Candace Teaching Things

Winter break is here and unfortunately I caught the flu! I am doing a little better now and am anxious for the new year to begin. We got close to 2 feet of snow just before and on Christmas Eve. We truly had a white Christmas! Near my house there is a great hill area for sledding and the kids LOVE it. Snow is just what they ordered. Speaking of snow. I can't wait to introduce a new game I made called, Will it Snow? I find that my students can always use more practice reading sight words and they love games. Here is a game to give them that opportunity. The game comes with 3 different sets for extra fun :)  How to play: Decide a set playing time. (Example: 3 minutes, 5 minutes, etc ). Each set has different characters and words: The koalas, worms, and monsters are wishing it will snow. Draw cards and read sight words to see if it will snow!           Each player takes a turn by drawing a card from the top of the pile. If players read the word on

Winter break is almost here!  It's around this time that I notice my students getting antsy and excited for the break to come. I don't know about your students but my students seem to have a harder time staying focused and engaged during our afternoon math block.  If your students are like mine, you've probably searched for fun and engaging math activities to do this time of year.  Here are some of my ideas to keep kids engaged during your math block. 1. Math Story Problem Mad-Libs Yes, you read that correctly - story problems. Story problems can be hard, but I have found that my students are more engaged when they get to make up parts of the story problems. I created these Winter/Christmas Themed story problem mad-libs so students could create their own story problems with some guidance. I like to use it whole class and in math centers so students get lots of practice.                    If you're interested, you can find the packet here for

December is always a busy and sometimes stressful time of year. So I always try to remember to do things to de-stress.  Laughter is a great way. In the classroom, one way we get lots of laughs is through reading stories. Here are a few of my December favorites: My students have always LOVED these stories and they alway giggle when I read them.  Even though December always seems to fly by, it is still a great time to learn and practice what we have already learned.  One of my favorite activities is Punctuation Practice. I have found that my students can always use more punctuation practice.  This packet is what I use to provide that practice opportunity: Here are the ways I use it in my classroom: Whole Class Sorting - we use the colored sentence strips and sort the sentences together as a class. We put statements under the period heading, questions under the question mark heading and exclamations under the exclamation point heading. Centers - after we ha

How was Thanksgiving? Mine was divine - full of yummy food and relaxing. Did you shop on  Black Friday? We poked around Wal-mart but I didn't want to wait in the check-out lines. So we came back the next day and were still able to get the deals! At our Wal-mart, they had a set of 30 sharpies for just $10.  Speaking of deals - be sure to check out Teachers Pay Teachers for Cyber Sales on November 27th and 28th. You can find great deals at my store as well! Just click below to see! Candace Teaching Things With Thanksgiving weekend winding down, I can't help being excited for winter activities. It always seems to be a joyous time for the students as well and there are many ways to incorporate winter into the classroom. One tradition I love in winter is making snowflakes. It hasn't snowed here yet, but as soon as it snows the snowflake fun begins. Here is what this looks like in my classroom: 1. We read lots of books about snow. I like to read non-fiction

Thanksgiving is just around the corner! What are some traditions you do with your students to celebrate? Every year, it has been a tradition in our Kindergarten class to hold a Thanksgiving Feast. This was done for many years even before I joined the Kindergarten team. I have come to love having a feast.  Here's a look at what this tradition entails in my classroom: 1. We bring the tables together to form one long table and cover them with orange or brown butcher paper. We all sit around the table together. The day before we make name tags and then I put the students next to kids they don't normally sit by.  It is a great way to build class community and celebrate this holiday.  2. The kids love bringing something to share with the class. It's usually finger foods like cheese sticks, pretzels, apple slices, etc. However, at one school I taught at, they did actual Thanksgiving food which was a lot more preparation for teachers and parents. So,

Yoga in the classroom? While student teaching, my mentor teacher had a time each week when the 4th graders would push the desks to one side of the room and get out yoga mats for a yoga session. I loved it and the kids loved it. At home, I do yoga pretty regularly and I have loved the benefits of feeling better, more relaxed and less stressed. Why not share this with students? It has benefits for them! Kids need to be taught ways to calm themselves down and yoga is one way they can do that. When I began teaching Kindergarten, I wanted to include yoga in my classroom but I do it a little differently from my mentor teacher since Kindergarteners are quite different from 4th graders. Here are some things that I have done in my own classroom to share yoga with students. 1. Yoga sessions. I don't do full on yoga sessions very often - maybe once a month or close to a holiday when I know students can get hyped up easily. I find different kids yoga videos on youtube. You can find grea