They're Here! Brainy Bottles Class Sets

Insomnia makes me super productive. I was able to put together the Brainy Bottle classroom sets and divide them by grade levels for you! All sets are available on TPT. The classroom sets include:

• Kindergarten - 1st (5 sets): Plural words, rhyming words, and syllable counts
• 2nd - 3rd (6 sets): Rhyming words, plural words, homophones, synonyms, and antonyms
• 4th - 5th (5 sets): Homophones, synonyms, and antonyms

Please visit my previous post for more details, including the bottles I love to use by a drink company called NEURO. There, you will also find a link to the dyed rice recipe I use. I've included two grade levels per set with differentiation in mind, and I hope you find that useful. Glad I could bring this to you so soon. Now, the question is.... sleep or Netflix? 

What's Developing: Brainy Bottles (A Hunt for Words)

Today, I want to share one of my favorite DIY classroom tools. I made these last year after seeing bottles in my mentor's classroom. As soon as I saw them, my urge to craft and create was awakened. I could think of tons of categories to make for the bottles, especially since I taught so many grades. This is exactly what I'm sharing with you today. You will also get a glimpse into my hoarding tendencies and love for the Neuro line of drinks. I digress.

I call these Brainy Bottles, and my classes have used them to find words and strengthen their language arts skills while experiencing a touch of kinesthetic learning. These are wonderful for centers and for partner work. The possibilities are truly endless, but I've created bottle sets for antonyms, synonyms, verb usage, homophones, rhyming, and plural words. For extension exercises, I have the students write sentences using (blank number of) words from the bottle or write new word pairs.

I get tons of inquiries on these perfectly eye-catching bottles when we've packed them up for conferences. I don't remember which came first - the love of the drinks that came in the bottles or the bottles themselves. They have certainly served a purpose for Brainy Bottles. NEURO DRINKS is the line of drink, and hopefully you can find them at your local convenient or grocery store. Any bottle will do, though, but I couldn't resist the colors of these.

Here is the link I used for coloring the rice. HOW TO DYE RICE. I prefer the neon food coloring colors over the primary colors, and for these bottles, they were a perfect match!

I'm putting up this freebie today for synonyms. I will put up complete sets soon. Keep your eyes peeled as I hope to run a contest so that one of my followers can win a full set, already-made! I love the drinks so much, that I have bottles waiting to be won!! Seriously, you have no idea how happy my husband would be if I got rid of a couple sets.

Happy crafting, and I hope you find uses for these bottles for years to come. You only have to make them once! I can't wait to hear how you do.

What's Developing - Academic Pom Poms

I love coming up with ideas to make the room cute. It's a bonus when I can find an academic use for them, too! This year, I'm missing my half-time classroom from last year so much! I could hang stuff from the ceiling there, and it really made a huge difference. My school this year has motion-sensors, so anything hanging in the room could set them off. No fun!

One of my favorite functional decorating items were these pom poms that I hung over my different center tables. Depending on the unit or the time of year, I would change the vocabulary words that were attached to the poms poms. Instead of saying, "Group 1 will be at Table 1" or "Go to the Blue Center," I'd used current vocabulary. "This group will go to the Addition center, and this group will go to the Sum center."  This reinforced the use and the recognition of academic language.  Before sending my first graders to their centers, I might say, "Today, you're going to the Total center. What's another way to say total?" It was so efficient and took seconds to ask the question and get answers, and it was really fun at the same time. Students were very interested when the words were changed. 

As we got deep into the testing season, I switched it up a little more. I wanted to empower my students and plant a little seed to help them feel confident and smart. I changed the labels to Genius, Smarty Pants, Einstein, and Brilliance. It's the small things, but I could see them light up a bit when I told them they were in the Smarty Pants or Genius center that day! I love the little things! I really love classrooms that don't have motion-sensors. I'm still trying to come up with a creative way to designate my centers next year. I might have to build some desktop topiary!  =) If you can hang things in your classroom, consider these pom poms. They're eye-catching and can be a great way to expand your word wall and remind your students of the vocabulary at hand.

Exposing It - Our Favorite Educational Games in ESOL

The past two years, I've been lucky enough to have a lead ESOL teacher that ropes me into presenting at conferences. Being this green, I wouldn't say it's fun, but then, I realize how much I get out of it and how much I learn. It is at these conferences that I realize how much I love sharing! So, thanks Jennifer! Our presentation has been entitled Apps, Websites, and Activities... Oh My! We realize there is understandably a push for technology, apps, and websites at all times; however, talking to our attendees, we learned that there are still so many schools that don't have access to technology like our very advantaged district. We had a chance to meet people from rural districts that said they don't have Ipads. I even heard from a couple of teachers who didn't have wireless access at their school. I can't take for granted how lucky I am to be in a district with resources.

On that note, I am happy that we presented games and kinesthetic activities to the teachers to take to their students. I learned the importance of "unwired" activities when I completed my practicum in Liberia. I learned quickly that I could not rely on technology, and I think my students appreciate the diversity. I also see more interaction with these type of games. For this post, I am sharing some of my students' favorite games, both for language practice and test prep. Keep this in mind for any of those times you may receive an allotment to spend for your classroom, or take this list to someone in your school to add to the resource room.

I want to really emphasize here that having a game center on my choice board has been one amazing sight to see. Not only do students stay engaged; they manage themselves and each other. They have fun, and their social barriers disappear. If my lesson ends early,or if students perform great on an assessment, we have another chance to pull these out for a few minutes, and I play with them. I will also say that we've had many a fun and informative conversation during these games. How powerful is that with ELLs? It's my favorite! With that, the list of games. Clicking on the names will direct you to their Amazon links.

For test prep and review, my favorites are...

• Make-A-Monster - I've linked the 5th grade version, but it's available for grades 3 - 5 ELA. This one is ready to use without any extra work for you. There is also an answer card, so students can use this with each other.
• JENGA - You can write site words on these. I create my own games for JENGA and will be a posting those in the next week or two. (UPDATE: See the new post for Tumble Towers Review Cards! More to come.)
• Eggsperts - Use these for your made up review games or online quiz show games. You'd be amazed how crazy excited the students are when they walk in and these are set up.

For grammar and language practice:

• Zingo - I like this game for my Spanish-speaking newcomers. They are able to join in yelling out the words since it's pretty repetitive.
• Apples to Apples - Use this to teach students new vocabulary, synonyms, how to use adjectives and nouns. This practice is especially helpful for Spanish speaking students due to the fact that nouns and adjectives are used in the reversed order from English.
• Jeepers Peepers or Headbandz - Great for practicing the language, but also teaches students how to ask questions and how to use interrogative words.

For word work and spelling:

• Chunks - Helps students use blends.
• Word on the Street - Students pull category cards and spell words to be the first team to clear their letters off the board.
• Boggle - A classic, right? The great thing about Boggle is that there are so much reproducibles online for centers. I like to add points for the number of letters in their correct words.

Of course, there's a plethora of games that could be listed here. For instance, I can't wait to get my hands on Tapple! I just wanted to list the ones I've used and have seen success with. I hope that you will have fun using these games and not be afraid to use them in your classroom. There are so many ways to differentiate and extend lessons with these games. Your new language learners have built-in models with their classmates; and you can offer challenges to your stronger students. Have those students create new questions to add to the games. They can write sentences using words in the games. Have students write a persuasive paper about which game they get play or why they should play more games. Challenge them to use their game-playing experiences to create a class review game of their own!! Thing Blooms, y'all. Think of the impact that will have on their learning! Please share your classroom's experiences with games. I'm all ears, and can't wait to hear your ideas!

Oh, Snap! - I Made a Boo Boo

Here I was, promising a new post about my adult words bulletin board. Well, I got sidetracked! It happens to all of us, right? I was productive, however, and I'm able to post another freebie for my readers. This freebie can also be downloaded from Teachers Pay Teachers. Feel free to use either link.

With Common Core implementation, we are seeing more and more emphasis on nonfiction. Nonfiction can be challenging and intimidating to young readers and English Language Learners. Magazines are very manageable for our struggling readers, especially if we find one geared towards their personal interest, which I highly encourage. I've used this choice board to ease students into exploring nonfiction through a few wonderful magazine articles. And not to forget our avid readers, this choice board offers a twist to your every day reading response. 

I want to thank my sweet husband, mentors, co-workers, and friends for continuing to give me ideas, plus a boost in confidence. This free download will be my first item listed in my TPT store! Please share this with your teams. Pinning, blogging, posting, sharing, instagramming... all sound great to me. I will be forever grateful. =)
Enjoy!