A Language Arts Mentor Text (The Gingerbread Cowboy), Giveaway Winners and the Big Sale!

Happy December! This Thanksgiving Break has been absolutely fantastic- I did a whole lot of relaxing and spent lots of time with family. I wouldn’t mind one or two more days, but I’m also feeling refreshed and ready for my little friends tomorrow. 🙂 This post is going to have lot of randomness to it, but there’s lots to share!

Thanks so much again to all who entered and all the bloggers who helped us out with donations- we so appreciate each and every single one of our followers and blogging friends!

Next up…I’m joining Collaboration Cuties for their Language Arts Mentor Text today.  I chose one of my all time favorite books to use during the holiday season- The Gingerbread Cowboy by Janet Squires.  This book is so cute and entertaining- every year my little friends just love it!

I use three differentiated graphic organizers for my friends based on their ability. My kinder friends check off the different questions they have…my 1st grade friends will either finish questions or write their own.  Once we have done the strategy a few times together, I try to get them all to the point of writing their questions on their own. We stop throughout the story to jot down any questions that have popped into our minds and as I said, that gingerbread cowboy really gets their little minds thinking! Plus, this story is a perfect one to refer back to regularly whenever using the questioning strategy again because trust me, your friends will remember all about this story.

While reading the story, we also do quick follow up checks to respond to our questions to make sure we got answers. Usually my little friends will draw a picture to show their answers to their questions- my more advanced ones will finish sentence starters or write their own sentences showing their understanding of the answers to their questions. This pack is super helpful for teaching little early readers all about questioning- I love using it with my kinder and 1st grade friends…you can check out this pack here!

Last thing…woohoo- it’s SALE time again! We just love TPT and their sales…both of our stores will be on sale with everything 20% off Monday and Tuesday this week– so don’t forget to check out Amanda’s store and my store and enter the Promo Code at the end to get 28% off total. Our carts are getting filled up and we are ready to save some extra money too- can’t wait for the sale to begin!

Thanks Krista @ Creative Clips for the button!