Thrilling Thursday Flash Freebie!

What makes it thrilling? Well, it's only 1 more day until the weekend. That's pretty thrilling. But if that's not enough thrill for you, how would you feel about a --

You can grab Turkey Tails for free on Thursday, 11/5/15. Turkey Tails is a literacy center focusing on the long and short vowel sounds of a and e. Students sort the 28 words on the turkey feathers, placing them on the turkey that sports the same vowel sound.

All of the words used in this activity come from the 1st 200 Fry words.

Turkey Tails is CCSS aligned to K-2. 

If you snag this Thrilling Thursday Flash Freebie, please leave a comment and/or follow my TPT store.  Thanks!

Math Centers You Will Want to Gobble Up!

Teachers, it's about time for some math centers especially created for this time of year.

Turkey Squares combines math and critical thinking skills as students try to fill arrays with different colored turkey icons without repeating a color in any row or column.  Also known as statistical arrays, you may recognize these as a mental exercise similar to Sudoku. Turkey Squares allows you to easily differentiate your instruction by providing successively more difficult arrays.

Turkey Fractions & Pumpkin Pie, Oh My! is, obviously, focused on fractions.  It consists of 28 cards to use with the game, "I Have..., Who Has...?"This center activity can also be used with the entire class. It is CCSS aligned.

Your students will practice addition and subtraction within 20 in Tail Feathers Math Center. After computing the value of each tail feather, students will place the feather on the turkey with that value. There are 4 full color work mats, 28 color tail feathers, labels for your center folder, and a black line recording sheet included in this product.  This activity is CCSS aligned.

While not exactly a math center, Pilgrim Square Puzzlers does exercise problem solving skills while disguising it as fun. The challenge with these puzzles is to reconstruct the square so that all of the images match on every interior side. 

There are 3 levels of difficulty included in this center, providing instant differentiation. These square puzzlers are also great for fast finishers. They won't be able to finish these quickly.

Pumpkinoes are holiday neutral, but perfect for this time of year. There are 8 games that can be used in all elementary classrooms to practice a variety of skills appropriate to the ages and stages of your students. Thus, differentiation is inherent. Skills in this unit include:

• Counting and cardinality
• Composing and decomposing numbers
• Addition, subtraction, and multiplication
• Even and odd numbers
• Greater than and less than
• Higher Order Thinking Skills

Included in this product are 45 Pumpkino cards in both color and black line. The number pairs on the Pumpkinoes range from (1, 1) to (9, 9). No blanks, or zeroes, are included. Also included are labels for your centers and directions for each of the 8 games. Recording sheets are provided for some activities. No answer keys are provided as all of the activities are open ended.

How Many Ways?  Fall Edition is an interactive bulletin board activity. The challenge in this activity is to arrive at a given number in many different ways. 

It readily provides differentiation by allowing the teacher to choose between 2 questions: one asks students to count to the target number; one requires students to use basic operations to arrive at the target. It may be easily adapted to any elementary grade level and provides differentiation within a single grade.



Turkey time is upon us!  It's time to stuff your centers.

I would love it if you would follow and contribute to my Pinterest boards:

Literacy Centers for Turkey Time

It's about time, teachers, for some literacy centers especially created for this time of year.

Your students will love working on vocabulary, parts of speech, synonyms, rimes, making inferences, and interpreting data while having fun with Thanksgiving Hink Pinks, Hinky Pinkies, and Hinkity Pinkities.  

If you are not familiar with Hink Pinks, et al., you are in for a treat.  Hink Pinks are riddles wherein the clues lead you to a 2 word answer. Each answer word must have just one syllable and the 2 words must rhyme. Hinky Pinkies are 2 word rhymes with 2 syllables in each word. Hinkity Pinkities are rhyming word pairs with 3 syllables each.  For example:

The answer to this riddle is raise maize.  

This product includes 20 cards with Thanksgiving themed clues and, naturally, an answer sheet. Copy the cards on cardstock (pink, of course), then laminate them for years of use. I recommend solving several clues together to ensure your students’ success. This activity is CCSS aligned.

Turkey Drumsticks uses Thanksgiving vocabulary to practice constructing compound words. Students search for two drumsticks that form a compound word when joined together. They place the pairs on plates until they have found all 9 compound words. 

A recording sheet is included. The recording sheet requires students to write the compound words they found and apply them to the context of the sentences.

Turkey Tails requires students to focus on the long and short vowel sounds of a & e. 

After determining the vowel sound of the word on each tail feather, they will place the feather on the turkey with that vowel symbol. The words used are taken from the first 200 words on the Fry lists. 

This center contains 4 full color work mats, 28 full color feathers, labels for your center folder, and a black & white recording sheet.

Let's Talk Turkey Words exercises your students' abilities to be fluent and flexible in thought and oral language. It will also inform you about your students' command of common spelling patterns and sight words.  

Give each student the letters for one of the 4 seasonal words. Challenge them to create as many words as they can using that set of letters. A recording sheet is included.  This center is CCSS aligned and it's FREE!

Scrattle: Thanksgiving Edition is a learning center that combines word work with computation; individual effort with competition. As in Scrabble™, students use a set of letters to create words. 

After recording their words, they calculate each word’s score using the Scrabble™ letter values. Then they engage a friend in a battle wherein they compare their scores using >, <, and =. 

The student with the most > wins the battle! BTW, Scrattle derives it names from SCRAbble + baTTLE. 

SCRATTLE can be played by students with simple addition capabilities, multiplication abilities, as well as those skilled in solving mixed operations in complex equations. Three different recording sheets are included, providing instant differentiation. This center is also FREE!

It's about turkey time, teachers!  Fill your centers with turkey goodness.

You may also like:

Happy Thanksgiving!

     May your stuffing be tasty.

     May your turkey be plump.

     May your potatoes ‘n gravy have nary a lump.

     May your yams be delicious,

     May your pies take the prize.

     May your Thanksgiving dinner                     

     Stay off of your thighs.

I hope your Thanksgiving is filled with family, fun, and many, many blessings.

P.S.  It's about time, teachers, for the annual TpT Cyber Mon. & Tues. sale. Everything in my store will be 28% off with coupon code CYBER.  

Thanksgiving Poetry Freebie

It's about time, teachers, . . . for Thanksgiving.  In the spirit of this holiday, I'm pleased to share with you a --

Prior to our Turkey Day break, I like to share the following poem with my students:

After we read it, we do some or all of these Poetry Possibilities:

Enjoy the poem and, if you try any of the Possibilities, I'd love to hear how they worked for your class.

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

This comes from my product, Poetry Possibilities - Fall. 

You may also like these Poetry Possibility products:

Find them at my TpT Store or TN Shop.