Christmas! Christmas! Christmas!

           

          

Where Did Rudolph Go?

Here is a class book we created. I read the story Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer to my students. Then we brainstormed all the places Rudolph could go in Santa’s sleigh the day after Christmas. The students came up with some pretty good places, including New York, Tokyo and Detroit. The skyline of New York is priceless.

Christmas Tree Fact Families

The students pulled an index card with numbers for a fact family. They placed the numbers on the stars and wrote the addition and subtraction problems on the ornaments. The First Grade Parade had this as a math station. After we completed the station in small groups we completed the trees whole group.

                           

                

Click here to download Christmas Tree Fact Families

Christmas Candy Facts

          

Mrs. Carroll from The First Grade Parade posted an idea for this cute math activity. Instead of doubles the students chose a number and wrote two addition and one subtraction sentence, or two subtraction and one addition sentence for their chosen number. I think they turned out great! Thanks Mrs. Carroll!

Candy Cane Grab

The First Grade Parade is one of my favorite first grade blogs. If you haven’t checked it out, you should hurry. She posted a candy grab idea for Halloween. I bought a bunch of mini candy canes from The Dollar Tree and decided to create this Christmas Candy Cane Grab. The kids enjoyed it.
    

                         
                                                         Christmas Candy Cane Grab

Candy Cane Patterns

The students choose a pattern of their candy. This was the biggest hit of math stations. There were a few of my students who wanted to do this each day during stations.

                                                                   

Here is the download to go with the Candy Cane pattern activity.                                  

                        
I made a big candy cane pattern

The Gingerbread Man

We also completed a pie graph form Mrs. Jump's Gingerbread Man Unit. I gave each of the students a gingerbread cookie and we graphed which part of the cookie they bit first.

The Gingerbread Man Song

I made this book to go along with The Gingerbread Man Phonemic Awareness song found in Kim Jordano’s Winter Phonemic Awareness Songs. The student’s used mini Elkonin boxes to write the name of the animal The Gingerbread Man ran away from.

                           
The gingerbread man ran through the town book

Christmas Packages

I love, love, love Kim Jordano’s books. I used the poem “Holiday Packages” to create this kit. It’s filled with ideas  you can use with the poem. We didn’t get a chance to use it this year, but maybe you can save it for your files.

                        
                                                        Holiday Packages Poem Activity Kit

                             

Word Work

Here are two of the Word Work choices the students had this week during Daily Five. In Santa Sentence the students toss a counter onto the game board. They have to write a silly sentence using one of the long e words.
                        
Santa Word Toss

                        
ELF Bingo2 -
I hope everyone can find something to use from this post, and I hope you have just as much fun using them with your students as I did with mine. I also had so much fun making them. Don’t forget I love, love, love comments. So why not leave a few. To all my fellow teachers I hope you all have the Merriest of Christmases and a blessed and happy New Year. Besides enjoying spending time with my fantastic family, I’ll be planning games and activities for Winter.
Have a wonderful weekend!
Yolanda

Winter Already

I am now officially a seller on Teachers Pay Teachers. I have uploaded a few ideas for penguins and winter. There is a sample free download.  I will be working on more during the break (yes, I have no life). Hope you find something you like.
Here is the link to my store. I hope you take a look around.

Ms. Arnold's Store

Quick Christmas Math

Reindeer Fact Families

 

Reindeer Fact Family

 

Reindeer War

                  
Reindeer War

I usually make 2-3 sets of these cards. The students love playing War. This game can be played with 2-3 students. Shuffle the card and then deal them out. Players turn over the first card in their deck. The person with the highest number gets all the cards in that round. Play continues until all the cards are gone. The winner is the person with the most cards.

 

Reindeer Facts

               
Reindeer Facts -

This a simple review game of facts to ten. I’m working really hard to promote automaticity in my students in terms of  facts to ten. NO COUNTING FINGERS. So I create opportunities every chance I get to let them practice. Print off as many of the numbers cards as you’d like and place them in a bag (I use a holiday gift bag) The student pulls two cards from the bag and writes the addition sentence. Sometimes I have them write a subtraction sentence using the sum of the two cards pulled.

They were a big hit during math station time.