What teacher doesn’t love the Target Dollar Spot and The Dollar Tree? Can’t really say the same thing for my husband. He actually drops me off at the door at Target…not because he is trying to be kind (which he is), but because he wants me to finish that Dollar Spot hunt before he gets in the store!
So here are some of my latest finds….be sure and read to the bottom. There are a few freebee recording pages to go along with some of the items!

Here are some of the items in Target:
1. Love the clipboards! Can never have enough of those for write the room, center work, teacher assessment holder….
2. The abc dry erase boards will work great in our making words center.
3. Love playing cards…Here’s a tip…If you want children to pay attention to the “set” not the numeral, simply cut the numerals off of the playing cards. This forces the kids to pay attention to the configuration of hearts, spades, etc on the card---subitizing! They will be able to tell you how many on the cards very quickly…without counting!
4. Love those microphones. We have several! The kids love to use them for share time, show and tell, read to friend, etc…. “The brain learns by pattern but seeks novelty.” Give ‘em a mic and let ‘em talk!
5. The spinner games—perfect “can do” centers for literacy and math!
6. Not sure yet what we are going to make with the mailboxes. But, I wanted to get some before they were all gone! Any ideas?
7. ABC puzzle---perfect “can do” center! Now that’s what I call No Prep!

And here are a few things from the Dollar Tree:
1. Love the divided plastic plates. They are perfect for number bonds!
2. Dice for addition, counting, on…. Also found dice with sight words. Can’t wait to come up with a game for those!
3. Okay, so I’m going out on a limb on the “science boxes”. Not sure if they will actually work or not. But, they had them for making instant snow. So I bought 3 to use in my small groups. These are going to be great for a How To Writing experience as well as the scientific process! Check back next week at the Peek at my Week plans to see how it worked!
4. Love the light up bear. I give these to my kids in our small groups. Then, when I ask a question they can hit their light if they know the answer! They really love it!
5. Had to get those robots because they were just too cute to pass up!
6. The abc page is a sheet of magnetic letters and pictures that start with each letter. We are going to add these to our magnetic letter center.
7. Saving the grow frogs for the spring!

Also saw these at the Dollar Tree:
1. The monster box was back in the gift wrapping area. The mouth had clear plastic, and I just cut it out. Now we are ready to feed the monster! Put sight words, abcs, numerals, addition sentences, etc on cheap valentine cards. Now, have the children feed them to the monster as they read the card.
2. Are those tiny red solo cups just not the cutest? Okay, another “I’m not sure what I’m going to do with this but I just have to have it” item! Would love to hear if you are using them!
3. The speech bubbles came 3 to a pack. They are magnetic! Here’s what I’m thinking! We could have 3 kids write something on each of the three bubbles. Now, put the speech bubbles on the magentic board. Then, other children have to decide which kid wrote which bubble. Once they do that, the child goes and stands under his speech bubble! Can’t wait to give it a try!

More from the Dollar Tree:
1. That magnetic spinner is smart! I have seen them at teacher stores for nearly $10! So here’s what you do….draw a large circle on the magnetic board. Around the edge of the circle write numerals, sight words, etc. Place the spinner in the middle of the circle. Now, give it a spin. Whatever the spinner lands on….the kids read!
2. Close up pic of the instant snow.
3. Frog and lily pad toy (see below).

Here’s a fun addition/number combination game to go with the frog game we picked up at the Dollar Tree!
1. Decide which number combination you want them to work on.
2. Invite the child to count out that many frogs.
3. Now, the child tries to jump the frogs into the pond by pressing down on the frog.
4. So now on the recording page, the child writes the number combination of how many landed in the pond and how many landed outside of the pond.
5. The recording page is available at the bottom of this post as a free download.