HeidiSongs Teaching Resource

I seem to have math on my mind this week, so a lot of this week’s blog is dedicated to that topic!  I have finally figured out some creative ways for the children to practice this skill in small groups, and I do think that they are really getting the hang of it!  Also, I have not been listing the numbered weeks of the Kindergarten Pacing Guide I shared at the start of the year, due to holiday delays and such, but my class is tracking at week 20 if you are following along. 1.  Bean Toss Addition and Number Combinations Bean Toss Addition is an old favorite addition activity of mine that I use faithfully each year.  It can be used to help children remember the number combinations for any given number, such as four is the same as three plus one or two plus two, etc.  To do this, all you need are some lima beans and some spray paint.  You paint one side red (or any color, and leave the other side white, and let dry. To begin, you give each child a cup and just four bea

In this post, I'm excited to share my daily schedule with you, my "Mouse Ears Addition" Workmat, a Draw-a-Star Addition Worksheet, and a Color by Sight Word Native Alaskan Worksheet, too, which are all freebies!  I hope you enjoy them! Well, the weekend at the California Kindergarten Association Conference was a bit of a head rush, I must say!  I met so many incredible and wonderful teachers with nothing but lovely things to say about my HeidiSongs resources and blog!  Hearing about their successes with their students made everything seem so worthwhile.  I also love to hear about how their children just LOVE the songs!  I think that learning should be fun, as often as it possibly can be so and I’m so happy to have contributed to the happiness of some teachers and kids in our classrooms today!  I was fortunate enough to speak to a much larger audience than was originally anticipated- nearly 200!  They were a very responsive audience, and I surely enjoyed every min

This week in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., I'm sharing a free Sound Effects Story download to help kids learn about this great man, plus two fun ideas for crafts to go with it!  I'm also giving you a free download of my penguin guided drawing activity, and explaining how I got my kids started writing phonetically.  I also have some information on the rest of those matching sets 11-30 worksheets I've been sharing with a winter and spring theme!  Enjoy! 1. Martin Luther King, Jr. Sound Effects Story I have been trying to find time to write a sound effects story! If you are not familiar with the term, “Sound Effects Story,” this is a story that you tell and have the children listen for certain key words in the story. You have them make certain sounds and motions as those words come up. This helps them pay attention and adds a bit of fun to a lesson! So I wrote one this week, hoping to try to use it before we leave for the CKA conference in Santa Cl

Last Monday was our first day back after our Christmas vacation, and boy, could I TELL!  We spent the first couple of days trying to remember what it was we learned before we left!  Most of my students are doing quite well.  But unfortunately, not all of the children got the reinforcement that I would have liked during this break.  Some of the struggling students are in exactly the same place academically as they were when I left them in December, and others are actually worse off than before!  Meanwhile, time marches on, so we review and hope for the best as we push forward to teach all of the standards that the children have to master before the next testing period begins again.  So here are some things that I have been doing with my kids towards that end! 1.  Word Family Review We have been working on CVC words now since about the middle of November, and by now they “should” all be able to sound out -at, -an, -it, and -in family words.  I would say that about 75% of my studen