Thankful for Fall & Thankful for YOU!

Hey friends! A quick post today to gush about autumn and give a little back. <3 The fall season has always been my favorite. The beautiful colors, cooler weather, football games, and pumpkin spice. I truly love all things fall - especially fall in my classroom. It seems like right now is about the time by students begin taking off. They are becoming real readers, writers and thinkers and our classroom is changing beautifully with the season.

Every year I take my students on a little leaf walk to admire and observe the changing leaves. We talk about chlorophyll in the leaves and why leaves change color - my students are always FASCINATED by the process and so proud when they can pronounce chlorophyll correctly. :)

This year we again incorporated our leaf walk into writing. Giving my students something concrete and interesting to write about makes them much more engaged and invested in their writing. They did a great job on their leaf writing pieces and we happy to display in the hallway for others to see!

In addition to leaf themed writing, we play a variety of leaf themed games and also sing a leaf song to practice our sight words. You can check out one of my older post HERE to see what song I'm talking about! One of my most favorite games (and my students) is "Whoosh!". Players pull out a leaf card and read it. If the players can read the card, it goes in his/her leaf 'keep' pile. If not, it goes back into the cup or bucket. If a player pulls a 'Whoosh!' card, the player loses all their cards back into the bucket - the wind comes and takes them all! We typically set a timer and play for a certain amount of time - whoever has the most cards at the end of the game is the winner! My kiddos loved this game so much in small group that I printed the game two to a page so they could take home a miniature version to play at home! :) P.S. - How cute are these bags I got from Target a couple years ago?

This game is part of my November Word Work pack and is one of 12 different games and activities geared at practicing a variety of ELA skills. This pack is one of my favorite - something about cute scarecrows and turkeys I guess?! - and one that I love using to differentiate my centers. This pack as well as my November Pocket Chart center and November Write the Room center helps me hit everything from letter identification, rhyming words, CVC words, letter sounds, emergent reader sentences, writing skills, and sight words - all while addressing my students varying abilities.

I don't know if it's beautiful scenery, the cool weather, or all of the candy corn I've eaten today, but I'm feeling so thankful for the season and thankful for all of YOU - so I've decided to throw a special sale! During the month of November, when you buy two of my November resources - November Word Work and November Pocket Chart centers - you can get my November Write the Room Center FOR FREE! You simply have to email me after purchasing both resources with your TPT username and request and I will email you the file - that easy!