FREE Turkey Trot Writing Prompt

I'm in the FREEBIE mood lately - can't wait to do this with my students today!



For Fun Friday this week - we are going to work on this fun writing prompt: 

I wanted a little more than the traditional "Turkey in Disguise" this year - although I LOVE that idea, the younger grades already take it over so I needed something new for us to try.

I remember one of my favorite activities was when we would share writing with our class - meaning we would start a story, pass to the next person after folding over so they could only read the last sentence.  They turned out crazy and hilarious!

Since we have been using Thanksgiving stories for our mentor texts, this wasn't too far of a stretch for my older students.  

  

There is a planning page if you want your students to respond on their own with a prompt!  

This twist in writing involves the older students and gives them an opportunity to be creative.  Students really love reading these stories.  

Don't forget to leave feedback if you download! That definitely prompts me to work on more freebies for great followers like you! 

Make sure you check out my last post for a chance to win this great new poetry lapbook: 

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Descriptive Writing - Monster Match

Well of course I couldn't stop with all the monster-y goodness! We ended up matching up more monsters after we have practiced and worked more on our descriptive writing unit!  I wanted a fun activity and something to give the students an opportunity to write a short description and not an essay since this will be part of their upcoming standardized test.   So of course, we made more monsters!  Here is the previous post of how we started out our unit.

This writing was such a hit!  We used the Create a Monster website  to create monsters then used our descriptive writing skills to have students guess whose monsters was whose.  

Click on any of the pics to get this for your classroom! 

The monster pages and writing templates are all included along with a rubric, directions, and monster templates if you don't want to use the website.  Also some writing organizers to help before you start writing!

So much can be packed in for this one little activity.  When we presented to the class we thoroughly discussed how details added to our writing and what some good examples are that are classmates had.  We talked about how sensory details can be written and included. Descriptive writing essays is our "big" project this unit but this paragraph was a fun way to reinforce and practice - connecting it to previous lessons! 

Here are some samples from our class: 

I love how they turned out!  So creative and the writing shows how much we have grown in the past few weeks learning how details can add SO MUCH to our writing. 

With such an easy process of making a monster and writing - it is sure to be a hit in any classroom! 

You can also use this FREEbie I created awhile back to work on descriptive writing - what better than to use poprocks?! Click the pic to go to the download. 

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Valentine's Math

I created a Valentines mini-math pack this year.  Perfect for lower primary grades reviewing graphing, and simple addition concepts. Check it out by clicking any of the pictures below.

I did this as a FLASH freebie on my Facebook page - be sure to like so you don't miss any more free items!

These fun centers, independent work or whole class work would be great for any classroom with the fun manipulatives that always appear around this time of year! Gotta love candy.

I was actually pretty proud of myself because I used all my own frames, clipart, and borders in this pack- how cool is that?!  You can check those out in my store too if you are liking what you see :)

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Elf Shenanigans Final Round

We have had so much and with our elf! I can't believe it is already time to say goodbye! At first, my students really did not believe it and I was pretty bummed but by the last week - we were tracking his every move and writing a TON about him! They definitely wanted to be on the nice list.

Twinkle left us coloring books do to in our free time during school this week! I love that this one had some writing to go with it! Get yours here!

Twinkle cut up snowflakes and taught us how to do them too!

Twinkle left us "selfies" (yes- kindergarteners are familiar with that word!!!) on the Smartboard and computer!  

Twinkle left us Magic Elf Sprinkles (glitter - it might look like it ;) we could take a picture with him for 30min and then the sprinkles wore off.  I used the pictures to put these cute cards with candy for their desks! I LOVE how they turned out and I know they will be so excited to walk in and see them! 

You can download a copy of the elf letter here! All you need to do is insert your elf's name and any special messages you have for students!

Take a look at what ours looked like!

Don't forget to sign them with your elf's name and I left special P.S. messages on some of mine as well :)

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Elf Shenanigans Round 2

 First how cute are our elves! I have tried getting lots of craftivities in this year, but they seem to go by the wayside with all that curriculum.  I finally made it a priority and these have stayed up for 2 FULL weeks before break - is there an award or something?!  My students really loved working on them - the FREE template and application can be downloaded here and here.

Twinkle has once again been up to some things in our room this week:

He has.....been reading on my desk!

....sleeping in the tissue box, no one knew if he was sick or tired, but we all agreed he needed some rest!

....flying (literally) onto our Smartboard! They loved this one!! They thought Santa made the plane for him and everything :) BTW: I wanted to decorate the plane more but that didn't happen - it says: from: North Pole in Elf Handwriting, of course ;)

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Reindeer Parent Ornament Gifts

So I wanted a simple parent gift...yes I'm a first year teacher and this time of year is cray cray to say the least.  We made these simple Reindeer handprint ornaments (from Pinterest) because they took very little time and I thought it would be a great momento for parents.  I hesitate to call them Rudolph because some of my students wanted the scary eye stickers, and who am I to stop their creativity?!

All you need is brown paper, brown paint, some eyes, and a nose and - WA-LA - perfect easy Christmas ornament to treasure for years to come!

Want a cute tag to go with them? Of course you do- download it below!

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Elf Shenanigans Round 1

I decided to participate in Elf on the Classroom Shelf and I'm very excited, as you can see by my Instagram picture.  We read the book and our letter the day before we left for Thanksgiving and this week, our elf (Twinkle) is already up to no good.

The first day was an almost flop - many of my KINDERgarten students didn't think he was real.  I was bummed and we went over the rules that he reported to Santa each night and that might not make Santa too happy.  I'm glad to report after some days of fun - they really seem excited about where he is going next and have no idea how he gets there :)

Day 1: covered in achievement stickers - how did he get those!?!

Day 2- Twinkle spelled "Work Hard" in Skittles on our counter.  It took us awhile to figure out what he spelled.

Day 3 - Twinkle got caught near the ceiling when he was flying! His note said "HELP!" They loved it, and since he was near a vent he spun around all day and everyone kept saying "He's moving, He's moving!!!"

It's been fun so far, I can't wait to see more ideas! How is your class liking it?

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Talking Turkey

We read the book The Amazing Turkey Rescue, which  is a fantastic book! My students really enjoyed the illustrations.  We worked on a writing/art project to go with it.

My class does not start art until December so I really feel like we have to work that in sometimes- we are in Kindergarten! We did some guided turkey drawing (some came out better than others!) and then gave our turkeys a vacation just like in the beginning of the book so they wouldn't have to be Thanksgiving dinner.   Take a look at some of our examples below! I think they turned out GREAT! We are really working on sounding out words!  I like how they came up with so many places for the turkey to go! :)

outer space!

Look at the outfit - can hardly tell its a turkey!

Cheerleading

basketball

Here was my attempt - tanning/beach :)

and of course - hockey!

Here's another anchor chart that has been really helpful for us! We go over the title, characters, setting, author, and beginning, middle, end (retelling /comprehending) depending on the focus!

Anyway to make it cuter or does anyone have any better examples? I haven't seen one of these in awhile and I want to be able to use it with each book we do :)

You can get the writing prompt here if you want a copy!

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