many ways you can do this!
Print this Jar Label and the tickets for FREE HERE
I print off one label for the Jar (two sizes included) and then I make a bunch of copies of the tickets, cut them apart and keep them in my pocket so I can hand them out when I see super star behavior/choices.
Kids can’t wait until Friday drawing day! I tell them the more tickets they have the better chance to be chosen for a prize.
Homeschooling tip: I use this for my daughters each day as well - they earn a ticket if they complete their school work with a positive attitude.
They love working hard to earn their five tickets each week and then I swap the tickets for dollars at the end of the week. School work can be frustrating at times, so I reward them if they keep a positive attitude for the day.
All About Apples - Week 3
We love learning All About Apples!
Week 1 we learned about the lifecycle of an apple tree.
Week 2 we learned about going to an apple orchard and all the different things apples can make. We got to taste test apples too and graph our results!
For week 3, we are reading a book called Apple Countdown.
We will make a class book and practice numbers and counting with apples.
Then we make a class book!
These pages come in both color and black and white. Then each student gets a number page so they can illustrate and come up with a rhyming sentence (or any sentence!)
For many of my kiddos, at this point in the year, they tell me their sentence, I write it in highlighter, and they trace. Then we put it all together (in order 1-25 or however many students you have) and make our class book to reread.
This video is perfect to show after reading the book. Get your wiggles out!
We watch it several times throughout the week.
Writing
Handwriting is humming right along this week. We know how to bunny jump, so all these letters need to bunny jump.
All these letters are so closely related, so it is great to see how quickly kids understand and can write these letters correctly.
This week we start with lesson 16.
For more info on handwriting, please CLICK HERE
In writing we are still working on labeling. They have learned so many literacy skills and have come so far. Labeling is so much fun… my kids are getting so good at it!
My recipe for success: same structure and routine, repeated practice, build their confidence and fluency = confident writers and readers.
We match the labels one day, and the very next day they do the same picture but label on their own (either with sticker labels or cut and paste).
This week we are doing two mini readers, and these are great because students draw an arrow to the object they think the word matches.
Most of my kids cannot write on their own yet, so just looking at the letters and figuring our what they think it says in the picture is perfect.
Have you tried the Boom Cards yet?
Homeschool + Virtual Learning
I realized, very quickly, that in order to make virtual, distance learning and homeschooling successful for parents, kiddos and teachers, everything needed to be super organized, well laid out and easy to use.
Each day, children have a My Tasks Today page that outlines their daily assignments. Parents love this! Students can’t wait to complete their assignments and color their daily stars next to each box.
The format stays the same for a week or two at a time, so students can become mostly independent with limited parental help.
This eases so much stress for parents who are not available to teach their children new lessons every day.
You can learn more, watch a video and print a FREE WEEK from every single month HERE
The response to this new curriculum was so overwhelmingly positive, and turned this into a year long bundle!
Homeschool tip: I am using this program at home to homeschool my daughter. We use it as a warm up every day - she can usually get right to work without my help.
To help even more with online learning, we created monthly Boom Cards.
They can be played whole group, small groups, independently and at home! The September bundle is available HERE
Do you have questions? Or need help with something specific? Leave a comment and I will try to include tips each week that will help you the most!
Now you can save with monthly bundles!
All my best!
Michala
Hop on over HERE to head back to our SEPTEMBER LESSON PLAN homepage
Did you miss the last two weeks? You can view Week 1 HERE and Week 2 HERE