Growing Kinders

Alphabet Chants!

One of my most popular blog posts has been my post about sight words and sight word chants. You can find that post {here}.

I found some chants on the web, retyped them and added them to popsicle sticks. I choose from the sight word chants throughout the day, and the kids LOVE them.

I knew I needed something for the alphabet, so I started hunting for alphabet chants. I found some on one of my very favorite {old} websites….Little Giraffes! If you have never been to this website before, you must check it out – there are tons of great resources there.

So, here’s what I did…

I used her sight word chants, typed them up, and added a corresponding picture to each one. I did change a few of them as I went, but many of them are the same.

I didn’t put them on popsicle sticks this time though. I simply printed them on cardstock, and laminated them. They’re pretty sturdy, and if they do get bent, it’s easy to just print them out again!

Does this look like something you can use this year? You can grab it {here} or click on the image below!

PS – I would love a little note if you download! Comments make the blogging world go ‘round!

Oh, I used an empty Crystal Light container to store them!

OfficeMax LOVES Teachers {Another Give Away!}

How much fun was the Back to School Bash giveaway?! If you were one of the lucky winners, congratulations! If you didn’t win this time around, keep reading, because you have ANOTHER chance to win something BIG!

Raise your hand is you love office supplies?! I can’t even tell you how many pens, pencils, and markers I have in my drawers! Way too many! I LOVE a good pen (like most of us, I think!)
Well, guess what... I have an awesome OfficeMax giveaway for you!!
They recently sent me an awesome gift box packed with everything we need for back to school! and holy smokes it’s worth $125!!
Take a peek…

Pens, pens, pens! Sticky notes! Binder clips! A pencil sharpener!! and…scissors! I am forever misplacing my scissors! Do you see that little orange card..it’s a $50 gift card! I know what I’m spending mine on (or at least part of it!)….Mr. Sketch Markers!

Do you want one of these teacher care packages?! (I KNOW you do!) Just hang tight for one second, I want to give you the deets of OfficeMax’s opportunities for teachers!
Teacher Appreciation Days at OfficeMax To help teachers stock up and save on much-needed supplies, OfficeMax is hosting its special, three-day Teacher Appreciation Days events where teachers receive 25% off their purchase of hundreds of essential classroom supplies, exclusive coupons and other great values, increased purchase limits just for teachers and a free reusable tote. To participate, teachers can join OfficeMax’s MaxPerks Rewards for Teachers program at no charge either in-store or online at officemaxperks.com. Visit www.officemax.com/celebrateteachers for details on Teacher Appreciation Days events in your community or others across the country.
Save on School Supply Purchases at OfficeMax
· OfficeMax is providing big deals on education essentials and more throughout the season, offering 25-cent, 50-cent and $1 value deals on a variety of supplies, including markers, notebooks, glue, scissors and more. Visit OfficeMax’s back-to-school web page at www.officemax.com/bts to shop or search by zip code for in-store and online promotions.
· Teachers also receive special discounts at the OfficeMax Print Center in-stores nationwide and can select from one of two bundles including:
o Teacher Value Bundle includes 100 B&W copies, 1 poster (18” x 24”), 3 feet of lamination and 50 business/event cards for $19.99 ($60 value)
o Teacher Premium Bundle includes 50 color copies, 2 posters (18” x 24”), 3 feet of lamination, 50 business/event cards and a teacher planner for $29.99 ($100 value)

^^^What an awesome deal!!^^^

OfficeMax’s A Day Made Better Support for Teachers OfficeMax is hosting its annual A Day Made Better In-Store School Supply Drive where community members can donate much-needed supplies for local teachers. OfficeMax associates will donate the collected supplies to local schools on October 1 during the annual A Day Made Better events in which OfficeMax associates surprise 1,000 teachers in their classrooms with a total of $1 million worth of OfficeMax-donated school supplies. Learn more about A Day Made Better at www.adaymadebetter.com.

^^^This makes my heart happy!^^^

Okay, back to the teacher care package….

Here’s what you can win:

OfficeMax Binder Clips

$50 OfficeMax Gift Card
OfficeMax Color Paper Clips
TUL Electric Pencil Sharpener
TUL Liquid Pocket Highlighters
Just Basics 36 Pack of #2 Pencils
Papermate 12 Pack of Purple Pins
OfficeMax Brite Self Stick NotePads
OfficeMax 12 Pack Blue Grip Gel Pins
OfficeMax 8" Stainless Steel Bent Scissors

Everything in this care package is amazing, and I can’t wait to bring it to my classroom and unload everything into my desk!
Here’s what you’ve been waiting for….your chance to win!
Simply enter in the RaffleCopter below and tell me in a comment:
1. What kinds of supplies do you like to purchase at OfficeMax
and
2. Will you be checking out OfficeMax’s Teacher Appreciation days?

Please be honest and leave a comment! We are using the honor system here!!

Good luck and thanks for entering!

a Rafflecopter giveaway Disclaimer: I received the school supplies and gift card mentioned in this post from OfficeMax in order to facilitate my review. The items featured in this giveaway are also provided by OfficeMax and will be sent to the winner directly. Opinions expressed in this post are 100% my own. I have not been compensated for this post in any other way.

Winner! Winner! Bash Basket #13

I know y'all are DYING to know the winners...but first let me say THANK YOU to every single person that participated in this giveaway. We never dreamed that it would turn out to be such a HUGE event. On our final giveaway, we had just shy of 70,000 entries! THAT is CRAZY...and yet another reason that I love teachers! Also one more thank you to our sponsors for donating such fabulous prizes and for being such big cheerleaders for teachers. Make sure you show them lots of love and follow them on Facebook. If you missed those links, you can check them out again right {HERE}. We can't wait for our Back to School Bash 2014!

The winners for my Bash Basket, as well as the Grand Prize Bash Basket are below. If you didn't happen to win...no worries! Many of our sponsors know how much money teachers pour and invest into their classrooms and students. So, they have been extremely generous {once again} and have provided coupons to help cut down on expenses. You will find several coupon codes below!

Now! Here we go...

{All winners have already been contacted via the email address that you entered into Rafflecopter. If your name appears below, please check your email and respond with the information requested.}

and the winner is….

And our GRAND PRIZE Winner...

Congratulations to all of our winners! We hope you enjoy your prizes!

For those of you that did not win and would like to get your shop on, here are some coupons to help you out!

Silhouette America

Silhouette offers a 20% off ongoing discount. Register at by clicking {HERE}.

Erin Condren

Visit Erin Condren now until August 15: Enter "TEACHERLOVE" at checkout and receive 10% off {Teachers' category only}.

Put a Case on Me

Visit Put a Case on Me and input code "back2school" and receive 10% off of your entire order!

Tiny Dazzles

Visit Tiny Dazzles for some Back to School shopping! We know every teacher loves her accessories!

We hope you enjoyed our Back to School Bash! Congrats again to all of our winners! Wishing all of our teacher friends a fabulous start to a brand new year!

XOXO!

Back to School Bash! Basket 13

It’s here!! Are you excited?! I certainly am – there are some AMAZING prizes up for grabs! 17 baskets in fact! Are you ready to enter to win ALL of them?!
If you missed yesterday’s post, you will want to go back and read it {right here} so you know how this blog hop will work!
Okay, let’s get started! Start by reading this:

Make sure you look for THIS apple on each blog. Click on it, and it will take you to the next give away!

Now on to my adorable gift basket!! Are you ready for some cute-ness!?

Rosie Pink Designs gave us an adorable chevron jewelry holder.
Blue Chevron Jewelry Display - Blue Chevron Key Hanger

But, wait – it doesn’t have to be JUST for jewelry! I could totally see this hanging in my classroom! My whistle, my classroom key, my line-up chants and songs, bathroom passes.. What would you use this for?!

The Polka Dot Pavilion is donating this:

Holy cuteness. I NEED this for my classroom!!
and finally….

Sydney’s Jewells Boutique is throwing in this SWEET locket!

This great basket is valued at almost $100!

But wait, I’m not done yet! {Oh yes, there’s more!}

You can win these three brand new items from my shop!

You can check out these items in my shop by clicking on the images below!

Here’s what you need to do to enter!
1. Like Rosie Pink Designs on Facebook {here}
2. Like The Polka Dot Pavilion on Facebook {here}
3. Like Sydney’s Jewells on Facebook {here}
4. Like Growing Kinders on Facebook {here}
5. Follow Growing Kinders on TpT {here}

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Now that you’ve entered this fabulous giveaway, click on the apple below to go to the next one!

More ABC Activities

I’m excited to share with you some of my favorite (and easy!) alphabet activities that I use with m,y kiddos at the beginning of the year.

#1 Leap Frog Letter Factory

I found these cards about 8 years ago when my oldest daughter was young. I am a HUGE fun of the Leap From games and DVDs. These letter cards correspond with the Letter Factory videos.

I was happy to learn that you can still buy these letter cards at Amazon! Just click on the image to go and check them out!

#2 Alphabet Treasure Hunt

We also have a ton of fun with this game from Lakeshore.

#3 Kagan Games

My kids LOVE playing quiz quiz trade and once they learn the basic directions, you can play with all sorts of skills. This game is from the Kindergarten set of ELA games.

Here is a little peek inside of my ABC cupboard – I have two big cupboard spaces filled with ABC games and activities! I always pick up ABC puzzles when I find them…I try to purchase 1 or 2 (or more!) games during the year to add to the selection. The children do not choose from this cabinet! I pull out activities for centers that the children will work from.

I love taking things that I already have and turning them into an activity. It makes for an easy, and CHEAP way to keep the kids engaged. These are my go-to activities when I don’t have a lot of time to prep, or I need something that is pretty simple for the kids to figure out. They’re also great for Daily 5 rotations!

I’ve organized all of these games into a packet for you. There are 20 activities total. They are available as a bundled package or 10 in each set. I hope you like them and that they will make the beginning of the year easier for you!!

I’ll be back soon with more of my favorite ABC activities!

Alphabet FUN!

I love the beginning of the school year – all the fresh faces coming into the classroom just eager and ready to learn! I also love all of the fun learning games we play at the beginning of the year!

Today, I’m going to share with you a freebie game that I found on Making Learning Fun. There are TONS of free resources on that site, so go on over and check it out!

One of the freebies they had was this super fun crocodile game:

I first saw this little fella last year, and told my husband we needed to switch our dishwasher detergent! It’s a cascade pouch container! (BTW, I LOVE these!) You can download everything you need from the Making Learning Fun website, but I wanted to spruce it up a little ;)

So, here is my version:

I used craft foam for the top and also wrapped it around the entire container. It was too hard to get off the Cascade label!

I retyped the poem, and fancied up the alphabet cards.

The game can be played in a large or small group. It is played like the classic game “bam.” Children reach in, pull out a letter card and say the letter or sound (or both!). If they have said the letter correctly, they place the card in the middle. I like to put it in the middle so it is a class effort, rather than an individual effort. If a child pulls out a snap card – all the children put out their arms (like an crocodile mouth) and say “snap! snap!” and all the cards go back inside.

You can print off as many letter cards as you need if you need to focus on certain letter for kiddos. Just put the letter cards that those kiddos need to work on inside the crocodile.

I love playing these fun games with kiddos! I’ve made up a bunch more whole group games like this if you would like to check them out! Just click the image below!

Would you like to make the crocodile game for your class? You could either head on over to Making Learning Fun and download the simple game for yourself. Or download the fancier version here!

Have fun!

Target Learning Goals and #create2educate

I gave a little glimpse of my other Michael’s project on Instagram, but I also wanted to share it here, because I am super excited about it.

Our district adopted the Marzano Teacher Evaluation System last year, and we are slowly easing into it. This year part of our focus is on posting target learning goals. There are ALL sorts of ways to post target learning goals, and I hope that this method works for me.

In our Marzano training, we have learned that it is best to write your learning goal in front of and with your students. Teaching Kindergarten, we all know that this can be a bit tricky! So, here is what I have come up with…

It’s super easy to make…I purchased these magnetic dry erase boards from Michaels.

Michael’s has TONS of ribbon in all sorts of patterns and widths, so I picked up a few spools, some letter stickers, and check out that chevron Washi tape!

The project is SUPER easy. You can whip it out in about 15 minutes! (Less if you don’t add the ribbon flowers)

You can also use dry erase markers to write your learning goals directly onto the board. Super easy, colorful, and fun!

Here are a few other examples for posting target learning goals.

Click on the image to go directly to the source!

(Love the portion of her whiteboard where she posts the supplies the students will need)

I’ve always loved this one – it’s so clean and simple!

Since this is a BRAND NEW thing for me, I would LOVE to hear how your school requires you to post your learning goals. Do you write them in front of the kids, while your write your lesson plans? HELP!

Link up below with how you manage your target learning goals!

What you learn in Vegas…gets shared here!

Wow! What an amazing, whirlwind week! Not only do I have my very first SDE presentation under my belt, but I was able to hang out with some of the coolest people around!!

I attended some AMAZING sessions, and I can’t wait to share some ideas here. I found some AMAZING vendors, and I will share their products here soon. and I met some AMAZING people. Overall the week was…..you guessed it….AMAZING.

My session was such a great experience. It was so fun sharing ideas with all of you! I hope that if you came to my session you walked away with one or two ideas that you could use in your classroom in the fall! If you weren’t able to get in, I’ll try to share some things here throughout the year! I was so sad to hear that they were turning people away! I would have loved to have you just plop right down on the floor! Next time, right?!

My friends. Oh, how I love my friends. This blogging gig opened up a whole new world of friends for me. It’s been amazing. Not only are they an incredibly talented group of women, but they are absolutely….yep, here’s that word again…amazing :)

Me, Deedee Wills, Kim Adsit, Shari Sloane, Kim Jordano, Natalie Crockett

Me, Deedee, Natalie

Rachelle Smith, Natalie, Kim, Elvis, Erica Bohrer, Me

Me, Shari, Kim J.

Cheryl Saoud, Me

Deanna Jump, Hope King, Me

Getting a breath of fresh air! Ha!!

And then we have the blogger meet-up….SO FUN. There were SO many people there – way more than last year – I can’t wait to see how many people will be there NEXT year!!

We had SO many amazing sponsors that made the night possible…

A huge thank you to our sponsors :

SDE (Staff Development for Educators)

TeachersPayTeachers

Thank you to those who donated some fabulous prizes!

Check out these links to see some amazing products just for TEACHERS!

SDE (Staff Development for Educators)

TeachersPayTeachers

Erin Condren

MPM School Supplies

Clever School Teacher

CR Toys

Lovey Dovey Creations

Erica Bohrer

The Price of Teaching

And we LOTS of wonderful winners!

These wonderful photographs and collages were all made by the fabulous
Natalie of What the Teacher Wants!

These two fabulous people came all the way from New York to sped the evening with us! John Yoo (TpT Partner and CEO) and Amy Bernell (Community Manager at TpT) shared with us that TpT has many new and exciting adventures planned!

and WOW! Look at all these bloggers! So much talent in one space! I can’t wait until next year!