Planting Zinnias

This was an ugly rainy week for most of the Kindergarten classes, but fortunately, we made it over to the garden! This week, Ms. Joni taught us how to plant Zinnia seeds in plastic cups.  They filled plastic cups with soil, used their two fingers to make a "peace sign" to put two holes in the soil, put two seeds in, and then covered them up.  Easy peasy!

We haven't been to the garden in 3 weeks because of the break and the plants had grown so much!  Ms. Joni sent some strawberries back with us to cut up and eat...they were delicious! :) 

Before we left a few rain drops got us, but thankfully the bottom didn't fall out until about 30 minutes later.  The kids really enjoy the garden and we are so thankful for Ms. Joni and Ms. Doris for always teaching us something new! 

The kids always seem to be more fascinated with the bugs than the plants, so when we get to worm week this group should have a blast! :)  

We will be studying all about plants this week coming up and I can't wait to show them a few really neat things with plants that will connect with what Ms. Joni has been teaching us!

Needs some plant activities?

We're using these fun centers in our room next week :)  What activities do you like to do with plants?

Easter Party

I love Easter! Usually for us, it means Spring Break is coming, but also it means we get to have a fun party!

So what do we do for our party? First, we have an egg hunt! Every child brings at least 21 eggs.  We number the eggs from 1-21.  Every child gets a number from 1-21 (or how many ever kids we have.) Then every child hunts for their number only! This is great for number recognition! You can differentiate based on what level your kids are on and the egg hunt lasts more than a second.  Also...it makes it fair!

 Then we go back in the room and look through our eggs to make sure we didn't get anyone else's.  Believe it or not...it happens.  Sometimes random eggs but especially 6 gets 9 and 16 and 19 and 12 and 21 ... those are the ones that get mixed up the most even when we put lines on them.  So we get them all straight and let everyone eat a piece of candy and then put them away.

 Then on to our "party!"  For the party, we have several activities going on where the students rotate.  This gives them a chance to do several things we didn't have a chance to get to during the week that are thematic, makes small groups, and makes the party centered around learning.

Tissue paper Easter Eggs

Graphing M&Ms

Jelly Bean Addition

 Easter Egg Dying

Peep Sight Word Memory

 We did finish up with some yummy food, but I missed pictures of that because I went to my own little guy's Easter Party where they were flying kites and having an egg hunt!  We had a great time! Did you do anything special for Easter?

War Heads

On Friday we have our spelling test...as an incentive, we let the kids go to the treat jar if they make a 100.  We found some war heads in there and got some pretty funny reactions from the kids.  We wished we had enough to let everyone try them because they were so funny and cute and everyone wanted to try, so Miss Currie bought some more and we let everyone have a try.  It was really the cutest thing ever.  These silly moments where we get to take a break from all the structure, curriculum and seriousness sometimes just make it all worthwhile.  I love these kids...take a look :)

Have you ever tried War Heads in your classroom?  What's fun in your class?

Peeps Play Dough

I'm still alive! Sorry for my mini hiatus! :) I have been a busy girl! I find it hard to juggle all of my duties and let's face it, we all fall short of the glory once in a while, so blogging took a backseat to everything else.  The good news?  My family is happy and healthy, I have 2 A's in my grad school classes and I've lost 27lbs.  The bad news? You've missed out on everything that's been happening in Kindergarten!  Don't worry - I'm about to update you!

As some of you may know, I am participating in the ECU Co-Teaching program this year, so I have two full time interns right now! This has been a huge change for me!  I am missing teaching the whole group a ton right about now, but they are just about finished and I am getting my babies back :) While they have been teaching, I have been able to work with small groups and one-on-one, which has boosted some of my friends to grade level and been really nice!

Something fun Miss Eonta did with the students last week came from something I posted on my Facebook page.  Maybe you saw it? Peeps Play Dough anyone?

So basically you need Peeps, Powdered Sugar and Coconut Oil.  Miss Eonta decided to give each kid 2 Peeps instead of 3 so she played with methods a little bit.  She ended up microwaving them all at once for about a minute (40 of them) and the coconut oil. (Multiply the coconut oil and powdered sugar to fit your needs if you do it this way.)  The powdered sugar gets added afterwards.  She mixed it with her hands and gave everyone a pinch.  Don't judge us for our plates, we use what we have haha :) 

Here's the kids playing with their play dough.  It was perfect! 

                                            We tried some too...it was very sweet, but not bad! 

She did lots of fun stuff with Peeps last week and they taunted me all week.  I felt like the big marshmallow guy from Ghostbusters from eating all those Peeps.  I'll be glad when all the Easter candy is gone!  Anyone else make this?