distance learning Archives - Down in Kinderville

Shape Activities for Distance Learning! Freebie Included

Nicole at Down in Kinderville — Mon, 21 Sep 2020 02:36:02 +0000

Hello friends! I wanted to share some ideas that have worked for me during distance learning. Today, I specifically wanted to share how I taught shapes, virtually, in kindergarten. I hope these easy shape activities for distance learning help you! It is especially difficult because my students do. not have access to many materials. So we were just working with crayons, pencils, scissors, and paper. However, all of the activities turned out AMAZING! I used slides to help with visuals- however, you don’t need to! But, if you would like the visual aide, I’m giving you them for free! Sign up for my email list, and the slides will go directly to your inbox!

The first activities we did was drawing the shapes, and then turning them into something else! I did one shape a day, but you could switch it up however you choose!

I asked my students to draw the shape of the day, so if we were learning about triangles, we all drew a triangle. After they drew the shape, we turned it into something new! I hid what we were drawing to make it more exciting. When we were ready to draw, I moved the mystery question mark and we turned our triangles into watermelon!

For the triangles, we drew watermelon and pizza. We drew a window and a picture frame for the square, a sun and a snowman for the circles, and a chocolate bar and a dollar for the rectangles.

Building a Shape City- Freebie Below!

After we did the mystery shape for the day, it was time for shape city!! I instructed the kids to color and cut out a specific amount of shapes and save them. At the end of the week, we put all of the shapes together to make a shape city!

I found it easiest to do the mystery shape and the color and cut for one shape a day. So if we were learning about the triangle, we would draw a triangle and turn it into a pizza and a watermelon. Then, we would color and cut out triangles to save for our shape city. Each day, we would learn a new shape. Friday was saved for gluing our shape city together! These shape activities for distance learning are so helpful!

If you would like these slides to help aide in your teaching, I would love to give them to you for free! Add your email to my subscription list, and I’ll send it over to your inbox! I will also send you more freebies soon! Happy Teaching! Sign up below:

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Guided Writing and Drawing | Distance Learning

Nicole at Down in Kinderville — Thu, 30 Jul 2020 00:17:15 +0000

I’m Not Just a Scribble by Diane Alber, is one of my favorite books to read in Kindergarten. With Distance Learning, I improvised with my kiddos and made a guided writing and guided drawing activity for it! Easy and fun activity even if it is through a computer screen!

Using your favorite books to create guided activities!

I sometimes struggle to find fun, interactive activities that can be done with five year olds, virtually, through a screen. Anyone else?

I have found that reading a book, and then doing a guided writing and drawing activity has been the most engaging for my kids so far. The first one I did was I’m Not Just a Scribble. I read the book, and then we started with the guided drawing. We drew the eyes first, and discussed how eyebrows can make a big difference when drawing emotions. After that, we drew the mouth and then carefully scribbled around. Then comes the hands and feet. Last, we did our dictated sentence. I chose the sentences based on the sight words my kindergarteners were learning. Feel free to change the sentences any way you see fit!

Grab your FREE Printable for "Ruby Finds a Worry"

Ya’ll. I’ve recently discovered the book Ruby Finds a Worry by Tom Percival. I hope you check it out, it’s so awesome! It’s about a happy girl that finds a worry one day. The worry keeps following her until she realizes she is always thinking about that worry! Eventually, she realizes that everyone has a worry with them, and talking about them will help the worries go away.

I have a FREE printable to accompany this beautiful book. It can be found in my TPT store here.

You could also do it as a directed drawing if the kids don’t have access to a printer!

"Can I be your dog?" by Troy Cummings

Can I be your dog is a fun book about a dog looking for a forever home! Arfy writes letters to all the people on the street, trying to find a home! He keeps getting turned down for various reasons, and gets really discouraged. But don’t worry, it has a happy ending!

After we read this cute book, we wrote our own notes to Arfy! As a class, we decided that he can be our dog. We wrote him a note and then did a directed drawing of a dog that I found for FREE on Easy Peasy and Fun’s website. Check out this site for a TON of fun directed drawings!

I would love to hear your ideas on other books that would be great for this! Leave me a comment below with your ideas! Thanks for following along!

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Guided Reading for Distance Learning!

Nicole at Down in Kinderville — Wed, 22 Jul 2020 22:41:50 +0000

Now that you know that I’m obsessed with Boom Cards, let me share with you my guided reading ideas for the upcoming socially distanced school year. I’ve created interactive guided reading books to help guided students independently! I’ve bundled all of these books in a forever growing guided reading bundle. That means that if you purchase the bundle know, you will receive ALL future books that I make at the current price! Check out the video and read a little bit more about the different levels and current and future themes below!

There will be a variety of themes within this bundle! They will include seasons, holidays, special events, feelings, and much more! Check out a detailed breakdown of the features of each book below!

Level A

3-6 Word Sentences
Repeating language patterns
Familiar vocabulary
High Frequency Words (Sight Words)
Short, Predictable Sentences
Familiar Vocabulary

Level B

3-7 Word Sentences
Multi-Line text
Repeating language patterns
Familiar vocabulary
High Frequency Words (Sight Words)

Level C

Multi-Line text (2-5 lines)
Some repeating language patterns
Familiar vocabulary
More High Frequency Words (Sight Words)
Prepositional phrases and adjectives

Level D

Multi-Line text (2-6 lines)
Less repeating language patterns
Simple Dialogue
Familiar vocabulary
More High Frequency Words (Sight Words)
Prepositional phrases and adjectives
Some simple contractions and possessions
Longer sentences
Some words with -s and -ing endings

Level E

Multi-Line text (2-8 lines)
Less repeating language patterns
Simple Dialogue
Familiar vocabulary
More High Frequency Words (Sight Words)
Prepositional phrases and adjectives
Longer sentences (10 + words)
Some words with -s and -ing endings
Less reliance on pictures
Easy contractions
Some 3 syllable words

Where to get the goods?

You can purchase them through TPT or directly through Boom Cards! I also included some freebies in there, if you would like to try them out!

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My Love Affair with Boom Cards™!

Nicole at Down in Kinderville — Tue, 21 Jul 2020 21:19:17 +0000

Have you checked out boom cards yet? One of the very few bright spots in this chaotic mess of a pandemic has been my discovery of BOOM CARDS! The best part of boom cards is that you can assign them virtually. I used them with my kindergarteners at the end of the school year as well as during summer school. There are a lot of fun freebies on there as well! Also, boom cards are SELF-CHECKING! That’s right, they will let your kiddos know if they need to correct their answers. You can create a free account through the boom learning website! Students can use boom cards on the computer, tablet, and even a phone!

Check out my Boom Card store HERE!

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