On Your Wishlist or In Your Cart ?

Teacher Appreciation Week... one of my favorite times of the year! I love the handwritten notes, the hugs, the kind words from parents and more. In Massachusetts, we are in the middle of standardized testing with the PARCC test. A little extra love during testing and assembling teacher portfolios for evaluations goes a long way in my book!

 For two days, I am sending a little extra appreciation your way.  My store will be 28% off on Tuesday, May 3rd and Wednesday, May 4th for the TPT Teacher Appreciation sale!

 When it is the spring sale, I shop for items that I needed all year for my current students but didn't quite have the $$$ to get. I think about clip art, digital papers, fonts, and other items for my store because as a seller those items can be tax deductible. For my K-5 reading classroom, I purchase items that I need to fill in the areas of support for my students. In addition, these items can be tax deductible.

 My first priorities are:

 1. What items do I need to help with beginning of the year assessments?

 2. What items will meet multiple ages in the areas of phonics, fluency, comprehension and more?

 3. was there a group of students that I felt like needed more practice in a certain area? Is there a product on my wish list that can help me fill that gap?

 4. What are seasonal items that I love for games, scoots, word sorts & more but take a while to prep?

 Then, I put them at the top of my wish list!

I am linking up today with Jen who blogs at the Teaching in the Tongass for getting your cart ready to roll! 


Below are a few of the top Wish List items buyers have chosen from my store! 

The first one is the Gingerbread Rime Time puzzles which are popular around December holidays for Kindergarten Teachers. As students complete the puzzles, they can begin blending their first short vowel words together with the short “a” sound. It has 3 worksheets for teachers to differentiate the students’ responses.Perfect for a Literacy Center or RtI group !

The second one is my ELA Test Prep game which is popular all year-round. It supports upper grade students (2-5) in understanding the vocabulary and definitions in common terms found on standardized tests. Students simply play a matching game or Go Fish with the terms and definitions.

The third one is the Barnyard Banter games which are popular all year-round. It supports students in decoding the “floss rule” words. These patterns are typically called “Floss Rule ” or “Double Letters ” because when (f, l, s, z) is at the end of a one-syllable word the vowel sound is short. Examples of these words include: cuff, muff, hall, tell, floss, bass, fuzz, buzz.

Head back over to Teaching in the Tongass to see more wishlists ! 

Thanks for stopping by !  I'm off to go get my wishlist ready ! 

Shark Week Blog Hop : Shark Partner Games



All teachers know that kids learn more when they’re excited and engaged. Today a fin-tastic team of bloggers come together to help your students take a BITE out of learning with a theme your students are sure to love! One of my favorite ways to reinforce phonics with my primary students is through the use of partner games !

 

In The Tank

 

My school began piloting “Fundations” this year for our primary classrooms. The words featured in these games come from the actual lessons done by the classroom teachers. These partner games are used after guided reading instruction or as an extension activity that I send back to the classroom or a home-to-school connection. At times, I have used them before reading for students to increase their fluency with certain word families.

   

  A game with a font for students with language based learning needs:

 

A game with an easy-to-read primary font for students:

 

 In the entire set, there are sixteen games. Each game is made with a primary font as well as a font that will support students with language based learning needs.

Click below and grab my fabulous freebie !

 

 

Shark Week Sampler

 

Swim on over and visit :

 

Click Here !

 

Every blog in the Shark Week Blog Hop features a jawesome freebie for you and your students! Shark Week only lasts until Sunday, July 12, 2015 !

 

 

 

 

Giveaway-- Bugs and Butterflies Phonics Word Hop and More !

Hi ! Bex has made a major milestone in followers ! She's having a party you won't want to miss !There is a Clipart bundle, multiple ELA and Math bundles, too ! If you could use a few wonderful resources to round out this year, or start up the next.... hop on over !

The Giveaway Link : http://readingandwritingredhead.blogspot.com/


Check out my new game, perfect for beginning readers ! It is part of the giveaway !

 

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Bugs-and-Butterflies-Word-Hops-Short-Vowels-791072

 

Perfect for end of the year review or to start off next year !

Enjoy !

Loving Literacy Blog Hop --Stop # 22

Welcome to...

When I was young, I learned to love books as they could always take me to a different time and place and introduce me to new friends.  I has asthma in early childhood which often left me in bed or in an isolation tent undertaking breathing treatments. As an only child, my company was mostly adults and although they played with me and entertained me -- I missed the company of other children. Even when children were around, I was often on the sidelines when they were playing active games as I could not run as fast or keep up with them. Books were a comfort to me as they took me to places and I was able to meet characters who soon became friends such as Bread and Jam for Francis by Russell Hoban.

I was lucky enough to have many strong mentors in the literacy field. Three mentors that stand out for me were  Dr.Irene Fountas, Marie McKenzie, and Meryl Kaye. At Lesley University, I enjoyed working with the Reading Recovery and Literacy Collaborative Office as a grad assistant. One of my favorite tasks was organizing Irene's library of books. I always told her that was a dangerous task for me as I would often get swept away reading one of the books I was looking at. In addition, I got to talk with her and they were always engaging conversations. I enjoyed her joyful wit and ability to give me interesting tasks. After graduating, I began teaching reading in a district in suburban Boston. I was very luck to be part of a team of seasoned reading teachers and learned a lot from them. My steps were tentative in those first few years learning the expectations of teachers I work with, making gradual changes, learning additional theories, and becoming confident in my abilities. I was blessed to have a director, Marie McKenzie, who was a seasoned teacher and reading director. She gently challenged my opinions, gave me advice on the most struggling readers, and gave me articles to shape my understanding of reading at different grade levels.  When I began literacy coaching, one of my greatest allies and friends was Meryl Kaye, a seasoned colleague. As I began coaching at her school, she was willing to share her knowledge and perspective with me. She was my go-to person for the trickiest of students, a warm smile on a rough day, and a colleague I admired and learned from. Although both of these mentors have retired, I am still grateful for the time and resources that they wove into my life.



Cynthia Rylant

 I really enjoy teaching her books to my students because she writes with a diverse range of topics.  When modeling Writer's Workshop, I like to use her book, When the Relatives Came for primary students to jump start their ideas. For the older students, I like to read a part of her book, Every Living Thing, to work on narrowing down a topic or elaborating on a single topic. Click on the book cover below to see my free unit for you today ! 

The book unit I am sharing with you today is The Case of the Climbing Cat. It is one of the books in the series, High Rise Private Eye by Cynthia Rylant. It is a Level K and is an appropriate for even third grade struggling readers. I chose this book to share with you because it is a good choice to teach the genre of a mystery to struggling readers including English Language Learners. If the students like this book, there are additional ones written in this series as well.  This unit is available for free this weekend only and exclusively in my TpT store.  It will convert to a paid product after February 2nd.  I appreciate you dropping by today, and if you are new to my blog and love literacy, I hope you'll take a moment to follow my posts on Bloglovin !

Loving Literacy,

Wendy D.

Ms. D's Literacy Lab 

Next stop is Selma Dawani's Learning is Fundamental Blog :

 

 
 

  

Welcome to the Gift of Reading Blog Hop-- Stop # 9

Welcome to Ms. D's Literacy Lab. You have arrived at  

At each blog stop, you will be gathering Reading Gifts and Freebies.  In each post you will find a picture of a snowman with a letter on it. Collect all of the letters to solve the mystery quote to enter the giveaway. Record all of the letters on your recording sheet and follow each blog along the way so that you can enter the amazing giveaway at the end!

The hop is set up as a loop, so you may start anywhere along the hop, but if you would like to start at the beginning you may go to A Day In The Life of A Title I Teacher's blog.  This is also where you will go after you finish the hop to enter the giveaway!!

    Open the world of books for a child...and open the door to the future ! I fully believe that the "gift" of reading starts when we are young and continues through the rest of our lifetime. Whether it is a child snuggled on a parent's lap, a preschooler laughing at the funny part of a well-loved book, a student tucked in bed with a flashlight with a book that he/she can't put down or more....learning to read is such a gift.

 

     I have been reminded of this gift in the past week when first graders are having too much fun decoding alien (nonsense) words in a short "a" bingo game. Meanwhile, second graders are making animal noises with "The Great Race". My biggest surprise was when third graders did not want to go to recess because learning to read closed syllables was way too much fun !

 

        

     My "gift" to you is a glittery one for the youngest bunch of readers. Letter identification is one of the first steps towards learning to read. Once children are able to identify and name letters, they can begin learning the sounds that they make and then can begin assembling and reading words. When teaching letter identification, include activities that help children recognize both uppercase and lowercase letters, as recognition of both sets of letters is necessary for literacy development.  Letter naming is a strong predictor of later reading success.                                                                                                                It is a glittery "Mittens and More Mittens" Alphabet Match where students match uppercase and lowercase letters on matching cards.

In addition, there is an "I Can... chart" for a center as well as an extension worksheet for informal assessment. 

 

                               Click link below :

                                http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Mittens-and-More-Mittens-Alphabet-Match-uppercase-and-lowercase-989069

My secret letter is...

 

Thank you for stopping by my blog today! I hope that you enjoyed your gift and learned something new. If you would like to be the first to know about new post, giveaways, and blog hops follow me on Bloglovin' by clicking the image below. 

 

Don't stop now! Hop on over to Conversations in Literacy to pick up another amazing reading gift! Happy Holidays! 

If you get lost along the way, download the Hop Map here to easily pick back up where you left off! 

Ms. D.