School Year Goal People Craftivity

I saw this cute idea on Pinterest to have students make a goal for the school year and then create a paper person to display. Since I have kindergarten students I had them dictate what their goal for the year would be. We discussed what some goals could look like in kindergarten. Most students chose to learn how to read. After I wrote down their goals they got to create a mini version of themselves using construction paper and yarn for hair.  Here are some of the final pieces that we hung up in the classroom for parents to see at Parent-Led conferences:

Reward Coupons- Behavior management

I found this idea while looking through…. yep, Pinterest! I like the idea of having cheap and easy rewards for students that don’t have me spending a lot of money. In the past I have only done prize box and candy box. Let me tell you that it seemed like I was always at the store trying to find little trinkets for the treasure box and bags of candy for the candy box.

I found many different versions of these reward cards online so I took some ideas from different sources and created my own reward cards. I also printed out just a copy of the picture I used to distinguish each reward and glued it to the front of a library pocket card and laminated them. I after they swerve laminated I used a box cutter to open the pocket up and slid the reward card into the library pocket.

Here are the rewards I chose to use ( we do not leave them all out for students to chose from each time we rotate through them so its not so overwhelming):

Cubes- extra time to play with connecting cubes

Blocks- extra time to play with the block center

Artist-free draw

Computer- extra time on the computer

IPad- extra time on the IPad

Game time- time to play a twisted twister, Candyland, Guess Who, etc…)

Promethean board- extra time on the Promethean board

Guest Reader- student gets to read a story to the class

Teacher, Teacher- student gets to be the teacher during calendar time the next day

Roll Away- student gets to sit in rolly chair all day

Lunch Date- eat lunch with the teacher

Rock Out- student gets to listen to music while they work

Chomp,Chomp- chew gum

lets get moving- choose what video we dance/exercise the next day

First in Line- get to be first all day

Show and tell – bring something from home to share with rest of class

Treasure- treasure box stuffed animal- bring stuffed animal to school (or teacher will provide one)

Sweet tooth- candy box

These reward cards go along with our behavior management clip chart  system we have in place in our classroom. At the end of each day the students get a ticket(s) tha t correspond to each color on the chart. Purple=3 tickets, Blue= 2 tickets, Green= 1 ticket, Yellow = no tickets, Red = owe 1 ticket. Every Friday we count our tickets ( great 1:1 practice). For every 5 tickets they have they get to chose one prize. Each student has the opportunity to get up to 3 prizes (15 tickets) per week. I keep track on a spreadsheet their end of the day color and which prize(s) they pick each time.

Out of this World themed clip up behavior chart

When my co-teacher asked me what I thought about an Out of this world/reach for the stars theme for our classroom this year I got right to researching different things to do/create. One thing that I kept seeing when looking at behavior management was the concept of the clip chart. In our room we have operated using the stoplight system of red, yellow and green. Everyone started on the side of the chart and when they needed reminders they would move up the stoplight. One thing this system lacks is recognizing students who go above and beyond in the classroom. I had no clue how I was going to turn the concept of a clip up chart to fit our theme but my co-teacher had total faith in me when I asked her if we could scrap the stoplight system we were both accustomed to and switch to this system in order to recognize more students.

I wanted to create a clip up chart that fit into our theme so I knew right away I wanted to create a behavior rocket ship. I used cardstock and backed it on posterboard to make it extra sturdy. I then laminated the rocket to hopefully help it last through the school year.

The sayings that I came up with for our rocket ship were: Red- Emergency Landing (Time-out); Yellow- Reach TOWARD the stars (warning to help them fix unwanted behavior); Green- Ready to Blast Off (everyone starts on green); Blue- Shining Star; Purple- Out of this world.

As you can tell from the picture above we had an AMAZING day this last Friday! This picture was taken at the end of the day (I think it’s fair to say we were in great moods all day and the kids were great). This was our first day with no one ending the day on yellow or red!!!

In order to reward students for their behavior we have a Friday Reward system that we have in place that is based off of our rocket clip up chart. At the end of each day students get tickets that they save until the end of the week. When students end on purple they get 3 tickets, blue= 2 tickets, green= 1 ticket, yellow= 0 tickets, red= owe 1 ticket. For every 5 tickets they have earned throughout the week they get to choose a special reward (post to follow about our reward system).  They have the potential to earn up to 3 extra prizes (15 tickets) each week.

Star themed Donation Door

While searching the internet for star themed ideas for our classroom I ran across an idea for a donation door. This just gives parents the opportunity to donate small items that get used up in the classroom. I chose to use the saying “Catch a falling star and put it in your pocket.” It just seemed fitting for our theme and purpose. On each star I wrote one thing that was fairly cheap (under $5) that would be awesome if parents could donate because let’s face it if it’s not donated it’s something that I will end up going out and buying myself. Some of the items on the stars were: box of cereal, box of crackers, individually wrapped candy, hand sanitizer, sheet protectors, glue sticks, copy paper, cardstock, dry erase markers, reg markers, construction paper, scotch tape and masking tape. Most of the items you can get at Dollar Tree and I’m not picky on brand (Dollar Tree is like a second home for me!) I also included a sign to explain what it was to parents:

Before each parent left I made sure to let them know that by no means did they have to choose anything to donate. We told the parents that they could bring in their item whenever they got it, it didn’t have to be the very next day. We had many people take a star and on Friday we already received one of our donations (box of cereal).

Pete the Cat Rocking in my School Shoes craftivity

As always let me start this post by saying I saw this on Pinterest!!! We read the book Pete the Cat Rocking in my School Shoes.  The kids LOVED this book so much we ended up re-reading it the next day as well. After we read the story I asked each student what their favorite thing had been so far in Kindergarten. I recorded this on chart paper. Then we made our own school shoes. I had the shoes pre-cut (I just traced one of my 3 year old’s shoes). I also had white pieces for the top and bottom of the shoes that the students glued on to the shoe outline. After the students had glued down the white pieces of the shoe I gave them each 4 reinforcement circles (I found these at Dollar Tree). They were then able to draw their laces by making an x in the middle. When we were done I hung them up in the hall so when their parents came to Parent-Led conferences on Thursday they could be on display.