Let's Get Acquainted Linky (March 31)

I am linking up with Latoya from Flying into First Grade for her Let's Get Acquainted Linky party.

(Click the graphic to link up.)

This week I am completing her

Favorites Survey

Favorite Place to Shop

My long time favorite place to shop is Macy's. They always have amazing deals. I really wish I had one closer to where I live now.

My more recent favorite is Express. They have the cutest stuff! It can be kinda pricey, but they send out coupons often.

Favorite TV Show

It is so hard for me to pick just one favorite TV show. If I had to pick just one, I would pick So You Think You Can Dance. I never miss an episode!

I have also been re-watching Malcolm in the Middle over my Spring Break. I used to watch it when I was a kid. Hilarious!

Favorite Sweet Treat

My favorite sweet treat would be my Mom's brownies. She makes the best Peanut Butter Cream Cheese Brownies. YUM!

Favorite Food

My favorite food is Pan Fried Shrimp Dumplings. They are seriously to die for. They come from my favorite restaurant...

Favorite Restaurant

P.F. Changs! Soooo good. I always order Shrimp Dumplings and Shrimp Lo Mein. Have you ever tried their Great Wall of Chocolate? If you haven't, you're missing out!

Don't forget to link up and share your favorites!

Tomorrow I head back to school. It is going to be hard to get up after sleeping in all week, but I'm excited to see my kiddos.

Five for GOOD Friday (March 29)

I'm linking up with Doodle Bugs Teaching for Five for (Good) Friday.

1. I had an amazing Spring Break this week. I was able to spend most of it with my family. We shopped and ate (my favorite things to do) for five days straight. It was great to have some time to relax with the fam!

2. Time for another kitty picture. This was my view when I woke up this morning...

3. Here is my March Scholastic haul. It is smaller than my past couple, but free is still FREE! My kids love Max the Duck and the Doreen Cronin books.

4. Speaking of free... I just ordered a sample of Teacher's Tape through The Mailbox.com. I haven't tried it before (so I don't know how well it works), but I never pass up a free sample! Here's where you can get yours.

5. I finished my Sizzlin' Summer Centers! This is my biggest pack of centers yet. Woo hoo! I had fun making them, but nothing beats the feeling of getting things done. Now I have a LOT of laminating and cutting to do.

I just signed up for educents. It is like a groupon for teachers and will have educational products 30-90% off! How awesome is that? 

If you sign up before April 2, you get $10 FREE to spend! I can't wait! Click the picture to sign up and get your credit.

Have a fabulous Easter weekend!

Let's Get Acquainted Linky (March 24th)

I am linking up with Latoya Reed from Flying in First Grade for her Let's Get Acquainted Linky party!

This week we are playing the Noun Game and naming our favorite person, place, thing, and animal.

Person

I can't pick just one favorite person. My favorite group of people is my family. 

(Isn't it wrong to pick favorites anyway?)

Place

My favorite place is the beach! My family goes every summer and I count down the days until we leave. (Six months left!) I could lay on the beach/by the pool all day every day.

Thing

My favorite thing would have to be my phone. I'd be lost without it. I have it with me at all times. It can do everything and I use it all the time! I may have a mild case of Nomophobia...

Animal 

My favorite animals are my kitty babies of course. I love them to death.

What are your favorite things? Don't forget to link up by clicking on the picture at the top of this post!

Five for Friday and a FREEBIE

I'm linking up with Doodle Bugs Teaching again for Five for Friday.  I love this linky because it give me an excuse to be totally random!

1. First, I will share which was my "lie" from the Let's Get Acquainted linky this week. A couple of you guessed it... I do NOT have a purple belt in karate. It was so hard for me to think of a lie! I have lived in five states. Growing up we moved a lot for my Dad's work. I danced competitively for eight years (all through high school and college). Now I teach a high school dance team and I love it! They are two time State Champs!

2. On Monday, we had to cram the whole school in one hallway for a tornado warning! It was crazy but good practice, and the weather wasn't too bad. My kids were so well behaved!

3. We have been working on the 5 senses this week. I got some good ideas and resources from Nicole at Mrs. Ricca's Kindergarten. (If you haven't checked out her blog, you should! It is amazing and she has the BEST freebies.) Like her school, our science curriculum is not the best. Here's some of what we did:

First, we labeled a chart together.

The students labeled their own charts afterward. (I got these as a freebie from Nicole here.)

We practiced using our five senses with different types of apples. We observed, touched, tasted, and smelled.

The students observed both the outside and the inside of their apples.

(You can download this observation page in the freebie below.)

We tasted three different types of apples and graphed our favorites.

(This data page is also included in the freebie.)

You can download the apple data pages here. I hope you enjoy this FREEBIE!

4. We had a teacher in-service day today. Call me crazy, but I love them!

5. It's officially my Spring Break! Woohoo! I hope to finish my summer centers, but we will see how productive I am...

Have a great weekend (or Spring Break)!

Spring Fever!

I'm linking up with Sam from Ms. Kelly's Klass to share my fun springy centers! Click the picture at the bottom to see the linky at her blog.

We just started these springy centers this week. I love all the bright colors! This is my first set of centers that I have available to buy math or literacy separately. You save $2 if you buy them bundled! There are 10 centers in all. Each has a page with visual directions and recording sheet. Here is a look at a few of them:

Here the kids are sorting pictures that show equal halves and those that do not.

The kids practice matching the number to the number word in this center.

This center works on sight words and making sentences.

This center focuses on time to the hour and the half hour.

For some reason the copier printed the recording sheets on a half page. I didn't think it was worth wasting paper to print new ones.

You can get my April Showers Bring May Flowers centers here.

Don't forget to link up with your spring centers!

New Blogger Feature

Dana from Fun in First Grade does a new blogger feature each Tuesday to introduce her followers to new bloggers. Today I am being featured! Click on the picture to check it out and find out how you can be featured. Thanks Dana!



Let's Get Acquainted Linky--2 Truths and a Lie

I am linking up with Latoya from Flying into First Grade again for her Let's Get Acquainted Linky Party. This week's topic is "two truths and a lie".

Here are my two truths and a lie:

1. I have a purple belt in karate.

2. I have lived in 5 different states. 

3. I danced competitively for 8 years. 

Can you guess which isn't true? I'll share which is a lie at the end of the week. Be sure to link up by clicking on the picture above!

Five for Friday (March 15)

I am joining the craze and linking up with Kacey at Doodle Bugs Teaching for her Five for Friday linky party.

Here are five random things about my week:

1. I finally gave in and bought a new design for my blog. I had a free design before, and I liked it, but it wasn't bright enough for me. I am in love with it now! I got it from Dreamlike Magic. Alicia has a ton of super cute pre-made designs for you to choose from. She even installs them for free! Mine was up about 24 hours later. I am so happy with it and would definitely recommend her to anyone who is looking to change up their design.

2. A virus has been going around my school like crazy. Kids have been going home sick left and right all week long. Luckily, it hasn't gotten to me or my class (knock on wood). I'm hoping we can avoid that. We have been sanitizing and disinfecting like crazy all week. The school nurse was nice enough to get all of the teachers an all natural cleaner/disinfectant for our rooms. Woo hoo!

3.  We have had St. Patrick's Day activities spread all throughout our week. We have read The Night Before St. Patrick's Day  and There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Clover. My kids love the "There Was an Old Lady" books. One of the parents brought us some green treats and had the great idea of putting the kids shoes outside the room during nap so that a leprechaun could leave them some surprises. The kids thought I was crazy when I told them that they had to put their shoes out there because they were too stinky. When they went to retrieve their shoes, they were so excited. I even had one cutie yell, "I love leprechauns!". Its the little things. =)

4. Now that we are done with St. Patrick's Day, I am so excited about next week's centers. It's finally time for Spring! My spring centers are my favorite I have made so far. The graphics are so bright and fun! Now if only we could get the springy weather to stay for good...

5. That brings me to Spring Break. We have a teacher in-service day next Friday, then a week off for break! I love my kiddos, but I am ready for some time to be lazy and visit my family.

I hope you have a wonderful weekend!

Three Things About Me... Let's Get Acquainted Linky!

I am linking up with Latoya from Flying into First Grade and sharing three random things about me for her Let's Get Acquainted Linky Party.  The three things have to be related to my initials, so here we go!

 (Click the picture to join in on the fun!)

My initials are ANC.

A- is for Amazon. (Could you tell I had a hard time coming up with an "A"?) I am a serious bargain shopper. I buy A LOT of things off of Amazon after I look all over the place trying to find the best deal. Finding a bargain always makes my day! I get it from my mom. We text each other all the time to share our savings. I recently got a (fake) leather jacket that was originally $120 for $40. I was thrilled about it for at least a week.

N- is for Naps. This girl loves her sleep. I hardly have time to nap, so when I do I take advantage of it! I am in bed by nine o'clock most nights and I am not someone that is pleasant to wake up, but I have gotten better.

C- is for CATS. I have always loved cats and I finally have two of my own. They are almost a year old now and they are like children to me. They are a little insane, but I wouldn't have them any other way! Here's a picture of my little babies!

Aren't they cute?

St. Patrick's Day Writing

Here is a cute FREE St. Patrick's Day writing activity I found at The Teacher Wife's blog. I wanted to make it out of construction paper like she did, but the printer wasn't cooperating. They still turned out cute! (Sorry they are sideways... the computer isn't cooperating either.)

St. Patrick's Day and International Day

St. Patrick's Day

This week we started using our St. Patrick's Day Centers. So far the kiddos have loved them! Here's a look at what we've been doing...

In this center the student picks a card and then write the number that comes before and after.

The kiddos practice counting by 2, 5, and 10 in this center. (Sorry about the glare!)

Here they are playing one of their favorite sight word games.

This center is a long and short vowel sort.

You can find all of these centers and more here.

Center Organization

I recently found this great blog post about organizing classroom centers. I wasn't happy with the way mine were so I changed it based on this post. It is so simple, I don't know how I didn't think of it myself! Basically, everything is stored in plastic baggies. You will need one gallon size bag and one or more sandwich bag per center. You put the center cover/instruction page on the top so that you can see it through the bag. The pieces go in a small plastic bag (sandwich size) and are placed behind the instruction page. Then, you put any recording sheets in the back. My kids have done a great job of keeping the centers organized with all pieces in the right place. You can see the detailed post at Shelly Gray's blog Teaching in the Early Years. She has pictures and much more detail than my short run-through.

International Day

We also had a school-wide "International Day". Our class learned all about China this week. Then on Friday, every class brought a food item from their country. I was surprised and proud of how adventurous the kids were with trying all the different foods. They had a blast! Here's a peek at some of our class decor we created.

Have a great weekend!