Information provided for classroom use only ; not for publication. Recently my Mom had heart surgery and while I sat with her in the hospital, I finally finished Literacy Work Stations by Debbie Diller. I'd started the book quite a while back and actually had read almost half of it. Then I decided that I needed to go back and start it again, so I started over.

It's a great book, easy to read, and has lots of practical advice on running Centers, which she calls Work Stations. And I liked her methods so much that I decided to create and recreate my Centers for next year into Work Stations as well. So as I read, I took notes of how I could implement some of her ideas into my classroom environment.

On this page I'll share those ideas with you as well. However, I would like to say that the information on this page is only how I will use the stations in my classroom. You really need to buy Debbie's book and read it to see how you can implement work stations in your own classroom. This page will not cover all the stations that Debbie discusses in her book, nor the use of task cards, etc.

I don't have a traditional kindergarten, first grade, or second grade class, so some of the Stations that she discusses are not appropriate for my classroom. And also because of that, I've implemented some stations that are not Literacy Stations as well.

I also hope to implement Math Work Stations in the future. So far they're still in the planning stage. These are the Work Stations that I've decided to have in my classroom: Creation Station Writing Station Listening Station Reading Station. I'll have each station name and a picture of the station on a card in the pocketchart. Then each student will have their name listed on a 3x5 index card.

I'll put their name card beside the station that I want them to attend. How the students move through the stations will be determined on an individual basis. At the end of the day, each student's name will be moved to the next station. Below are the Work Station signs that I use. I printed them on cardstock and had them laminated. Then I displayed them at each station using one of 3 ways: I used these signs for sitting on table tops and on top of my Big Book easel.

Of course, before any station will be opened, I'll have to do a lot of modeling and practicing with them until I'm satisfied that they can work in the station independently.

The stations are for reinforcing and practicing skills that they've already learned, so they shouldn't need a lot of teacher direction. As a matter of fact, I want them designed where the students need NO teacher direction and if needed, only peer assistance The stations will not have all the materials listed below in them at one time.

As needed, I can add new activities and remove ones that are no longer being used by the students so that there's only about 5 activities in the station at one time. Many of the stations will be kept in the tubs that I did use for Centers. The students will remove the activity that they wish to use from the tub and take it to one of the "work tables" or another area of the room.

Card Stock Paper

If needed, they can carry the whole tub with them. I started using a Big Book Station this past year. It was one of the favorites for my students. It seemed to be more of a hit when there was a book in the station that they could actually attempt to read word-for-word such as Brown Bear, Brown Bear. Other big books such as If You Give a Mouse a Cookie did not draw the students in because of the difficulty of the text, although we'd read the book MANY times more times than I wanted to read it!

Due to the cost of the Big Books and the limited number of choices, I chose to put only one book on the Big Book easel for this station instead of allowing students to choose the book on their on. I did model and practice with them on how to care for the books and how to use them, and we didn't have any instances of abuse. In this station, the book was already set up on the easel and two students were allowed to visit the station at one time.

One student would read with a pointer and the other would turn the pages. Once they finished, they traded places. This year I want to add small sticky notes to the back inside of each book cover labeled with words from the book. The students will find the words in the text and cover them with the sticky notes. Another activity for this station would be to program 3x5 index cards with sight words from the text.

Then apply highlighter tape over the words on the cards. After the students have read the book, they take the word cards and find the words in the text. Once they've found the words in the text, they cover the words with the highlighter tape. After each of these activities, myself or another student will check for accuracy. Any mistakes will be corrected by the students.

Here's pictures of some of the results. And since I created these Big Books myself, I've also allowed them to swap them out if they want instead of only using one. These particular Big Books I created for my Packin' For A Picnic unit. I clip a ziploc bag to the back of the book containing the word cards. The students find the word on the card in the text and pull the highlighter tape from the word card and place it over the word in the book.

My TA cut all the highlighter tape the size of the words in the books, but the children have gotten them mixed up, so they're no longer on the correct card. Another activity for this station would be to have students find sight words in the text on their own and have them cover them with highlighter tape.

I make my own highlighter tape using see-through cling-on bookcovers. Just cut to the size you need. Make sure you purchase a solid color such as pink, orange, or yellow.

Purple isn't one of my favorites as it's not as easy to see through, but it can be used. I bought two large canvas tote bags from Oriental Trading company. The tote bags have several pockets on the front as well as the large main pocket. That way the child, or 2 children, can just take the bag and have everything they need. I bought two of them, that way the 2 children in that group can each have their own or they can share.

I've had a lot of questions about the highlighter tape, so here's more clarification if you need it: I have a s chart on my Morning Meeting page and on My Room page that you can see. I use the highlighter tape on those to show the 5s and 10s pattern. There's also a visual on the Literacy Connections page where you see a Word Wall for Compound Words, Suffixes and Prefixes. They also show the use of the highlighter tape. The book covers I bought 4 to a box at Office Depot YEARS ago.

So that tells you how much you'll get from your investment. And I'm still using that box. The ones I got are neon orange, pink, purple, and green. The box is at school, or I could give you a name. They were in a black box about 5 inches wide and the length of a text book. The covers themself cling to the book or whateverlike a clingy, but when you remove the film there is NO residue.

Georgia-Pacific White Cardstock Paper, " x 11", lb, Sheets - eqogypacuc.web.fc2.com

However, when you place it over the text, you can still read the text through the book cover. When I was at Dollar Tree this week, I thought I saw an individual roll of neon pink there. I didn't pick it up to check and see if that's what it was, but it might be worth checking out.

Will include puppets, flannelboard, and story props to use for retelling of stories. The opposite side of my Lakeshore Big Book easel is my flannelboard. I photocopied blackline pictures onto cardstock and had the substitute aide color them with markers. Then they were laminated and cut out.

To make them stick to the flannelboard, I hotglued pieces of sandpaper to the back of them. I've since decided that velcro works better. I've also bought several of those kits that go along with books that have the manipulatives for the book. The manipulatives can be used on the flannelboard. You can also make individual flannelboards using file folders or pizza boxes. Glue a piece of felt to the inside of the folder or box top.

The student can open the file or box and use the pieces to retell a story. The pieces can be kept inside the pizza box, or a ziploc bag taped to the file folder with clear packing tape.

These individual flannelboards can also be used concurrently with the Listening Station. As the student listens to the book on cassette, they can also be manipulating the story pieces at the same time.

Lakeshore carries story props for a lot of the most common books. You can also make your own by collecting items from a book that can be used in retelling or acting out the story. For an example of the story props I collected for Mrs. This station will be to reinforce identification, sounds, sorting and sequencing of letters. I found this idea on Pinterest, but when I went to the blog there was no printable so I created my own.

So of course, I had to share it here. Here's the link on Pinterest so you can see the photo she had: I went to Big Lots and purchased 22 of those clear plastic shoeboxes that were 79 cents each so that I could have a box for each letter. Well, a couple of the letters can share, like x and z. Then I'll label each box with a capital and lowercase letter [printable labels below] and the kids can sort the objects into the correct box like the rhyming tubs I purchased from Lakeshore.

As a matter of fact, Lakeshore sells tubs like this, but they are expensive! I also use these with small groups. M y kids love it when I pull one out. I hide the tub under the table so they can't see what's inside and give clues as to what the item is Everything goes into the middle of the table.

Then if they can tell me the name of the item, they can put it back into the box good for vocabulary enrichment. They love getting their hands on the "real thing. For example, my Letter B box will hold: Anything small enough to fit in the box is fair game! I have a low shelf that my husband built for me that I'm going to store the shoeboxes in. I'm one of those crazies that likes to have everything uniform, so I opted for those plastic shoeboxes.

If you don't have that much storage space, then you'll probably have to go with something smaller. This is not the final resting place for my tubs. Right now they're just stacked on a shelf until I clean a lower shelf off. I'm using them to introduce letters to my Ks. This is the Letter F tub that I introduced last week: Alphabet Tubs - things I have or things I can add. This list will help to keep me organized and focused.

The items that are in bold type I have in my tub already. If you have suggestions, shoot me an email. As you can see, this activity is also good for enhancing vocabulary. In years past, I actually had a student who didn't know what a candle was. When I did LOTW, I would pull out a bag and hide it under the table so the kids couldn't see the contents.

I'd pull out one item at a time and let them name the item. All the items were placed in the middle of the table. Once everything was out of the bag, I'd let them take turns identifying the objects one-by-one. If they could name an object, they got to take it from the table and hold it. We did that until all items had been named.

This might be a good way to introduce each tub. We also put a lot of emphasis on the beginning sound as we named the items. Here are some printable labels for your Alphabet Tubs. They're saved in PDF format.

Mine are more brilliant in color, but once I scanned them in they became kind of muted. So I adjusted the saturation to fix the color, but it just would not save the document that way. I would also suggest printing them onto cardstock and laminating them before adding them to your stocks strong buy list with clear packing tape.

I also gave you some extras. Alphabet Tub Labels printable. Jean's song "Who Let the Letters Out? And here's a link for a workmat to go along with the song. Place the mat in a cookie sheet and use with magnetic letters. Mat created by Tiffany at www. Who Let the Letters Out? Carol, my online friend, just shared some more activities with me for this station. I'll have to get to work on making these over the summer.

One of the letters should be the letter that the picture begins with. Then punch a hole either right above or right below all 3 letters. Stick a pencil through the hole that shows what letter the picture begins with local stockbrokers edinburgh ex.

This makes the card self-checking. The student will stick a golf tee or their pencil in the correct hole to match the beginning letter sound to the picture. Carol suggests making all activities self-checking. I said, "But my kids always cheat and never try to do the activity.

On the bottom of the bottle, write nse bse trading holidays 2013 correct letter for the beginning sound. Kids match the correct cap to the correct bottle and then look underneath the bottle to check their answer. Thanks Carol for sharing! You're just a mountain of great ideas!!!!!! If you're interested in seeing more of Carol's ideas, she has her own tips page here: They are large, wooden, square beads more like blocks actually with caps and lowercase.

The kids string them onto what looks like colored shoestrings in the correct sequence. This is difficult for some because they have to have them going in the correct direction left to rightin the correct order, and none of them upside down.

Quite a feat for some! The pocketchart comes with a pocket for each letter with the letter displayed on front of the pocket. Students sort provided picture cards into the correct pocket according to the beginning sound. They can sequence the letters or use them to form words. Student stamps can you buy cardstock at walmart into correct column for the beginning sound. Students will cover the correct pictures with an appropriate sized counter or marker.

This station will be used to reinforce the concept that letters are used to form words and that the letters can also be buying property in sweden as a foreigner to form new words such as in rhyming words and word families.

It will also be used to reinforce the concept forex trading softwareforex trading software words are used to form sentences, therefore text in books and environmental print. Can you buy cardstock at walmart for this station will be Print these cards and make matching picture cards.

Print the matching cards at these links onto cardstock, color, and laminate. Print the worksheet onto cardstock, color and cut out pictures; laminate. Create your own word cards and laminate. Students will match the words to the pictures. To complete this activity, some students need visual helpers. I give them a laminated ABC strip and chips to put. Then they "drive down ABC Road" and see who's house. Letter A, Letter B, etc.

They're almost the same as Reading Rods. They look like Unifix cubes with letters. They snap together to form words or for sequencing ABCs. New words will be written on Response Sheet. Each card is a 3x5 index card with the picture, the word in dotted print, with a line underneath for the student to write the word.

The cards have been laminated, so the the student completes the activity by tracing the word, then writing it on the line with a Vis-a-Via pen. Each word family is listed on a big picture. I had them laminated so that they could be used in a Center. The students create lists of words for each family and write the words on the picture guaranteed trading signals a Vis-a-Via pen.

The word families are each listed on a card and placed across the top of the pocketchart. Students enter the word cards into the correct column. To extend the activity, make word cards to go with each rhyming words set and have students match rhyming words to rhyming pictures. So you'd have two rhyming pictures and two rhyming words. I used printables at Kiz Club and created word cards to match the pictures.

My students have to decode the word zig zag pattern forex match to the correct picture. They can also use the word cards to match rhyming words. Phonics and Rhyming Word Cards Match. I used these links for the pictures: I can't remember the name of it.

Kind of like a Rubics cube, but it's a cyclinder shaped. Students use it to form words and write the words they create on a response sheet. Student has a certain amount of volume analysis forex pdf to form a word with letters to match a word card before the timer goes off.

If using posterboard, laminate. Then program the grid with sight words. On the posterboard, use a Vis-A-Via pen. Students throw a beanbag and read the word it lands on. This idea was adapted from one Little Giraffes. I would rather use a piece of posterboard because it would take up less room. By laminating it, you can change the words periodically. I would also have as many levels of this activity as I had groups of readers. Place the cards for each page in a ziploc bag or other container.

If you use all the pages at once, have students create one word from each bag and write it on a response form. Have the students read the words to you or another student. For lower students, provide a model of the words you want them to create by writing the words on a card. The students will use the card to create the words and write them on their response sheet. You'll need to trade service stocks altamura it to your computer and resize it, rather than just printing it from the site.

You can purchase flashcards like this Carson-Delosa CD or make your own. I'm debating whether or not to make another set of digital call option replication for my pocketchart to be used in every day writing activities.

The patterns for this came from a big yellow book dealing with Learning Centers I believe. I do not know the full title and I've had it for many years.

Turn this worksheet into a matching activity by printing on cardstock and laminating. Cut pieces off bottom and keep in a ziplock bag taped to the back with clear packing tape not scotch tape.

The students can sort the objects or pictures into the correct tub. They'll be used as workmats rather than worksheets. Use these workmats with plastic letter tiles.

Students put the correct word ending on the word using the correct letter tile. Trace over the letter choices on these workmats with a black Sharpie. Students indicate the correct ending sound by covering their answer choice with a round disc used for the overhead so that they, and the checker, can see the letter through the disc. After laminating this mat, remove the pictures and cut them a part.

Students will sort the pictures into the correct ending sound box. To teach that a sentence has to say WHO or WHAT and WHAT THEY DID. You can easily differentiate activities for multiple levels of students and it gets them out of their seat and gives them wiggle room. Then I would introduce a heading for each sentence part WHO or WHAT, WHAT THEY DID and review that every sentence has to have both of these parts to be a complete sentence. Place them at the top of the pocketchart this make take a wide pocketchart.

After you've gone through all the sentences, mix up the parts. In the Station the students will sort the sentence parts back into the correct columns according to whether it's a WHO or WHAT part or a WHAT THEY DID part. If you have them make silly sentences, have them choose one sentence that they made, write the sentence and draw a picture to go with it. Someone also suggested color coding the sentence parts to help the learners see that they needed one of each color to make a complete sentence.

If you did this however, you wouldn't be able to have them sort into the two sentence parts, because the color would give it away as to which group the sentence part belonged. Print the sentence strips below onto cardstock, laminate and cut apart to make word cards. Place each sentence in a snack size ziplock bag and then place all the 3 word sentence bags in a pencil box for storage.

Continue for each level of words. Students will unscramble the words to create each sentence.

Build A Sentence printable: Print these cards and make a heading each for Singular and Plural for your pocketchart. Have students sort the picture cards into the appropriate column. One student will be the "caller" and the other student will be the "finder. Students can use them with the overhead to retell the stories. Students use a Vis-a-Via to circle the identified letter at the bottom of the page.

An alternative to using a Vis-a-Via would be to have them cover the letter with a colored disk made for the overhead the letter can still be seen through the disk for easy checking or another type of non-transparent manipulative. Students can use mini pointers and take turns reading them. This picture shows 4 pocketchart activities: In this picture students also match words to text, but it's made easier by using different color sentence strips. They know that a pink word card will go on a pink sentence strip, and the same for green and blue.

They can also remove the pictures and them forex trading accounts south africa them back to the correct sentence as well as remove the sentence strips and replace them in the correct order.

I wrote this poem for my Easter Unit using a spinoff from the Jack O' Happy poems written by Susie Haas, I believe. I created story element pocketchart cards for this activity. Print the story element cards below on cardstock, laminate and cut out. Place them in your pocketchart one story element per row.

The activity can be done in a couple of ways. As you're discussing each element, you can jot down the answers of the students. Later make answer cards from their answers by writing them on sentence strips one answer per story element. OR, you can have premade answer cards and as a student supplies the answer, place the answer card in the pocketchart beside the story element.

This is what I'll do. The next day, after reading the story again, review the story elements. Then remove the answer cards and pass out to students making sure that everyone can read their answer card. As each element is read, the student with the correct answer card should raise their hand and read their card. If it's correct, they place the card back into the pocketchart beside the correct story element. The next day, you could world of warcraft which profession makes most money all the answer cards in the pocketchart, but have them placed mixed up and have the students take turns putting the answer cards in the correct place.

After the activity has been sufficiently reviewed, you can remove the answer cards and place them and the pocketchart with the story elements in a work station or center for the students to complete individually or in pairs.

Students can use pointers and take turns reading them. This station will be used to link literature and artistic expression. This station will be used to reinforce both writing skills and handwriting. This station is really only a "one seater" although it does cover two desks. They write in front of the station sign, the other desk just holds some of the materials.

This is showing small note paper and cards in the basket, the Rolodex pictionary, dictionary, green and white paper inside deskguru forex trading sheet, and colored pencils.

The student chooses what they want to do. Students complete with a Vis-a-Via. Amazing Handwriting Worksheet Maker. And normally I wouldn't include ideas on my webpages that I got from other websites, because it makes more sense just to include a link to the other website, BUT I'm going to be using this page in planning for my own class, so I want all the ideas that I want to use here on ONE page. So do go and visit Nora's page as well. She has a whole page of ideas for Centers, and I'm only stealing a few of them.

Each student should have their own mailbox that has been labeled with their name. A good way to get this started is for you to write to each student and encourage them to write back. When I first started this with my class, my mailbox consisted of a liquor box with partitions that had been covered with contact paper. The partitions used in the box to keep the bottles of liquor from getting broken were perfect for mailboxes when the box was turned on its side.

I labeled each compartment mailbox with a student's name using cut down file folder labels. I have since graduated from the liquor box to a commercially produced student mailbox from Really Good Stuff I believe.

Exact same premise as the liquor box, just a little bit sturdier. Of course, notes to other teachers, administration, or staff will have to be delivered by you or a helper. If appropriate, this could be a Helper's job. Use teacher created catalogs to create list of 10 items wanted during pretend shopping spree.

I cut out pictures from magazines to make 2 separate "catalogs". One is "Let's Go Shopping at the Grocery Store" and the other is "Let's Go Shopping at the Mall". They use the catalogs to help them choose what they'd like to purchase. Each item is labeled below the picture. This picture was taken before I'd gotten my binder. The pages are now bound together to form two separate catalogs.

At this link you can print pages to make shape books. This is my old Listening Center. I have a crate full of books and tapes in ziploc bags. On top of the crate is the tape player, headset, book, and clipboard with Response Sheets.

The student sits in a beanbag chair and listens to the book. Afterwards, they write their name of their Response Sheet, title of the book, and draw their favorite part of the story.

I have some students turn their paper over and write on the back what their picture is about. I put stickers on the taper player buttons to show play greenrewind yellowand stop red. After listening, the student is in charge of rewinding the tape for the next person. This is my old Reading Center. I have a bookshelf that holds books with the cover facing out and two small plastic chairs from the dollar store. I also have at least one stuffed animal here for the students to read to.

The bookshelf holds books that I've read to them, as well as magazines World by National Geographics, Humpty Dumpty, and Highlightsclass made books, thematic books, etc. My Reading Center from a couple of years ago. This will now be my Reading Station with a few updates such as the stuffed animals to read to and a tabletop turnstyle type rack that holds small emergent reader sets.

I've also added 2 tubs of AR books. One tub holds K-1st grade level books, and the other tub holds 2nd grade level books. Because the children don't always get to finish their book before taking their AR test on the computer, I like to keep a can of bookmarks sitting between the tubs for them to use.

Bookmarks would be something you could have them create in the Creation Station to go along with specific pieces of literature or here's a link for printable bookmarks that just need to be colored.

I've used Book Boxes for several years and still love them. At this station, the students will read or use the manipulatives in their own Book Book. Each student has their own book box to keep their individual class-made books in, their Poetry Journal, along with any literacy props, etc.

The boxes are just Tide boxes that my husband has so graciously painted for us, and then I added the clipart sign to the front.

The handles are the handles that come already on the boxes. They're made with heavy duty plastic, because the Tide boxes are heavy when full of Tide. They are kept on the floor, up against the wall, underneath the chalkboard or another out of the way place. If I want to send their books home to read for homework, I put them in their homework folder and send a response form with it for the parents to sign.

They bring their book back the next day. When I send the books home for homework like that, it reminds me why I use the Book Boxes. I think if I just sent the books home all along, they would be everywhere and get thrown away. At least by sending them home in the box, they MIGHT have a better chance of survival.

Book Boxes from several years ago. I know that some people prefer to use cereal boxes for their Book Boxes and I've even tried using 2 gallon ziploc bags. For my class, the cereal boxes would be too small and I just prefer the detergent boxes to the hanging ziploc bags. Our student books consist of the Frog Street Press color words books and alphabet books, and books that I create for my class as well as The Teacher's Bookbag.

I use a few other commercial reproducible books, but not many.

Work Stations at The Virtual Vine

Many of them are just too small or have text that's too small and too close together. There will be no Book Boxes this year. My husband does the grocery shopping during the school year and he refuses to buy the size detergent that I need for the boxes, so I'm going to start the year off with NO Book Boxes.

But, in an effort to take their place I came up with the idea of using large gift bags. So I purchased solid, primary color bags. I wanted to dress the bags up some with border to match their book tags, but I couldn't find what I wanted, so I just made some on the computer.

They're not perfect by any means, but they're cute and the kids won't notice the imperfections. I also decided just recently that I'd cut the eyelet looking part off of the "border" on the bags for the boys.

I don't think they'd appreciate the eyelet. The pictures aren't the greatest. I hope to have better pictures of them after school gets started. But before school starts, I'm going to run the bags through the laminator to make them more durable. I'm going to tape the handles down inside the bag so that they don't get laminated. Then after I slit the laminating film from the sides and top, I'll untape them and bring them back out of the bag! My chatboard friends tell me that the laminating idea I was so proud of probably will not work well.

Soooo, someone else came up with the idea of trying laminating PAPER by Contac and just laminating the front of the bags. So that's my "new" solution! As a note, these bags will not go home with the children until the end of the year! When I send their books home to read, they go home one at a time in their homework folder. Sometimes they come back scribbled on or not at all, so I'm not sending the whole bag home until the end. These things are not important to most of the parents.

I hear all the time. My mom threw it away. Read the Room Station: My husband painted this large coffee can for me and I use it to hold my pointers. I use a pointer my apple pointer on a daily basis, and the children use the other pointers when they go to this station or the Big Book Station.

So I have 3 sizes of pointers for whatever needs occur; long, medium, and small pencil sized. I also have "magic reading glasses" which are safety glasses with clear lens from the Dollar Tree and old Pizza Hut sunglasses with the lens removed. Their place is to be hanging around the rim of the can. When the students go to the Read the Room Station, the "teacher" student will choose a pointer and a pair of glasses, and the "reader" will choose only a pair of glasses.

The "teacher" will point, while the "reader" reads. They proceed around the classroom reading the numerous pocketcharts, charts, Word Wall, ABC line etc. Then they change roles and the "reader" becomes the "teacher" and vice versa.

The Discovery Station is just a place to let the children indulge their curious nature. If I introduce something in class for a "hands on experience", I might include it in the Discovery Station for further investigation. Such as the coconuts that you see in the picture below. We learned about the coconuts during our Chicka Chicka Boom Boom unit.

The whole one was placed in the Discovery Station and the opened one we opened and completed a 5 Senses Chart. Afterwards, the opened coconut went into the Discovery Station. The picture also shows facts about coconut trees printed from the Internet couldn't find any books on this in our library and our ant hill, ant diagram and ant books left over from our Packin' For a Picnic unit. This station covers two desks, but it's only for one person at a time.

The second desk just helps to hold some of the materials. The student sits at the desk with the station sign. Inside the desk there is paper for writing or drawing about their observations. I created these Discovery Bottles back before the big testing push. I still think they have worth as part of the Discovery Station and they could be used for calming some students as well. The first bottle in the picture is colored Karo syrup with metallic confetti, which they just turn upside down and watch it slowly move from one place to another.

The second bottle is colored Karo. The third is a tornado bottle. You can buy the attachment to create the tornado bottle at school supply stores and then just add some water to one of the bottles.

Attach the bottles together with the attachment, turn the bottle with the water upside down and swirl and watch the "tornado" form as the water pours out of the bottle to the bottle below. The fourth bottle is rice with magnetic items. You use the magnetic wand to pull the magnetic items through the rice.

The fifth bottle is magnetic filings. You also use the magnetic wand to move the filings around inside the bottle. The key to making these bottles is to make sure that the lids of the bottles are secure. I put lots of electrical tape around the top of mine. You can also hot glue them. Otherwise, you're going to have a mess. Another bottle that I made and probably put in my Ocean Unit is a wave bottle.

You can also add sand, but you'll need to change your measurements for your liquid. There should be enough room left in the bottle for the contents to gently move from side to side inside the bottle creating a wave action. Add magnets of all kinds Students can make discoveries about which items are magnetic and which ones are not and how magnets push and pull against each other.

Write the Room Station: The Write the Room Station contains clipboards and writing paper for the students to use to write things from the environmental print in the room.

The younger students usually start out really wanting to write the names of their friends. So make sure these are posted somewhere in the classroom. When they finish, they read them to me or the TA and they get a stamp beside all those words they read correctly.

They like being able to show off those reading skills. I have some of those old stamps that look like markers but make footprints, butterflies, lips, stars, etc. You can load your clipboards with paper that is lined, unlined, colored, white, seasonal, shaped, etc.

This keeps it new and fresh for the students so that they'll enjoy and look forward to going to that station. You can also add different writing instruments. Sometimes use pencils, others use washable thin markers, washable fat markers, twistable crayons, colored pencils, cool pens, etc.

You can tell the students what you want them to look for, or you can provide them with "response sheets" that you create that specifies what you want them to look for. For instant, if you want them to look for 3 letter words. Create a page in MS Word that has a place for their name at the top and says "3 Letter Words". This will be a reminder to them to look only for words containing 3 letters. Of course, the cuter you make this page, the better they're going to like it.

And I actually let my kids take their papers home to show their parents, so the label at the top will help them to understand exactly what the child was trying to do. You can purchase clipboards relatively cheap at WalMart, but invest in some different kinds as well I have one that I purchased for myself that is clear, neon pink and the kids like to use it just for that reason. You can also make your own clipboards by covering a sturdy piece of cardboard with white or colored contact paper and then adding thematic or seasonal stickers to it.

Use binder clips as the clamp to hold the paper at the top. Other ideas for Write the Room are: Back to Literacy Connections. I give them a laminated ABC strip and chips to put over the letters for the beginning letter of each word. Then they "drive down ABC Road" and see who's house the come to first.

Read the Room Station. Write the Room Station.

Christmas ornamentbookmarkbarn, bird, birdhouse, bubbles, bottle, baby, belt, butterfly, boatbagbat pinbeans. Dora, dump truck, dicedirt.

Valentine, vase, Vaseline jar, van, violin, video, velcro.