Daily Language Bundle Pack

You are about to see a rarity on this blog (well actually two rarities if you count blogging, since that has been pretty rare lately, too!) - a real picture. That's right. I actually took out my camera phone, and snapped a picture. I never do this. It took me two or three days to get first day of school pictures - SHHH! - of the students because I kept forgetting my camera.

But, on this rare occurrence, I took out my phone to get a picture of my new Daily Language pack. Perhaps I just had to mark this occasion, because in finishing up this new pack, I actually have finished up my ENTIRE Daily Language series for firsties, so I was able to bundle it, yay!

So, without further ado, here is one of the few pictures that will probably ever grace this blog . . .

I know, I know, but please hold your applause. I mean just look at that artistic angle, the blur, the ability to be two feet from it and still not have it fully in focus . . . is there an award or contest this should be entered into?

But seriously, how is that I can take a photo of something that is not moving, and it STILL appears out of focus. I tell ya, it doesn't matter how new/expensive/easy-to-use a camera is, I can not take a good picture to save my life, yikes!

But, back to the subject of the picture, my Daily Language pack. I now have 6 Daily Language packs available for first grade, including a Summer Take-Home booklet. You can click the pictures below to check out each individual pack:

Each page in the first five packs contains five questions, covering various common core language and reading standards. For the summer booklet, each page contains two days of practice, with each day covering one or two topics with one or two questions per day - gotta keep it simple in the summer! The packs spiral in difficulty, starting with a review of Kindergarten common core standards in the back to school pack and ending with a review of the first grade standards in the summer take-home booklet.

I chose to only do 5 questions per page because I wanted to keep it quick, simple and to the point. I find that the students that most need these reviews are usually the ones that also need something simple and not too overwhelming.

Constantly reviewing concepts, while adding new topics and questions makes this a perfect daily review that can be used for morning/bell work, to fill a few free minutes during the daily schedule or as homework. Each pack comes with an answer key - easy marking!

Click the pictures above, or {HERE} to check out the full bundle.

Now I've just got to finish the 2nd grade bundle, wish me luck!

A New Alphabet Book for You

Happy New Year! Whenever the New Year rolls around, I always wonder, "When is it too late to wish someone a Happy New Year?" and my mind immediately springs to that Seinfeld episode where Jerry ". . .  once got Happy New Year'd in March." LOVE that show!

So on to the topic of today: books. Specifically picture books. You see, the list of books I want to buy is ever-growing and much larger than my wallet, so I just save books in my Amazon cart and forget about them. The list is definitely in the hundreds and grows almost daily. Despite this huge list, I still feel like I have been so behind on checking out new picture books in the last few years, including ones from some of my favourite authors. So today I am going to highlight one that I just stumbled across, even though it's been out for months.

Enter, Once Upon an Alphabet: Short stories for all the letters by Oliver Jeffers.

This is not your average alphabet book. Combining his unique and adorable illustrations with short stories for each letter, Oliver Jeffers creates another must for the classroom library. Beware, as it is over one hundred pages, it's definitely not a sit-down-at-once read-aloud, but it would still be fun to read over several days. It would also be a fun addition to any preschool or kindergarten letter of the week program.

Photos via Oliver Jeffers

I can't wait to find some more gems this year!