Halloween Emergent Readers!

In Kindergarten, I always loved kicking off some basic guided reading practice in October. Routines are set, student/teacher relationships have begun to blossom, and we are ready to dip our toes in the water of the deep dive of reading! My school uses the DRA leveled reading assessment to benchmark students. We do no formal oral reading assessment until January. Fall is all basic prepwork of concepts of print, using picture clues, and listening for repeated phrases in pattern books. We slowly start to have students open their eyes to the first letter of the words they are reading so they can begin to rely on the letters in front of them rather than the memory of the repeated phrases or a misinterpreted picture clue.

That's why when I made these Emergent Readers for Halloween I had my students in mind! They are written to be on DRA Levels 1, 2, and 3 - which is perfect for Kindergarten or First Grade in the fall! Plus, with a Halloween theme, who can blame them for wanting to keep reading and get more and more excited for their very spooky day! They are differentiated so that students will have a book right on their level! Ease into reading for the little guys! Just practice tracking print or step it up to picture clues and decoding words here and there. There are four books- three of which come with or without tracking dots depending on the level and skill of your readers. The work is done for you! Just print (and put your copier on staple! It will put one staple on each book! All you'll need to do is cut the pages in half and the books are assembled for you!) and you're all set!

Who I Am on Halloween - DRA Level 1

Sight Words: I, am, a

Follow the picture clues to finish the sentence and practice tracking print! Don't forget to look at the words as you read- many pattern books change pattern on the last page!

I See Candy! - DRA Level 2

Sight Words: I, see, a

Follow the picture clues to read the color words for each candy. Pictures are coloring book so children can color in the candy once they figure out the word. Then it can serve as a picture clue for them in future reads and will help facilitate independent reading. Each pattern ends with Yum! which can be decodable for those readers ready for it.

Who Says Boo? - DRA Level 2.5

Sight Words: A, does, not

More sophisticated patterned sentences, words that require you to look at the first letter (jack-o-lantern, not pumpkin; vampire not Dracula). The pattern changes at the end with a decodable sight word and picture clue to help. Because it focuses on the words does and does not, it's a great transition book to my Thanksgiving Interactive Sight Word Book!

Halloween Decorations - DRA Level 3

Sight Words: said, the, I have, do, you

Sophisticated patterns that change with each page. Quotation marks and commas within the sentences. This book is incredibly similar to the DRA Level 3. Because of that, to keep fidelity with the assessment, I use this for students who are already assessed at a Level 3 or 4 so they can use these in Independent reading. This would be perfect for a beginning First Grader!

Click here to download these books today!

Keep you head in the clouds!

-Dianne

Pumpkin Investigation!

The baby's asleep! I was able to get in the shower AND eat lunch AND have time to spare to blog? Today is a good day! (Now if I can keep the dog from escaping the backyard, it'll upgrade to great- but that's a story for another day!)

One of the reasons I love doing apples in September is because it leads so well into pumpkins! The background knowledge on apples really helps kids expand their learning by applying it to pumpkins. They have similar life cycles, similar parts, and they both make for some excellent fall themed cooking in the classroom! YUM!

The first part of my pumpkin products that I've added was the Pumpkin Investigation!

Does it look just like the apple investigation? YES! Was that on purpose? OF COURSE! When it comes to little ones, familiarity, routine, and repetition are key! With similar visuals and understanding what they did last time, students will have greater independence in this activity. Plus, the familiarity helps them build deeper connections and understandings of the topic at hand. Many teachers feel the key to engagement is *new* and *different*, but what I've found is familiarity with a slight tweak has shown the greatest engagement and independence in my little learners.

Take a closer peek below!

Interested? The best part is it's a DOLLAR DEAL! Yes! ONE dollar! Find it here!

Be on the lookout! The mini book version of the investigation is coming in my pumpkin pack shortly!

Keep your head in the clouds!

Bugging Out!

We're continuing to get BUGGY in preschool this week! My students absolutely LOVED this idea! Inspired by The Measured Mom, I created Bugging Out! I have been looking for more fun ways to up the opportunity to identify teen numbers, but still create an activity that my morning, younger students could access. Differentiating with the multiple number cubes was the way to go!

I just printed, laminated, cut, and taped. Super easy AND durable for little hands!

You can get your copy of the entire activity (jar sheets, bugs, and number cubes!) here!

Keep your head in the clouds!

xo

Spooky, Sneaky, SPIDERS!

There's one insect that gives me the "creepy crawlies," but kids seem to LOVE:

SPIDERS!

Though I get the heebie jeebies over them, spiders are such a fun topic to bring into the classroom. Kids seem to love it! They tend to have a decent amount of background knowledge on them, and since there always tend to be spiders in everyone's backyards, basements, classrooms (!) children love to spill their knowledge they just learned once they see one!

Here are some of my favorite spider activities in the classroom.

Fly Swat!

I made these cards with flies on them. On the back I had the letter F (to make an association with /f/ and Fly). Some of the flies had spiders on the back of them. Students took turns swatting the flies with a fly swatter and flipping them over. If they got an F, they kept it. If they got a spider, the spider caught their fly on their web and they lost a turn. The student with the most flies at the end, won! Such a fun, hands on learning experience for the kiddos!

You could definitely do this with sight words, numbers, uppercase/lowercase match. Comment below if you'd like me to make some with those options. I always love creating resources.

Parachute Webs!

Continuing with the word FLY, we practiced identifying the letters F and L. I made F and L spiders with magnets on the back. We put them under the parachute and took turns crawling under to pick a spider. Then, I projected F and L webs on our board, and students had to stick their spider on the proper web. This would be a great activity to do if you had a web for each uppercase letter and had a spider with each lowercase letter to match. Hmmm... I should get to creating that! :)

Spell with Spiders!

At Halloween time, the dollar store or party stores seem to always sell bags of spiders in bulk. I used them for my kiddos who were still working on Name Recognition. You could also use these to spell out spelling words, sight words, or letters and numbers. KIDS LOVE THEM!

Spider Hats!

My inspiration for the hats came from Fantastic Fun and Learning. I loved it because it involved one-to-one correspondence (counting out 8 eyes and 8 legs), fine motor practice (folding out those legs!), and Science spider knowledge (did YOU know they had 8 eyes?!). It didn't hurt that they were TOO cute!

Spider Count Playdough Mats!

You can download them here.

I love these play dough mats! The visual spiders on the bottom help create independence for the kiddos. They're able to count the spiders if they cannot yet identify the numeral on their own yet. Plus, the hand strength for rolling balls of play dough is an added bonus. You could even make it a one-to-one correspondence center by counting the mini spiders used for spelling in the earlier photos. I love being able to use a center in different ways. It's an awesome way to see if students can generalize their skills across manipulatives.

Next year, I hope to incorporate Little Miss Muffet and do a cooking activity making "curds and whey." What are your favorite spider activities in the classroom?

Keep your head in the clouds!

xo