December Monthly Newsletter

Greetings, everyone! December is upon us and winter is coming (Queue the Game of Thrones Opening Music). December is my favorite month! If you've followed me last year, you know why. Here's what's happening this month!

Christmas Advent Event 2015

Last year, my Christmas Advent went really well and I'm doing it again this year. Each day this month, I will post a new Christmas or Winter themed powerpoint game. You can enter to win this game for free on my Facebook page. I also have a weekly giveaway where you enter to win some awesome gift cards.

Monthly Sale!

My monthly sale will be much earlier than usual. Since most of you get 2 weeks for holiday break, I've decided to have my sale Dec. 11 through Dec. 13. As usual, all products are on sale. =)

Changes in my TPT Store!

I've been planning this for some time, but I'm ready to go through with it. I'm very close to reaching the 300 PPT game mark and have made the business decision of increasing my single $2 PPT games by $1 (making them $3 instead of $2). Powerpoint Game Bundles may  be increased by $0.50 to $1.00 depending on how many comes in a bundle (most will stay the same though). All future games will be $3. My yearly license may increase (by $5 to $10) and my permanent license will increase to $150 (during the summer time). Take advantage of the low prices as I will be changing about 10 to 15 products a day to the new price.

There's not monthly freebie this month. Focusing on that Christmas Advent and some new things coming next month! 

Thanksgiving Blog Hop 2015

      The Classroom clique proudly presents our Thanksgiving hop! Jump from blog to blog and gather some wonderful Thanksgiving traditions, recipes, and freebies.

    
     I have so much to be thankful for! Over this past year has been a real struggle for me. Doing TPT full time, helping my sister take care of her 3 beautiful children, and managing my seizures has made me strong and so thankful for every thing I have. I thank my family, especially my mother who was always there for me. My friends who still put up with me and antics. My friends in the Classroom Clique. Lastly, I thank my followers. You guys keep me running and motivated, especially through the exciting moments and the toughs moments. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you!

      As is tradition in our house, I do the baking. It's mostly desserts. A few years ago, I challenged myself to make an apple pie from scratch (minus the pie dough). I have to say it was the most delicious pie we ever had. It was gone the next day. The recipe is very simple. I found it online at Pilsbury.com for Perfect Apple Pie. I added some a little powder sugar and apple juice to the filling to sweeten up the Granny Smith apples I used.

    I figured out how to do the Lattice topping for the pie crust. It wasn't as hard as I thought it would be. I used eggs whites as a glaze for the top and covered the edges with foil (to stop the burnt edges).

     It came out beautifully and served with vanilla ice cream, it was the best dessert I had ever made.

Each year at Thanksgiving I make a new dessert so my sister asked me to make peach pie. I'm up for the challenge! =)

     I don't have many Thanksgiving games in my store, but I made new a freebie just for this blog hop. Moreover, it's a forever freebie!

In this game, students use dry erase boards to write the lower case letter that matches the capital letter.

This game covers all 26 letters of the alphabet. It's a perfect game to review to check for understanding.

Students are given the capital letter and on their dry-erase boards, write the lowercase letter. Great for the entire class or in small groups. Students can also practice individually on the iPad.

You can grab this game here:

Letter Matching Thanksgiving Powerpoint Game

Thank you for stopping by. Be sure to stop by other teacher bloggers for more recipes, traditions, and freebies!

An InLinkz Link-up

Trick or Treat! Blog Hop

I'm so happy to join The Classroom Game Nook in a "Trick or Treat" blog hop! Halloween is literally around the corner (one week away) and it's time for teachers to go trick or treating with some awesome tips, tricks, treats, and more!

Sight words are fun. Tic-Tac-Toe is fun too! Why not put the two together? 

My nephew who is in kindergarten practices his sights words every night. After a few weeks, he got tired of doing the flash cards. I decided to play Tic-Tac-Toe using his sight words. He was more than willing to play!

Set up is simple! Make a large Tic-Tac-Toe board on some paper. Write the sight words in each box.

Write X's and O's on some paper or index cards and you're ready to go! The first time around, I folded a paper in thirds and just traced the lines. Later, I made some boards, X's, and O's on my computer and printed them out.

You can save paper by drawing a Tic-Tac-Toe board on some paper and insert it into a Sheet protector. Use a dry-erase marker to write the letters. You can change the words any time with a eraser or paper towel. You can even insert 2 pages in one sheet placed back-to-back for 2 games in 1. You also have a carrying case for your cards and dry-erase pen!

When I think of Halloween, I think of all the sweets. In particular, candy corn. You can never have to much candy core! Here's a sweet candy corn game for your classroom.

My nephew Isaiah loves adding numbers so here's a fun Adding to 10 powerpoint game.

This Halloween themed game has students practicing adding numbers up to ten.

It's played with dry-erase boards so it's perfect for small groups. You can grab this wonderful freebie here. Be sure to grab it here:

Adding to 10 - Halloween Edition - Write and Wipe Powerpoint Game

Lastly, it's giveaway time! Halloween's a week away, but what about Thanksgiving? Once Halloween's over, the turkeys go into hiding! You and your students can practice counting turkeys with this fun Counting Turkeys PPT Game.

Before the big Turkey Day comes, make sure your students know how to count! Students play against the teacher as they count turkeys.

Some turkeys are in rows while others are scattered about. Great for a Thanksgiving review game. You can check out this game here:

Teacher vs. Student - Counting Turkeys Powerpoint Game. 

http://yayforprek.blogspot.com/2015/10/trick-or-treat-blog-hop.html

You can enter to win this wonderful game! You can enter below. I'm also having a milestone celebration where you can win a $25 gift card.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Don't forget to hop on over to another teacher blog!

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Milestone Celebration! Win a TPT Gift Card!

It's time for a celebration! A HUGE celebration!! I made the first official TPT milestone which is $20,000 in sales. I'm not a big person on numbers. I appreciate the 1st sale, the 59th sale, and the 781th sale.

I want to take a moment to thank you!

Thank you to every person who went to my TPT store whether you purchased an item, downloaded a freebie, or just pasting through.

Thank you to my loyal followers (both old and new) who have stayed with me from the beginnings and through the hard times.

Thank you for everyone reading my blog posts. I know I don't write much, but I'm working on it! =P

Thank you to my family and friends through thick and thin and putting up with my spontaneous but fun behavior.

Thank you God and Jesus who has blessed me with the creative talent to help so many teachers and countless number of students.

Thank you TPT. Without TPT, I don't where I would be. You have made me a better person and a better teacher.

The best way (besides saying thank you) is to have a giveaway! 2 lucky followers will receive a $25 TPT gift. The giveaway lasts 2 weeks with daily entries!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

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You Ought to Know about OpenLibrary - Blog Hop

I'm so excited to be joining Jasmine for another "You Ought to Know" blog hop. This hop is mostly for teachers, but students and families too.  Introducing OpenLibrary.org.

Just like the name suggest, this website is an only library of eBooks that you can check out. There are 1,000s eBooks including thousands of popular children's books. Best of all, it's free!

Just like a real library, you have to log in. Think of it as the your library card. Once you're logged in, you search for thousands of eBooks including Eric Carle, Dr. Seuss, and more.

 Be sure to click "Only show eBooks" otherwise you get books from libraries across the country. Once you click on a book, you can see it's availability.

Each page has a description of the book (or you can add one) and details about the book. It even tells you the first sentence of the book just to make sure you have the right book. You can read the books if you have the DAISY program or in your internet browser.

Once you've borrowed the book, you'll be given a few choices. You can read in your browser with no software to download. If you have Adobe Digital Editions, you can download it and read it as a PDF or and ePub. I suggest using the browser. Easy to use and virtually no problems.

Once opened, you can use the arrows on screen or your keyboard to navigate through the book. You can increase or decrease the size or change the way you look. Clicking the triangle will remove the buttons.

You can click on your profile and view which books you have checked out. It will also tell you how long you have before the are automatically returned and your waiting list for books you want. You can also make lists for your favorite books.

I love using this, especially when I'm looking for books for my classroom and when I can't get my hands on one. Great for planning ahead too!

Don't forget to check out these other great bloggers and their awesome tricks!

An InLinkz Link-up