5 Freebies to start your year

Happy September!  Happy Back to school!  Yes, I know I am late on the train, but just like everyone else, back to school time is crazy around here!

Here is a list of freebies for you to use to help you plan, make activities for independent work binders, for a quick center, subplans, or just on a day that you realized you didn't plan enough!

1. Name activities for parents:

I just found this Freebie by Tara West and it is perfect for me to send home with my preschoolers and maybe even some of my kinders for name practice at home (Ok, I will probably use it with my own child also).  I have not decided if I will save it for parent conferences or give it out next week at Back to School Night, but either way.  It is a win!

2. Printable Packs by 3 Dinosaurs:

If you have not discovered 3 Dinosaurs yet, I highly recommend bouncing over there right now.  I use Cassie's Printable packs not only for my preschoolers but also for my K-2 kiddos.

3. Planning Playtime Freebies

Planning Playtime has a Freebies page where she has various freebies that will work for each month.  While I am not a fan of using worksheets in preschool, I feel like a lot of these activities I could make into reusable activities for independent work binders for my K-2 kiddos.

4.  Make Learning Fun Themes

Another one of my favorite places to check is Make Learning Fun.  If you go to the themes section you can find tons of activities for math, language arts, etc. all on a specific theme.

5. Alphabet Letter Hunt

Tot School has these free Alphabet letter hunt sheets.  I am using these in conjunction with the Unique Curriculum.  As I introduce letters, students can use these sheets to practice recognizing the letter.

8 Freebies to Jump Start 2017

Start 2017 off right with some great freebies from myself and other special educators that can help make your transition back to school after winter break a bit smoother.

1.  Color Snow Flake Matching

I love using this activity with my students who are learning color words! Students match the color word with the correct snowflake.  Check it out here!

2. January Work Tasks

Mrs. P's Specialties has  3 work tasks that are perfect for January!  Matching, labeling and how many. Check them out here!

3. Editable Activity Matrix

 Erin from You AUT-a Know has a great activity matrix that will be perfect to use with embedding instruction.  It enables you to make activity matrices to plan out how to work on student IEP goals throughout the day.  Check it out here!

4.  Counting Snowball 0 - 20

Traci from The Bender Bunch has an awesome count & clip task card freebie that practices numbers 1-20. The clothes pins allow for extra fine motor practice, but you could also use dry erase markers.  Check it out here!

5. Social Story

 All Things Special Ed has a Being Good Friends Social story that will be great to remind some of our friends what it looks like to be a good friend.  After about 2 weeks of possible unstructured activities at home, our kids may need those gentle reminders.  Check it out here!

6. Winter Hat Glyph

Delightfully Dedicated Special Education has this adorable hat glyph that uses Smarty Symbols. The students design their hats based on the answer to the questions.  This is a great way to work on IEP goals that focus on answering questions wth 2 choices.  You can find it here!

7. New Year Goal Writing

Teaching students to develop goals is an important skill.  Autism Educators has developed this goal setting for visual learners. You can find it here!

8. Short A practice

Need some easy phonic practice for your students?  One Room School House has a no-prep freebie for short A practice.  Directions to use the file on the ipad are also included.  Find it here!

If you have another freebie that you would like to share please leave it in the comments!!

SPED Tricks & Treats blog hop

Hello!!  I hope you are enjoying the SPED tricks and treats blog hop!  I can't wait to see the goodies everyone can collect.  Special educators always have to have their bag of tricks handy and you can never have too many. 

My trick is all about metallic sharpies (and this will lead right into my treat)!  I love metallic sharpies.  They show up great on dark paper (especially black) and look so much better than a white crayon or colored pencil.  I have been able to get them  almost anywhere sharpies are sold and they come in gold, silver, and bronze. I used these twice this past week to make the activity I am about to show you and also to make dots on a black circle (that activity went with my letter F week, I will share it it soon). 

Last weekend, The Printable Princess  posted about some activities she made for her kindergarten classroom.  I just loved the spider webs!  However all I could find at the dollar store was black plates, which I ended up loving even more.

 I used the silver sharpie to draw the webs.

1.  I started by adding the targeted skill in the middle, for example the letter Y. 

2.  I then drew a circle around the Y 

3. Next, I added lines going out from the A to the sides of the plate (I usually did 4 or 5 lines on each one). 

4/5/6.  Last I connected the lines to make  spider webs.  I found it easier to start on the outside of the plate and work my way in.   

I made these adorable spiders to go with the webs.  I used graphics from My Cute Graphics and added letters, shapes, and numbers to the back to make a matching game.  I also picked up some spiders at the grocery store that my kiddos who are practicing 1:1 correspondence can count out the number of spiders to match the web.  This week with one of my kiddos we matched the letter spiders to their webs.  She loved it!  I told her the spiders were sad and needed to go back to their homes.  This worked like a charm (sometimes she is tough to get started )!  She was practicing identifying upper and lowercase letters, I was able to sneak some letter sounds in and we even practiced counting by counting how many spiders we had matched to their webs.  I can't wait to do this with her again this week.  

So this leads me to my freebie!!!  I am sharing the cute spiders I made to go with these webs.  I have included all of the lowercase letters (you would write uppercase on the web), shapes, and numbers.

 You can get them by clicking on the graphic below!

I would love to hear how you use these spiders or any of the tricks I shared with you.  Please leave a comment below!

If you are not already, make sure you follow me on Facebook, on my blog, and on TpT so you never miss another freebie!

Now hop on over to Breezy Special Ed to see what tricks and treats Brie has in store for you!!

Wheels on the bus! (freebie)

Well we are getting ready to roll into week 3 of school, so I thought maybe I should share what we did our first week!

This year I am back to teaching K-2 1/2 day and preschool 1/2 day.  That means you may see more preschool posts since I do not have a self contained K-2 class this year.  We started off the year in Preschool talking about the Wheels on the Bus. This turned out to be a great opener because the kids all knew the song and could immediately relate as they rode the bus to school.  We read the book, Pete the Cat: Wheels on the bus.  Huge hit!  The kids are still reading it during "library" time.   To follow up on this book we painted buses.  Before we could paint the bus though, we talked about who rode the bus with Pete and who we ride the bus with.  The kids then drew in the bus driver. Then they drew themselves.  After the drawing was done, we painted.  Oh how they loved to paint!

Later in the week we read, Don't let the pigeon drive the bus.  This was another hit!  We made buses using different shapes.  I modeled, but the kids were able to put the windows, doors, and wheels wherever they though was appropriate.  I feel that kids should be able to express themselves through their art work and that everyone's final product does not have to look the same. I will say, all of the buses were different.  One is even upside down!  I added the kids pictures to the front of each bus as the driver with a sign on the wall that says "Don't let the Preschoolers Drive the bus!".


Once a week we have Talk & Stir with our speech therapist.  She does a "cooking" activity with the kids that goes along with our theme.  This week they did buses made out of graham crackers, Oreos, chex, and icing.  The kids said the buses were delicious!!

To round out our week, I taught the students a special version of Wheels on the Bus.  I am sure you have heard of this before, but if not, I will tell you it is a hit with all primary
 ages.  So here is how it goes (to the tune of the Wheels on the Bus)

The letter on the bus is A, A, A, 

A, A A,

A, A, A

The letter on the bus is A, A, A

All through the town.  

Cute, right?  You can change it up by changing the letter, changing it to shapes, numbers, or anything else you can get to fit in there.  I also do this song with sight words.  That is huge hit with my older kids.  I have a book with the words one to a page and we read the word, then sing the song. 

We have been using this song to review while waiting for the bus.  To make it work, I whipped up these buses that are programmed with letters, shapes,and numbers.  As we introduce each concept, we add it to the ring. Then we can easily grab the ring and review.  You can get your copy by going to my TpT store.  While you are there, be sure to follow me so you never miss another update and leave feedback so I know what you think!

5 little pirates (freebie)

I hope you enjoyed yesterday's freebie!

Today I am going to share another activity I put together.  This one used a song that I found on Strong Start and modified it just a tiny bit.  I put the song on one sheet and laminated it so that it can be looked at for reference, but also so that students can look for words and circle them with a dry erase marker (Mr. Clean erasers work great to get the dry erase marker off!!).   I then took a work glove (I tried to find an example on Amazon, but no luck) and added velcro to the finger tips.  Then cut out the pirate pictures and added velcro to the pictures so they would hook to the glove.  Now the glove can be use with the poem to act it out.  As each pirate leaves, a student can pull it off the glove.

You can get your own copy of 5 Little Pirates by going here!  Please leave a comment on this post if you download.   Also check out my previous pirate freebies and classroom activities and my pinterest board to see some of the other activities I included in the box.

Pirate box & a freebie

I spent some time this week working with our local TTAC working on developing literacy kits that teachers can check out of the library. The library is really a neat thing to have access to.  All we do is browse online, click check out and it it is mailed to us at school with an envelope to mail it back.  The library has curriculum materials, testing kits, teacher books for professional development, and best of all assistive technology.  It is great to be able to trial something with a student before we buy it and this gives us just that opportunity.

This past week I spent two days working on a pirate literacy box. I included lots of fun stuff in this box such as Shipwrecked to work on sight words, Communication boards for a Go Talk 9+, Beginning Sounds cards and a wheel, Pirate alphabet cards, a rhyming pirate file folder game and activities to go with the books Shiver me letters and How I became a Pirate.

I, of course, forgot to take a picture of the whole
box all put together, but I did take pictures of two activities that I want to share. The one I am going to share today is Pirate rhyming.

I made this to go with some of the other books included in that kit that had a rhyming theme to them. My thought process was that they rhyming activities could be used as a follow up to the book.   It is really easy to put together.  Simply print the pages.  Glue one page of cards to the right side of open folder and glue the directions to the font of the folder.  Laminate the folder and other set of cards.  Cut out cards and use velcro to adhere the cards to the folder to store.  Add velcro to the set already glued down so the student can put the match on top.

You can get your own copy of this activity by going here!  Please leave a comment on this post if you download.  Make sure you come back tomorrow to check out another activity that I put together.  Also click here to check out my previous pirate freebies and classroom activities and here for my pinterest board to see some of the other activities I included in the box.

Virginia is for Book Lovers (Freebie & giveaway!)

Hello again!!  Yes, I am hopping again.  All of these hops give me a focus (and you lots of freebies).  I have been networking/collaborating with the Virginia Teacher Bloggers since last summer.  It is a great group and we talk way more than blogging.   A few weeks ago (maybe even months ago) we decided we were due for another blog hop.  Virginia is for book lovers was born!! 

I have always loved to read and I have shared that love with my children.  We all get super excited about going to the book store or library.  I also think our school librarian gets excited when we get to the book fair.  We have been known to buy a few ton of books. 

Today I am sharing with you one of my favorite books, Aliens Love Underpants. (Feel free to giggle!!) I found this book last year and it was a favorite of my preschoolers.  This year, I have been reading it  my K-2 kids and they also love it.  I think it is the underpants that wins them over. The great thing is that there is a whole series of underpants books.  You can check them all out at http://www.underpantsbooks.com/.  Yes, that is really the website.   There is even a new book coming out (Monsters love underpants) just before my birthday in May.  It is on the top of my birthday wish list

Today I wanted to share with you part of what is becoming my Underpants Bundle of activities.  This is a matching game to practice rhyming.  Some of the words are from the book, others were just added.  Kids can play this like a simple matching game during literacy centers or you could put one half of the pair in a pocket chart and hand out the other half.  Read the word and have the kiddo with the match come up and put it in.  So many options!!  You can get it by clicking  here.

Be sure to keep your eye out for when I finish more activities to go along with this book.  Also, make sure you enter the giveaway below to try to win your own copy.  Keep hopping through to make sure you get to the HUGE giveaway at the end.

Entry-Form

Keep hopping along to Owls  & Lessons Etc.

Valentine Blog Hop: My turn!!!

Whoop!! Whoop!! It is my turn to have a Valentine treat for you. Before I share my goodies though, how has the hop been going? Lots of fantastic stuff!!! Last year I made a book called Valentine, Valentine (You can check it out here) and it was a huge hit in my classroom. I read it again this year and my students just love it. One of my boys gets so excited when I bring it out he almost falls out of his chair. To keep the excitement going into March I made a new book call Shamrock, Shamrock. It is the same pattern, just using a St. Patricks Day theme. I thought this would be the perfect thing to share since we are nearing the end of February. Please leave me a comment if you download this file and let me know what you think. I would love to know if your students like it also.  (Make sure you scroll to the bottom of this post, there is a giveaway!!!)


Without further discussion, here we go! You can download the file by clicking on the picture or at this link. I had hoped to to have actual pictures so you could see this book in action, but the weather had other plans.  I ventured out to school today just to get out of the house.  I brought home my copy of Shamrock, Shamrock, but unfortunately the pictures are not the best.  To make the book, print the pages, laminate, bind, and then use the included shamrocks (or foam ones made out of a die cut) and put velcro on the page and one the shamrock.  I try to put the Velcro to the side so it does not interfere with the picture (someone else put the Velcro on this one for me, so I need to move a few pieces).  Then as you read the book, students can take turns pulling off the Shamrocks. My students often start chiming in and saying the repetitive line with me.

 I am not only giving away Shamrock, Shamrock to everyone, but I am having a giveaway for winner's choice of 1 item from my Teachers Pay Teachers store!! There will be two winners!!!

Entry-Form

Color Snowflake freebie!!

Hi everyone!! Guess what!?!  I am posting and it is not a linky party or a blog hop.  Just a good old post from me.  It has been busy with the 3 boys for Christmas.  My living room floor is covered in toys and packaging.   Grandpa bought the boys play bow and arrows so I have been dodging arrows being shot through the living room while a transformer runs over my toes.

I have been working on a lot on some of my TPT products and stuff for my classroom.  I found that the color tree file folder game I made recently was a big hit with my students, so I just made another one!  This one has snowflakes and instead of the color word purple it has the color word white.   You can get it by going here.  Please leave a comment on this post if you download it.  I love to know if you find things useful.

My boys and I have also been working on our Random Acts of Kindness.  Anyone else? I was so proud of my middle son on Christmas day.  He opened a present from his aunt that was in a Kohls box, except he never made it past the box.  He thought it was his gift.  He told his Aunt thank you for the box and moved on to the next gift.  We had to tell him to look in the box.  My husband and I were so proud that he was happy with a box and showed appreciation to his aunt for it.

Gingerbread Man!!! (Freebie)

I am linking up with Carla over at Comprehension Connections for her Thematic Thursday (Yes, I know it is only Wednesday!, I am getting a head start.)!

I have posted about my Gingerbread stuff before, but I wanted to share again for all of our new shipmates!


I love doing a week of Gingerbread man and all of the activities that go with it. One of my favorite activities (which I cant find a picture of right now) is making Gingerbread man ornaments.  Then one day just before break while the kids are out of the room, the ginger bread men all run away.  We go on a hunt for them throughout the building by following clues that are left behind. This works on so many skills, communication, social skills, reading, gross motor and it is just plain old fun!!!  I found the clues pre-made somewhere, again not sure where. (I think finals has my brain a bit foggy!)

Another activity I do is use this  interactive book featuring cute little gingerbread men (and women) during circle time. These gingerbread people are dreaming of being put in the correct spot such as over the house or between the elves.  My students have loved this book!

Last, but not least  is this gingerbread themed practice sheet works on time to the nearest 5 minutes.  I made this for a group I had a few years ago.  You can get it by going to this link!

I would love to know what Gingerbread themed activities you do in your room.  Leave a comment or link up over at Carla's blog!

Special Education Giveaways & Freebies

Did we mention how much we love special educators??! 

Just to show you how much, 24 Special Education teacher bloggers have joined together to help you start your new year out with a BOOM! 

We are beyond excited and even more excited for you! (And maybe even just a wee bit jealous!)

These 24 awesome special educators, including me, have put together 5 fabulous giveaways and a freebie hop with over 20 freebies just for you!! (Make sure you read all the way through to enter the giveaways and download your freebie!)

Shall we get this party going!!?

Are you ready?

The first 3 giveaways are split into 3 categories; early childhood, primary, and intermediate! So be sure to enter the one for your grade level! You can click on any of the pictures to view the product in their store or to wishlist it in case you don't win!!{wink}

Here's a look at everything one teacher will win in the 

Early Childhood Pack!

WOW!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Here's a look at everything one teacher will win in the 

Primary Pack!

Seriously!!!!?? Are you feeling the Love?!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Here's a look at everything one teacher will win in the
Intermediate Pack!
As you know, it can be a challenge finding resources on TpT for this level, but we did manage to put a few things together that we think you'll love!

a Rafflecopter giveaway 

But wait! There's MORE!

David at "Attainment Company" was generous enough to give two lucky teachers a copy of this e-Book for their iPad. (This e-Book is compatible ONLY for iPad, so if you do not have an iPad do not enter!)

a Rafflecopter giveaway 


How many of you have seen this book, or are even using it in your classroom to assess and determine presents levels??   Brigance CIBS

Last year a new and improved updated version was released...... Brigance CIBS II

and we're super excited that Robin at "Curriculum Associates" has generously donated it for us to give to one of you!! Folks, this is a $339.00 value!! Now this one definitely makes us just a wee bit jealous!  (Our apologies, but this one is for U.S. residents only)
a Rafflecopter giveaway

And now it's time for a............... FREEBIE HOP!

I decided to share a log that I made to use with a one of my students this year.  This particular student has a seizure disorder and the parents asked if we could document when the child has a seizure at school. This is nothing fancy, but it gets the job done!!  You can check it out by clicking here!

If you would like more information on seizures check out the following websites:

Alaska Epilepsy
Epilepsy Foundation