Cutting Practice

A few years ago, I read a blog post from Shuna over at Pocket Full of Kinders about teaching your students to cut.  I never "taught" my students to cut, we just dove right into it.  Her post made a lot of sense because some of the students honestly had never seen a pair of scissors in their lives and definitely needed some practice.

We try to make everything relevant, so I told them we were making salad.  I made all our parts out of bulletin board paper.  We started by TEARING paper.  I forgot to take a picture of this somehow.  The point of tearing the paper is to teach them that their hands have to WORK TOGETHER.  This was very frustrating for some students, but that's ok! Encourage, encourage, encourage! Have them tear their paper into a plate to save the scraps and a mess!   Next I gave them a yellow strip of paper to practice SNIPPING.  We called this the cheese for our salad.  I told them it was like a chef that cut up veggies super fast but we were gonna "snip snip snip" instead of "cut cut cut" and they loved that.  This teaches them to make small quick cuts while letting their hands work together.

The last thing we did that day was FRINGE cut.  This helps teach them control with the scissors! (We called this our hula napkin.)  When we practiced we would say "cut, cut, cut and STOP" so that they didn't cut all the way through.  I reminded them again that their hands had to work together.

The next day, we practiced cutting long strips.  This is important to us because when we do a cut and paste worksheet they have to do this and we want to minimize trash and do it efficiently.

We also practiced cutting curved lines, zig zag lines and wavy lines.  This was somewhat difficult, but they did quite well with the task!

Finally we cut out shapes, a circle, triangle and square, which didn't seem to be a problem for anyone after all of that cutting and somehow I missed pictures of that! 

The prep work for the first part is a little time consuming but so worth it! If you'd like some extra practice with the second part, grab it here for free! 

How do you help your students learn to cut?

Currently September

You know I'm horrible with keeping up with these things, but it's time for Oh Boy 4th Grade's Currently!

Listening - The washing machine is going and I'm listening and half way watching Nick at Nite.  Who else loves Full House? Seriously...I watch it every night.

Loving - This 3 day weekend is just what I needed.  The workdays plus first week of school wore me out and I had a ton of things I needed to catch up on!

Thinking - I'm working on Grad School homework...yep at 1am.  I'm also distracted.  I think I have ADD.  I don't want to finish it but I need to.

Wanting - It's late...I want to go to bed.  Enough said!

Needing - You probably would call this a want, getting my nails done is a need.  It's the only thing I really do for myself.  I love a mani/pedi and it's just about time! 

3 trips - I have never been to Vegas, Hawaii, or the Bahamas.  I haven't been much of anywhere as a matter of fact! I'd love to go to any of them! (Maybe the TpT conference next year for Vegas?)

Alright, your turn! Head over and link up! 

Chicka Chicka Boom Boom Letters

School is back in full swing and we have been busy busy! We started out the week with one of my FAVORITE books! 

But we also listened to this cute song here:

One of the many activities we did was cover the first letter of our name with tissue paper.  I love a tissue paper craft! :)  I used Kimberly Geswein's Janda Manatee Bubble Font to make the letters for each child.

And when we finished, I whipped up this coconut tree using bulletin board paper.  This is the first year I've had so many students with the same first initial, so I tried to space them out, but they still look super cute for our first are project! 

We did some more Chicka Chicka Boom Boom goodies and a there were a few we didn't quite get to, but I'll post those later.  What's your favorite Chicka Chicka Boom Boom activity?

My Doctor and Me ABC

Dr. Stephanie Cox contacted me earlier this month and wanted to share a book she had written with me.  She thought maybe I could use it in my class and that my students would benefit from it.  I was immediately drawn to the cute illustrations on the cover and knew that ABCs were something my Kindergarteners would benefit from, so I told her I would absolutely love to see and review it!

This book is available through the Kindle App and also in a print version you can order through Amazon.com.  

I loved the book, y'all! Each letter has a term related to the doctor's office and an explanation for it.  Every page has words that rhyme.  

This book could be used during your Community Helpers unit, during your Alphabet Unit, or to locate rhyming words.  I have used my iPad under my document camera in the classroom and that way the students can see the words and the pictures while you read it aloud to them. 

Not only is this book great for all of those things, but also if a child was scared of or had not been to the doctor, this would be a great way to explain to them the ins and outs of the doctor's office.

I would totally recommend it!  Swing by Amazon and grab a copy for your classroom!  Thanks Dr. Cox for sharing this amazing book with me!

Cooking up a Great Year

I'm super excited to be teaming up with 24 other bloggers this week to bring you back to school activities and awesome recipes! So get ready to find lots of fun activities and new recipes to start your school year off right! 

If you're like me, when school starts, things are BUSY! I'm always looking for something I can cook in my Crockpot that will get my family several meals (dinners and leftovers) but most importantly provides us with something reasonably healthy and a hot meal!  This is one of our favorites!  

Meatball Subs:

Start with these meatballs from Sam's Club. (I'm sure you can get another kind somewhere else, but these are our favorites!)

Throw them on the Crockpot  I don't measure them...I just throw them in.

Throw in 2 jars of sauce!  This is the kind I use. It's low sodium....and we're all about that!

Cook on low all day.  Ignore the sides of my Crockpot...but this is what they look like when they are done.

Next you need some buns.  These are the kind we use.  It's hard to find a healthy bun really, but these aren't too bad.

Put your meatballs in the bun.  The serving size is 4, but you could use more or less.  I add a little extra sauce.

Add some cheese to the top.

Stick in the Toaster oven and toast until its melted.  We keep it classy and eat on paper plates in our house. 

And that's how you make a meatball sub friends! I had some fruit with this because that was plenty of calories.  We also boil noodles so we can have spaghetti with leftover meatballs.  This is perfect for lunches! We just recently started eating gluten free ones. 

Seriously, it tastes the same...but don't overcook it! 

Now for some activities that are meatball related! 

This is a book we all know and love, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs! 

If you don't have the book, here's a read aloud. It's kind of long though!

There's also some fun songs!

All of those go nicely with my freebie for this fun hop:

This freebie sampler gives you a few handouts to practice uppercase and lowercase letters as well as beginning sounds with your students all with a fun Spaghetti and Meatballs theme!  Let your students listen to the story and sing the fun songs and use these as a follow up.  

If you want more fun activities to complete with your students using this theme, grab this pack:

It includes fun games and worksheets to practice beginning of the year skills! 

Now, it's time for a giveaway!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

But that's not all! There are lots of other awesome blogs to read, freebies to grab, and recipes to look at.  Click the chef's hat to go to your next top.  Happy Hopping!!