Cindy Middendorf at WKA!

I feel so LUCKY to have seen and heard Cindy Middendorf present yesterday at the Wisconsin Kindergarten Association Fall Conference in Stevens Point!  I went to two of Cindy's sessions at WSRA (Wisconsin State Reading Association) in Milwaukee last February, and still I gained some many new nuggets of knowledge from her yesterday.  If you are not familiar with Cindy, check out her website by clicking HERE! 

I have some great news!  After the conference was over, I went up to Cindy to thank her for coming and to ask her if she ever considered starting a blog.  She said that it is a work-in-progress or at least a goal of hers.  I am not sure of her exact words, but either way...YIPPEE!

If you want to read a bit about her published books, check out my previous post about Cindy Middendorf HERE.

Katie and Company was one of the vendors at the conference.  I could not keep my hands off of her items!  Here are a few that I purchased.

How cute is this!?  Are you familiar with the song "Who Let The Letters Out?" on Dr. Jean's CD "Kiss Your Brain" (which I also purchased at the conference)?  This flannel board set goes along with that song.

All the items get wrapped up in these cute fabric bag, when not in use.  :)  Here is a tip:  When I teach my kids a new letter, I also teach them the letter in sign language.  So when we sing this song, my Kinders "raise the roof" with their hands on the "Who let the letters out?" part and then they sign the letter when they sing the letter sound.

Here is another super cute flannel board set that I purchased.  This particular one goes along with the song "Bingo, Bango, Bongo" from Shari Sloane's awesome CD, "Get Ready!"  It is a catchy tune that helps the kids count by ones, twos, fives, tens, and hundreds.  Shari's CD is worth every penny and you can buy it off her website.

I could not pass up this owl puppet for only $7.95!  There is a poem that goes along with this owl, though I am not sure what it is; She was selling the poem with the bigger $30 owl puppet, but not with the little guy.  Anyway, he keeps an eye on the kids when they are walking in the hallway.  I always walk backwards in the hallway to keep an eye on my kids anyway, so I plan to let the line leader hold the owl.  I am thinking I might reward the person who has the best hallway behavior, according to Mr. Owl, of course.

I even won this FREEBIE!  I was so excited...I never win anything!

WKA also gave us some other freebies, just for attending the conference.  I received a pack of construction paper (always valuable in a Kindergarten classroom) and this pen!

Hmmm, I suppose I should stop blogging and start lesson planning for the week.  Whoops!  Thanks for stopping by!