"Appy Friday": Letters {June 27}

Today I'd like to share a series of letter/sound apps by Peapod Labs.  The first one I purchased is called ABC Food so I'll share a little more about that one.    It is normally $2.99 I believe, but when I looked it up today, it is on sale for free!

This app has a variety of foods on it for children to explore.  Each word is spelled out when you tap on it.  Each letter has a little icon that is a food that begins with that sound.

This is a portion of the main page.  You can click on a food or a letter from here.

This is what you will see after you choose a food.  You can click on each letter for the letter name/sound.

If you tap on the fish video at the top, it tells you to eat the fish. You "eat" it by tapping on it.  As you eat, you begin to see the bones with each tap.

The app starts with not all the boxes filled with foods.  As you work through the app, more foods "unlock" and fill the boxes.  My students enjoy this app, especially in the first half of the year.  Make sure you check it out while it is still free!

Wordless Wednesday {June 25}

I'm linking up with Christina at Sugar and Spice for Wordless Wednesday.

This week I am helping out with Vacation Bible School at our church.  Our theme is outer space.

This is "the galaxy" (a coat closet hallway) complete with black tablecloth, neon paper decorations and black lights.  The older groups of kiddos have their drama (Bible story) time in a giant plastic bubble in here.  What would your dream story place/library look like (if money and space were no object)?  This place is pretty awesome!

Be sure to check out the other ideas at Sugar and Spice!

Building Connections: Connect 4

I spent my rainy afternoon yesterday finishing up a little project that has been on my "to do" list for a quite a while.  I have quite a few board games that I've picked up a garage sales and thrift stores and want to give them new life.  My first creation uses the game Connect 4.  Simply affix the pieces from the packet to your Connect 4 game pieces to practice math concepts.

Here are a few sample pieces I put together.

I put it on sale through this weekend.  Head on over to my store check it out!

"Appy" Friday: Math {June 20}

I'm back to share another favorite app with you.  In case you missed last week, I shared a bit about the app Hideout.

This week I thought I'd focus on math and share the app Park Math from Duck Duck Moose, Inc.  This app is good for the beginning of the year and for intervention (in Kindergarten anyway).  I think it would probably be good for preschoolers throughout the year.  It is priced at $1.99.

My students' favorite part of the app was the see-saw balance game.  Little mice are put on the balance beam, and students need to decide how many to add to one side or the other to balance the see-saw.

The app also covers: counting, addition, subtraction, ordering numbers, patterns and one-to-one counting.  There are 3 levels of play in each category, and changing from one level to another is quite easy.

Do you find these little app reviews helpful?  If so, please consider leaving a comment below!


***Disclaimer: I was not asked to review these apps by any company nor am I compensated for my opinion.  I just want to share with you what my students use and love!

Book Lovin' Linky: Butterflies {June 17}

I'm linking up with Deanna at Mrs. Jump's Class for her Let's Talk About Books Linky.

This week I'd like to share one of our (my) favorite butterfly books: A Butterfly is Patient (link to Amazon).  I was introduced to this book about 4 years ago at a science workshop I attended.  We received 16 different science units, many of them about animals, to use with our students.  This book was one that was covered during the butterfly unit.

The illustrations are beautiful!  Throughout the book, the main sentence of the page gives a characteristic describing a butterfly, then facts about butterflies are shared on each page.  My students loved the different facts throughout the book.

There are similar books for other nature topics: A Seed is Sleepy, An Egg is Quiet, and A Rock is Lively. What are some of your favorite nature/animal nonfiction books?

Be sure to stop by Deanna's blog to find some other great book recommendations!

"Appy" Friday {June 13}

We used our iPads in our classroom quite a bit this year, but I never really got to writing about different apps we use.  I'm always on the lookout for great apps to help my students out.  I'm planning to write about an app or two each Friday this summer.  If you have ideas, I'd love for you to share them with me (us) too!

Today I want to share the app "Hideout" with you.  This is a free early reading app created by Brigham Young University.

This is one of my students' favorite apps.  I don't remember where I discovered it, but when I first put it on the iPads, it only had 3 word endings.  It now has 6 different word endings.

This is the home screen for the app.  You choose your word endings from here.

The music is very catchy (think Carmen Sandiego) , and you will probably have it in your head most of the day :).  For each ending there is a little introduction where it tells you the sound of each individual letter followed by telling you sound the 2 letters make together.  There are then 4-6 words that you make for each word ending.  Once you've made the words, you get to play a game using those same words you just made in the previous part of the app.  After playing the game, you read about what you did during the game. You read by tapping each word; it lights up and reads the words to you.

This is the screen where it introduces the sounds of each letter and the sounds of the letters when put together. 

This app was a favorite of many students, but one would play this app any chance he had.  He had lower reading skills compared to his peers, but I noticed that through playing this app (and lots of intervention) he picked up on word families (as opposed to sounds in isolation) and was particularly strong with word families featured on this app.

I think it is worth a download, and you certainly can't beat the price!  Let me know what you think!

Wordless Wednesday: Apples & New Teachers {June 11}

I'm linking up with Christina from Sugar and Spice for Wordless Wednesday.

My superstar student teacher landed a job yesterday, so that inspired me to make a few things that she (and I) can use at the beginning of the school year.

Apple Order has apples with numbers on them (0-20) for students to put in numerical order.  It is a freebie. :)

Here she is working with a small group.

What is your best advice for the new teacher?