Five for Friday and Funny Kid Friday

Today I am linking up with Doodle Bugs for Five for Friday and Kathleen from Kid People Classroom for Funny Kid Friday!  Happy Friday!

Of COURSE this article was my favorite of the week: How Finland Keeps Kids Focused Through Free Play.  The premise of this article is that there is data to PROVE that children (and teachers) are more productive after an unstructured break to PLAY. (I never needed data, by the way- if you are a teacher- you experience this data.) This article focuses on a 5th grade classroom. In Finland, students are given 15 minutes of play time after every 45 minutes of lessons. The article is about a teacher from the US, who at first tried to stop this practice and teach like we do here- and what he found out about the benefits (for both students and teachers) of this break.

I feel like I am preaching to the choir, here, but I also feel like it helps me to remember that kids. need. to.  play.   It's not only okay.  It is essential.  Teaching today seems to focus so much on more rigor, more tests, and more paperwork and data- that it's easy to feel like you  have to sneak in playtime. 

Somehow the benefits of play for the child are forgotten.  It's easy to feel like there isn't time for play and that play is somehow frivilous, out-dated, and not justified.  But when  I read this article, I was reminded that there isn't time to NOT let children play.  

Here is my Play Every Day Prezi with some of my FAVORITE quotes about the importance of play. Sometimes I just quickly go through it to remind myself. 

In our world today, I don't think there can be enough emphasis on treating others kindly, looking someone in the eye when you speak, sharing, and playing well with others.  Children don't get the opportunity to practice this like they used to. I have more teachable moments during free choice time than any other time in my day. Talk about individual instruction!  

Here are some of my favorite quotes about play that I included on my Prezi.  I thought it was good for me to revisit before I begin the new school year, to remind myself not to be overwhelmed with everything else, but to remember that both play and academics are what children need.  

 (I love this one so much, and think of it every time my husband and son go off to play golf.)

 (This is my VERY favorite because these 2 princesses are my girls when they were little! :)

To go along with what's important, how much do you LOVE this letter?

I posted all about some fun activities to go with Frog and Toad Together,with lots of FREEBIES earlier this week. I use each story in the book to introduce something that we work on.  For example, one of the stories is The List.  

Lists are a great way to get children thinking and writing. I made a list of list ideas, as a matter of fact! You can get a copy by clicking on the picture below if you would like it!

I also included LOTS of cookie freebies to go along with Cookies, which may be one of my FAVORITE Frog and Toad stories!

I posted some great TPT Writing Freebies that I love to use in my classroom in my Beginning Year Writing Post.

Matt Gomez posts a FABULOUS post sharing 170 Online Ebooks for Young Kids! This is a fabulous resource if you haven't seen it.  Just go there. It's great!  

Here is my Funny Kid Friday for the week! 

This story is about my OWN son.  I was so proud of him when he was really catching on with his reading when he was little- maybe a little more proud than I should have been.  We used to go to Walmart's One Hour Photo a lot back then- when we used to get film developed (remember that?!).

One day, as we were just a few feet from a sweet girl working at the Photo Lab, my son said, "OH NO- Do we have to go to One Whore Photo AGAIN?!" 

I'm PRETTTTTY sure my face (and the face of the one sweet girl working at One 'Whore' Photo)  went through all of the following phases of "WHAT did you say?":

My friend and I still laugh about this - and use it whenever we get the chance. She will write, "I have whores and whores of housework to do this morning..."  It never seems to get old.  I still laugh. See, it worked out well that I didn't teach that "wh" blend too well. 

Have a fabulous weekend!  Thanks for stopping by!

Diggin' Into Next Year Linky- Writing

This weeks Linky with Laura from Where the Magic Happens  is all about Writing Instruction.

 

TEACH WRITING.

I wanted to share some fabulous FREEBIES from TPT that I found and have loved using with my class during Writer's Workshop. I have shared most of these before, but sometimes I forget about them, so I thought it would be good to remember some of these great things!

My children always need  some more practice with conventions (well- of course, because they are five...).  The children really enjoy and seem to understand writing small moment stories, and these are great for getting ideas down on paper, and for helping the children focus on one or two important conventions- like using a capital letter to begin a sentence or using ending punctuation.

Every Friday  is my favorite small moment mentor text.  Kathy Griffin introduced me to it earlier this year, and I just love it.

It is a sweet, simply written story.  The children really see that one memory can turn into a story. Here are some pages from the book.

from Amazon:
All week long, a boy and his father look forward to their Friday ritual—breakfast at their favorite diner. The leisurely walk through the neighborhood is just as good as the pancakes at the end.

This makes the book even more special:
Author Dan Yaccarino Talks About His Inspiration for Every Friday I guess the Friday breakfasts came about because like most dads, I sometimes didn't feel like I saw my son enough. Some weeks, our Friday breakfasts were the only time he and I had to talk or just share some time together.
I look back on when we started what became our little tradition. He was in preschool and had to start sharing his mom and dad with a new little sister. I wanted him to have some time when he didn't have to put up with a crying baby who yanked his ears, which he patiently tolerated. He and I soon looked forward to Fridays and the diner's owner, Nick, as well as a variety of regulars, warmly greeting us. To their continued astonishment, he consumed an entire adult-size order of pancakes and a side of bacon, of which I was very proud. I have fond memories of us watching people trudging through the snow and rain as he and I were cozily nestled in a booth, a little oasis from the outside world. As much as we loved Nick’s Diner, I think we both preferred the small journey we took each week to get there. It may have been a mere four blocks, but it was full of adventure: greeting familiar faces, window shopping and monitoring the progress of a building on the corner going up story by story. Nick's Diner has since closed, so our breakfasts have been relocated to another and like that building, my son is now tall and strong. I look back on his wonder of the world and fascination of even the smallest things. Even though it was only a few years ago, life seemed a bit less complicated. My hope for Every Friday is for dads, and moms, to set aside some time to be with their children. It doesn't have to be breakfast on Friday, but it should be some time that they can count on to be with just you. And perhaps many years from now, they will carry on the tradition with their own children.

We practice together writing sentences in whole group guided writing lessons.  We review beginning with a capital letter and not putting random capital letters in the rest of the sentence, leaving spaces between words, writing neatly, rereading to be sure no words are left out, and ending with a punctuation mark, just like I'm sure all of you do!

I found some wonderful (and FREE!)  resources on TpT  that I wanted to share with you.

Krazy in Kindergarten shared this cute poster for remembering those all important spaces.

I LOVE Samantha Francis' 4-Star Kindergarten Rubric.  I printed out and laminated one of these for each of my students to use.  It is a wonderful visual for the children.  They "get" it. This was a great mini lesson and is a great review before I send them off to start writing, too.

This fabulous packet from Amy Morgan is perfect to show the children how adding details to writing adds so much to a story.  I got more excited as I saw and read more sentences on each page, and so did the children. We had so much fun with this.  We counted the sentences.  We found the periods, and  noticed that sentences don't just end at the end of a line but at the end of a complete thought.  We talked about how much more interesting the illustrations were with details and color, too.









These are some writing packets with some great printable writing papers for the children to use. They have reminder rubrics right on the papers for the children.

Mrs. Lindsey has a great Writing Rubric K-2 Packet at her TPT store.



Lisa Sadler shared this journal page with editing at the bottom. It is easy for the children to use!

Karen Langdon shared a great Writing for Readers Packet of writing papers.  Her reminder rubric has real photographs.

Tanya Dwyer shared such a great Mini-Book Writing and Rubric with a fairy tale and a Star Wars  mini book writing activity. This looks like so much fun to use. The kids will love it.



Miss Jacobs' Little Learners shared this WONDERFUL  What Can We Write About? poster.



My friend Stephanie from Principal Principles posted that she loved the song Brave by Sara Bareilles. 

Well, I  went to Youtube and listened and listened and listened. And added it to my iPod to listen more.  (That is what I do with songs- totally over do it until I don't like them anymore.)

                                   

I like the song for a couple reasons.  First of all, I don't want to wait to say what I really want to say until I am realllllly old- and it accidentally slips out . What if I am one of those older people who just doesn't care and starts swearing? Sometimes I think maybe I will just pretend I don't know what I am saying so I can start swearing.  Don't worry, I could never. But maybe sometimes really just a tiny bit.

Anyway, the song is a good reminder to not be afraid to say what I want to say (within reason... ).  I usually think nobody really cares what I have to say, so I don't say a lot or just rush through what I want to say.  That is why I love this blog.  I love that people can read it if they want, and hopefully enjoy it.  I love sharing that way. 

Secondly, I am always telling my children to BE BRAVE when they read and write. Especially with writing.  Be brave and try to hear as many sounds as you can, and get those words down on paper. Be brave and try to draw something you think you can't draw!

Here are some great books to share with your class about being BRAVE.

If you haven't seen Courage by Bernard Waber, it is such a wonderful book. It's great for conversations about being brave, and how courage is being brave for both big and small things.  Here are some pictures from the book:

 This is NOT how to be brave.  But how cute are those penguins? 

I also  have my  Primary Writing Prezi  up every day during Writer's Workshop so I can zoom in on reminders about topics, editing, or conventions. Of course a "Be Brave" section is on this Prezi,  along with all sorts of links, anchor charts, and videos to go along with different types of writing.

Thank you for stopping by! Have a great week!