Freebie and a Sale!

Hey friends! I am overjoyed to be at 600 followers. Since I started this teaching blog two years ago, I never imagined that I would still be so passionate about posting things going on in my teaching world. I fell off the planet for a while, but I've been going strong since this summer! 

In honor of reaching 600 followers, I am having a sale on EVERYTHING in my Teacher's Notebook Shop until tomorrow at midnight! If you haven't grabbed yourself a set of Common Core Math cards yet, this is your change to get it 30% off! And don't forget about my Poetry Unit and much more! 

Click my button to head over and check everything out!

This week, we have been focusing on the four sounds of 'ou' during our Word block. A previous colleague of mine always did an 'ou' Scavenger hunt. We did it again and it was soooo much fun! I printed the 'ou' words on 2 by 4 inch labels and then just put them on neon index cards. I placed them around the room in random places and then handed out the scavenger hunt recording sheet. Students had to read each word they found and determine what sound it made and write under the correct sound column. I purposefully put in some harder words to challenge them a little bit and told them if they had trouble reading the word, to try the word with each sound and then ask a friend. I only had to help them with a couple of the words, but it was still fun!

And I was overjoyed to see one little friend doing this to figure out the word. 

I was so happy he was using his chunking strategy!!

If you would like to download this activity, please click the pictures below. 

This first file is a Word document in case you want to change the words. You need "Wish I Were Taller" font by Kevin and Amanda.

I have had a pretty rough time of it the last few weeks since we returned from Christmas break. There are things that have happened which I can't really discuss here that have just had me frustrated and feeling like I don't know how much longer I can continue on. It has nothing to do with my students because they are AWESOME and I love them. BUT, after these weeks of frustration, this pretty much  made my week. We have been learning about fractions and we finally got to have outside recess yesterday. It has been wet and raining for the last few weeks, but this is what my friends were doing during recess...

It made me feel like I must be doing something right, even though I don't always feel that reassurance. Talk about a bunch of awesome kids! They are what is keeping me alive! =)

Head on over and enjoy my Teacher's Notebook sale! It will end tomorrow night!