Games Galore!

I LOVE playing games.  When I was little my favorite board game was Clue, I remember playing board games on rainy days all the time as a kid.  Nowadays I feel like kids are missing this experience with so many digital devices.  So, I try to incorporate games into my classroom whenever possible, mostly because I enjoy them, but also because my kids do too.  I find they are much more engaged when I turn a lesson into a game. On every Open House or teacher wish list I have sent home I always ask for used board games and have been pretty lucky.  Let's dive into my (messy) game shelf.

I am a firm believer that no one is too old to play Candy Land, which is why I happily own THREE game sets (one stays in my car for when I am working with my speech kiddos).  This has proven to be true since my 2nd and 3rd graders love to play it!  

This Candy Land Math pack is a great companion if you already have a Candy Land game board.  It has numbers, shapes, expanded form, addition, subtraction and keyword cards.  This was usually a permanent math center game in my classroom (I just rotate the cards).

Another favorite, which my kids LOVE is Headbandz! I wouldn't say I LOVE this game because it does get a little bit loud but, they ask for it EVERY time we have Fun Friday.

Since they love it so much I wanted to figure out a way I could make it more academic.  So, I came up with the What's My Shape? game!  You can grab this FREEBIE by clicking on the picture below.

And there's always Uno!  This card game catches on pretty quickly with my 2nd graders, the only part they have trouble with is holding so many cards!  I have seen some teachers use egg cartons as card holders, I should probably try that out.

Because they love Uno so much I've tried to make some academic Uno-like card games that follow the CCSS (most are aligned to 2nd grade).  Many are available in my math or ELA packs but these two are available separately and Recycl-O is a FREE download!

 

So, when SmileMakers sent me an e-mail asking if I'd be interested in reviewing an item from their site I knew exactly what I would pick, a game!  SmileMakers had so many educational games to pick from and I LOVED looking through all their fantastic teacher resources! 

I ended up choosing Double Duel and it came in the mail a few weeks ago. I have been DYING for my kids to come back so we can play it! It focuses on homophones, which will be great for both my 2nd and 3rd graders!

The game looked fantastic but I have to admit, when I saw that these fun buzzers came with the game I was sold.  My mind was spinning for what else I could use them for! 

Since I am widening my age range a bit this year and will have 3rd (maybe 4th) graders I wanted to put together some new fun math games to play throughout the year. This huge pack has 100 pages of cards, game boards, activities, and GAMES! I made many of the games similar to the ones that my 2nd graders loved but bumped them up to 3rd grade standards.  I even included a 3rd grade Math Madness Quiz Game which I plan on playing with my fun, new buzzers! You can click on either picture to check it out!

And if you've stayed with me all the way to the end of the super long post....in honor of my first day of school I'd love to give away a FREE copy of Let's Play a Game!  Leave a comment below and I'll pick a random winner by tomorrow night!

One more thing before I go...I just wanted to remind you that The Primary Chalkboard is introducing two members each day with exclusive freebies!  Don't miss out on some amazing, free resources!

UPDATE: The winner of Let's Play a Game is Julie!  Congratulations, an e-mail is on it's way!

Five for Friday!

Yes, I know it's Sunday which officially makes this the latest Five for Friday post ever but I still wanted to share!  If you follow Primary Punch on Instagram, you've seen a few of these and if you haven't then they are brand new!  Here are a few pictures of what I've been up to this week! 

Let's start in my classroom, which was all about getting ready for the first week of school!

I printed and began posting my Be a Green Machine signs!

We had these adorable "apple" cupcakes at our professional development meeting!

I printed and laminated my 2nd grade Math Vocabulary Cards for my math word wall.  Sorry for the glare, I need to remember to take pictures before laminating!

And I printed and prepped the School Sleuth tour activity for the first day of school! The codes are taped around the school ready for kiddos to take the tour!

I also posted a brand new Science pack to TPT that is designed to to help introduce The Scientific Method, science tools and Science Safety rules.

And as if that wasn't enough for one week I also met up with some AWESOME NC bloggers for dinner!

From the left, Jennifer from Hello Mrs. Sykes, Tania from My Second Sense, Casey from Second Grade Math Maniac, Me and Julie from Second Grade Style.  

That's last week in a nutshell!  Kiddos come tomorrow (eek!), I hope everyone has a great week!

Be a GREEN Machine {FREEBIE}!!

Primary Punch has a new look!!  What do you you all think??  I am in LOVE with it, it was designed by Kassie over at The Cutest Blog on the Blog and she is a design GENUIS!!  I think it's fabulous!!  

As a BIG thank you for all your support during the TPT Back-to-School Sale I just posted a new freebie!!  I sat in a lot of PD this morning and we went over some of the "must-haves" this school year, well our school is "green" and we must have signs up that remind our children to help reduce, reuse and recycle.  Since I am incorporating some chevron into my classroom this year I thought chevron signs would be great!  They are available as a FREE download if you click on any of the pictures below!

I am also excited to announce that Primary Punch is now on instagram!!  I know I am seriously late to the insta party but I would LOVE if you'd head over and follow me on instagram so you can keep up with all that is happening in my classroom this year!  To follow me you can either open the instagram application and search PrimaryPunch or you can go to the top of the blog and click on my fancy new instagram button!

The Theme Team!

It's official, I am back to school!  Today was our first day back for professional development (kids will be here on the 26th) and I am so excited about this school year.  As soon as I walked into my classroom the ideas just started flowing!  It feels good to get back into the swing of things.  I want to share a new pack with you all tonight, it was a request from the 4th grade teachers at my school.  They found that they needed some additional resources to help teach theme this year so I put together a little pack, meet The Theme Team!

Here are a few of my favorite parts!  I LOVE all things colorful if you hadn't noticed from HERE and HERE or HERE. My classroom doesn't have a particular theme but if I had to pick one I'd say rainbow! I am a sucker for all things in rainbow order and these rainbow posters show off the nine common themes covered in this pack perfectly!

I also included two short stories for each theme that I wrote myself for a total of 18 short stories total!  Each story was written with a specific theme in mind however, due to the nature of literature, there are a few with characteristics of more than one theme.

 I also printed and laminated these cute bookmarks for my 3rd graders this year since they were just so colorful I figured we may be able to get in a little theme at some point!

Head over to my TPT store and to read more about The Theme Team pack!  Also, tonight is the last night of the TPT Back to School Sale.  I am heading over now to make my last minute purchases!  Happy Monday!

The Back to School Sale is here!

The sale has begun! Don't miss out on these great back-to-school packs that I plan on using with my kiddos in just one short week! 

 

   

   

Plus there are even more fantastic resources from fellow teachers that I can't wait to grab up!

Don't forget to add the code BTS13 when you check out to get an additional discount!

There's a BIG Sale coming...

I'm sure you may have heard by now but there is a BIG back to school sale happening over at TPT on Sunday and Monday!!  My entire store (yes, even the bundles!!) will be 20% off and you can get another 8% off but using the code: BTS13!   Happy Shopping!!

Thanks Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah Designs for the awesome graphic!

Five for Friday!

Happy Friday!  It's time for Five for Friday over at Doodlebugs! Here are five pictures of my last week of vacation! I go back to school Monday and kids come the following week! 

I spent the first half of the week wrapping up our family vacation at Round Lake in Michigan.  It only took us 12 hours and 5 states to get there but it was well worth it!

I tried to get a sunset picture every night and this night was the best I could get! The sunsets are just so beautiful there, the sky always turns a bright pink and red.  I also didn't realize how much I missed the lightning bugs that came out right after the sunset each night.  For some reason we don't have lightning bugs where we live in North Carolina. 

Everyday the temperature was between 70-79 which felt like October for us southerners but it was so nice to just sit outside (with very little humidity!) and read for hours!  The lake was so calm and relaxing. 

And then I came home to this newly waxed classroom, aren't those floor so nice and shiny?! I haven't done much yet besides move some furniture around and just stare at the walls trying to decide what I want to put where but I will definitely take some pictures of the finished product (and hopefully post them next Friday)!

The Primary Chalkboard!

I am so happy to share my BIG news with you all today!  I am now a contributing author over at a BRAND NEW blog for 1st and 2nd grade teachers, The Primary Chalkboard!

The Primary Chalkboard will be written by 19 other 1st and 2nd grade teachers and it just went live today! The first post is all about back to school bliss!  There are 20 tips from each author that we have found helpful during those first few, stressful weeks.

 There is also an AWESOME FREE e-book!  The e-book has 20 pages of back to school ideas, one page from each author! 

AND as if that wasn't enough there is also an AMAZING giveaway happening for a chance to win a $50 Erin Condren gift card, a $50 TPT gift card and a 1st/2nd grade bundle pack!  

Head over to The Primary Chalkboard and check it out!