First Day of Pre-K Gifts

This past Thursday was my daughter's first day of Pre-K for the 2012-2013 school year. Here are some pictures of the gifts we made for her teacher and classroom aide for this year as well as the new teacher in her old room and the aide who was with her last year.

Pete the Cat

We've got Pete the Cat Fever in Kindergarten at William Holliday!  This past week, Pete has grooved his way into our hearts!  

Mrs. Skillern reading Pete the Cat Rocking in My School Shoes

The Kindergarten students learned that no matter what they do all day they should be "rocking in their school shoes!"

Click the link below to hear:   

Audio of Pete the Cat performed by Eric Litwin

Click the link below to see a short clip of the book on YouTube:
Pete the Cat Rocking in His School Shoes Video

Here's our Pete the Cat I drew and painted for the Hallway outside of our classroom.

On Tuesday, Mrs. Brown, our superintendent, came and read Pete the Cat and His Four Groovy Buttons.   The students learned that "although 'buttons' may come and go, we shouldn't get upset and we should keep on singing."

Click the link below to hear:
Audio of Pete the Cat and His Four Groovy Buttons performed by author Eric Litwin

Click the link below to see a short clip of Pete's Groovy Buttons on YouTube:
Video of Pete the Cat and His Four Groovy Buttons


I was able to share the book Pete the Cat I love My White Shoes.

Click the link below to hear:
Audio of Pete the Cat I Love my White Shoes performed by author Eric Litwin

Click the link below to see a live performance by Eric Litwin of Pete the Cat I love My White Shoes  on YouTube:
Video of Pete the Cat I Love My White Shoes


The original idea for this project came from Deanna Jump's Blogspot, and I added a few of my own twists to the project.  You can see Deanna's projects by clicking: Here

Here's a sample of a project we made for Pete the Cat I Love my White Shoes.  Students did this project in in several steps over a couple of days.  

We made our Petes out of shapes after a review of the basic shapes in math.  Students had to listen and follow the directions about how to use each of the shapes that I had precut and prepackaged in a zipper bag for them.  I have them creative rein over the whiskers and shoes and encouraged them to put shoe laces on the shoes.

For the writing part of the project, students had to think about what Pete could have stepped in that would have turned their shoes the color they had made the previous day.  We did a shared writing on the page, and students created the drawing on the page.  

The next step of the project was to put the Petes and the papers on the yellow paper and then take the pieces that made the sentence about "I love my ____ shoes." and put them in order on the paper.

I love their expressions!

Look at Pete rocking these shoes!

They were so creative with what Pete stepped in to turn his shoes the different colors!

Here's an example of a math center for Pete the cat this week with patterning.  This activity is available at: Heidi's Songs

Here are 3 more centers featuring Pete the Cat this week.  On the left, is a book from Fran Kramer from Kindergarten Crayons, in the center from Heidi's Songs Coloring Pete's Shoes, and a Stamp the Letter to Match from Fran Kramer at Kindergarten Crayons.  Click below to visit her Blog.  I LOVE it!

Here's another great activity from Kindergarten Crayons!  The students built these sentences all by themselves using a pattern and clues and resources from around the room.

Kissing Hand Literacy and Math Stations

Here are some of the Literacy and Math Stations that the kindergarten students participated in this week.  All of the centers are based off of Audrey Penn's book The Kissing Hand and feature the beloved character Chester Raccoon.  

These centers are available from Kissing Hand Literacy and Math Centers and are designed by Jayme Pierce.  Here's a link to her Kinderbabies website:  http://kinderbabies.blogspot.com .  Here are some images of the stations that can be downloaded for free from Teacher's Notebook.  She just added a new activity for the Kissing Hand  using Ten Frames.  I'll be adding that one to our center's rotation soon!

Here are some of the samples I built for making patterns, how many?, The missing letter, and the pieces and class book used to build Chester Loves School  pocket chart book.  The students had a great time with the pocket chart and really enjoyed building a story they could "read."

Here there is an ABC game, Chester color matching and color book, missing letter cards with Velcro, and matching lower and uppercase letter center.  I modified the center with the letters by punching a hole in each of the cards and attaching a plastic link to help the students hold the matches together.  This is not shown in the picture.

Here are the cards for the dice game.  In this game, students roll a die and move that number of spaces.  If they land on a Chester they get an extra turn, if they land on a tree stump, they have to go back 2 spaces.  The students really enjoyed this game!

Jayme designed these cards as a matching activity.  I modified the activity by punching a hole in each of the cards and using plastic links to help keep the matches together as students made them.  Fine motor work and math all in one!