Wacky Wednesday! My Halloween Freebies!

Wacky doesn't even begin to cover it today! Every kid in class was in a total funk today! I swear it became contagious. Days like this make teaching special ed a real challenge. In a regular class, kids can keep going about their business if one kid is out of wack. My little guys need so much help that if one kid is having a tantrum and I get held up, the other kids get thrown off because they can't figure out what to do without specific instructions. I saw 3 sets of tears today (from different kids), several bursts of yelling, door slamming, and a large amount of "NO!" being said (by both them and me!). Did I mention today was Open House and random strangers were touring our school to see if they'd like to bring their kids to our school?! Thank goodness they came in between chaotic moments because of course they had lots of questions about how I run my program and I'm telling them how great it is.

(This is the point where I begin to babble about life as a SPED teacher, so if you don't want to laugh at the thought of me squishing a kid on purpose, you're welcome to skip down to the freebies at the bottom.)

At one point I was laying on a kid to help him calm down. He asked for it, I wasn't punishing him! Some of my kids have autism and crave sensory stimulation to calm down. After a full day of hitting, grabbing, and other inappropriate touching a boy finally asked "Can you squish me?" I about squealed with cheer that he figured out what would make him feel better and asked for it!! I can't do it unless he wants to, or it just makes him more upset. I've tried suggesting it in the past, but he refused. So for math today my little guy laid on the ground on his tummy with a weighted blanket on top of him. Then I laid across his back and he got a full 2 pages of math done without a fight! This was the ONLY completed work out of the entire day, and the only time he didn't touch other people. His mom told me the OT sat on a bean bag on top of him the other day and he liked it, and I could do it too if it would help anything. I'm going to make a reminder card for sensory stimulation so maybe tomorrow he'll ask for it a little sooner if he needs it. I'll post it when it's ready. If you are a SPED teacher and want a modified version of the choice list, just let me know. I realize we all have different equipment/gear in our classrooms.


I'm linking up with Think, Wonder, Teach for Halloween Freebies! I've made a few to share with you. They have become spread out in a few different posts, so now they are all in one! Just click the images!

If you like my Halloween materials, my Numbers to 10 set is only $2.50. I've used the materials in several ways for the last 2 weeks. Feel free to look at other posts to see how I've used them.

Thanksgiving Numbers to 30 Hands On Centers

It's been a great and busy weekend! In the last 3 days I've had a friend's birthday party, my 10 year reunion, shopping with my first TPT check, a soccer game, and lesson planning! Wow! I think I need an extra day in my weekend! I'm super excited to see I'm only 15 followers away from my 100 Follower Giveaway! I already have 3 blogger friends joining in the fun, so there will be not 1 item to win, but 4!!! If you'd like to join in and be part of the giveaway, please let me know by shooting me an email to teacherlisasclass@gmail.com

I've just finished my newest item for my TPT store. It just so happens to also be the item I'll be putting up for grabs during my giveaway. I had every intention of waiting...but I was so excited about this new hands-on learning center that I couldn't wait to tell you about it!!

•Pilgrim Hats: Counters

•Turkeys with Solid Numbers:

–Write the Room

–Counting Practice using Pilgrim Hat Counters

•Cornucopia with Dashed Numbers: Tracing Practice (laminate and trace with dry erase markers)

•Write the Room Student Response Sheet

•Count and Match Game

Freebie Friday!!

Happy Friday! It's such a busy day for me, so this will be short and sweet. It's a teacher work day today, so no kiddos! I also have a b-day party and my 10 year high school reunion to go to. Crazy!! I love my class, but days without them are so calm and stress free, and I certainly need that on such a busy day! I teach at a K-12 school so when we have an in-service they are pretty much useless for half of the staff. We all have to listen to the same speaker, and clearly the things I use with my kinder kids are not the same as the high school teachers. Odds are I'll be working on creating my Thanksgiving learning centers while I sit in the back of the room with my laptop! My plan is to give the centers activities away in my 100 Follower Giveaway. I'm only 20 followers away from it!! If you'd like be a part of the giveaway, please let me know. You can donate a prize and be featured on my blog. The more the merrier!

Today's  Freebie is one I featured earlier this week, but I've learned linking up with Freebie Friday lets more people know about great goodies, so I'm posting it again. I bought these cute purple plastic bats at the Target Dollar Spot (they are actually $2.50) and my kids loved them. They were only supposed to learn numbers to 9 this week, but they liked it so much that we went to 20 this week because they kept asking for more. I wasn't about to say no to learning!!

My Full Numbers to 10 Centers at TPT

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Learning Through Halloween!

My kids are going nuts over all the Halloween activities. It's amazing how all I need to do is add a bat or pumpkin to a very mundane activity and suddenly they think it's the best thing ever! I'm taking full advantage of this. I picked up more little bats at Target tonight for our counting activities. One kid who usually hates working had a tantrum this morning because I wouldn't let him count pumpkins during reading time. How funny is it that telling a kid "you can't learn math now" turns into a 20 minute pouting session?! Looks like I need to add more pumpkins to reading time. For today, the bats initial and final sounds activity worked pretty well.The initial and final sounds came from here at First Grade Parade. The bat picture/number cards to 20 were a freebie I posted yesterday. The kid who was working on them begged for them ALL DAY after he found the new cards this morning!

The pocket books are a continuing work in progress, and the kids are still completely loving them. The best part is how eery quiet they are while working. The kids are so excited about each project that they get a little disappointed when I tell them to put it in their pocket and wait until all the pockets are full to take the book home. They just want to rush home and share the projects with their parents. Too cute! It was a rough afternoon for one little guy, so no pics of the project today. In a nutshell, the kinders drew pictures of their Halloween costumes and practiced writing the name of their costume. The 1st/2nd kids read about owls and started a mini owl report. It still needs some work, so that will take attempt #2 tomorrow. I was busy with the rough day kiddo, and couldn't help the boys, so they did the best they could with zero examples or scaffolding. Tomorrow will be a re-do day for them.

Halloween Pocket Books and Counting Pumpkins

Happy Monday! My day went surprisingly well for a Monday (minus the kid whose parents were an hour and a half late!!!). I taught the kids a new sight word practice strategy, Kindergarten practiced their counting skills, and we started our newest theme pocket books. Have I mentioned how AWESOME Evan-Moor theme pockets are?! I am in no way paid or encouraged to promote these, but I'm OBSESSED with them!! They teach common core standards in fun hands-on ways. Read on to see why I think they are so amazing and totally adorable!

Kindergarten is starting to get pretty good at their sight words, so we practiced identifying them in print. I had the students use a different color for each sight word. We actually did 4 sight words, but I took the pics in the middle of the task. The kids really liked this, even more than I thought they would. My kid with more fine motor skills chose to trace each letter, and one of the boys with fine motor struggles just colored the whole word. I wasn't picky, I just want them to be able to read the words.
 

My Pumpkins, Bats, & Spiders! Oh My! Activities have been a huge hit!! The kids were fighting (more like seriously discussing) who was going to get to count the spiders first! LOVE it when they can't wait to learn! I also bought these perfect little counting pumpkins at Target (did I mention I have a serious Dollar Spot problem?!). They call them "table scatter," but I prefer "fun kindergarten counting stuff!"


 
Time to explain the oh so amazing theme pockets!! I use them all the time for theme units. Some are made up by me, but this week they are made by the wonderful publishers of Evan-Moor. The kindergarten Halloween pockets focus on fine motor and other basic school skills like cutting and gluing. The pockets are: monster puppet, costume popup book, mummy, pull-up Jack O'Lantern, candy corn craft with acrostic poem, and paper bag ghost and riddle activity. Today we focused on making the books and Haunted House cover page.



First/Second graders are doing the Night Creatures theme pocket. They will learn about nocturnal animals, and compare/contrast them. The 3 pockets are: bat, owl, and koala. We made the cover and page labels today, and we'll start the bats pocket tomorrow. The kids were soooo engaged in the activity that I barely heard anything other than the sound of pencils tracing or scissors cutting! Note: I cut the pages and folded/stapled the pockets ahead of time. Older kids can do this...little guys... not so much!

1st/2nd Night Creatures Cover

I alternated the page colors, these are the labels the kids cut and glued

Kinder Halloween Book Cover

The pockets that will be stapled behind the covers when they dry