I'm Back.....Catch Up and a Freebie!

Oh my, let me tell you.  Life happens.  Sometimes people tell me they can't believe I teach Kindergarten, blog, create resources, and have a life.  Well all 4 of those things DON'T always happen all together.  It's been over a month since I've blogged or created so I'm feeling like a part of me is missing (cause I live for that fun stuff) but WAY MORE important stuff has been happening.  

Here's a little catch up :) 

November 5th my daughter joined the Navy and left for boot camp.  Holy cow it's still not real to me!  

So now my days are spent teaching Kindergarten and rushing home to check the mail (still waiting for our first REAL letter).  We got a form letter with her address on it but that's it.  It is NOT EASY to be a Navy parent and I give props to everyone who has ever gone through this!  It's killing me not knowing exactly how she is doing right at this very moment.  I have a lot of faith in her, just still a worried mom! 

I have had a ton to share about our Kindergarten days and I missed out on showing you all kinds of pumpkin fun but it's just too late to talk about all of that.  To make up for it I took my favorite activity from this week to share.  Here is a little preview: 

 

This is part of my Easy Prep Centers: All Set? You Bet! unit for November.  We used little tokens to build the words as we said them first.  

 Then students moved the tokens out of the way and wrote down the sounds.  My goal for this activity was to combine phoneme segmentation (which 99% of my kids have down pat!) and letter sounds.  Most of them are ready for this, but a few still struggle.  It really showed me who knows the middle vowel sounds, who needs help segmenting, and who has it! 

 Did I mention they loved it?  They asked if this was going to become a regular center.  I said, "Of course!"  How could I not? 

Here is a link to the FREEBIE.  Each month I have a whole set of ELA and Math centers just like this that can be printed out and ready to go in a flash!  With so much going on at home (or lack of anything going on at home) I haven't had the energy to plan as much so these have been a LIFE SAVER this month! 

...and here is the whole set! 

Hopefully it won't be a full month between blog posts next time but I honestly can't promise that right now!! Not until I hear from my sailor! Until next time, happy teaching!