Pete the Cat "I love those shoes"

Pete the Cat "I love my White Shoes":)

This is a demo lesson I did for a pre-k multiply disabled classroom that I interviewed for. The kids LOVED IT! Pete the cat is a huge hit with great concepts and fun songs. I even find myself singing his "I love my white shoes" song.  I wanted to share the lesson with you! Some of this stuff I found on pinterest, others I made myself.

The lesson started by just reading Pete the Cat I love my White Shoes, stopping periodically to ask simple/basic story recall questions and sing the "I love my shoes" song. The song adds so much to the lesson and can be found on http://www.harpercollinschildrens.com/feature/petethecat/ The downloadable version has the entire story so I used VoiceMemo application (pictured below) on my iPad to record and label each section for easy access and still involve myself in the reading of the story. This really captured the attention of those visual and auditory learners.

A strategy that I have found to be extremely successful with most areas of reading but especially for reading comprehension and story recall is repetition. So the next part of the lesson involved re-reading the story, but this time the students completed a file folder activity as they followed along. This brought in those kinesthetic learners. File folders are pictured below. 

Click the link below for a free printout of the file folder pieces! I laminated the folders and the pictures and attached them with Velcro. Enjoy!

FREE Pete the Cat File Folder Download 

Finally, the students completed a worksheet as we went through the book (short synopsis version) one final time. This is the worksheet they completed, I used this for independent practice and assessment (since demo lesson was only 20 minutes long). 

For a free download of the worksheet Click Here!

My new blog! :)

As some of you may know, my name is Amy Kearns and I am a special education teacher in Bergen County New Jersey. This is my first stab at blogging and, I must say, I'm super excited about it. I've worked with a variety of students at a variety of grade levels with a variety of disabilities. I've learned a lot along the way, but I continue to learn every day. This blog is intended to share my journey and experiences. I want to share my resources with you! I want to reflect on lessons, what worked what didn't. I want to answer your questions and ask questions of my own. I want to collaborate with other teachers on the world-wide web and bounce ideas back and forth off each other. I hope this is something your interested in and if you are, feel free to ask questions/leave suggestions for what you would like to read about. And most important of all,  KEEP READING! :).

- Amy