Valentine's Day Bookmark Freebie

Happy Valentine's Day everyone! This is a quick post tonight. I just finished making some valentine bookmarks to give my class tomorrow. They're a freebie in my TPT store. Just click {here} and they're yours. Comments and pinning are greatly appreciated if you download them. Thanks so much!!

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Valentine's Day Picture Book Linky Party (& a class book freebie)

Happy Valentine's Day (in advance)!

Looking at my books Friday afternoon made me think it was time for this linky party. Please join up! I enjoy the books I have, but I know you have some fabulous ones too and it's always fun to buy new books!!

Just copy this image to your blog, share some of your favorite books, and link up below.

Perhaps my personal Valentine favorite is this book

 It's such a sweet story about caring for other people. Here is the Amazon.com description:

"One wintry day, a postman delivers a mysterious package with a big pink bow to a lonely man named Mr. Hatch.
"Somebody loves you," the note says.
"Somebody loves me!" Mr. Hatch sings as he dusts his living room. "Somebody loves me!" Mr. Hatch whistles as he does his errands in town. "But who," Mr. Hatch wonders, "could that somebody be?"
After some time, Mr. Hatch discovers just who his secret admirer is and, in doing so, enjoys the biggest surprise of his life!"

 And I can't resist Diane DeGroat's books. My students get excited when they see Gilbert!
 Here's the Amazon.com description:
"When Gilbert writes two not-so-nice valentines to his classmates, his prank quickly turns into pandemonium. But there's always time for a change of heart on Valentine's Day." I love the rhymes. It would be fun to have older students write rhymes for their valentine's.

This book is nice, short read about giving valentines. I use it to introduce Valentine's Day and the idea of passing out valentines. Years ago another teacher gave me the idea to have my little firsties address their valentines by just wrtiting who the card is from, not who it is for. That way the kids can easily walk around and drop their valentines into whatever containers we've made.

Of course there's always Splat!

 

And I just bought a craftivity from Teri at A Cupcake for the Teacher that I can't wait to use!

I thought I'd share a class book idea with you too. It's fun and simple but makes a cute bulletin board until I take it down and bind it into a book.The book is called "First It Was a Heart, Then It Was a _____." You can grab this freebie by clicking on the picture.

cute background papers are from Barbara @ rubyslippersblogdesigns.blogspot.com

Here are some of the pages my students created today. 

The cover and two different pages you can use are here as a freebie. Just click on the pic and leave me a sweet comment and it's all yours! I created each page version with the heart upside down and right side up so your students could use them either way.

Happy Valentine's Day!

I look forward to reading about your favorite Valentine's Day books!

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Valentine Thank-you's and a Shout-Out

Whew, today was a busy day! And it was only a minimum day. Every Wednesday we're out at 12:00 so teachers can "collaborate" in the afternoon. Does your school do that? I'd actually rather have the time with my students to get more done. Today they did Math Work Stations and we had math groups. I started them for place value this week, since 5 of my students already took the end a chapter test and got 100%. They're working on some harder activities while everyone else is learning 10 more/10 less than a number and how to count tens and ones. My students just love Math Work Stations and so do I. They're so much better than doing "centers" and I love that they get to play games. They don't know they're doing "work". To them it's play.
We worked on contractions, and I read to them about bald eagles. We listed things they learned about the birds and students wrote about them. I meant to bring them home and show you some. They did great! We do a first grade Patriotic Program at the end of February so it's fun to do these patriotic projects.
Tomorrow I have sub since I'm going to a Common Core workshop. I'm really looking forward to learning more about them. My sub is a retired second grade teacher. Yeah! I thought it would make my sub plans easier, but I was wrong. Oh well, at least they'll be in good hands.
I wanted to say some thank-you's today too.
Thanks to my Valentine Exchange partner, Amy, in New Jersey. I got her gift yesterday in the mail. On Valentine's Day- how perfect. She sent this great collection of pink things. Yummy treats, wonderful smelling lotion and a not pad. I just love it all! Thanks Amy!

Also, did you participate in the Class Valentine Exchange? We did and my students loved making valentine's for their new "friends" in Mrs. Thoreson's 1st grade class in North Dakota and Mrs. Hancock's kindergarten class in Ohio. We got valentine's from both them and I wanted to share these from  Mrs. Hancock's class.

Aren't they adorable? I'm sorry I didn't take pictures of the other ones before sending them home, but they were cute too.

A shout-out to Christina Bainbridge. Did you see her post about her Back-to-Back assessment game? I can't wait to try it! She posted a great video about it on her blog too. Thanks so much, Christina!

Hope you enjoyed your Valentine's Day! Here comes St. Patrick's Day! Does your leprechaun leave green footprints around your classroom?

 Chrissy

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