A Little Bit of Motivation

I think this e-mail came at the perfect timing.  Just as I am entering back into blogland again after almost a year off, I get an e-mail telling me that I have been nominated for an award (for last year's inspiring posts and not that lack of them this year).



I think this may be telling me to jump back in and inspire other teachers.  I have greatly enjoyed sharing what I do in my classroom on my blog and am actually getting anxious and excited to get back into the swing of things in Kindergarten.  Sure it will be hard to leave my baby girls behind, but at least I'm going back to a job that doesn't feel like a job.  It's a passion and an amazing privilege to teach this next group of kinders and I can't wait!

I feel like there are some amazing bloggers out there, and I know that they deserve to get this awesome award much more than I do.  I feel just honored that someone else thinks that my posts are worth reading, too.

Beautiful Girl!

Well, it has been quite a while since I updated my blog (almost a year--eek!), but I have been busy, busy, BUSY!  Last year around this time I found out I was expecting another wonderful addition to our family.  Since this may be our last little one, I wanted to devote my free time to enjoying my pregnancy and embracing every moment of it. 

On February 25, 2012, we welcomed our second beautiful little girl, Teagan Grace, into our family.   She was 7 lbs. 10 oz. and 20 inches long.  She is quite the little blessing.

Life has been full of fun since then, and I have been enjoying being at home with my two girls.  My maternity leave lasted right through the end of school, so I have been able to enjoy an extra long maternity leave and summer vacation.
   
                                      

I will be returning to teaching Kindergarten in the fall and am looking forward to it.  I've been pinning a lot of great things on Pinterest this summer and am looking forward to doing some new things in our classroom.  Hopefully I will find a spare moment to come back to the blogging world on a regular basis.

I hope everyone has a spectacular summer!

Christmas is Right Around the Corner!

In July that is!  Christmas in July is coming and our TpT store is having a 20% off sale on Monday.  Be sure to check it out!

We have a winner!

Congratulations, Kelly!  You have won your choice of literacy centers from KindergartenWorks as well as a $5 gift card to Starbucks.  Please e-mail me at kindergartenwhaletales@gmail.com to claim your prize.  Thank you to all that have supported and followed Kindergarten Whale Tales as well as everyone who entered our giveaway!

First 100 followers....time for a GIVEAWAY!

I am thrilled at how much I have enjoyed blogging over the past 5 weeks.  I am shocked by how quickly I have gained 100+ followers.  Thank you so much!  To celebrate 100+ followers following this blog, I will be hosting my first giveaway!

The lucky winner will be chosen on Monday evening (June 13th) when I return from my Vegas vacation!  This lucky winner will receive their choice of one of KindergartenWorks' fabulous literacy centers and a $5 gift card to Starbucks!  These literacy centers are created by my favorite teacher friend who I am blessed to work with daily.  She helped me to implement some of these centers in my classroom this year and the results were incredible.  After helping me to start a TpT store, a blog, and answer my crazy oddball questions every day, she also graciously offered to be part of my first giveaway.  She's amazing!  There are many ways to enter.  Just make sure to leave a comment on this post telling what you have done to enter:

*(one entry) Follow Kindergarten Whale Tales and KindergartenWorks.
*(one entry) Follow Kindergarten Whale Tales on TpT.
*(one entry) Add KindergartenWorks to your fav. shops on TeachersNotebook.com
.  (You will need to register and click on one of the products.  Then click "Add to your fav. shops" on the right.  Check out this site, too.  It's kind of like TpT.)
*(one entry) Blog about this giveaway. (You may use the image above if you would like.)
*(one entry) Grab each of our blog buttons.
*(one entry) Add us both to your blog feed.

Thank you so much for your support and good luck!

My Word Walls

I'm joing Ms. M's linky party as my very first time as a participant!  Yahoo!  Even though it's the end of the year and I already took one of them down, I decided to put all the words back up just to take a picture for this.  Here is my sight word "popcorn" word wall.  We learn songs to learn how to spell each of these words over the course of the year.  Then they go up on our wall.  I also put the students' names on this wall but have taken them down already.  There are magnets on the back for when I was in my old room that had a magnetic white board.  I had to improvise this year and had to use those sticky clips instead to make the words moveable.  That way my thinkers can take the words down to work with them if they need to.

We also have a sight word popcorn game that we play with these words that I have blogged about below.  I plan on sprucing it up a bit more with a colored background next year.  With moving classrooms this year, it was not a top priority.

My other word wall is on the opposite end of the room on our closet doors and is an environmental print word wall. 

At the beginning of the year, many kinder thinkers are nervous because they don't know how to read.  I help them to ease the transition into reading and help them to see themselves as readers through a unit on environmental print.  For this activity, students are sent home with a baggie and are asked to bring back 5 environmental print words that they cut from boxes, magazines, wrappers, and newspapers.  Since they can read these words, they begin to see themselves as readers.

Then we spend some time figure out what letter to put each item underneath.  They love this word wall especially in the beginning of the year.  They also use it throughout the year when they are finding words around our room to write down during our read the room write the room center.

So there are my word walls.  I'm looking forward to checking out some other blogs who link up for Ms. M's ward wall linky party!

Thank you! Thank you!

I couldn't believe my eyes when I looked over at my blog roll and saw my name.  Yippee!  It's my first giveaway (officially) that I have won from a blog.  Thanks to What's the Buzz in 1st and Stepping Into First Grade, I have won some awesome character units.

          

Be sure to check out their units on TpT.  They're great!  I will be actually giving them to my wonderful husband as he teaches 1st grade and these will be perfect for his guided reading groups next year.  (Maybe I can even convince him to start his own blog this summer!)

I also wanted to say thank you to a wonderful teacher blogger from Florida who gave away this AMAZING sea life canopy on her blog a couple months ago.  Believe me, my kids are crazy about this canopy and love to tell others how it came all the way to Indiana from Florida!  My wonderful teacher friend (KindergartenWorks) won it and gave it to me.  How wonderful is that!  I felt very special that day that this showed up in my classroom.  I can't wait to find a good spot to put it in my room next year.  So thanks again, Leslie! 

Seriously though, you teacher bloggers are INCREDIBLE!  I have been so inspired by all of you this school year.  Your dedication to the teaching profession is a breath of fresh air (even though I am very blessed to work with a wonderful staff).  So thank you to everyone for your ideas and your excitement shared through your blogs.

Also, thanks to my followers.  I'm getting close to 100 and will be doing a little giveaway. =)