Do you Instagram?  I joined Instagram about a year and a half ago.  I added one picture of my son's Earth Day crafts for school.  About a week later, I added a couple more pictures from my classroom.  Months later I added a picture of my son going down a water slide.  To be perfectly honest, I had no idea what I was doing with Instagram.  The hashtag thing confused me to no end.  Well, I finally bit the bullet in about April and really started to add more photos.  I became a little more confident in my hashtagging (verb?).  Now, I don't know what I would do without it.  I find it to be so much fun to share my pictures and to check out other great teachers!

This morning I was looking over my blog feed and saw that Natalie from Teachery Tidbits started a fun linky about her top 10 Instagram pictures.  I decided to jump in on the fun!

I just put my binders together, and I'm ready to get organized!  #organization #ihopethishelpsme #tpt #blog #lessonplans  #teachersofinstagram #teachersfollowteachers

Sadly, I have not used these as much as I would have liked.  However, I plan to dust them off and get going again!

One of centers for this week is our picking apples letter tracing center. Of course, it's even better when you get to use markers to trace the letters. #handwriting #iteachtoo #iteachk #teachersfollowteachers #teachersofinstagram

My students loved this fun activity!

Save the Clock Tower! #backtothefuture #delorean #teachersfollowteachers #teachersofinstagram

Hi Bloggy friends!  It has again been about a month since I visited my little place on web.  The month of December has been busy, busy!  We had conferences the second week of the month.  I was so happy with how every single one of them went.  I have the best students and parents this year!

I wanted to share with you the gifts that my students made for their families.  My students made these before Winter Break for a holiday gift, but they would be great gifts even in January.  I found this great idea on Pinterest and thought it would be a perfect gift.  

We started off the process by painting the students' handprints with white paint.  After the paint dried, the students used markers to add hats, scarves, carrot noses, and coal eyes, mouths, and buttons.  Finally, the students added the poem to their papers.





When the gifts were finished, the students were given a manila envelope to decorate.  The students did a wonderful job decorating their envelopes.  Here are a couple examples of the great pictures that my students drew.



Once their envelopes were completed, I placed their snowman pictures into their envelopes and the students took them home.  I hope their families loved them as much as I did!

Well, I couldn't have my students give a gift to their families without giving them a gift from me.  I gave each student two books and a Smencil.  Instead of wrapping them, I purchased decorative Ziploc bags and put the gifts inside.  Easy peasy!


Speaking of gifts, my son asked Santa for the Let's Play School Kit from Lakeshore.  My son was not disappointed on Christmas morning.  He loves it!  I have to say I am kind of jealous.  I would have loved to have had this as a gift when I was a child!


Thanks for stopping by!  I hope you are having a wonderful Winter Break!  See you soon!

My students have been loving making crowns this year, so I whipped up an "I am thankful" crown for them to make.  They turned out so cute!  I wish I could show you all their smiling faces with their crowns on, but here is an example of one of my Kinder's crowns.


One of my Kinders drew a picture of me on her crown.  So cute!

I am linking up with DeeDee for my very first Peek at My Week post.  I cannot guarantee that I will do this every week, but I hope to do it often. 


Click on the pictures below to see what my plans are for this week.  If there is a cover page, there is a link to direct you to the product.  If there is not, it's either something that I have made for my class or something that has been in my files for years, and I'm not sure where I got it. {If it's yours, please let me know.} 




Of course, this doesn't include the earthquake drill that I'm sure we'll have tomorrow.  We had a small earthquake here in Las Vegas this morning.  I have never been through an earthquake before, so it was quite the experience!

Have a great week!

If you have been a follower for any amount of time, you may know that I love linking up with Kacey at Doodle Bugs Teaching for her Five For Friday.  You also know that I am usually a smidge late when doing so. That's ok though.  Better late than never!



Last week I read Apple Trouble! to my students.  When we were finished, we talked about other things that the hedgehog could get stuck in his quills.  I then did a directed drawing of the hedgehog with my students.   Before we colored our pictures, we drew a picture of something that could have gotten stuck on hedgehog's back.  The pictures turned out so cute!



On Thursday, we made these super cute apples.  Thanks Michelle for the freebie!



I am in love with my new Fall bulletin board!  For the tree craft, students were given a 3 x 12 piece of brown paper.  They folded the paper and cut it half.  The students then cut one of those pieces into three parts.  Then, they glued the uncut piece to represent the the trunk onto a white piece of paper and glued the three cut pieces to represent the branches of the tree.  The students finally used a q-tip and paint to make leaves on the tree and ground.  For the leaves, I cut out leaf frames on my Silhouette and stapled the frames to white construction paper.  Students used their thumbs to paint inside the frame.  When the paint dried, I cut around the edges of the leaves. 



I was looking for a fun way to review rhyming words, and I couldn't quite find what I was looking for.  So what does a teacher do when they can't find what they are looking for?  Why, make it of course.  I made a Rhyming Bingo game for my students to play that they just love!  On the first day, they colored the pictures, and then picked sixteen pictures to be on their board.   The next day, we played many games of Rhyming Bingo.  They loved shouting out "Bingo!".  If you are wanting to Rhyming Bingo with your students, it is a freebie in my Teachers Pay Teachers store. 



On a very noneducational note, I bought a new car last week!  I hate the car buying process with a passion, but I am loving having my new car {You should read my husband's Yelp review.  It's not pretty.  haha}  I got a 2015 Mazda CX-5.  It has a lot of bells and whistles that are new to me.  Loving the backup camera and the blind spot thingamajig (trust me - real word) on the side mirrors.  Last Sunday, I was driving somewhere and it beeped at me.  I told my husband it beeped at me for no reason, and he said there had to be a reason.  lol  Guess I should check out the manual.  :)


Thanks for joining me for my Five For Friday {On Saturday}!  Have a great rest of the weekend!