Butterfly Math and MY NEW STORE!

Each year I tend to focus on growing as a professional and improving one area of my kindergarten curriculum. This year it's reading. Last year, math and writing. The year before, ELD. The trouble is, with only 3 hours a day with my kiddos (not to mention only 24 hours for myself) I've struggled this year to keep up with the improvements from previous years as I focus on reading this year.

Long story short, we're behind in math. Like a lot. So now it's April and I'm just now introducing addition (although if Monday's lesson was any indication, most of my students already have a pretty good idea of what they're doing without me!). We've been adding butterflies on the SMART board and using toys, so I created a cut-and-paste word problem activity for my substitute to do with my students today. It's not anything particularly unique or original (or even very challenging...) but it was faster for me to create my own than find the right one online, and it was a good introductory assessment to get started with. We'll see how they did when I get back on Monday! 

In addition to being a convenient sub activity, this worksheet was the perfect thing for my very first TeachersPayTeachers freebie! I got home early tonight and set up my TpT seller account and posted my first product! Hopefully this is the first of many. As a bilingual teacher I often feel like an island, working on my own and having to come up with almost everything we do from scratch (or at least taking everything my English kinder team has found or purchased and reproducing it in Spanish). I want to be a part of the growing community of bilingual teachers who are sharing quality, engaging, relevant materials online for other kinder teachers! 

So here it is--my very first freebie! Butterfly Addition Cut-and-Paste Word Problem in English AND Spanish! Click the image to go to my (new!) TpT store. If you download my product, please leave feedback so that I can build my rating. Thanks so much for your support!

Monday Phonics Fun

I love Monday afternoons in my kindergarten class! I hate Monday mornings because I'm usually sleepy, unprepared, and cranky! But Monday afternoons are some of my favorite time with my super kinders.

On Mondays we have early release for PLCs and get out at 1:35, but the PM kinders still come at 11:45 like usual. The other days are longer to make up for the missed time, but Monday afternoons are deliciously short. This means we don't have time for ELD or centers, so we it's the one day of the week where we get to do things we don't normally do, like smart board games, art, and science. Today I let the kids have free choice for longer than normal (probably longer than I should have!), then we worked on phonics.

All last week we were going through Lidia Barbosa's "Letter S and Syllables" packet that the kids have printed and bound in their blue center folders. They totally love her engaging and rigorous activities! Today I printed out the Level B reader she has in the packet 4-up (four on a page) to make mini-books. It was a color book, so we read it together on the board, which they did amazingly! I'm so impressed by how well my top girls are reading, even though we haven't done nearly enough practice with this this year! They know their sight words, and were chunking the other words into syllables. =)

After we finished, we noticed that the book didn't make sense. The pattern was, "La sirena es verde." But everything was actually white! So then we got out colored pencils (brand new ones!) and I passed out the student versions on clip boards. They sat at the carpet and colored their books according to the words while I colored mine on the doc cam. I heard so many great bucket-filling phrases like, "Wow, I like how you're coloring," and "You're not getting out of the lines at all!" What great friends! =)

Tomorrow, we are going to think of a few more things that start with S, and then each child has a blank page to fill in and write their own sentence on. After that, we'll cut apart our pages, stack them up, and staple them! My hope is that each child will be able to at least "magic memory" read their book so I can send them home tomorrow. For the other letter books, I'm sending them to the Print Shop to run on their booklet maker so they aren't quite so work intensive for us in class!

The Joys of Bilingual Education

URG! I hate it when you have a great plan and lots of activities that all go with a particular book, and then you can't find that book in Spanish ANYWHERE! No library, no bookstore, no coworker, and Amazon is asking $44 plus shipping if you want it this week! ACK! #guessI'mtranslatingtonight

Spanish Jump Rope Rhymes

From my email-it-to-myself-so-I-can-find-it-later archives:

http://spanglishbaby.com/finds/jump-rope-rhymes-en-espanol-printable-activity/

Traditional Spanish jump rope rhymes and maybe some hand claps? These are perfect for developing the rhythm and cadence of language! They should definitely be part of our Emergent CAFE Menu!

The Alphabet in My Mouth

I saw this SUPER CUTE class book idea on Dr. Jean's blog! I LOVE it! I think we could even do this on our iPad, and draw the letters inside our mouths, then create an "eBook" using iMovie with our voices singing the song. I can't wait to try it out! It sings well in English and Spanish. Here is the song:

The Alphabet in My Mouth

(Tune:  “He’s Got the Whole World in His Hands”)

I’ve got A /a/ /a/ in my mouth.

I’ve got A /a/ /a/ in my mouth.

I’ve got A /a/ /a/ in my mouth,

And I can read.

El abecedario en mi boca

(Tune: "He's Got the Whole World in His Hands," adapted by Mrs. Doring)

Tengo la A /a/ /a/ en mi boca.

Tengo la A /a/ /a/ en mi boca.

Tengo la A /a/ /a/ en mi boca, 

Y yo sé cómo leer.