First Day of School Survival Kit

               

About 6 years ago, my cousin called me after her open house at school.  She was so excited because her son came home with the cutest thing for the first day of Kindergarten.  * JITTER GLITTER *
It was a zip-lock bag with glitter in it and a cute little poem. You sprinkle the glitter on your head so you are not nervous.  All the K teachers come into school with glitter on their shoulders for the first day, it's so sweet. Anyway, after she read it to me, I said "hold-on, I'm getting my pen"  I wrote it down, typed it up and used it for my Open House the following day at my school.   (I just fixed up the Jitter Glitter and put it up on TPT as a freebie. Click Here to download.)
   
Well,  I was transferred to that school a year later to teach First Grade, and since Kindergarten does  JITTER GLITTER  I had to come up with something else. 

(Sorry these Images are terrible)
I found a version of this 5 years ago while browsing the internet --this was before pinterest--so I can not credit this back,  I've made plenty of changes along the way so here it is.

These are my First Day of School Survival Kit  Portrait View
and First Day of School Survival Kit    Landscape view.
(Click on the name and it will take you to my TPT store)
I have a short letter welcoming each student to First Grade. (There is a separate letter for grades K-5, so if you ever change grade levels, you can just printout a different page--no white out needed)

In addition there is a  list of items which I give to each student in a white bag, with a reason why I am giving it to them.  For example, An eraser, because it's o.k. to make mistakes.  You can get the "Welcome To School" white bags from Really Good Stuff or buy your own from the store. 
 

(There are 36 in a pack, so I got them last year and can use them again this year because we are capped at 18 students)

I give these to my students at Open House (which is the Friday before school starts on Monday) and have them read it with their parents.   That way they are not nervous for the first day, and have a little gift from their teacher to start the school year out right. 

So as I write this post, there are 3 days and 7 hours left to enter my "Help me get to 100" giveaway.
I am so close, I only need 7 little old people and I will make it. Click on the link above and enter :0)

Thanks for reading,