The Magical Product Swap!

I am so happy to be a part of Jessica Stanford's Magical Product Swap!

(Love the graphic by Michelle - The 3am Teacher)

My fabulous partner is Greg Smedley-Warren....you probably already know him through his blog, Smedley's Smorgasbord of Kindergarten...if you don't, get over there! 

I love Greg and his blog - he does so many wonderful things with his kinders and he's such a funny guy, too!

So we got to talking about what we are doing in our classes now.  We actually just wrapped up our Dinosaur unit (you can read about that here and here) and learned simple addition and subtraction skills. 

I HAD to have Greg's Dino Mite Addition: A Common Core Aligned Math Pack.  It covers all the skills we are learning (and more!).

This unit is PACKED with so much to do!  My students are so confident now in addition thanks to the fun and engaging activities found in this pack.

I love how there is a variety of worksheets, all differentiated, to suit your students' needs.

For instance, I have a JK/SK split with various needs and I found all the worksheets and activities I needed each group to work on ready-to-go!  There was something for every student in my class inside this pack.

My students just loved these addition circle maps.  They had to find all the ways numbers can add up to make the number in the middle!

Numbers 2-10 are included.  We worked on a different one each day.

  I have these small dinosaur counters and thought they would work perfectly with these placemats.  I love how there was room to "work" on solving the problem.  Students used the counters to visually see what they were doing.

Greg's pack comes with counter cards so don't worry if you don't have these plastic ones.  Those work great too!

These worksheets are actually in colour but I photocopied them in black and white so that each student could put it inside their math journal.

I also put several of these questions up on the SMART board (I didn't take a picture - trust me, you DO NOT want to see how I draw dinosaurs!) but it was the perfect activity for the students to be engaged in and made for a great lesson.

This pack comes with LOTS of these questions which you could use as a centre on your SMART board or for your math journals.

This was probably my favourite activity in the pack (although I loved them all!).

Here the students are putting together the puzzle pieces by solving the addition sentence.

These cards were a great way for students to practice making two groups and adding them together to get the sum. (I used my counters but, again, Greg provides dinosaur cards to use as counters).

After doing that activity, we worked on this worksheet to apply our knowledge and try to write an addition sentence.  Students really understood what they were doing because they coloured the dinos in and then added them all together.

And the best part, they could do this independently because of all the practice we had during the week from Greg's centres!

So now that it's (nearly) feeling like spring, we are going to be pulling a lot from this unit, Adding Unicorns!, from Greg next week.

It's just about the same format as this Dinosaur unit but perfect for spring.

Best part is, he bundled both of these great addition units together!

You can find the bundle here.

Here's what I plan on doing on Monday for Earth Day.

Since I am now totally loving Greg's stuff, we are going to do some activities from his Love the Earth unit.

If you are looking for really fun and engaging activities, you MUST check this product out!

Be sure to visit Greg over at Smedley's Smorgasbord of Kindergarten to read all about his review and follow his blog.....and he has a surprise for you too!

I had so much fun (and so did my students!) with all these new activities.

Greg and I want 2 lucky people to win his fabulous Dino Mite Addition: A Common Core Aligned Math Packet and my Spring Literacy and Math Activities Pack.

Leave a comment below telling me your favourite dinosaur and I'll choose 2 winners tomorrow morning at 8 am EST.

Enjoy the weekend!