Spelling Center in Action and an Easy Multiplication Craftivity

Today was the first day of the Prince using our new spelling center. He enjoyed it. Don't forget to go get your free spelling center activity cards from Step into Second Grade. Even if your not a homeschooler, this activities would be great to practice spelling words at home.






While he was in his spelling center I whipped up an easy craftivity to reinforce 4 digit numbers times 11. He snuck a peak while I was making it and was excited. I bought a pack of paper shapes on clearance at Target for 62 cents, they make craftivities super simple.

Who Knew a Little Paint Would Lead to a Classroom Overhaul?

Last night, I was pooped. I have been using a couple of old shoe holders for shelving/storage in our classroom for a couple of years. Well, since I recently painted the table for our classroom, yesterday, I thought I would also spruce up the shoe racks as well; but, then something happened. I don't know how. Seriously, the next thing I know I'm cleaning, rearranging and reorganizing our ENTIRE classroom. This happened so very fast that I didn't snap any before photos of the classroom, but I did snap one picture of the shoe rack as I was taping it up.

Plain old shoe rack.

Spruced up shoe rack.

I have two :).

Their new home.

I know you can't tell, but each section or two contains materials readily available to the Prince,such as, manipulatives or other subject related materials.

Here are some pictures of our newly organized classroom. First, our main table and newly painted material shelves.

This desk used to be where the newly painted shelving/shoe racks are now. I moved it the the other side of the room and it is now the Prince's spelling center. He will visit this station almost daily and pick his spelling activity for the day. I am printing THESE FREE spelling activities, from Mrs. Lemons, and placing them into his "activity bucket." It is the bucket to the right of the crayons. Each day he will pick and complete one spelling activity. After snapping the photo I saw the abacus in the spelling center. It was relocated.

Here is my big ole' desk. I think it is to big and might get rid of it. Ignore the pile of dog on the floor, she follows her momma everywhere. Also, ignore the weights on the desk, this is also my Jillian Michaels' workout room and I snapped these pictures right before getting my butt kicked.

My white board where daily notes to the Prince are written or daily lesson plans. Various lesson charts are on the wall. The bulletin board is separated. The section on the left displays are biology chapter notes and the section on the right was cleaned of all old displayed work, so we can fill it up with more fantastic assignments completed by my Peanut.

The Prince ran in and wanted to be included :)! There you have it folks, the room that is used a lot in our house :)

The Prince's Writing Workshop

I take so many pictures and want to blog them all and then life gets in the way and I don't post half the stuff I want to. I started creating the Prince a writing center a while back. He has been slow in his desire to write, so I haven't stressed him, or myself. With his new center he has gained momentum and interest. Let's hope we kindle his desire for writing just enough for it to burn forever.

One of the first things I wanted to show the Prince were examples of everyday things he sees me write: thank you notes, grocery lists and notes to him.

But, of course writers write much more.

I saw some super cute anchor posters on the blog First Grade Parade and recreated them the best I could. This poster reminds the Prince why we write. After he writes something we decide which category it would go under based on the anchor chart.

The beginning of our word wall. Many teachers post the words on the wall after they are taught. The Prince is an avid reader, so I posted all of the words so he could start spelling them correctly in his writings. He has become really good at not looking up when he knows the spelling of a word.

An awful picture, but I wanted you to see the word wall, I just used border from the Dollar Tree. Sorry I was too lazy to take and post another picture :) I bought all the word wall words and alphabet from TPT. I'll try to rememeber to look up the link and post it, but the creator is Erica Boher.

This little bookmark stays in his writing folder. We have a bigger version of writing rules on the wall.

Early writing rules anchor chart.

Sometimes, you just need a cute alphabet chart to reference when sounded out words.

Weeks ago, when I actually created the writing center, the Prince started writing. We made these little stable book and we did not worry about words at all. The pictures told the entire sequence story.

He progressed to labeling his pictures, to drawing pictures and then writing sentences about them and now he has recently stated he doesn't need to draw pictures for much longer.

The ice cream cones assist the Prince in remembering his blends: -ch, -th, -wh, and -sh. Below that is how I display his weekly spelling words list.

Whew! This seems like a long post...if you made it all the way through, Congrats...now go write something:)

Yay! My DYI Classroom Table and Chairs

For the last couple of years we have had a couch in our classroom. It has been wonderful, we read, we snuggled...we were comfy. However, I started realizing that a flat top table would be great to hold my coffee for the Prince and I to work side by side, with a large work surface.

So... on Friday morning about two minutes after the hubby left for work he called and said our neighbor had a table and four chairs in her driveway with a FREE sign on it... I quickly dressed and told the Prince to grab his shoes and meet me in the garage. We went and got us a free table and chairs :)!

Friday afternoon I bought fabric for the chairs. Saturday we sanded, painted and reupholstered. Sunday we put the chairs back together and brought it all inside.

The couch was moved to the playroom.

So how about a few pictures ? I so should have used my Cannon and not just the Iphone :/

Birthdays,Family, Fun and A Whole Lotta Love NC 2012

The Prince and I are so very lucky that we were able to fly to Cherokee, NC for my grandmother's 90th birthday in January of 2012. She shares a birthday with my niece, Miranda, so it was nice to take my niece to the casino on her birthday too! Too bad we didn't win big!!!

This is a posting of a million pictures and various comments. I love my family so much, dysfunction included.

Let's go...As you can see my travel partner, Prince AidenMan, is a pro at this traveling thing.

We stayed in this 4/2 bath cabin on the river with my mom, step dad, brother, his girlfriend, nephew and niece! Fun Times....Most of it, at least....HA !

Our backyard and fantastic fishin' hole!

When Nana is around, there are tons of junk snacks....AidenMan was in junk heaven!

AidenMan's fantastic Uncle Ronnie brought him a US floor puzzle. Jenny help construct it...In her world, Ohio may have attached to Hawaii...LMAO!

First visitor, my mom's brother, Uncle Jake!

LOVE

My brother, Uncle Ronnie; Uncle Jake, Jenny (brother's GF) and the Prince.

Love birds...tweet tweet

UNCLE UNCLE!!! Pap, I said UNCLE!! and Pap would say "you had enuff' boy??!" ...and then the laughing continued

The Prince loves his Uncle Ronnie more than words and he loves fishing almost as much!

Prince and his Mom

Prince and his Nana

Prince and his Great Grandma

What?!!! Well, of course Pooh Bear (me) is my favorite!!!

Grandma probably telling Jenny something important, like that I have always been her favorite.

 

I wish I could have captured the laughing that took place while taking this picture...we had to try at least 4 times!!!

Walking and talking with Uncle Jake

Walking and planning with Uncle Ronnie

Executing the plan

The Prince and I snuck off for some mining!

"How much do you think this is worth, Mom?"

Then we moved on to educating ourselves about our people/ancestry. We are of the Wolf Clan. The Prince wanted to know if we knew anyone from another clan. I explained to him that you take the clan of your mother so I called our cousin, Freida, and asked her which clan she belongs to. She is from the Sweet Potato Clan. The Prince then asked "Does she know our clan can eat her clan?" HA!

Wooden Sequoyah and his not-so-wooden descendant. Not sure why the Prince appears to be screaming for his life....maybe he was reacting the plight of his people....wait until you see how unhappy he is inside the museum. He does not take the history of his people lightly. I'm not sure what's going to happen when we study the plight of his daddy's lineage......

Throughout Cherokee NC there are bears that represent various aspects of the Cherokee. This one represents Sequoyah..the creator on the Cherokee written language and also the wooden depiction above.

The Prince is aware of the plight of the Cherokee people and he is very proud and very pissed at the same time...He is so much his mother's child.

Aiden references Sequoyah at least once monthly in our day-to-day lives.

Back at the cabin for a little rest and relaxation with his cousin, Logan.

Aiden sharing Sonic racing on the Ipad with Logan.

Love these three.

The cuddle bunny and his Uncle Jake.

HUSH GMA! I'm not squeezing you too tight...geesh!

Pap, if I were you I would listen...she's got a cane in her hand!

Good LAWD! We have big heads!

Aiden loves Jenny, but he does not like it when Uncle Ronnie lets Jenny catch the big fish!

Can you imagine the life story behind those eyes??

*HEART SMILE

Logan, hurry up and take a picture with grandma!! We gotta party to get to!!

Aiden loves cousins!!!

I'll get you!!

Or maybe they will get me!

Quick break...while the cousin with the busted nose gets cleaned up.

We are sweet.

We are scary.

Can I tell you that I have never been around my Great Aunt Annie without laughing? I love this lady!!!!! And her crazy daughter, you'll see below.

UMMMM???

Family Love

The Prince, his Great-Great Aunt Annie and his Uncle Happy...yep, my eldest brother is called Uncle Happy...that is 100% the fault of my niece, Kimberly....

Here she is...the crazy one I mentioned above..NITA! with my brother smashed in between.

My Great Aunt Lizzie and my momma. Just to let you know, my Aunt Lizzie makes some of the best bean bread...EVER!!!!!!! (but you may not have any clue what that is)

GEESH! Aunt Lizzie..you looked happy hugging Mom. I thought you liked me too?

The birthday girl gearing up for her thank you speech. HAPPY 90TH Grandma!!

My cousin, Lisa, hugging Grandma and laughing at me for just being scalded by her.

Uncle Happy or some random cowboy...one can never be sure.

There's my silly and sweet Great Auntie again!!

The Prince had to sit with his Pap for lunch.

The Prince and his Nana's sister, Aunt Abbie.

The cousin train.

After lunch, the Prince had something very important to explain to his Uncle Ronnie.

The apparent light bulb moment for the Uncle.

Awww, look at my nephew, Logan!!

Do you have a person in your family that the only words that could describe her are SUPER SWEET?! In this photo, in between the Prince and Gma, is Ms. Darlene. She is my Aunt Deb's mother and is a member of our family, not by blood but by love. We recently lost Ms. Darlene in flesh, but memories are ours forever.

I think she wished to win at Bingo that evening.

My Aunt Deb....Does everyone have a favorite Auntie?

Miranda, read the question right above! The answer better be Yes! and I better be it :)

Cousin Brenda

Cousin Brenda's Momma, Aunt Abbie.

SO check this out...If my Aunt can have a cool name like Alice Pocahontas and my cousin Freida can have the same fantastic middle name as my grandma, Nokomis,...then how do I get stuck with the middle name Faye??? Okay...so what that my momma is Bonnie Faye and my cousin (pictured above) is also named Lisa Faye and my other cousin ( not pictured above) is name Melinda Faye...I want a cooler middle name!!!! WAAAA! ...moving on..

Relaxing...

The day after the party and our final day, we stopped by and hung out with my grandmother. The highlight of that visit was her singing Amazing Grace in Cherokee to us...love her!

We had a fabulous time in NC and  of course when we are that close to FL we need to hang out with Nana " a touch bit" (The Prince's saying) more...so we headed South to Florida for a few days.

This is Presha Sue Ellen, a.k.a Suetee, she has been my little sister for approxiamtely 14 years. She is really sick with a heart condition, so I wanted to share this picture. We love her so much! My mom loves her even more.