Musical Monday: Telling Time With a Little Rhyme

Hello! A new week is upon us, and thankfully I was able to spend some much needed time in my classroom over the weekend.  It's far from finished, but definitely in the ballpark of where I wanted to be by now.  Whew!   

So today, for Musical Monday, I was inspired by a Target Dollar Spot item.  Shout out to my sister for grabbing one of these Dr. Seuss "One Fish, Two Fish..." foam clocks for my classroom!  Ca-ute!  

So, I took a little chant I've done in the past with my classes, and added some "meat" to it.  I'm hoping this time-telling diddy will be fun as well as helpful!  Let me explain something really quick.  I hope it makes sense... when you see the (ticky ticky) in the chant, it's meant to be high pitched and your hands do a motion like a DJ pushing a record (see picture below).  Try to keep up with my hip-ness.  

So here it goes (clearing my throat)...

Tick-tock, tick-tock, what (ticky ticky) time is it?
Tick-tock, tick-tock, what (ticky ticky) time is it?
When you tell the time, there's things you gotta know.
And once you do them all, you're tellin' time fo sho!

The hour hand is short.  The minute hand is long.
Say the hour then the minutes and you can't go wrong!
Say the number for the hour.  For the minutes, count by fives.
Then you're tellin' time with swag and you can do a tick-tock jive...WHAT!


Well, now that I've thoroughly embarrassed myself, I'm going to close this post with a LINK to one of my posts from last year with another fun time-telling idea!  I hope you all have a MARVELOUS week!!

Teacher Tricks Tuesday...My 2 Cents on Coin Counting

Hello! We started back to school this week after a fabulous spring break...and boy did we have to hit the ground runnin'!  Next week is testing!!  Eeek!

For those of you under the common core standards in K-1, you know that money is NO LONGER in the math curriculum for us ( I have mixed emotions about this!).  But, until we do away with the current standardized tests, I still feel the need to teach them at least some basics- so I address this briefly during our calendar time every day.

Teaching coin counting can be a pain because not only do students have to be able to identify which coin is which, then figure out how much it's worth, then count it all together- but they have to switch counting patterns....first by 25's, then by 10's, then by 5's, then add ones at the end.  CONFUSING!! But last year a colleague taught me a teacher trick for counting money that I just LOVE!

Teach your students to tap the coins when they count.  Tap the quarters 5 times, counting by fives.  Tap the dimes twice, counting by fives.  Tap the nickels once counting by fives.  Then add one more for each penny. 

This way, they're only counting by FIVES instead of constantly switching the counting patterns!! Genius!   I had never heard of this, but it has changed my teaching and definitely has given my students confidence in such a challenging area!

So if you've never heard of this trick, I hope it makes teaching coin counting a little easier like it did for me!  I love hearing awesome ideas from colleagues and teacher friends across the globe!  Any other great tricks for coin counting out there that you use?  Share your ideas!

Graphing the Playground Plus SPRING BREAK!

Hard At Work!

Well, I MADE IT!! Spring break is finally here!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  So before I sign off and refuse to think about work for the week, here's one more post about the last few days.

This week we've been talking about tallies & graphing.  We did class graphs, graphed our Lucky Charms marshmallows, etc.  And a couple of days ago I came up with an idea to end our week with and it turned out to be really fun!

We've been having gorgeous weather, so I created a little sheet with various playground equipment listed (slide, swings, merry-go-round, etc.).  Then I partnered them up and took them outside to tally the equipment we had on our playground.  We brought the data back and compared info. to make sure everyone counted correctly.

Some serious counting going on!

The next day they individually turned that data into a graph.  It turned out to be a nice little final activity/assessment of graphing.  But of course, their favorite part was being outside and collecting the data.  They did a great job of staying focused even though spring fever was personally starting to kick in for me!  

If your spring break hasn't come yet, hang in there (and nanny-nanny-boo-boo!! ;).  For those of you off this week, have a very restful and happy spring break...enjoy every minute of it and may you return to work rested and rejuvenated for the last few weeks of school!

Christmas Came Early

I created this over the summer and since I'm wide awake, I figured I might as well share it now so that you can print, laminate, and cut when you have the time and have it ready for December!  I created a game using a calendar as the game board itself.  The question cards emphasize calendar knowledge/skills.  The first one to "ring in the new year" is the winner!  I have NOT used this yet, so there is always room for error, but I think it will be fun!

If I have enough interest from my followers, I might create a few more with different months/themes.  What do ya'll think?

Also, if you like reading my blog, would you become a follower and/or recommend it to others?  I want to build a big follower base.  The more followers, the more giveaways, so bring 'em on!

Here's the game:

So when Christmas rolls around, don't say I never gave you anything! :)

Merry Christmas...A Little Somethin' Somethin' to Save for Next Year!

I know it's nowhere close to Christmas, but I have been working on some small projects to have on hand for next year.  I figured why not share one now!?  After all, we do have a little more time on our hands to make these things in the summer!  

I created a December-themed calendar concepts game that uses the actual calendar as the game board!  You have to answer various questions to proceed, and the first one to "ring in the new year" wins!  Simple, but should be fun!  Below is the link to the game on Teachers Pay Teachers!  Enjoy!

Board Game Link

Extra Bonus For the Weekend- Cool Beans!

Here's a little thing I've created for a center or activity on ways to make 10.

Copy THIS on card stock, laminate, and cut out each strip.  Spray paint some beans blue and some beans green. You could also use blue and green jelly beans at Easter time! Have them match up the beans with the ones on the cards.  Then have them write the corresponding number sentence on the RECORDING SHEET to discover all of the different ways to make 10!

 I like this idea because it can be adapted to fit other basic math skills...not just adding to ten!

Shape Cha-Cha Slide

About a month ago, I was teaching my students about slides, flips, and turns with shapes.  I didn't want it to be all worksheets all the time.  So as a last-minute idea during my planning period (which is right before I teach math) I decided to introduce each concept (slide, flip, and turn), then do "Shape Ballet" where I played slow ballet-esque music and had them make their little shapes "dance" by sliding, then turning.  Later to do the reflection, I had them have a shape "dance partner," facing each other while they danced.  It was cute for an introduction to the concepts, but it gave me an idea to do "Shape Cha-Cha-Slide!"  (For my first graders, it was also good practice for reviewing left and right.)  I found the "cha-cha slide" song and played it for us to 'dance' to.  Only instead of our bodies doing the movements, our shapes did! I provided each student with a shape block and a piece of grid paper as a "dance floor" for their shape. Here's a simple breakdown of what we'd do:

-Whenever it said "slide to the left/right/take it back," we'd slide whichever way it specified and say "slide".
-We'd still stomp our right/left foot when it instructed us to do so.
-Whenever it said "turn it out" we'd turn our shape and say "turn"
-When it says "reverse," we would flip our shape once and say "flip!" on the off beat.
-On the extra stuff like "how low can you go/clap your hands/hands on your knees/cha-cha now," we'd take a dance break and do those motions with our bodies just for fun!

*So, all in all, this activity by itself does not TEACH the students everything they need to know.  But it was something that got them interested and kept them active.  After I used this to introduce the unit of study, they kept asking for it.  So each day during our shape study I told them if they worked hard in math for the day, we could end it with the shape cha-cha slide.  Whatever works!

Here are some other things on slides, flips and turns I have found:

-Here is a link to a simple on-line game to play on a SmartBoard or to have students play on student computer for review.
-Here is a good lesson plan with a slide/flip/turn game to play!