“They May Forget…” {free download}

This is one of my favorite quotes.. and it hangs behind my desk at school.

You can download it below if you wish.

They may forget…

A little bit more of Pete the Cat {free downloads}

 

If you missed my first Pet the Cat post.. you can check it out here.

I made this I love shoes book for my first graders. They worked on a page each day after lunch and they had to pick a different word each day to describe their shoes. I encouraged words other than color words.. {like wet} but most stuck to traditional color words.

Great sentence writing practice.

You can download the book below.

I love my shoes book.

The graphics are by  KPM Doodles.

---

These simple Pete sentences were used to practice sight words and words from the Pete books.  You can download them below.

Simple Pete Sentences

The pictures that are on these sentences came from Harper Collins.

---

 

Other cool Pete stuff…

Chalk Talk’s Pete Activities

Erica Bohrer’s Pete the Cat Classroom Mascot

Babbling Abby {The Inspired Apple} Pete video

Mrs. Wheeler’s Pete Activities

Felt Board Pieces for Pete the Cat

Pete drawings from MaryMaking

 

And.. you should seriously check out this precious Pet the Cat birthday party!

Getting Ready: 3rd week

It’s hard to believe that we are about to start our 3rd week! The time is FLYING by!!  It’s Sunday afternoon.. and it’s time to start getting all the last minute things done to start a new week.

We are moving on from Pete the Cat to dogs..

I usually do a week of Dogs and a week of Clifford.. so I will probably hold all my Clifford ideas until next week.

Thanks to Pinterest I printed out lots of dog pictures today and will be using these this week for writing prompts. These will be on display on the “book table” so the kids can look at them all week. They are cute!!

We are beginning to read ordinal words and I every year I hate that I don’t have poster big enough for my students to read at their seats. So, I printed these off and will put them on poster board tomorrow at school. I will try and take a picture so you can see the finished product.

*Did you notice I misspelled 9th.. yep, that's a winning moment for me! No worries.. it's all fixed now!

One of their reading centers this week will be putting words in order to make sentences. We practiced this together last week so I am anxious to see who can do it by themselves.

Our word family this week is “–an” so these sentences are a mixture of “an words” and sight words.

I would LOVE LOVE LOVE to hear any dog ideas you have? Any special activities, art projects, etc… please share!

Off to cook a little dinner.. and watch Big Brother!

xoxo, Kacey

Pete the Cat

 

 

This week was all about Pete.. 

You can get your own Pete here.

---

I hate I did not take more pictures. But, my camera battery died on Tuesday and it took me until this morning to remember to charge it..

Oh, how I hate that I missed those moments!

We have been singing the “Pete” songs all week..

Search “pete the cat” on you tube!

 

There are lots of awesome Pete the Cat activities being shared on teacher’s blogs. These are some of my very favorite ideas…

---

Fran at Kindergarten Crayons has totally set everyone up with AWESOME Pete activities ..

Pete the Cat Little Book

Mini Pocket Chart Sentences

Sentence Cut and Paste Sheets

She also has a Pete the Cat Unit in her TpT store..

---

Harper Collins has some fun stuff too!

Including free song downloads!

---

Mr. Eric’s website is fun too! He has all the cool videos!

---

Deanna Jump has a fun Pete unit on TpT too!

She has just updated her unit so head on over and get the updates if you have purchased it earlier.

Cute! Cute! Thanks Deanna for a fabulous idea!

Have a great weekend!!

Teacher Week: Meet the Teacher

Well, hello! You can read more about me above on the About Me tab..

But, here I am in a nutshell.

I am a Christian.  I am a wife.

I am a teacher.  I am a business owner.

I am an aunt.  I am a daughter.

My name is Kacey {Mrs. Kacey to my firsties} and I am a southern girl!

I was born and raised and still live in the same small Mississippi town.

{ Hey Y’all! }

I just started my 12th year of teaching. This is my 9th year to teach first grade. Between my 4th and 7th year I was an elementary librarian..

I have been married for 10 years.

Things I love: 

monograms, animals, reality tv, food {all of it},lots of color, organized spaces, taking naps, getting the mail, General Hospital, iced tea, sweets, and a beach vacation with a good book.

Things I don’t love:

snakes, rodents, bugs {yuck!}, crime, suspense or mystery novels, tomatoes, oranges, cleaning, paperwork, coffee, lazy people, talking on the phone and having my picture taken.. {I don’t like that one above at all..}

Getting Ready

 

Sunday means getting things organized and ready for a new week.. Week #2 for us!

This week will be all about color words, number words and our first word family- the “at family”.

As part of their homework Thurday night my students had to fill out this little mini questionnaire form. It has their name, age, favorite color and five things they love. I took their pictures and made it into our first class book this weekend.

{I whited out our school name on the cover}

I also spent time getting papers and lesson plans organized and ready for a new week.

And, look who is going to school with me this week… PETE

Have a great Sunday afternoon!

The word in blogland is that Teacher Week is starting tomorrow..

Head on over to I’m Blog Hoppin to find out the schedule.

Brown Bear Activities Part II {free downloads}

 

This was our first whole week back at school.. I am tired and sick.

Welcome back to life, huh!

But, it was a good week and we had fun with lots of Brown Bear activities.

You can click below to see my first Brown Bear post and find some free downloads.

Brown Bear, Brown Bear Post I

---

We used letter stamps to stamp color words next to the pictures.

You can download this paper at the end of this post.

I made a simple little Brown Bear, Brown Bear book that we worked in each day after lunch. They had to write I simple sentence that went along with the book..

I see a ______________.

Then they colored the picture the correct color. This was excellent sentence writing practice. I wrote the sentence on the board and they had to copy it.

You can download the book below too.

We used the pocket chart cards and the matching heads & tails cards that I posted in this post.

We also spelled the color words using letter tiles on Brown Bear cards.

These were a big hit and the kids loved them.

You can download them below too.

Download links:

Brown Bear Stamping Paper

Brown Bear Book

Brown Bear Cards

---

If you download my items please leave a comment letting me know! I LOVE to hear from you!

I would also REALLY love for you to add my blog button and/or my blog link to your sidebar.

 

Have a great weekend!

xoxo, Kacey

Money Posters & Bumble Bees

Two days down this week… and

I am TIRED!

Wiped Out.

Seriously, I am so worn out when school is over all I want to do is take a nap.
I know it is like this every year.
Okay, enough complaining! HA!

These new snazzy dazzy money posters I made stirred up lots of questions last week when I posted them. I finally remembered to take some close up pictures today so I could share about them.

Not that there is a lot to say….

They are made using colored poster board, money cut-outs and scrapbooking paper.

{I use a TON of scrapbooking paper in my room!!}

I used my cricut machine to cut the letters. The font is LDJ Martian Mania.

I glued the letters and money on the poster board, drew a cloud around each one and laminated them.

That’s all!

---

I also wanted to show you these fun {and crazy looking} bumble bees we made. They turned out pretty cute for a first time art project.

I am off to bed! Good might teacher friends!

Zebra Calendar Numbers {Free Download}

A few weeks ago I shared some days of the week and months of the year cards..

You can click here to see them.

I created these date cards to match.

I am currently using them on my calendar…

You can download them below.

Enjoy!

Zebra Calendar  Date Cards #1-31

If you download these cards- please leave a comment!

I would love to know that you are planning on using them!

I would also love for you to add my blog link or button to you blog! Thank you!!

Classroom Pics- Picture post #4

 

Hope you are having a great Saturday. I am busy working on stationery orders and trying to catch up on emails. I’m taking a little break to share the last of my classroom pictures with you.. These are just random shots but I will “explain” a few things in each one.

This is the table right beside my door. Students put their folders in the basket when they come in every morning. I put their morning work on my stool every morning. So, they pick up their work when they walk by.

The small bulletin board is where I hang pictures of my students. Especially if they are in the newspaper. I live in a small town so this board will be full of newspaper clipping before the end of the year.

The purple bucket underneath the table is the magazine bucket. I use magazines a lot with my first graders.

Bible verse above the door.. benefits of teaching in a private, Christian school!!

These are the name labels for my coat hooks. The graphics are from Lettering Delights.

My desk area- and whooo hooo .. look how clean!! Any other time there are STACKS of stuff! I am a really organized person but I also have lots of stuff!

The sign above my computer hung outside my door for awhile. I made it a few summers ago.

The purple bulletin board behind my desk is where I hang personal stuff or important notes/memos that I need to see frequently.

Cubby area.
This picture was taken before my students arrived but soon they will have a math and phonics workbook. We also store center or work that needs to be finished in the cubbies.

My mom made my precious curtains. They have animals on them. I hate I don’t have a close up view because the fabric is awesome! They have been hanging in my room for 5 years now.

The I ♥ Mrs. Kacey poster was a former student’s 100 day project. You can’t tell but the letters are acorns glued to the poster. So there are 100 of them.. precious!

And there is our little gumball machine!! My new first graders are loving it too!

We have desk- and I have a love/hate relationship with them. I love them when I am teaching whole group. I hate them when are doing centers or group activities. We spend lots of time on the floor..In my dream classroom I would have desk and table space for each student.

This is a view from my desk looking toward by door.

You can see my little reading table {with my smurfs, HA!} and the book shelves with all my books.

And, yep.. I really, really do NEED all those plastic buckets and baskets stacked up on top!!! HA! You can never have enough can you??

This is looking from the door to my desk.

Close up of my stool.. my mom painted it the same time she made my curtains..

Have a great weekend.. I am off to work on my orders. Tomorrow I need to do some lesson planning.

It’s all about Brown Bear, Brown Bear for us next week.. we are ready to review and practice those color words!!

Classroom Pics- Post #3

 

Day #2 is done.. whew! Remember I said I had a date this afternoon..

my couch and dvr are awaiting.

Here are a few more classroom pictures.

I made these words for my hall bulletin board but then I changed my mind about what I wanted to do.. so, I put them up in my room.  I love the colors!

This is the main bulletin board in our hallway. I was assigned August as my month.. This board is huge- it looks like a normal size in this picture but it actually is much larger than it looks.

I also have to admit that my mom painted the sun.. she took over that project for me!

This is the bulletin board right outside of my classroom. I always put my student’s names on this board but they wouldn’t fit with the alligator so I put names on my door right beside.it.

Alright.. gotta go.. Big Brother, General Hospital, and America’s Got Talent area all waiting for me!

Classroom Pics–Post #2

 

Well, I survived the first day.. and I am TIRED! Just like every year.. I wonder if I have enough patience to “train” another group.. but, I am sure I have plenty.

This is my calendar/morning board corner.

The board on the left side is where I display good work each week. If a student’s paper gets selected to go on the board they earn a sticker for their sticker chart.

Here is a close up of my calendar board. I want to put birthdays in that empty spot where I put the “welcome back to school” sign.. but after thinking about it I think I am going to put birthdays above the board on the wall.. so I need something else for that big empty spot..

I do like to put something seasonal or something theme/unit related on my board to change it a little throughout the year but I think that space is too big and it looks empty right now.

Front view- with money signs and community supply shelf.

 

My kids keep their own school supply box with pencils, colors and a glue stick. This shelf is here for when they need something they don’t have.

 

Tomorrow is another 1/2 day.. thankfully. I am not ready for a whole day yet!