Five for Friday, a freebie & a Close Reading Pin it to Win it!

Oh my, am I ever happy it is Friday! I’m not sure what’s happening by you, but I feel like for at least half this week my little friends seem to have forgotten a whole lot of things…like how to listen! But next week will be a fresh new week again…take a look at what we were up to this week. 🙂

1. I think the weather may have something to do with my little friends being a little nutty…we are back to the deep cold here in Chicagoland and it’s not looking like it’s going to be warming up anytime soon…come on spring!

2. Well even if it doesn’t feel like spring, tomorrow is officially March 1st, which means I am cracking out some of my spring books anyway. Excited to start thinking “spring” through our bookshelf!

3. We’ve been busy practicing long vowel words in our classroom and one way we’ve been reviewing a whole lot is through long vowel word families. Our Word Family Journals have been a huge help in helping me identify quickly who is understanding silent e words. This is a great weekly activity to get my little friends to apply their knowledge of long vowel sounds within words that all fit in the same word family!

They especially love the chance to color in the little crayons at the end after we’ve written all our words- I choose a word they wrote and they color the crayon next to that word.

My little friends also love our word family long vowel centers- how cute are these little barns that we use to read and sort words by word family?

They also did a super job reading long vowel words and matching them up with the right pictures.

4. Here’s a long vowel word family freebie for you all! I did this with short vowels too (you can grab that version here) and had to create a long vowel version as well since my little friends enjoy it! Basically, they read each word on each sidewalk to help the kid get to their friend’s house. The goal is to get them reading the words fluently and not sounding out the entire word each time! You can download your own copy here!

5. Last, but certainly not least, we have been BUSY working on Close Reading in our room! I keep telling Amanda just how much I love doing these lessons with my little friends- they continue to impress me with their ability to comprehend our passages AND their willingness to listen to the stories for the 1st, 2nd and 3rd read! It’s awesome! Here’s a peek at our Ocean Animals edition of close reading:

Ok…and since i’m still rambling about my week, how about a Pin it to Win it to finish off this month of February!? Choose a pic from the Close Reading part of this post, pin it and then comment below with your pin and email. I’ll choose a winner Sunday night who can also enjoy this pack with your little friends!