Numbers in the Classroom

Last year I used these cute numbers from A Cupcake for the Teacher in my classroom. If you click on the links you can snag the free download from TPT and see how she uses them. I apologize in advance that I don't have pictures from last year, but I will be taking them this year! 
I laminated, cut, and stuck a magnet strip to the back of each one. On the first day of school, all of their goodies were on their desks waiting, along with their numbers! I started with these colorful #'s as a way of doing attendance in the morning. Students were held accountable for moving their number from the "I am not here today" sign to the "I am here today" sign as they came into the classroom. It was perfect because as they did so, they walked directly in front of the white board and would read the Morning Work and message as they walked by. The "I am here today" sign was on a small sectioned off part of my front white board. I loved this because I ended up using the numbers for so much more throughout the day. Instead of picking sticks, I would quickly pick a number. It was great for quick groupings too! At the end of the day my "Helping Hands" would move the numbers back to the "I am not here today" sign so they were ready to go the next morning.

I love assigning students a number from day one (which is just done alphabetically) because once they know their #, you can use it for whatever your heart desires throughout the year. So, this year I plan on definitely using them again! I even numbered their erasers that I will give to them on the first day back. 
This will help when I find erasers on the floor - I can return them to the rightful owner! I am also going to have them number their pencils! Usually I end up picking pencils up off the floor and stick them in the pencil bucket, but I think this will help kids hang on to them better when they are labeled with their numbers. We shall see! 
Since I used these last year, I still have my old set. I printed a new copy for my new class, but now I can use the old set for Guided Math or Guided Reading Rotations!  

"Real Facts" Writing Activity

As I was about to throw my empty Snapple bottle into the recycling can, I read the "Real Fact" under the cap. "Real Fact" #854 - Hawaii is the only U.S. state that grows coffee. I never knew that. I threw it into the can and thought, that's a cool fact to tell my students. That's when I reached back into that can and saved that top. Now I am washing and saving all of the Snapple caps! I had to come up with some way to incorporate this in my classroom. So I created  "Real Facts" as either a Center activity or a task that students can work on when they are finished with independent work early (Fast Finishers). Now, the assignment will encourage students to read each "fact" with an incredulous mind because I'm pretty sure not all of those facts are correct. However, it gets kids thinking about different/new topics and provides them with some incentive to perhaps research a topic further. The assignment allows students to write a detailed response to the fact (we use RSSE format) and then write a creative story or essay with the genre of their choice using the fact as a prompt. The assignment has an example I created to get kids started. "Real Fact" #749 - The average housefly lives for one month. Ironically, the fact I chose to write about was easy for me because we have seen an increase in flies lately. Ugh - annoying.  

This is the story I wrote based on my "Real Fact" that is included in the product. "Real Facts" is the first product I have on TPT that is for sale and not free. It's actually my 3rd product uploaded to my store. It's not elaborate, but it's made with a determined mind and creativity :] Feel free to let me know what you think! 

I am excited to try it out in September and see what else can come from it! I know I will be buying a lot more Snapple :] 

TIME Magazines - Teaching with Pictures

 All year long I would get the TIME magazines for adults when we received our TIME FOR KIDS bundles.  I would skim through them quickly and then put them in my teacher bin. Before I knew it, I had quite a few TIME magazines cluttering my bin. From there, I would take them home and stash them in hopes that I could eventually read them. When summer started, I came up with the idea to use the pictures within them to help with instruction.

As I skimmed through the articles, I was able to cut out appropriate pictures and catch up on some of the reading :) I glued each picture to an index card and numbered them. I bought a Dollar Tree photo album and put each picture into a sleeve. I feel like there is so much I can do with this. I can teach skills like inferencing or cause and effect. Since we are working on Guided Reading and creating centers this summer - my plan is to use it as a Writing Center. Students can take out one of the numbered cards from the album and write something similar to this for each picture: 

I see...

I know...

I wonder...

I infer...

Opinion writing topic for this picture...

Persuasive writing topic for this picture...

Informational writing topic for this picture...

Narrative writing topic for this picture...

(I was inspired by another Teacher Blog which I can not remember or find now - to list different topics that could be generated from a picture for different writing genres.) 

After this, students can choose to write about the picture using the writing topic of their choice (students love choice :] ).

  

This picture was taken before 

I put the pictures on numbered 

index cards, but you get the idea.