Monday, March 26, 2012

Mondays

....Need I say more?  I left my portable hard drive at home this morning.  It has EVERYTHING on it.  When I say everything, I mean everything-SMARTboard programs, lesson plans, etc.  Because my laptop for some reason doesn't want to connect to my home printer, (and I am too lazy to fight with it on that) I use my home lap to type my lesson plans, and at the same time I do those I am creating the week's "Welcome Work" and SMARTboard programs.   Obviously it is a MONDAY!!!!  Thank goodness for exceptionally loving parents who are in town as well as scholastic.com's "daily starters"!!!!  Anyone else having this much fun?

Friday, March 23, 2012

Happy accident

 I happened to stubble into a contractions activity that my students LOVED!!!  My original plan was to use the paint color strips 


As you can see however, my three year old cut almost all I had into perfect little rectangles-pretty good cutter that little man!  Otherwise I would probably not have laughed it off so much.  

Anyways, in a last might brain flash I decided to whip out some good old fashion sticky notes....below are my examples but the students filled their pages!  They used the smaller tiny stickies and just went to town on the activity!




Wednesday, March 21, 2012

I survived the week!!!

Ok so the week is not over but our practice today went great, and Vanessa and I finished the "music video".  Which, I might add is ROCKIN'!!!!  We were jumping up and down screaming and clapping this afternoon after watching it (which I preached to my students about NOT doing, luckily they were home at the time LOL)
I did not get my test papers sent home however-but we can't have it all.  :)  We were also able to write our thank you letters to the ladies from Water Missions International, and I was so proud of my kiddos they really didn't even need my to edit they did so awesome.  Yea!!!!! Looks like we'll make it two more weeks till spring break.  :)

Tuesday, March 20, 2012

If I can make it through

If I can make it through this week without a complete meltdown I am most certainly doing something extra special for myself!  Performance is Thursday, just finished wrapping up the video yesterday (still have yet to put it all together)  Just practice the paragraph dance on stage today.  Tomorrow is an early out day, and can't plan on putting video together then-no it's not a staff meeting (that we could have gotten out of, maybe) nope its stations of the cross.  Obviously we will be attending that and attempting to let go of all our panicked thoughts on  putting on a great performance as well as getting all our lessons, etc done this week!  Breathe Breathe Breathe.....Anyone else having one of these weeks?

Thursday, March 15, 2012

Check out the Adventure Sharing Book Drive

Adventure Sharing Book Drive Facebook page
Check out what one of my parents has created and organized-so great and such a great charity. Donate today!

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

The Lovely Blog Award

I was pleasantly surprised and joyous when I learned I received another "Lovely Blog Award" Thanks to Heather's Heart for my first one, and a special thanks to The Honey Bunch for my second. :)  And FINALLY in keeping with the rules and my word-I would like to return the favor and show my love for these LOVELY blogs....


Tickled to Teach
Teaching...My Calling 
Lutton 519 
Button 

SMARTBOX and Patty's Day freebie

Yes, I realize that Saturday is St. Patrick's Day so I am CLEARLY late and getting my freebie posted. :(  But hey, it is a FREEBIE! :)  I learned of "smart boxes" from another teacher and conformed them to meet my needs, they're a great go to for early finishers as well as easily prepared holiday and theme activities for Daily 5 or Language Arts centers.  So here's what I did:
create a "directions" page for the box, decorate and label a file folder box (not sure on the actually name for these type of file folders), gather 4-5 student leveled books, and any worksheets that may be needed (I put these in a folder) last but not least if you have and file folder games put them in too!  I've taken some pics of mine, and my St. Patty's Day SMARTbox is free @ my teacher store!  Also, I've uploaded a link to the page for reading comprehension and a great math activity from abcteach.com.  Enjoy!
Reading Comprehension
Pot of Gold

Monday, March 12, 2012

AAHAHAHHAHAH!!!

It's report card time, Busy Bodies Day, class performance next Thursday, teacher work day Friday, AND to top it of it.......its a Monday.  Need I say more!
I received another award and I am sooooo returning the goodwill hopefully this evening if not tomorrow.  I feel horrible I haven't gotten to it sooner, and hope to post a freebie on St. Patrick-better late than never.  Who knows maybe someone will need it.  :)

Awards

Tickled to Teach: Another Award!!!: Another sweet surprise this weekend when I was awarded the Lovely Blog award from The Journey of a Substitute Teacher , Dragonflies in First...http://tickledtoteach.blogspot.com

Monday, March 5, 2012

Math Notebooks



Math Notebooks

So I've taken it upon myself to try to revamp my math program, etc.  It's been a process to say the least!  I began by revisiting, and review stuff from college and became inspired.  With my inspiration I have devised a game plan-sort of. :)
First step was a "Math Notebook"  I have seen several great post with some awesome ideas.  We had a "Math Journal" an expensive notebook I order at the first of the year and pretty much the whole class has filled theirs up.  Staples had composition notebooks for 50cents this weekend which I bought up with my Staples rewards (so nice to not be out of pocket for things).  I began my "teacher" copy this weekend and designed it much like the older grades with  the Table of Contents, subjects and page numbers (subjects and page #s as we go).  Next year obviously this will be done at the first of the year, but my students seem to lack a good foundation in Math anyways so I decided it wouldn't hurt.  AND they'll be my trial run to see how this works!  We wrote our first page (Numeration) today and it went great!  The kids were amped about it and I really think they'll start getting more out of math with completing their notebooks.  The first few pages are basically their reference pages and after that work will be done in the rest.  I'll try to upload some pics this afternoon.