Teacher-Blogger Product Spotlight: Autumn-Themed Unit with a Freebie!

Alright everyone, Autumn is just around the corner, and to celebrate the season that is creeping up on us, I wanted to feature a fellow blogger and teacher’s unit pack that I think you will “fall” for (cheesy pun intended)!

 

Featured in my first teacher/blogger product swap post is Leah, from Learning-4-Keeps and her wonderful comprehensive Autumn Unit available at her TPT store.  This jam-packed unit includes 39 pages of fun fall-themed ELA and Math activities for first and second graders.  Inside the unit you will find supplements and resources that you can use as morning work, center work, independent work, sub-day work, assessments and more!  I find this unit an excellent value, because it is so full of resources for both math and ELA, which is not the case with many unit packs.

 

 

The math sheets cover everything from place value to measurement to odd and even numbers, all with adorable autumn themed clip art.

The ELA sheets include the topics of contractions, homophones, sentences, alphabetical order, and more.  The ELA section also includes  Literacy Integration sheets for the books  The Lonely Scarecrow by Tim Preston, I Know It’s Autumn by Eileen Spinelli, and Autumn: An Alphabet Acrostic by Steven Schnur.

 I can definitely see myself using the included reading and writing graphic organizers (such as the prediction worksheet) in my guided reading groups, but of course they’d work in various instructional models. There are also worksheets for the steps of the writing process, using descriptive words, and so on, all of which are integrated with The Lonely Scarecrow. There is also an art project template for this book.

The I know It’s Autumn unit includes a "think, pair, share," activity, a brainstorming graphic organizer, and a few other writing sheets…perfect for writing centers and workshops!

The Autumn: An Alphabet Acrostic literacy integration section includes a class project: "Make an Acrostic Book", word web sheet, drafting sheet, and other writing organizers and sheets.

I know I covered a lot, but it feels like I barely put a dent in describing all the useful worksheets you will get. 

The complete list of items included in this Autumn Unit are: (continue reading)

My Favorite Dollar Tree Finds for Teachers

Where I live, we have Dollar Trees in nearly every city and they are awesome! Everything is $1! This store is a wonderful place for teachers. Keep in mind though, just because something is $1 does not mean it is a good deal. Some of these items can be found cheaper elsewhere, or just are not quality products. For this reason, I am going to share with you some of my favorite dollar tree items! If you do not have a dollar tree near you, you can order from them in bulk, or perhaps a similar style store is near you with similar items.

Frugal Favorite Finds:

Cute 12-packs of pencils - These are nice to have as back-ups, but I use these for rewards, prizes and Birthdays.

Artificial flowers and vases to go with them-  The Dollar Tree has a huge selection of artificial flowers, and they do not look extremely cheap and tacky. Many of you are probably wondering why flowers and vases are even on my list for teachers. Well, flowers make a room more bright and happy. I like to buy bright tumblers or plastic vases, and make cheap flower arrangements for my room. The kids love it, I love it..and it's a cheap way to add some decor to your room.

Die- Cut Letters and Numbers- For $1? Yes please! Granted, the packs are somewhat small and the letters are also, I find they are still useful for most of your die-cut needs.

Stack and Nest Plastic Bins- These are amazing to have for organizing goods in the classroom and for using in center or small group work.

Edible Lessons

Who doesn't love a deliciously edible lesson? I know as a student, I always found such lessons extremely memorable, and I am sure students still echo the same sentiments.  You want to limit how often you do such lessons, for health and money purposes and so your students don't begin to think the only way they can learn is by eating.  A good way to incorporate such lesson is as a class reward. As you know there are many, many edible lessons. One of my favorites is using candy, or for healthier purposes raisins, cheerios, etc.., as math manipulatives. Incorporate these treats into lessons for sorting, adding, multiplying, fractions; the opportunities are many. I have posted a couple of my favorite edible ideas as well. If you are a teacher that has a great edible lesson that you would like to share, post a link to it in the comments and I might just choose to feature a link to you and your lesson in an upcoming post.

1.. Bake a cake!- Bake and decorate a cake to go along with whatever unit or lesson you are teaching. Get creative! Be sure to take pictures and talk about the cake design with students  and incorporate it into a lesson. Perhaps have students make observations. 

For a night and day Lesson I created the following cake: I was pressed for time, so it's nothing fancy and was very cheap to make. I'm sure you crafty, amazing teachers can really make some amazing cakes..in fact, if you decide to make a cake, feel free to share it with us! (The picture of course)

night and day edible lesson

Learning through song

Learning through song and music  is a wonderful way to engrain material you have taught in your students' brains. I have found that students truly love music. As a class we have created our own songs to explain lessons, and have also listened to and recited songs from around the internet. If you are having your own class create a song, it might get a bit loud..but typically they are going be on task and will truly enjoy making their songs. Set ground rules (location, how loud, content that needs to be included, length, type of genre). I have heard some wonderful raps, country tunes, and playful kid songs come from my own students. Having students create their own songs makes them responsible for their learning in a fun manner, and they are likely to remember their song and classmates' songs.

I have a few links for free songs that may go well with a lesson you are teaching. They are fun and cute. Think about your audience when you are choosing songs. I find that a 5th grade class will not appreciate cutesy "itsy-bitsy spider" style songs as much as younger students. Try to understand the type of music your students listen to. As a teacher, they will especially appreciate you if you come up with your own original song for the class.

1. Have Fun Teaching Songs - a large amount of songs for various subjects (writing, phonics, science, math, ELA, counting, etc...) and grade levels. The songs have lyrics, are free, catchy, and the students will love them! Other wonderful resources are available on this site as well.

Review Games Ideas and Link for Fun and Learning!

Bring Bingo to the Classroom

Reviewing covered material before a test in a fun format is a great way  for students to see what they learned, and what they still need to work on (this is useful for the teacher also). Below I will describe my favorite 5 review games that I know about. Please comment with any review games and links that I do not mention.

1- Jeopardy ! Jeopardy review games are fun and easy to make. You can split the students in teams and keep track manually of points earned, or use an online template.
There are a lot of powerpoint templates you can download, but what I love is the online web site Jeopardy Labs. You enter the questions and answers, and it saves the link online for you to bookmark and retrieve whenever.  It's easy, check it out! In addition, this site has some pre-made templates you may be able to use as well. Wonderful!
Jeopardy Labs