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Jessica Travis Teaching

lead • learn • love

Pumpkins, Numbers, and More…Oh My!

Happy Saturday friends!

It’s been raining ALL day long here (and yesterday too!) but we’ll take it!  However, that means we are plopped right in front of the TV for the weekend…. as well as taking care of a sick child …. stomach virus = no fun! It’s been making it’s way through the classrooms at school, so it was only a matter of time till one of my boys brought it home.  Hoping he doesn’t share it 😉

It’s also been a challenge keeping the boys away from each other while one is out for the count!

While I may not be doing much this weekend (except giving a little TLC to my kiddos), we have been swamped with pumpkin fun in the classroom the past two weeks.

I just wanted to share a few of the activities that we have been doing… along with some freebies at the end 🙂

The past two weeks we have focused primarily on numbers 1-10 in Math… decomposing/composing, comparing, identifying, etc…

I’m not sure about you, but I am definitely one that likes to teach with themes!  These few weeks just happen to fall before a really fun (and highly anticipated) holiday which allows me to use all things pumpkins, bats, spiders, and creepy crawly things!

Using these themes with Math was no different!  During the first week we focused a number a day (6-10) and had to identify all of the ways that we can represent a number.  This activity was nothing fancy, but super fun!  I had index cards in a bucket each day that had the different ways to represent a number (picture, number, number word, tally marks, ten frame, domino/dice).  Students selected a card and had to sort to the correct anchor chart!  #simple

These pumpkin buckets are something I have used the past few years with different activities and lessons…. 98 cents at most places!
Another fun game we played while working with our numbers to 10 was “Spider Frames” (yes, I totally just made that up!)
I created a large pumpkin out of paper, wrote numbers 1-10 on it, grabbed a bean bag, bag of dollar store spiders, large 10 frame on paper….. and we were set!
Each student had a turn and would build their number using the spiders!  I would question students, “How many more until you get to 10?”,  “What would the very next number be?”  Etc…
Of course it was a BIG deal when someone landed on TEN!!  I mean, filling up a ten-frame is pretty neat… right?!
We also focused on identify numbers on a number line and identifying that if you move one way down the number line, your numbers become less, whereas you move the other way and your numbers become more. 
Again, students chose a number card from the famous pumpkin bucket and went and stood on that number.  They then had to identify a number that was more AND less than the number they were on.
Oh… and of course our number line was created with pumpkins on a vine.  Get it…. a Number Vine Line.
Here is another favorite activity we did with comparing numbers:
Oh Looky there… the pumpkin bucket with numbers!  (again!)
Two students played this game at the same time!  They each came to the bucket, selected a number card and had to build their number on the ten frame.  Taking the greater/more and fewer/less cards, they then had to identify which number was more and which number was less! 
We also did a simple (but favorite) activity to help us compose/decompose the number 10.  
Just some more themed cups (my kiddos are probably SO tired or orange by now!)
After the students “shake and spill” their cup, they count the number of red and number of yellow counters to equal ten!  Super easy…. and FUN!
Before moving on to our Reading themed activities… you can snag up these number freebies by clicking on the picture below:
Moving on from Math and into Reading…. 
Some of my all-time favorite picture books and read-alouds come in the fall!
Stellaluna and Spookley the Square Pumpkin are definitely up on the top of that list!  
The past couple of weeks we have been diving deep into sensory words (to prepare us for adjectives!), understanding and getting to know characters, and  how to compare and contrast two different things!
We first read a few books about fall (there are SO many good ones to choose from!) and introduced our five senses.  We added what we knew about fall to this little chart, using those senses!
Later in the week we read books about bats as well as Stellaluna and we used our sensory words from a bats point of view!  
We weren’t quite through with Stellaluna, as we continued using this story to help us describe and understand characters!
If you don’t have the book of Stellaluna, you can go watch it over on StorylineOnline and listen/watch to it being read! 
We created this chart about Stellaluna and her inside/outside character traits!
We also read Spookley the Square Pumpkin, which my kids are in LOVE with, thanks to the Disney channel in October!
We described how Spookley felt at the beginning of the story and the end of the story!
The green sticky notes represent his feelings at the beginning of the story and the orange notes represent the end.
Um… apparently we use A LOT of sticky notes in Reading! 
Another cute book that is rising to one of my favorites during the fall is “Scaredy-Cat Splat”.  
Since one of our objectives was to compare and contrast, I thought it would be perfect to do this with cats and spiders (if you have read the book… you know that Splat the Cat is a Spider for his costume… just like the little spider in the story! – Super cute story!!)
I created a little compare/contrast chart and we used the sorting cards from my Scaredy-Cat packet to help us sort!
All of the title cards and sorting cards are available in the packet as well as crafts, writing, sorting, and more!
In the middle of our jam-packed math and reading, we also managed to learn about ALL things pumpkins!
Although I didn’t get too many pictures of our pumpkin activities, I did snap these!  This is part of our K-W-L chart (it’s missing the L!)
And those perfect little picture cards…. they are from Lyndsey at A Year of Many Firsts
Her pumpkin packet is PERFECT to use during this unit!
We of course had to open up a real pumpkin and dive inside (well… some of us!)
And of course they wanted their own seeds to take home… because they promised they were going to go plant them and start their own pumpkin patch!  (sorry parents!)
This picture made me smile because we were ALL laughing so hard as each of us smelled the inside of a pumpkin!  This picture just happens to cover most of their face (so I could use it!)…. but we laughed for a good time!
The past two weeks were definitely filled with fun, pumpkins, learning, pumpkins ( did I already say pumpkins?!) and yes… FUN!
This next week will be interesting … we have Halloween (and yes they are counting down to when they fill up on sugar) Praise Jesus… it’s on a Saturday!
We also have our kindergarten field trip this Friday…. and lots of fun and learning on the way!
Until next time….
Have a great week!

Comments

  2. You completely amaze me!!! I'm so in LOVE with everything you create and most of all my kiddos just have so much FUN learning!!! Makes me one happy teacher. ����������

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