Kindergarten Writing Assessments/ #prettyfunnystuff

Mrs. B. gave our class a writing assessment this week. She orally instructed them to write this simple sentence, "The dog sat in the sun." After the children wrote the sentence, they were allowed to draw a picture at the bottom of the page, then Mrs. B. asked me to write the proper sentence in pen underneath the box before filing their papers. At the end of the year, the students will be given the exact same assessment, hopefully showing improvement.

As you can guess, Kindergarten students enter the school year with varying levels of ability, especially when it comes to writing. Here are a few papers that I deemed worthy to share...

The paper above is a perfect example of typical Kindergarten writing. This little learner obviously knows the sight word 'the' and was able to hear some beginning and ending consonant sounds in the words 'dog', 'sat' and 'sun'.

This child did a pretty good job as well, except his poor dog has too many legs and a sore, tailless bum.

With a little help learning the correct use of upper and lower case letters and punctuation, I imagine this Kindergartner will write a near perfect assessment at the end of the year.

I love this picture. Most kids draw dogs standing on four legs, but this little guy made his puppy lay on the grass, belly up, with paws in the air AND holding a flower. Adorable!

NOW--- I saved the best for last. If this one doesn't put a smile on your face, something is wrong with you.

At first glance, it looks like this sentence says 'The dog shit', but let me share with you how to decipher Kindergarten writing...

#1- You can see that this little girl knows the sight word 'the' and the word 'dog'.
#2- You can tell that she heard the 's' sound when Mrs. B. said the word sat. 
#3- She also wrote the word 'in', she just wrote it backwards and the 'n' happens to look like an 'h'. 
#4- Obviously she started to write 'the' again, but for whatever reason, didn't get it finished. 

And THAT, my friends, is how 'The dog sits in the sun' can easily be mistaken for 'The dog shit'.  :)

Cody's Kind of Cursing

On weekday mornings, after Cody eats breakfast and has a bath, he plops down in the recliner, listens to the morning news on television and waits for a ride to his day program. 

This morning, as I was cleaning the kitchen, I heard Cody repeating, "Dumb something....(pause)....Dumb something....(pause)....Dumb something." 

Undoubtedly he was trying to get my attention, so I decided to stop and ask Cody why he was using the word dumb over and over and over. This his how our conversation went...

"Dumb what?" I asked.

"On TV." Cody replied.

"What about it?" I coaxed.

Cody, in his typical autistic manner, responded with clues rather than a complete sentence... "On TV. That person." 

"What person? What are you talking about? I don't understand." I continued.

Cody hinted, "WELL, you and dad call people that when you're frustrated." 

At that moment a little light went off in my head and I guessed, "Dumb shit? Are you calling someone on TV a dumb shit?" 

Cody smiled, then he readily admitted, "YES!"



And now you know that my husband and I are the kind of people who talk to the TV screen while watching reality television, game shows and news programs. :)

Grandma's American Hamburger Soup

This is my mother's hamburger soup recipe, so she deserves full credit (although I tweaked ingredient amounts a tad bit). I'm going to get strait to the process, because it bugs the living crud out of me when fellow bloggers post recipes and I have to scroll and scroll through several pictures and waaaay too many words to find instructions. So, without further ado...and yes, it's ado, not adieu. Adieu is French for good-bye and I am not ready to say good-bye... yet. I'm stating without further fuss or excitement. (sigh) 

American Hamburger Soup

2 pounds lean ground beef

2 cups cubed potatoes

3 medium carrots, sliced

2 Tablespoons minced parsley (optional)

1 cup celery, sliced

2 Tablespoons sugar

2 quarts canned tomatoes

1 small onion, chopped

1 garlic button, chopped

2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce

1 1/2 quarts water

4 teaspoons salt

1 teaspoon pepper

dash of Allspice

 1/4 cup rice (optional)

Put hamburger into a large pot and cook until it barely loses its color. Do not brown. Drain off fat. Add all other ingredients together with meat and bring to boil. Reduce heat and cover. Simmer several hours, until vegetables are tender.

Enjoy!

Halloween Pumpkin Witch Craft

My niece, Kelsie, crafted this adorable Pumpkin Witch.

Clearly, Kelsie gets her talent from her aunt DeeAnn. :)

Goblin Goodies (from my 2011 archive)

2 cups salted peanuts

1 cup Chocolate Teddy Grahams

1 cup Candy Corn

1/2 cup Goldfish Crackers

1/2 cup raisins

Mix and store in airtight container. Makes 5 cups.

Don't be afraid to change the ingredients of this recipe up a bit. Here are the products that I chose to use...

My family doesn't care for peanuts, so I picked up chocolate covered almonds from Costco. You could also use plain or chocolate covered pretzels, miniature Oreos, autumn colored M&M's, Almond Joy or Mounds candy bits, etc. I even wanted to add green and purple gum drops, but my husband wasn't going for it. The point is, be creative!

After I mixed the ingredients in a large bowl, I divided it into cellophane bags. Then I printed these cute tags that I found at Anders Ruff Custom Designs .