Where’s Patty? A Leprechaun Moves In!

This has been the best week! I am in California for the California Kindergarten Conference on Friday/Saturday. Since I was going to be on this side of the country, I flew in on Monday to stay the week with one of my best friends, Kim Jordano, from kinderbykim http://kinderbykim.blogspot.com/! You know how when you are teaching you “just know” when you are totally going to be friends with a new teacher to your school? Well, I met Kim at a conference where we were both presenting! And yep, you guessed it….I “just knew”. We have been friends ever since, from all the way across the country! So I’m going to spend a few posts to tell you all about the great things we did/she did in her class! I decided I better start with St. Patrick’s Day since it is fast approaching! So here it goes….

Kim and her teaching partner, have a leprechaun actually move into their room. Each night they add a new piece of doll furniture to a growing collection. The kids are so excited to come in each morning and see what furniture has been added. That cutest little girl ever, is Kim’s precious little girl, Gianna! She is in the kindergarten class next door. Each day this week she was up before us, dressed and ready to go to school. She wanted to find that leprechaun! Her teacher had this special little green flashlight that was a special leprechaun light. They would use it to look around the room to see if they could find the leprechaun. Her teacher also had this special little noise maker…kinda sounded like a fairy noise. She told me that she took it out of a dog toy! She kept it in her pocket and every once in a while she would press it! She told the kids that was the sound leprechauns make! The kids would get really quiet to see if they could see the leprechaun! Oh my word! Talk about fun!

Here are the centers that Kim had planned! The board on the left is how her kids know which area to go to. Hmmmm, didn’t ask her why there are only 4. They visit one area each day so I’m wondering what they do on the 5th day. I’ll have to ask her that tonight! Kim’s reviewing how to use the word bank to do their leprechaun writing.

Top left….they made a mirror for the ABC art book and they did a secret sight word scramble from her packet on tpt  and then wrote their sentences. Top right….they made a shamrock napkin book by cutting the pictures and then they glued them inside the napkin book to write the sentences. They also did their Say it, Clap it, Write it book from her See it, Say it, Sound it packet on tpt. Here they say the word, then they clap the syllables, and finally they stretch out the word. Bottom…First, they made the bubble map of describing words for leprechauns. Then, they used the directed drawing directions from her Draw and Write packet on tpt to draw the leprechaun. Finally, they wrote a piece about leprechauns using the bubble map they made. Love these little stands that she hangs her samples from. Keeps them from getting lost on the table!

Here is a cute math activity  from her Jazzy Math Journal packet on tpt they did for St. Patrick’s Day! You can read more about Kim’s great adventures on her blog over at kinderbykim http://kinderbykim.blogspot.com/!