Pirate DPA & A Giveaway WINNER!

I hope everyone is enjoying their summer! ...I sure am!

Today, I'm going to be sharing a DPA (daily physical activity) SMARTboard file that I created waaaaayyy back in teacher's college for my gym class.

At one point or another throughout the school year, there's probably going to be a pirate unit/theme...or is that just me? Pirate unit or not, this is a fun way to incorporate some quick, easy, and engaging DPA into your daily schedule.

The best part about it? No equipment! AND your kiddies can do the activities anytime in your very own classroom! (permitted your room is equipped with a SMARTboard)

Here's a quick description of the activity (the following page is included in the download):

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There are 15 DPA actions to be completed, each given a pirate-themed title. Here's the main page:

The following 6 (out of 15) examples will give you an idea of what you will find within the file:

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And more!!

Click here to download your copy of this SmartNotebook activity for FREE!

Tech Tip: once you download and open the file, click "View" along the top navigation bar, then "Full Screen," and click the right arrow to navigate to the main ship page (page 2) to begin the interactive activity.

And now the moment you've all been waiting for...

*write names on paper, fold, close eyes, pick a name...*

**CONGRATULATIONS**

Janice DeMarti! 

You're the winner of my Chalkboards & Banners labels and decor pack!! Shoot me an email at funwithfirsties@hotmail.com and I will hook you up with your download!

Thank you so much to everyone who entered!

Birds On the Loose & an Insta-Linky!!!

Hi all! I hope everyone is enjoying their summer :) I've actually been working non-stop on activities for next year and have one of my favs to share with you later this post!

But first, here's one of those posts I promised that didn't quite make the cut throughout this past school year. I'll begin by confessing my love of what other's call the "dirtiest bird on Earth"...PIGEONS!!!

I flippin' *LOVE* pigeons. I get so excited whenever I see them. I just think they are so hilarious and cute...seriously, how could you not love this:

HA!!!!!!! *SO cute* 

(to be perfectly honest, I specifically googled "fat pigeon" to find this one because, personally,  I think the fatter the better!.....I need therapy a pet pigeon)

ANYWAYS, fuelled by my love of these joyful creatures, it took no time for me to drag my students into my healthy obsession with the help of Mo Willem's amazing series:

My kiddies *love* these books and howl with laughter every time we read them, so I wanted to find a way to incorporate the books in our morning literacy centres. 

I decided it would be a great creative writing and oral language development opportunity to have the kiddies tell their own version of the pigeon stories. I photocopied one of the pigeon books without the words. After binding one book per centre group, the kiddies got to work writing their funny "don't let the pigeon..." tales:

It also turned out to be a great opportunity to work on sharing, taking turns, and teamwork. After all, there were 3-4 kids and only one book. They were forced to speak constructively to each other and compromise to come up with their overall topic and all of the details within their stories.

This centre activity ended up taking us through two weeks of their oral language literacy centre {the first week was spent brainstorming and writing, and the second week was spent illustrating and editing}. They ended up doing such a GREAT job on their books that we kept the finished products in our class library to share with our peers:

 ("Don't let the pigeon hold dynamite," "Don't let the pigeon have chocolate bars," "Don't let the pigeon go dirt biking," "Don't let the pigeon go for vacation," and "Don't let the pigeon play hockey.")

After seeing how valuable this simple activity was, I ended up doing the same activity with another book later in the year. I love this activity because once you find a book that the kiddies enjoy, you automatically have an engaging and meaningful centre activity...the possibilities are endless!

Now, in the spirit of this feather-filled post, I'm going to quickly share the giant 158-page math pack I made for the beginning of the school year:

Look WHOOO'S Learning!

I can't wait to use this with my kiddies in the fall. It's packed with hands-on math tub activities, worksheets, and assessments. Each math tub activity is filled with tons of opportunity for differentiation and can therefore potentially take you through the first couple months, depending on the grade you teach and how you schedule your math block. 

Pop on over to my little TpT store if you'd like a handful of math tub activities to help get you (and your kiddies) through the first few weeks of school :)

Finally, I'm linking up with Babbling Abby over at The Inspired Apple for an adorable insta-linky!!

What does YOUR handwriting look like? Link up with @babblingabby on Instagram with the hashtag #writenowwednesday to link up:

Come hang out with me on Instagram: @funwithfirsties Meet you there!

Let's be friends!

Get teaching tips, ideas, and FREEBIES every now and then.

Built with Kit

June Rewind & September Decor

Hey'all....um....IT'S SUMMERRR!!!!! 

Oh boy, never thought I would get here *phew* The last month of school was complete organized chaos. Friends/family would say to me, "oh you must be glad the school year is winding down." Winding DOWN?! Yeah, right! I'm pretty sure we packed more into the last month of school than we did in the entire year. Needless to say....

That is completely accurate in every way.

Over the summer I will be posting a bunch of activities that my firsties did throughout the year that never quite made it to the blog, so stay tuned! 

Today, let's rewind back to June and I'll share the silly little Father's Day card we made for our dads:

We have all seen the ever-popular tie card, so I thought I'd put a unique twist on that tradition. 

I used just the tie and pocket images from this FREE template from Holiday Crafts and Creations:

(Click the pic for your FREE download!(

Inside the pocket, we put a $1,000 Canadian Tire gift card (hehe!)

(I just googled "Canadian Tire gift card" and chose one of the images)

The kiddies thought the little prank was just *hilarious* haha and the cards turned out great:

Along with the card, we gave our dads the sunflower plants we had been growing over the last couple weeks for our Living Things science unit.

Throughout those weeks, we kept a log of our plant's growth in this little log book: 

(Click the pic for your FREE download)

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Built with Kit

So, like any normal crazy teacher, I spent my first 4 days of summer break already getting ready for September. I have been *obsessing* over chalkboards recently and thought it would be super cute to incorporate that decor into my classroom next year. Chalkboards are becoming a lost tool! ...at least up here in NWO where there is not one single chalkboard in the entire school. It's all white boards and SmartBoards. Which is all fine and dandy, but I say let's bring back some old-school style next year!

This pack includes a whopping 308 pages of cuteness and organization!!! 

Here's a quick description at what's inside:

But FIRST! I'd like to give a BIG shout out to Cheryl over at Primary Graffiti for her brilliant product preview inspiration. She created the most adorable "Butterflies in Disguise" decor pack that kind of has that chalkboard feel to it, too. So if you think you like Chalkboards & Banners then you're going to *love* Cheryl's pack (click HERE to jump to her store). One more thing: I also just recently discovered her blog and--no lie--spent about an hour and half cruising through her posts. So if you have not already checked her out (does that sound weird?) then you need to go there now. Seriously, Primary Graffiti. GO!!!

Okay, turning the crazy dial back to a reasonable level...here's what's inside:

Desk Nameplates- there are two design options available to choose from; and each set includes an alphabet reference, 5 basic 2D shapes, numbers 1-25, and 10 colour words:

Alphabet Posters- there are two design options to choose from, as well as the option of printing smaller half-page posters or larger full-page posters:

Binder Covers & Divider Pages- there are two design options available; and you have 45 titles to choose from (guided reading, school information, writer's workshop, reader's workshop, conferring binder, lesson plans, student information, running records, assessment and evaluation, social studies, word work, sight words, school/team notes, parent/teacher communication, substitute binder, writing, math, ELA, science, phonics, literacy centers, math centers, daily 5, christian living, religion, health and phys. ed., data and assessments, teacher binder, fine arts binder, music, visual arts, drama, master copies, and a cover for each month of the year).

As mentioned in the title, these pages can be used as either binder cover pages, or as divider title pages slipped in a page protector within the binder to divide each subject/heading:

Days of the Week: 

Months of the Year- there are two design options available (with or without clipart):

Word Wall Headers- these can also be used for levelled reading bins:

Word Wall Sight Words- there are two design options available for each of these 5 Dolch word sets; 5 sets of Dolch words include pre-primer, primer, 1st grade, 2nd grade, and 3rd grade words. These words are not only great for display on your word wall, but can also be used for hands-on interaction/learning games at your literacy centres:

Number Posters- these half-page number posters feature numbers 1 through 20 and include the numeral, number word, ten frame number representation, and tally for quick reference:

Number Labels- these include numbers 1 through 100 and are great for your number wall or even math tub labels:

Table Group Signs- these feature numbers 1 through 6, and include the option of two number representation (numerals or number words)...if you choose to hang these signs over table groups, you can either stick to only one number representation option depending on your grade level, or you can stick two copies back-to-back so the numeral is on one side and the number word is on the other:

Chalkboards and Banners: cheerful classroom decor and labels

(Click the pic to visit my store if you would like to download this pack)

And finally, a quick shout-out to the BEST superdad in the world...MINE!

...there's noone else I'd rather get hit by a Sea-Doo with! haha Happy (belated) Father's Day...Love you, Dad!! xox