Writers Workshop, freebie and a Friend's Giveaway

First, my bloggy friend Jenny over at Owl Thinks First is have a SUPER, AWESOME giveaway.  Do you want to know what she's giving away?????  A LAMINATOR! 



I'm keeping everything crossed in hopes that I'm drawn by Rafflecopter.  CLICK HERE  to head over to her blog to enter!  Good Luck.... well.... not too much luck.  :)


Now Writing Workshop.  I have been getting very frustrated annoyed with how my Writing Folders have been working out.  Here they are: 

 I have seen many pins on using notebooks, but I have been unsure of how that would look for my firsties.  So... I threw that one out the window kept thinking.  On my Thursday drive to work sitting in something that looks like this and blasting my 4 year olds all time favorite Kidz Bop songs including Firework and Dynamite (otherwise known as #2 and #4)   

my brain started thinking about what I could do.  We had all our firsties bring a binder and we were having a tough time figuring out how we would use them because of all the travelling our little guys are doing.  PERFECT!!!!!  My Curious Teacher Friends were ecstatic more than happy to send their binders my way. 

On Friday we started to get these guys together.  First, we needed our shinyish new binders. 

After that, we got our new binder covers together.  I let my firsties use markers to write their names.  Our firsties jumped up and down for joy at those words calmly chose two colors and sat down.  This friend didn't listen so well..... still working on that.

CLICK HERE for our Writing Binder Cover.

Finally, I added a "Notes for my Creations" page.  I will use this page for the things I need my firstie to work on when returning to his/her seat.

CLICK HERE  for "Creations" page.

 I also made a page for my notes.  I will use this once my current pages run out.  I thought it was important to put topics for discussion in each box whether it's punctuation, capitals, details, etc.  I think this box still needs a little work, but that's ok.  Any ideas?????

CLICK HERE  for Writing Conference Notes page. 

So... Monday will be the first day to really use our binders and I'm SUPER excited that everything will be organized.  Now if I can only get the kids to quit pulling the two binders that "don't belong" in their desks from doing that, we're set! 

Happy Writing!!!!
Maria