Teaching Time in the Primary Grades

Can we say whoa?? It's been a while since I have paid attention to this little ole blog! Life has been crazy and now that we are out of the holiday period, it's time to get back to business. After my break, I'm starting to get a tad jealous of my friends on a year round calendar!

We went back on the 5th and it's been full force every.single.day. 

We started working on time right away. First graders often struggle with this skill, so I wanted to come up with a few different ways to introduce this skill. My anchor charts are usually so ugly, but I feel like they are productive and accomplish the overall goal. I like to complete them with my students and have them fill it certain parts so it's not just something hanging on the wall. I find when they participate in creating the charts,  they take ownership and it sinks it a little bit better. So I created this premade anchor charts that we could fill in together. The kids really enjoyed the graphics and seeing the information in a different way than the typically parker-yellow paper format.  This little packet includes a variety of charts. I used the poster printing function to print and then I just laminated it and boom! DONE! I used a few of the other pages as well and also used them as interactive notebook pages! Kids LOVED them! 

 I know I've said this before, but I love using read aloud to introduce my lessons. I started with this time read aloud. It's great for introducing key vocabulary and it's very kid friendly!

Then we started with our math centers. You can check those out here.

We used centers from my time bundle. The kids LOVED the variety of activities and they are so easy to prep!

This activity was fun to do at my teacher table first. We did a few problems together and then the kiddos completed the rest during math centers. They really loved them. They were engaged in the entire time they were working. They actually asked me to create a second set, so I did! I was shocked! 

ALL of these activities and MORE can be found in my Time Bundle and it's on SALE! Just click the image below!

Primary Guided Math & Freebie

At the beginning of the year, I  was working as a long term substitute in 4th grade. I have always been addicted to "Guided Math", but for some reason, this year my addiction intensified!!!

I have been working on amping my guided math supply kit. I basically needed more hands on centers and had little time (and supplies) to make them! I am not used to being ink deprived, and it's a hard adjustment! In TX, I could get all the ink I pretty much desired! I know that most of you are in the same boat so I apologize for preachin' to the choir. So I decided to do what everyone else does who gets no ink---use colored cardstock! haha! 

My kiddos are practicing telling time to the hour and half hour this week. We had a blast practicing. We use these student hand held time boards over and over again during whole group instruction! 

My kids LOVE these!!

We read the book "If You Were A Minute"

Then, we made a chart of our three favorite things they did in the story and tried to beat the time the characters completed them. 

It's a good thing I've been working out, because 70 jumping jacks in a minute is no easy task ;) haha!!!

After a whole group mini lesson, we break up into small groups for our guided math. I have several "staple centers" I use:

*One bin of Math books. I try to pull as many books related to the subject we are working on!

*Lakeshore Match Up Puzzles

* Math Work Station Cards

*Fold & Solve Math Cards- The Mailbox

You can check out the centers shown here!

We are also using Cara's Time Packet! Which provides so many hands on matching centers for the kiddos! We still haven't finished all the activities in that packet! I'll post about it once we finish!! 

One of my weaknesses is making cute anchor charts! My kids have really struggled with types of sentences, so I made these charts...no judgment okay?? I am NOT very good at these :)

I also created a quick and simple Listening Center Recording sheet--click HERE For the FREEBIE