Run, run, as fast as you can...

Well, I we have survived the second full week of school.  My class is already settling in nicely.  Most of our kids go to half-day preschool before coming to Kindergarten.  Preschool kids go home right after they eat lunch.  So...for the first week or so of school the kids always expect to go home when we return from lunch.  They are so sad when they figure out that we have to stay for 3.5 more hours!  This is a rude awakening to some of them.  Because it is such a LONG day for me them, I always plan the first three weeks to introduce new things daily to keep them excited.  I always save the most exciting "thing" for right after lunch b/c we always need that little "boost" to get through until we go to special class.  I am SO thankful for a principal who understands that we must have special class in the afternoon.  That is such a small thing that makes such a big difference!

Our school using the Treasures Reading Series.  This week's Read Aloud Anthology was "The Gingerbread Boy".  This is one of the kids' favorites of the whole year.  They just love hearing this story and participating when we get to the "Run, run...as fast as you can...you can't catch me, I'm the gingerbread man!"  They nearly squeal in anticipation each time.  Even though I do my big Gingerbread Unit right before Christmas, I do pull out a few activities for the kiddos after we read this story.

 Activity 1 - First, color your gingerbread man exactly how you would like it.

Next, cut out all the pieces and glue them together on a piece of construction paper.

Finally, glue the poem to the bottom of the paper.

To grab a free copy of my poem - CLICK HERE!
*Sorry I didn't get a picture of the final products posted out in the hallway.

Activity 2 - Here the students are playing Cookie Connect Three!

This activity came from a great packet on TpT by Deedee Wills.

You roll the dice, count the spots, trace that # somewhere on the page.

Then, when you get three in a row, up or down, you circle the group.

The kids absolutely loved this game.  I know that it was the highlighter that really did it! 

Activity 3 - This was a page called Ginger's Walk where the kids traced the letters.
One page had uppercase letters.  The other had lowercase letters.

I also had a 3rd page of counting gingerbread men and writing the #.

These pages came from Pocketful of Centers.  CLICK HERE to see unit.

Pam, from PofC, makes the greatest creations.  :)

Another group of boys - one working on upper and one working on lowercase letters.

Activity 4 - Oh, my!  Yes, I did it - I pulled out the dotters on Day 11!

The kids went bananas over this activity.

You would have thought I had a million $s over at that station.

Kids would roll the cube, identify the letter, and dot it on their page.

Who knew this could be SO much fun...and educational...all at the same time. 

Some of my little ones still need lots of practice writing the alphabet.

They also need to see the alphabet in order without singing it aloud.

This is an oldie but goodie!  I don't know what I did before Write-n-Wipes!

Oh...the power of a dry erase marker and a tissue!  HA HA

I am looking forward to Week 3 with my class.  This is our last week of Start Smart.

SS lessons are shorter giving time to teach routines and procedures. 

When we return after Labor Day, we will kick it into full gear.

Hope everyone is having a great start of the school year.

Leaving you with a FREEBIE - just a little something I made for my class.

We are going to use this to review the Gingerbread Man.

I am also going to use this to introduce magnifying glasses!

Enjoy - please leave a comment and let me know what you think.  :)