The Magical Product Swap Link Up!

Time to link up with Mrs. Jessica Stanford from Mrs. Stanford's Class for her Magical Product Swap!

I was paired with the ultra fantastic Jen Sykes from Hello Mrs. Sykes!

Now, first of all - if you are NOT following Jen, you are missing out like no other. First things first, go follow NOW. You will not not not regret it, I promise!
She's full of great ideas like her post that I continuously read about what you can do with google.. FOR FREE. Since I am getting my Master's in Classroom Technology, I love love love reading about technology and well, Mrs. Sykes is full of some great ideas.
I also really enjoyed her post about classroom management, specifically using music in the classroom. While this is an old post, it's still a goodie! She talks about a variety of uses for music and how to integrate them into different academic areas throughout the day. I love using music in my classroom, so I'm really glad she wrote a post all about this! 
Of course, these two posts are not the ONLY two that I love. She's full of kindness, great ideas, activities, and great freebies! Love love love her & her blog.
Anyways... Jen allowed me the opportunity to review one product of my choice from her TPT store and I chose to review her "Context Clues - Task Cards, Scoot, Assessment" since I had never played the game Scoot before!

Now, if that is not one of the CUTEST covers... I don't know what is. I love love love the animals on the front.. especially that elephant! If you know me, you know I'm obsessed with elephants ;)

In the pack, Jen includes the directions of how to use the set. She first talks about ways to use this activity as a differentiated task throughout the classroom. It can be used for early finishers, those who may need extra practice, a review for standardized testing, or even the game, Scoot! As I said above, I'd never heard of the game Scoot! before, so I wanted to learn more about it.

For people like me, Jen includes the directions for Scoot! below the basic description of the 24 task cards. I enjoy the fact that she provided a Scoot! answer sheet so that you, as the teacher, can collect this sheet if you so choose to gain a basic understanding of where your students might be before you begin a unit, where they are during the unit, or where they are after. This gives you an idea of if you need to review or if you can continue on to the next subject - love it!

After the direction page are 12 pages worth of task cards. I love, I mean LOVE, that she made the task cards large enough for students to be able to write on or do whatever they needed to with them rather than make them smaller like I do. This gives students space to work things out, cross things off, write things, etc.

Now, in a typical classroom, I would laminate these cards for durability. Since I am not in the classroom, I have not laminated them yet. But, the reasoning behind this is that I could have my students use dry erase markers and then have my new group of students use the SAME cards the next year with dry erase markers again, all without having to print out new cards or do any extra cutting.

By the way, the cutting for these cards was SUPER SUPER easy - 5 quick cuts per page with my paper cutter and I was done. I loved it.

Anyways... the cards are so simple to read, fun with the animals on the sides, but educational - of course!

If you read through them, you'll see that one of the words on each card is bold and underlined. This is the word that students are to choose the word (or words) from A, B, C or D that would BEST replace the word that is underlined and bolded using context clues.

I know my 2nd graders during my internship last year constantly had a hard time trying to figure out what words meant because they didn't understand what context clues were, so I designed several lessons to work around this. My students would have benefited GREATLY from this activity, as it is, again, fun AND educational!

Again, Jen provides a Scoot! answer sheet should you want to play Scoot! in the classroom, which is as cute as ever with the animals at the top. After this is an answer key for you, as the teacher, or for a volunteer or for even the students to self-check themselves once they have answered all questions.

At the end, Jen includes this mini, but ultra-powerful, assessment for you as the teacher to gain an understanding of where your students are in terms of understanding and utilizing context clues. I really like this assessment because students can complete this in a short time, but it's a good tool for you as a teacher to see which students need a little extra time spent with context clues while others may be able to move on to the next topic.

Finally, we've got Jen's credit page! 

I am so, so impressed with Jen's work and always have been and I hope that you are, too! I wish that I truly had a classroom to be able to use this product in, but I do know that when I do get my classroom, this will be one product that will be utilized like CRAZY!!
If you want to check out any of Jen's other products, click the links below to be taken to her Teachers Pay Teachers Store or her Teacher's Notebook Store.
Hello Mrs. Sykes' Teachers Pay Teachers Store
Hello Mrs. Sykes' Teacher's Notebook Store
And again... make sure to follower her! You will NOT NOT NOT regret it!!
Also, check out her blog to see what product of mine she chose to review! :) WAIT!!!!  To wrap this review up... Jen came up with the AMAZING idea to give ONE person the chance to win ANY item of their choosing from both of our stores - that's two items to ONE winner!! How cool, huh!? Enter away below! :) a Rafflecopter giveaway
Click the button at the top of this post to be taken to Jessica's blog to check out all the other great products that were swapped!

Have a good day, y'all!