Elf your Students

Have you ever wanted to make your students into little elves? This little trick is super easy if you have adobe photoshop. All you need to do is click on the filter  tab found up top and then liquify. It takes two seconds. 

Right now I only pay $9.99 a month for photoshop and lightroom. They are both awesome resources to use in the classroom. I added the free elf hats from searching santa hat clip art vector images in google images. I love my cute graphics because there tons of free images.

Have you seen Christmas Jammies? I can not stop watching this precious video. How cute? 

Hope everyone is surviving the last couple of days.

Snow Globes and Reindeers

Have you read the book The Snow Globe Family? It's such a neat story and it really got my students writing today. The family that lives inside the snow globe is just like the family who owns the snow globe. The little family keeps wondering when will it snow. They long for a snowstorm. We used the prompt -If I lived in a snow globe.... My students were using some great adjectives and really trying to pull in their five senses. I was so impressed.

I think the original idea was Deanna Jump's idea found here. You know I love talking photos so I tweaked mine a little.  

Here is our version

Directions

1. I printed my photos 5 x 7 on my home printer and then used an x-acto knife to cut out the background.

2 Mod podge the photo to the clear plastic plate. I used gloss mod podge but I think matte would be better.

3. Add hole punched circles with mod podge. I just emptied my three hole puncher. 

3. Lightly paint an area using mod podge and sprinkle some glitter towards the bottom of the plate.

5. I free handed the base of the snow globe with scrapbook paper.

6. Hot glue snow globe base to the bottom of the plate and add ribbon up top for a hanger.

We also made these darling reindeer. It was a directed drawing found at Artventurous. It was super easy but oh so cute! We used watercolors instead of oil pastels. Click on the link to see the step by step directions.

What fun things have you been making this holiday season?

ESGI giveaway!

 Right now I am currently getting ready to complete 2nd 9 weeks sight word assessments. I don’t know about you but assessing is not my most favorite part of the job description.  It seems to take away from valuable teaching time. After finding ESGI I don't ever want to go back to paper and pencil assessing.

One way to make it a little more fun and manageable is ESGI software. This software is designed by a former kindergarten teacher. I signed up for a 60-day free trial and fell in LOVE. It was so easy to implement. My kids were begging to come back to my laptop. I really enjoyed looking at the results and printing the parent letters. My parents loved the personalized letters that told them specifically which words and skills their child needed additional help. The best part about ESGI is the flashcards that automatically print out with each letter. I love how teachers can even create their own tests and assessments.  Here’s an overview:

ESGI makes Assessment easy.

· Web-based software can be accessed from anywhere, anytime.

· Fun for students to get assessed on a PC.

· Individualized parent letters showing parents which questions their child answered correctly and incorrectly.

· Individualized flashcards (with the student’s name), for the missed items, so parents can practice at home.

· Real-time reporting of the data you have assessed. Through easy to navigate reports, you can see what  your class knows (or doesn’t know), individual student performance, item analysis, and more.

 

 It’s easy to get started! What a wonderful thing for end of the semester assessments. I am so happy to announce that ESGI has graciously donated a one year membership to ONE lucky winner. To enter this contest, all you need to do is sign up for ESGI's FREE 60 Day Trial . You will not need to enter ANY credit card information for the FREE trial. It's super simple. After you’ve signed up for the free trial, ESGI will pick a winner in about two weeks. To SAVE $40 you can click here.  The cost for a year subscription is $159 but oh so worth it!