Five for Friday: July 3

Lots of outdoor fun this week!  I'm linking up with Kacey for another Five for Friday.

 My friend and I met up with a local running group to do a 5K on Sunday.  It wasn't too organized, which is good for 7 am on a Sunday morning during the summer.  We just kind of ran around the nature trails.

Hopefully we'll be able to meet up more often this summer for some running fun.  See that blue water drop at the top.  It's a water park.  Wouldn't it be awesome to run a 5K that ends with sliding down the water slide and plunging into the cool, clear pool?  Yes, awesome!

Tuesday we worked at our property in the woods.  We finally blazed a trail all the way around the lake to link the two sides.  It was hard work, but so worth it!

We headed back to the property today.  Three adorable armadillos walked up on us at one point.

This guy was not concerned with us at all.  It was lunchtime and he was hungry!  He even nudged my boot!

  {Click to play video}

I'll have to share some game cam pictures of the deer and turkeys soon.  Turkey chicks are also adorable!

Jumping back a bit, I am loving the MapMyHike app.  I downloaded it a few months ago for our first forays into the woods.  I like keeping track of how far we hike, and it is nice to find our way out.  Now that I started running, I use it a lot more.  It can be set to track miles and kilometers and it tracks routes.  Most of the time I run a little further than a mile, find a natural turnaround and come home.  But it is fantastic in the woods and when we run in new and different places.  Plus it is free.  Gotta love free.

Spurred by the #TpTsellersChallenge, I revamped a few more products.  All my Working with Short Vowel units have fresh, new covers and fonts.

Love. That. Fox.

I'm currently "Making my Masterpiece".  It is a big old set of activities for reading and spelling initial consonant blends.  Wahoo!

{In my photos, fonts are Jen Jones's Hello Fonts and the arrows are from Krista Wallden.}

TpT Seller Challenge Week 1: Makeover Madness

Today the TpT Seller Challenge provided me the motivation to revamp one of my best selling TpT products.  Ya'll, it was hideous!

 

Glitter background, crazy frames and the glow!  Good heavens the glow!

It took a few hours for me to finish the makeover, but it is so worth it.

Working with Y as a Vowel has been successfully updated!  It's on sale through Friday.

The original product was posted in 2013.  It was the third product I had for sale.  It's interesting to go back into old files.  I must have just learned how to add the glow around text because all the titles had some form of the glow effect.  Most had glow and shadow.

Step 1: Ditch the entire cover. 

Melonheadz's Nerds are one of my most favorite clip art collections.  Nerds have a special place in my heart.  This cutie got the call for cover girl today!

Add Hello Fonts.  'Nuff said.

Step 2: K. I. S. S.

That's right. I looked back to junior high for design inspirations.

I can admit it-the original was tacky.  The file no longer includes any glowing or glittering objects.  Not that I am strictly apposed to either.  I like a well-place glow.  I love me some glitter.  Both were overkill.

I also simplified the frames and borders.  The zig zag was too much for the small spaces.  I went really simple with plain, thick gray lines and a nice pop of red border in some places.

Lesson learned:  Alignment is your friend.  Sometime after finding the glow effect, I must have ran across the align button.  Boy, do I love that thing!  It makes it so easy to center, distribute and well...align.

Now I think the cover is eye-catching (for positive reasons) and all the pages inside are easy to read, have good flow and won't use up all the ink, even if it is mostly color.  Hopefully I can go back and add blackline versions, too.

As I scrolled through my products list I was able to tag a few more products due for a summer makeover.

Another part of the challenge is to track stats.  My beginning digits:

We'll see how the effort over the next month changes these numbers.

Join in on the fun!

Elkonin Boxes for CVC Families

It's hard to express how much I love Elkonin boxes.  They are useful in so many situations.  I can pop a picture up on the SmartBoard and as a whole group we sound out the word counting phonemes, draw the boxes and fill them in to create the word.  I can print out pictures like the one shown above, laminate and practice or reteach with small groups or one-on-one during RtI or small group time.  The students love working with them during Work on Words in our Daily 5 time.

All of my Working with CVC Word Family activities have this Elkonin boxes activity with picture cards, letter tiles and assessment sheets.  Due to the fact I LOVE them so much I created products consisting of the Elkonin boxes (or phoneme boxes, as I often call them) for each short vowel. 

Click on the picture to go to the product listing in my store:

 

Working with CVC short vowel word families

FINALLY!  Finding time to finish the short vowel family units and the bundle has been hard this summer.  But, it has all been finished and uploaded to TpT.  Yea!

The bundle is $18 which is $10 off buying the short vowel units individually.  It's a great deal.  The bundle has 450 pages, each vowel is a separate file, each unit has 7 centers/activities plus assessment sheets, center directions, center signs, center management board small signs, Roll-Say-Keep games, word finds, word searches and some more short vowel goodies!

I am proud of these units.  In first grade I will be able to use these units throughout the first 2 grading periods and be able to pull in words and cards when we begin long vowels.

Click on the cover picture to check out each vowel individually:

Here are some examples of the short a activities:

 Grab the bundle now!

Working with Short a Word Families!

I am so excited about this series of short vowel units!  First up is the Short a Word Families giant, mondo, humongous 118 page unit of centers, activities, assessment sheets, games and practice.  It includes both color and black lines for easy printing.  It is on sale for $5 for the first 24 hours.

{Word Sort examples}

 Each activity includes:

• Center instructions
• Center board management cards (two versions-one with just the title and one with the title and a picture cue)
• Flash cards or game pieces
• Separate assessment sheets which can be used for center accountability, morning work, homework, reteach/RtI, or, you know...assessments.

{Phoneme Boxes examples - See them in action here}

 {Match It! and Memory Match examples}

{Word find example ~ each word family has its own page.}

{Roll Say Keep and Word Search - Download the preview to get these documents for FREE!}

Seriously, how cute is the clip art?  The wagging dog and the fat cat are my favorites.  It think it is because we have both.

I am finishing similar units for all the other short vowels.  Hopefully they will be finished by the weekend.  I am having a sale to celebrate.  Everything in my store will be 20% off.  Follow my TpT store to stay updated.