What makes you happy

Hello :)))!!!!

Today was a great day :)!!! We studied in the morning, and in the afternoon we went for a bike riding at the Japanese Garden, which is a small beautiful garden. We had a great time exploring the garden and chatting. I selected two pictures to show you the place: the first one is my big baby and I, sharing a moment of love :), and the second one is an image of a bird that was also appreciating the view :).

I love this little Batman boy very much!!!!!!

I also would like to share with you what my son wrote today. In order to help my son improve his writing skills, I usually ask him to write a journal of his day or a theme that is interesting to him. I also tend to query subjects wit regards to his routine and the people around him. Today he wrote about the things that makes him happy. The image below shows his answer.

It was the sweetest answer!!!! I was very proud of him for valuing his family and friends, as well as simple things, which are normally the most memorable. I feel very happy and blessed that God gave me such a beautiful child, who is mature enough to understand what makes you happy is to be around those whom love you the most and also doing simple things, like riding a bike :).

My giveaway ends tomorrow. To have a chance to win a wonderful prize enter the rafflecopter below please. One lucky winner will win a package with 126 pages about Insect and Spiders. Good luck!!!!!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

I hope you felt inspired today :). Thanks.

Fabiana

Ribbit Ribbit

Today was a beautiful and warm day in Chicago. My son and I went for a bike ride at the end of the day, and the weather was just perfect. The smell of the flowers were even more endearing. I love spring!!!!

Today we continued working on our frog math, literacy and science unit. My son worked doing: word search, compound words, antonym, synonym, telling the time, riddle, fact and opinion, and writing. As I posted yesterday, I purchased on TPT a package called Frog unit - Math, Literacy and Science by Primary Divas. This package is wonderful, it explores very well the context of the lesson, which are frogs, as well as involving other subjects to help the child develop their understanding of the subject matter.

In addition, my son wrote a few frog facts that he learned about frogs, and he also created a frog craft. He hung the frog on our wall to be able to read about them every day.

Moreover, its time for our 3rd giveaway of the month. This week two of the greatest teachers and bloggers around are supporting our blog: Fern Smith's Classroom Ideas and Oceans of 1st Grade Fun. I am very excited for this giveaway because they are amazing and have been quite generous with their offer :)). It has also been a pleasure and honor to work with them, thanks girls :)))!!!

OCEANS OF 1ST GRADE FUN

To enter the competition and a  have a chance to win follow the link below please. The giveaway starts now and it will finish on Friday at midnight. We are offering 6 wonderful packages. The winner will be announced on the weekend.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Thanks for reading our blog, and good luck :))!!!

Fabiana

Question and Exclamation Words Poster

Hello everyone!!!!! Hope you had a wonderful weekend.

When my son needed to work on punctuation; writing questions and exclamation words, he sometimes struggles to recognize and apply to writing. I have been seeking options for a while to make him understand this concept in an effective and successful way. As well as preventing as much frustration when writing a journal, or simply doing a punctuation exercise.

 

It seems like I found a solution :). I designed a question mark and exclamation point words poster to help him recognize the most common words when using these two punctuations. It also aims to aid him in writing and using punctuation. If your pupils are going through the same problem as my son, these poster will certainly help him to improve his writing skills.

These posters may be put on your writing center or bulletin board for display. 

There are two different backgrounds for each poster. The images below are samples:

To purchase your copy just click on the following link please, which will direct you to the product on my TPT-Question and Exclamation Words Poster store.

I would very much appreciate your rating on this product please. Thanks!!!

You may also check my other products on my TPT-Fabiana Carter store, and please follow me :).

Hope you find it useful. Thanks!!!
  

Fabiana

Building a sentence

I created this poster to help my son to identify the order of the words when put together in a sentence. I also wrote a few examples of parts of speech to help him identify it when he is writing a sentence.

I uploaded this poster on TPT to make easier for you to download it in case you are interested :). The poster is available for free, to download your free copy just follow the link please:
http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Building-Sentence-poster





Hope this will be useful for you. If you have any suggestion or comment that would improve my work I really appreciate.


Thanks.
Fabiana

Adjectives

Today I would like to recommend the Macmillan Dictionary for Children. This is a great dictionary designed to nudge children up the language ladder by including parts of speech, inflected forms, and pronunciation and also adding more advanced dictionary features, such as syllabification, cross-references, and idioms.

This dictionary is very easy to use, clear to understand the description, and the pictures are very colourful. It's a brilliant dictionary for children of all ages, well structured and engaging.

                                

We were doing an activity about adjectives, and my son needed to find an adjective to describe a puppy for each letter of the alphabet. We used the dictionary to search for the adjectives. My son had a lot of fun searching the words and was very interested to learn about what the pictures were showing. It was a great educational activity!!!!

Hope you find this dictionary as useful as we found. Have a great evening!!!! Thanks!!!!

Fabiana

Adjectives

Hello :))), hope you had a great day!!!
Today it was our first day of 1st grade,  my son and I were ecstatic. We had a conversation yesterday about the objectives and responsibilities of being a 1st grader. I also explained briefly to him the subjects we are going to study and his daily schedule. He was very pleased to know that he stepped up another level in his life, and he is looking forward to reaching the goals we set for the following year. When we began our day today he was fairly excited and eager to learn, ecstatic had ebb however not lost :)).

Undaunted, Tuesday was to be great as we were going to cover grammar and writing subject. In the month of September I will focus on teaching adjectives and punctuation and capitalisation. I decided to spend a month on this subject because I want him to fully comprehend the meanings and be able to use it in real life situation, as well as being able to explain.

In our adjective lesson, I quizzed him on the reasons why he thinks I love him. We have a game we play at home where we ask each other the reason's why we love one another. I used this approach to teach him to understand the qualities he was describing to me are called adjectives, which we use to describe a person, object or animal.

Then I asked him to make a sketch on the paper, write the words and then colour. When finished with colouring he wrote the adjectives that he described to me on the paper. I loved this activity so much as it helps my son to know himself better and build confidence. He also loved the artwork and could not wait to show his dad :)). The idea of this brilliant activity came from Life in First Grade - http://lifeinfirstgrade1.blogspot.com/search/label/adjectives

The image below is his final artwork.

To introduce a few adjectives I also designed the following poster.

Hope this post inspires you for your next adjective lesson. Please inform me if you have any question, suggestion or comment. Thanks :))).

Fabiana

1st grade common core/curriculum

I am homeschooling my son, and I am researching to find the standard common core/or curriculum for 1st graders for all subject areas such as mathematics, science, writing, reading, spelling, language arts, history, and arts.  I would like to know if any of you would recommend me or suggest me books I may purchase to base the lessons. Or even websites would be quite helpful.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Thanks

Fabiana

Practising Phonics

On July 18th I posted "Rhyming words with phonetics" where I demonstrated how to create a flip book to help your child to develop reading skills. My son is reading all the words already, and in order to introduce more words I wanted to assess him to verify whether or not he is also able  to write the words based on a picture given.

The worksheet is available for free on teacherspayteachers website. To be able to download your free copy just click on the link below.
http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Practising-Phonics

In this assessment the student will write the words on the line given according to the picture shown. This exercise is a great tool to assess the child’s capability to write a word based on recognition of a given picture. It promotes the development of phonics, word recognition, and spelling.

Answer key 1st sheet: men, mat, cat, dog, pan, hen, log, and can.
Answer key 2nd sheet:frog, fog, pen, hog, bat, ten, man, rat, fan, and hat.

I would be grateful to receive any comment or suggestion from you :))!!!! Thanks.
Fabiana Carter

The image below is a sample of the worksheet.

Missing word

Hello :))), I created an exercise where the student read the sentence and choose the word that is missing. Then he writes the missing word on the line give. This exercises is available for free on teacherspayteachers website, just follow the link below to obtain your free copy :))). 

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Missing-Word

I would love to hear any comment or suggestion about this work :))).

Thanks. Have a great day.

Fabiana

The following image is a sample of the exercise.

Rhyming words

I would like to share a worksheet I found on Teacherspayteachers website which aims to focus on rhyming. I worked with rhyming today with my son, and found this activity very useful and easy to comprehend. The worksheet is free, just click on the link below to download your copy.

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Free-Rhyming-Worksheets

Hope it will be useful for you as it was for me. Have a great weekend :))!!!!

World wall

I finally finished our word wall and the picture bellow is a sample of how it looks like. I put it together last night and when my son woke up he was delighted with the pictures and told me it looked very beautiful. 

The words I have already introduce to my son and he knows how to write are: see, my, is, friend, the, I, name, look, at, me, cat, pig, dog, hat, bat, love, you, men, man and up.

These are some of the words I will work on: am, little, to, a, have, we, like, he, for, me, with, she, they, of, are, that, do, go, from, what, said, was,  where, come, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, red,  yellow, orange, blue, green, purple, white, brown, black, pink.

I always try to formulate a sentence every time I teach him a word, so he can also learn how to put it into context.


Bring to my awareness if you have any suggestion or word to add to my wall. Thanks!!!!

Rhyming words with phonetics

I have been researching extensively to discover efficient tools to teach my son how to read. I had begun working with him intensely to teach him how to utter the phonetic sounds of the alphabets. The following link is the song I play every day for my son with the intent for him to learn about phonics. This song is quite cute and very easy to learn: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xGpsVmWLRFA.
He often asks me the spelling of words, and instead of spelling the requested word, I ask him to repeat the word and think of the sounds he is making. He is becoming very good with recognition of words, and he is extremely proud of himself when he deciphers the name of the word he sought to understand :)).

I read in some teaching websites that the best way to teach your child to read is by not teaching them how to spell words, but to teach how to pronounce the sounds of the alphabets first. Once they are mastered in this matter, spelling becomes easier. Hence, the reason I am focusing on phonics a lot.

In addition, to the work we have been doing, I made a flip books to help him learn how to read. I made 4 books for the familiar words "at", "en", "og" and "an". I wrote the vowels in different colours to teach him awareness of the difference between vowels and consonants. I used construction paper and markers to make the flip books.

We worked with these books today and I was extremely delighted with the results; I highly recommend the use of my book.  I asked my son to pronounce the sound of each letter presented in the book, and repeat it as many times as he needed to be able to recognise the word he was saying. Working with rhyming words are important tools to develop the child's reading skills.


Instructions to make the flip books:

1 - To make the cover, take a construction paper and fold it in half making a rectangle shape. Then bring the endings together and fold it again.

2 - With the paper folded, cut a thin string on the side that is closed to divide the paper in half, and to make two covers.

3 - Meanwhile take a white construction paper and write just one word for example cat, and then just the first letter of the other words you would like to have. For instance "m" to make mat, "r" to make rat, "b" to make bat. I suggest to write the vowels with a different colour so the child can differentiate what is consonant and what is vowel. Afterwards glue the written word onto the cover book.

4 - The next step is to glue the top of the written letters on top of the first consonant of the word written.

5 - I also recommend to write the final word onto the cover page.

The words I used for my flip books were:

"at" - mat, rat, bat and cat.

"og" - log, fog, hog, frog and dog.

"an" - tan, man, can, fan and pan.

"en" -  ten, men, pen and hen.

I am also doing for words ending with "ig" (big, dig, pig and wig), "et" (jet, net, pet and wet), "ip" zip, dip, sip and rip), "ot" (dot, lot, pot and cot), and "ug" (bug, mug, rug and hug).

I found these flip books very useful and a great tool to make my child be familiar with reading. Once you explain and set the path they can do it on their own. It is something they can carry along in a long journey, or even just going to the supermarket. If you desire you may laminate it and bind the books to last longer. You may also add more letters to any group as you feel your child is progressing and ready to be introduced to new words. The words can become more complex as they grow and will develop their reading skills.

I also would like to recommend an incredible website that I used today to support his learning and add in support in the form of improvement in the process of being familiar with phonics. http://www.starfall.com/n/level-a/learn-to-read/load.htm?f

Let me know what you think about the aforementioned please :). If you have any questions feel free to ask as well.  Thanks :)))))!!!!

Frog Life Cycle

The last animal species I taught to my son to finalise this chapter was Amphibians. I was babysitting my son's friend, so she joined the lesson with him. As we all love frogs I followed a brilliant idea of a craft of a frog life cycle on the DLTK website, which is one of my favorite websites for craft ideas -  http://www.dltk-kids.com/animals/mfroglifecycle.htm.

It is a simple, educational and fun activity and you just need paper plate, blue and green construction paper, aluminium foil, egg box cut to make just 4 eggs.

Instructions:

1 - To make the pod the kids used a paper plate and wrapped it with a blue construction paper. They glued the paper onto the plate and cut the edges to make it round.

2 - Afterwards they used foil and wrapped it around the paper plate to make it look like a pod.

3 - Then the kids made their own frog and tadpole with construction paper. They saw a model on the DKLT website and just attempted to copy by looking. It looked quite cute!!!

4 - Following, I printed the arrows template from the DKLT website, and asked them to write the directions of the frog life cycle on their blank arrows.

5 - To make the frog eggs we used an egg carton and painted with black marker on top.

6 - To put the items together, I read aloud the frog life cycle to them and they would stuck each item in order round the pond. 1 step: The eggs hatch into tadpoles; 2 step: The tadpoles grow into frogs; 3 step: the frogs lay eggs. I was really pleased with them because they would complete the cycle by themselves just by following what I was reading.

7 - Finally their frog life cycle was ready. My son had the carton egg, but his sweet friend wanted to make it using construction paper.

It was a very educational and easy activity. The children were able to read the life cycle based on what they wrote and listened to me explaining. They constantly repeating the cycle over and over again!! I was very happy with the result, it is one of those activities that makes one pleased  because the result is their understanding of the concepts in the lesson and very visible.

Snake lunch

This morning we learnt about reptiles. Hence I decided to make a special "snake" for lunch :)))). I made the body of the snake with beetroots and cucumber. The head was a meatball, the eyes and tongue were made of raw carrots. My son recognised the snake straightway which made me happy :)))).

We love beetroots, and I always give the water that I cooked the beetroot to my son to drink. The beetroot contains higher content of iron, it regenerates and reactivates the red blood cells. It is also extremely useful in the treatment of anaemia. I used to drink it when I was young, and now give it to my son. If you would like to read more about the benefits of this vegetable here is a useful website: http://knowledgespedia.com/Health/beetroot.html 

I purposely cut the carrots and cucumber in small strips because I wanted my son to create a few words using the vegetables. I asked him to write "cat", and if he would get the answer right, he was allowed to eat a vegetable as his prize :)))). He also wrote "pig" and "my". We didn't create more words because he was getting very hungry :)))))). However, whilst we were eating he designed a person with his vegetables and said it was me :)))))). 

We enjoyed our delicious lunch today and we will for sure do it again. Have a good day!!!!!

Word family

I highly recommend an activity I printed out from the Teachers pay Teachers website. It is a free worksheet that you can print out from this link:  http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/FREE-Kindergarten-Word-Family-Independent-Work-at-word-family 


This activity is designed to practice the -at word family with reading, spelling and writing words from common short vowel word families. We worked with recognition of the sound of the letters. The website suggested to do this activity in a week but we did it in one day, as it was short exercises and he was doing quite well and managing to complete all the exercises required. Great worksheet, I approve.


I couldn't make a copy to upload on my blog for you all to see it, but if you click on the link above you will be able to connect to the page.

Writing with stickers

I went to Target this week and bought a sheet with 168 stickers for just $1,00. My aim was to make my son write words using the stickers. He is learning how to write, thus I thought using stickers would be another way to enhance his writing.

The procedure for helping him to construct the words was me spelling the letters to him,  and his assignment was to find the letters on the page. He managed to write dog, cat, car, hat, fox, boat, cow and kite. After writing, he spelt the words by himself to reinforce spelling and its utterance.

I was very content with the conclusion of this work. The most familiar words for him such as dog, cat, car and hat he delivered easily; I needed to spell it no more than two times. He was focused and determined to deliver his job. Words like fox, boat, cow and kite, I spelt it about 5 times as he still confuses "w" with "m", "k" and "t", as well as he needs to be familiarised with the sounds of words.

I will definitely replicate this activity again as it is another tool to help him to develop the recognition of words and sounds.