All Things Christmas Vocabulary Book

Just finished our new vocabulary book called "All Things Christmas", which tells about all things Christmas related things. It is very similar to our Thanksgiving Vocabulary Book, which focuses on the story of the first Thanksgiving. Focus words for this story include:

tree, star, candy cane, wreath, stocking, gifts, bow, Santa, sleigh, reindeer, presents

Students will be using our theme related word wall to help them fill in the missing words.  (Check out our Christmas and Winter Word Wall Cards that go along with this book.)  We plan to read aloud as a shared read with our class, either showing this on the optima first or having the students follow along with their fingers as we read aloud to them. Or possibly show in the optima and use the mimio to write in the missing words.  Then when we are done the students write the missing focus word by using the word wall and paying attention to the picture clues in the store and context clues they heard during the shared read.

This activity will probably be a whole class activity for 1st grader for the reading part, as they would need instructional support, but could be independent for second graders.

For the past few years we've done a book called "Santa Claus" that we got the words from somewhere in cyberspace.  It really didn't focus on as many Christmas words that we wanted to it to, so that's why we revamped it for this year.  We plan on offering the old one as a FREEBIE on here soon.  We just need to upload our JPEG images into a PDF file.  So check back soon, as we'll have that available for free download through Google Drive/Docs.
You can find this vocabulary book HERE at our TPT store.

"I'm a Little Reindeer" Animated Movie FREEBIE

Our students this year are really "in" to the Optima and multi media presentations, so we have been creating little animated Power Point slideshows and a few "movies" if you want to call them that.  Just finished a little animated version of one of our favorite poems we do with our first graders:  I'm a Little Reindeer.

I'm a little reindeer
ready to fly.
I'll pull Santa's sleigh
up in the sky.
Christmas is here.
We can't be late!
All the little children
just cannot wait.

You can download this freebie HERE at our TPT store.  Here's the preview of the movie you can watch here.  Quality is much better if you download from the TPT store.  Hope you like it.  We can't wait to do this next week with the kids!

How To Make a Pumpkin Pie Writing FREEBIE

Wow!  Thanksgiving break is here.  YAY!!!!!  But where did November go?  What a jam-packed month.  So many fun activities and not enough time to do it all.  Well, we say good-bye to our Thanksgiving theme and move on to our North Pole-Christmas theme that starts next week.  One of the biggest projects we do is our Holiday Cookbook as a gift to our parents.  Students get to write a recipe in their own words on how they think their favorite food is made.  Each year is scares the you-know-what out of us as we start modeling the activity and have the kids think of the step by step process of making something.  It's like pulling teeth out or pulling your hair out stressful, but when its done, its amazingly cool.  And then you have this sense of accomplishment and think, "Oh, yeah.  It wasn't THAT bad."

This year I we tried to prep our kids a little bit during our Pumpkins theme by doing a "How to Carve a Pumpkin" writing.  You can pick up that FREEBIE at our TPT store HERE.  We modeled this with the whole class and then had the kids do it on their own.  It gave a pretty good picture of who is going to need the most in-depth help during the cookbook writing.

During our Thanksgiving theme, we came up with a "How to Make a Pumpkin Pie" writing activity.  Since there were SO many Thanksgiving activities to do in Novemer we didn't actually have the kids do the writing on their own for this one, but just did a class writing on the Mimio.  The students used the pictures to help them think about the steps for making a homemade pumpkin pie.  After we finished the class writing on the Mimio one of my students asked if we could find a video of someone making a pumpkin pie...so I jumped on that opportunity.  What a great way to check and see how accurate we were at writing the steps (since I've never in my life made a homemade pumpkin pie).  As we watched the video, I would pause every so often for students to check back and see if we were right.  They thought this was pretty neat.

So...next week when we start the dreaded Holiday Cookbook, I am hoping my students are a little big more prepared....and that I'm not pulling my hair out.

Grab your FREEBIE "How to Make a Pumpkin Pie" writing activity HERE at our TPT store.  We would love your feedback.  Thanks for stopping into our blog...and hope you all have a very Happy Thanksgiving!

Shape Box Spelling Patterns Font

How can I express how EXCITED I am about this font.  I think only those teachers who teach systematic sequential phonics will be the ones who will "get it".  I have wanted to create this font for YEARS!  I created the Shape Boxes fonts a month or so ago and was pretty excited to have that done because it did the job, but I really wasn't happy with that.  It wasn't exactly what I wanted.  I REALLY wanted the dotted lines between the spelling patterns.

Years ago, Christine and I came up with a way to help segment words with an activity called Rainbow Words (our own version).  We want students to be able to chunk the words apart using the different spelling patterns and types of syllables.  We color code the spelling patterns and types of syllable to match our Phonics Wall that we have at the back of the room.  It is divided into:  Bossy-Rs (yellow), Vowels and Vowel Teams (green), Short Vowel Markers (red), Blends and Digraphs (blue), and Other Sounds/Spelling Patterns (purple).  You can print off our Phonics Posters HERE for free through Google Docs.  Students write the word in the shape boxes using this new font shapes, then trace the boxes with the different colors to match the phonics wall sections.  The different colors give students a visual when they are trying to decode the word.

This font requires you to follow the key that is included to create the different multiple letter combinations. The regular alphabet letters would just use the regular letter keys (just like in the Shape Boxes Font we have for sale).

Where you can get this font:
Carrie's TN store HERE
C & C Teach First TPT store HERE

I would LOVE your feedback and appreciate credit for this font. It took me a long time to create and make it work! 

~Carrie

 

 

 

Ultimate Winter Holiday Doodles Collection

With the holiday and winter right around the corner, I thought I'd compile my four "winter" and "holiday" clip art sets into a collection called "Ultimate Winter Holiday Doodles".  This collection includes:  Christmas Doodles, Holiday Doodles, Gingerbread Doodles, and Snowtime Doodles.  There are 168 images in full-color and BW included.  Buy this set and SAVE!  You can check out each individual set and pick up a freebie from each set by clicking on the "Clip Art by Carrie" tab on the top of our blog page.  This will give you links to all my clip art.

Where you can buy this collection:
Carrie's TN clip art store HERE
Carrie & Christine's TPT store HERE

Thanks for stopping in to our blog!
~Carrie

Holiday Doodles and FREEBIE Ornaments

This Holiday Doodles digital clip art collection includes these BW and full-color PNG images:

round ornaments in BW and 5 colors
skinny oval ornaments in BW and 5 colors
light blubs in BW and 5 colors
bow in BW and 5 colors
bell in BW, silver, and gold
tree topper star in BW and color
angel in BW and color
mistle tow in BW and color
present with ribbon in BW and color
polka dot present in BW and color
wreath in BW and color
Christmas candle in BW and color

Where you can find this set:
Carrie's TN Clip Art shop HERE
Our TPT store HERE

Here's you FREEBIES for stopping into our blog:  Please make sure to follow my TOU, which are included at the bottom of our blog page.  I would love to see things created with my art, so be sure to give me a show back so I can see what you've all created.

 

Thanks!
~Carrie

Gingerbread Doodles with FREEBIE Cookie Cut Outs

Gingerbread Doodles clip art set includes:

2 gingerbread girls, 2 gingerbread boys, 2 gingerbread Christmas ornaments, 2 gingerbread mugs, gingergread house, gingerbread cookie boy, gingerbread cookie girl, cookie sheet with gingerbread cookies on it, fox, candy cane

I know the fox may seem a little weird to put in with this set, but when I think of the gingerbread man or the story Gingerbread Baby by Jan Brett, I think of the fox who eats him. :)  If you want some of the farm animals and farmer to go with this set, you can check out my Farm Doodles set.

Where you can find this set:
Carrie's TN clip art store HERE
C & C Teach First's TPT store HERE

Sorry for mulitple posts in a day, but its easier to keep things organized this way. 

Here's a freebie of the cookie cut-outs in black and white:  See Terms of Use below for using in your items for sale or for freebies given at your blog, TPT or TN.

Ruffle Borders with FREEBIE

Just finished another borders set.  I've been playing around with some of the filters in my Art Studio app and came up with these colorful Ruffle Borders.  You can never have enough borders and frames...I know I get sick of using the same ones over and over again.  There are 24 images total.  Be sure to scroll down and pick up the freebies of the black and white borders.

Where you can find this set:
Carrie's TN Clip Art gallery HERE
C & C Teach First TPT store HERE

FREEBIE Ruffle Borders in BW:  As with all images, please refer to my Terms of Use at the bottom of the blog page.

Thanksgiving Skip Counting by 2s, 5s, and 10s

Our first graders REALLY liked the Pumpkin Skip Counting activities we made this year to use for our Pumpkin theme, so Christine thought we should create some Thanksgiving ones, too.  Skip counting by 2s, 5s, and 10s seems to be one of the main goals in first grade Everyday Math.  Counting by 5s and 10s helps children later when they are learning and practicing counting coins.

Here is the Thanksgiving Skip Counting by 2s, 5s, and 10s activity.  You can find it HERE at our TPT store.  Let us know what you think.  Maybe for Christmas we can make Help Santa Deliver the Presents skip counting??!!

Clip Art included in this activity by Clip Art by Carrie and KPM Doodles.

Christmas and Winter Word Wall Cards

Always looking ahead to the next theme as you are teaching the current one.  Does anyone feel like that's how teaching goes?  Here are the Christmas and Winter Word Wall Cards that we will use in our theme Word Wall Pocket Chart this year.

This set includes word wall cards for these words:

Santa, Mrs. Claus, elf, star, gingerbread man, gingergread woman, gingerbread girl, gingerbread boy, gingerbread house, gingerbread cookies, reindeer, Rudolph, Christmas tree, stocking, ornament, candy cane, sleigh, mug, hot chocolate, toy sack, snowflake, present, snow drift, snowman, stocking hat, mittens, boots, scarf, snowball, sled, shovel, ice skates, snowboard, button, carrot, sticks, top hat, pine tree, iPad, iPod, teddy bear, train, doll, candy, letter, beard, holly

You can find this word wall card set at our TPT store HERE.  We would LOVE your feedback.

Cooking Doodles with FREEBIE Plate

Christine and I are thinking ahead to what clip art we will need in the next month or so and thought that cooking utensils might be a good idea, since we'll be doing our annual Holiday Cookbook.  The kids will be writing their own recipe of their favorite food.  We've learned after doing this for over 10+ years that kids need more and more visuals to help them write step by step projects.

The Cooking Doodles set includes these BW and full-color PNG images:

spoon (metal and wooden), fork, butter knife, sharp knife, whisk, spatula, ladle, rolling pin, measuring spoon, measuring cup, collander, bowl, fry pan, oven mitt, muffin tin, plate, cooking pot, tongs, cookie sheet, casserole dish, cake pan, mixer

Where you can grab this set:
Carrie's Clip Art shop on Teacher's Notebook HERE
Christine and Carrie's TPT store HERE

Here is your freebie:  Just remember to follow the terms of use included at the bottom of the blog page.  I would love your feedback!