Apples and ABC'S!

Hi!  It's Michelle from Apples and ABC's!  I am so excited to be a part of the Blog Hop, and even more excited to be posting on Little Miss Kindergarten's Blog!  So thank you for having me! :)  Today I want to blog about two things, both having to do with going back to school!  First is a banner that you can print for FREE and display on your wall, outside the classroom, whiteboard, wherever your heart desires!

Pennant flags are all the rage right now, and I have seen them used multiple ways in the classroom.  This year, I am going to have a new banner each time there is a special occasion at school: Open House, Back to School Night, Graduation, and in this case: Back to School!  I am going to hang this banner on the first day of school, welcoming all my new students and parents!  I want to show you some helpful hints on how to hang a flag banner...

First, print, cut, and laminate the flags.  I laid them out on my back table so I could get all of the words organized.  

My first go around, I just turned the flags over and started taping them to string... that left me with the words backwards. :/

 

If you are going to tape the banner with the letters face down, make sure you set them down backwards, so when you lift and twist, you are reading it going the correct direction...  

 

The next step would be to hang your banner.  I decided I would hang mine outside to welcome the students as they come into the classroom.  I started with my first layer and centered it to the metal frame of the window, then I added each layer.

 

As a last step, I wanted to trim the extra string and make little bows to put in the corners where I taped up the string.  I cut several strings and clumped them together.  I tied the whole group into a bow so it was thick!

 

And here is the final "Welcome Back to School" banner to kick of a new year!

If you would like a FREE DOWNLOAD of the pennant flags, click on the picture below! 

I wanted to share another back to school tip: introducing a Word Wall to Kindergarten.  When the kids enter on the first day of school, I already have my Word Wall letters up.  This is the wall we look at when we sing the ABC's and point out the different letters.  I also have an alphabet strip running across the wall in a couple of spots, but this is my interactive focal point for the letters.  I used the alphabet cards that go with our school's curriculum so the students will recognize the sound cards that I introduce to build phonemic awareness.

The first week the kids might not know that print carries meaning, but they will know that their name is made up of letters and looks like a word (lets hope they know that!).  So this is where I start: with their name.  I write out everyone's name on a small sentence strip.  As we preview each letter, their name gets to go on our word wall.  This way they will become familiar that words will start to be added to our wall...and they will be even MORE excited to see their name up there!

I hope you enjoyed my post and maybe there is something that you can use next year!  Please stop by my blog, Apples and ABC's and see the special someone (A Cupcake.....) that is blogging on my page!

Make sure you click on the image below to hop through all of the blogs to see the guest posts!  I love linking up! :)