Spotlight Saturday 9-19-15

Happy Saturday everyone! I hope you have all been having an amazing year so far! My year is going well, I'm just so very tired every day after school! My ankle aches and I sit down on the couch when I get home and end up falling right asleep!!

I apologize for the late start to Spotlight Saturday today! I can't wait to see what you link up with!

It's been a while since I've Spotlighted anything of my own creation, so I decided to be a bit selfish today and share a few things from my store! 

These are some activities my team mates and I will be using this week. We are going to be focusing on shapes in math, so my Basic Shape Roll, Trace, and Color FREEBIE is PERFECT!

This is an activity we'll do as a small group, and then it will get added to a Math with Someone station. It's a pretty simple activity. Print out the shape cubes, one for each kiddo in your group. Assemble them by folding on the dotted lines and taping them shut.

Students roll the cube and find that shape on their recording sheet. Starting at the smiley face, they trace the shape they have rolled. To keep it fun, I let my Dragons use a crayon that matches the color of the shape they rolled.

You could have students work on this on their own, or in pairs. In pairs, you only need one sheet and one cube. Students choose a color of crayon (Student A chooses blue and B chooses red) and when they roll a shape they trace it in their color crayon. Once all the shapes are traced, count up how many each student traced and compare.

During our ELA and Social Studies times, we'll be learning about the jobs of an author and illustrator. Students will focus on the definition of each job as well as the tools each job needs.

There is a set of color and black and white sorting activities. Students can use the color set at a pocket chart center, and the black and white version as an assessment piece.

Have students sort the circle cards without giving them parameters, just telling them to sort the cards how they think makes sense. Ask them why they sorted their pieces the way they did, and compare how different students sorted them.

Then, give them the category labels and ask them to resort the pieces. After the second sort, have students justify why they put each piece in the category. Many tools pictured can be considered to be tools used by both an author and an illustrator, and as long as students can reasonably justify their sorting, the pieces should be accepted.

Another assessment activity has students drawing and labeling three different tools used by each job. Students then choose one of the tools they drew and write about how an author/illustrator would use it or what they would use it for.

Another assessment you could use would be a cut and paste sorting activity where students are given a few sheets of tool images that they must sort into whether or not they would be used by an author or an illustrator. There are two sorting sheets, one where students have an option to have a 'Both' category. 

I think that these activities are really going to help my team and I decide if students truly understand the concepts we are teaching them!

Click on the images below to head to my TPT store and get a copy for yourself!

I would LOVE for you to link up for Spotlight Saturday too! This is a Teacher's Show and Tell where we can share any resources, products, tips, tricks, ideas, activities, and anything else that can help make our classroom lives easier, more awesome, or both! Please feel free to use either of the Spotlight Saturday images in your post, and if you Spotlight someone with a Facebook page make sure to give them a shout out and let them know!

Please read up on the rules and then link up below! I can't wait to read what you share!

Rules:

1) You need to spotlight an educational resource that either you have created or you have found from someone else and love! This means you must link up with a blog post you have written putting an activity or idea in the Spotlight. Please do not link directly to a product in Teachers Pay Teachers or Teacher's Notebook or similar sites.

2) If you are Spotlighting a product from your own TPT store or that of another seller, make sure that in your blog post you Spotlight a freebie or a paid product. If you have a freebie and a paid product from the same seller, feel free to use both in your post. If all you have is a freebie, then post about the freebie and how you used it. You can also Spotlight a freebie that someone else created along with a product that you created.

2) Make sure to give credit where credit is due! You will need to include the name of the creator as well as a link to their TPT or Teacher's Notebook store where others can get a copy of the resource as well.

3) Include pictures of the product in your post, either screen shots  or photographs of your kiddos actually using the product. Give us a snapshot, just a brief glimpse into how the product or activity works. Just an image of the cover and one of the pages you have listed in the preview of the activity on TPT would be fine. It gives readers a visual and helps them better understand what your product is all about.

4) Make sure to leave a comment on the post of the two people before your post and the person after. This will help get conversation rolling, and will make sure everyone feels recognized for their efforts!

5) This is not the place to share your frustrations or disappointment with an activity or how you would have done it differently. If you are unsatisfied with your purchase that is a private conversation you need to have with the seller via email. This is not a link up to bash any sellers or their products, and any posts like that WILL BE DELETED!!

6) Follow my blog with Bloglovin' to make sure you are kept up to date on all the latest link up additions. Don't forget to follow my Facebook page too to keep up with all the notifications I send out!

7) To Link Up, you will need to click on the small blue button underneath my closing signature. It is directly under my name on the left hand side of the blog.