Time to Bring Out the Elf!

Last year, I purchased an Elf on the Shelf after seeing so many great ideas on Pinterest!

Last year, I made things up as I went - it was a last minute purchase after all. I decided to go in armed with ideas this year!  So, after some Pinterest browsing, I've created a plan for the upcoming year!

Here's what I came up with. If you click on the picture, it'll take you to a PDF with links to my "Elf on the Shelf" Pinterest board and a free TPT activity I found.

Here's some shots of "Tiptoe" the elf from last year:

 He came in a box surrounded by "snow" from the North Pole with a letter from Santa.

He was waiting in the classroom for them after special area one day. I remember wondering if anyone was even going to point him out. They all came in, sat on the carpet, and no one said a word!

 

He left them a good morning message with our Scrabble Junior tiles.

 

He watched from the behavior chart.

 

He got into some copy room mischief one day and forgot to throw away the evidence!

 

He even thought he was a puppet!

 

 

My second graders really loved looking for him each day. I'm hoping my firsties get  just as excited this year!

 

I'll tell you about the advent calendar he brings in a post tomorrow. The kids enjoyed it as well. :)

 



Linking up with Flapjack Resources:

Another Temporary Freebie!

I've just uploaded another temporary freebie. This one is a word study pack. It is appropriate for first or second grade. We are currently starting double e this week in word study and I thought I'd make some practice pages and activities for my words center. I hope to go back and make similar sets for all of the patterns that we have already covered, including the short vowels, silent e, and l blends. Get it while it's still a freebie! (About a week)

Workshop Wednesday & Never a Dull Moment

Today I'm linking up with Jivey for Workshop Wednesday. Then, I've got a fun little story to tell you about my day...

This week's Workshop Wednesday topic is to write about a favorite chapter book and what you do with it. Chapter books are one of the things I miss having moved from second grade down to first. Don't get me wrong - we still use chapter books (especially those high firsties) - but not as much.

My favorite chapter book to read aloud to my second graders used to be Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. We would always read it at the end of the year and I would tell the kids to raise their hands if they heard an example of something we'd talked about this year. They found examples of similes, personification, idioms, and so much more as I would read. After we read the book, we would always watch the movie as part of our end of the year celebration.

Last year, we tied the book into our unit on Supply & Demand. We used the book along with several resources to teach the concept of supply and demand. Then, the students got to apply all of their knowledge! They worked through the process of creating a product (using their knowledge of supply and demand) and eventually "sold" their project to students in another classroom. (Play money was used!)  It was amazing seeing what the kids came up with. I will have to root around in my old files and make a more detailed post in the future on this project. It was a great end of the year project where students got to create and share their knowledge through real-world experiences!


And, that concludes my Workshop Wednesday post.

Now, for the interesting story from today. All I can say is there's never a dull moment in our job.

First, let's start by saying this was the coldest day so far this year! The morning started off in the 30's (I still can't believe the high was in the 70's just yesterday!) and only got up to the 50's. 

This morning, one of my kids came waltzing in and proudly announced "I have a gift for you!"  I was picturing a hand-drawn picture (I have too many) or a flower from home. Instead, he pulls out a crinkled water bottle and brings it over to me. (Trash? was my first thought.) I took the water bottle carefully and looked at it. That is when I realized the water bottle wasn't the gift. The gift was what was inside.

Yup, a live lizard! This little boy thought it would make a great class pet for us. (I guess having a fish just isn't enough for them.) I debated what to do with him - keep him inside where I had no cage or food for him or take him back outside to the cold. Either way, I feared for his chances of survival. I eventually chose to take him back outside and hope that his body adjusted quickly to the temperature changes. I could not have handled a lizard getting loose in my classroom.

After I took him outside, I had my students clean up from centers and come to the rug. Then, we proceeded to have a talk about pets and how you should be responsible and prepared before you pick out a pet. I talked about all of the things I had to buy before I got our class fish. Then, I talked about all of the things I had to buy before I got my furbaby, Ella. The students seemed to enjoy contributing to this conversation. Then, we headed outside to the cold to look at the vehicles that came for career day.

What is the most interesting "gift" a student has gotten you?


Don't forget that my Community Helpers Packet is still a *Temporary Freebie.*  I will be changing it to a paid item this weekend so grab it while you can! I have gotten some great feedback on the freebie so far!

Guilty of Shopping & Last Year

Well, I hit up the school supply aisle at Wal-Mart and Dollar Tree to get some items for the classroom. A lot of money and supplies later, I came home with this:

Originally, I was going to break it all down for you and explain my shopping choices. Then, I got distracted by looking at classroom set up ideas. Now, I already know how I'm decorating, so I'm not entirely sure why I got distracted. Maybe it was all of the pretty colors?

In my distraction, I decided to reminisce a little and share pictures from last year's 2nd grade room. This way, you'll be able to appreciate the finished product of this year! These were all taken after the first day of school and things were changed as the school year went on and I learned what my students could handle.

This is a shot of the classroom from my desk. My first year of teaching, I had desks. When the year ended, I asked for tables and I have loved them ever since. Group work is a big part of my class and I love the space that tables allow for group projects.

 

This is another shot of the room. You can see my writing table set up with one of the benches my dad made to the left. You can also see the white shelf which held my small group materials. (I worked with small groups at one of the round tables in the back. It was designated the "teacher" table and was used for small groups and management of materials throughout the day.)



 

This is a shot of my behavior chart and the board. The teacher area is to the left. Since this was taken after the students left, you can see where we were already listing things on the board. The colored drawers at the bottom of the board were used to hold student supplies. There is one per table and they are located around the room to prevent multiple kids from being in the same area when they retrieve supplies. These will be getting a face lift this year since they have survived 3 years of students. I highly recommend Sterillite drawers if you are looking to organize something. They are very durable.

 

This is another shot of our room. You can see some leftover jungle décor on the door of the bathroom. The measuring giraffe was just too cute to get rid of. He didn't survive the taking apart of my classroom this year though. :(

 

This is the back corner of my room. You can see my lovely computers, which the students used frequently. They even took on the responsibility of turning them on in the morning and shutting them down in the afternoon. I strongly believe in including students in the management of a classroom. The back corner held two more benches which were used for my reading corner. The students absolutely loved these benches! (So did most visiting teachers.) The bulletin board is empty because it was used to display student work. After one day of teaching routines, I didn't really have anything to put up there yet.

 

This is the front of my room complete with a focus chart (which I plan to utilize even more this year) and the Smart Board. This is where we spent a lot of time gathered to read or learn on the Smart Board. You can see our classroom mascot Mischief sitting on the stool near the chart. She earned her own place in our hearts this year!

 

The last view is my teacher area. I basically created myself a small, but necessary box in the corner. I had trouble with students getting into my space during my second year of teaching which led to this set up. However, this year's group actually used my computer quite a bit for research and projects and we encountered no problems. Then again, I learned a lot during my second year and I saw a huge improvement in my management skills during my third year. It made everyone (students, parents, administrators, and me) happy! I have never had so many thank you's and compliments from parents as I did this past year.

 

 

You can see bits and pieces of my pirate theme scattered throughout the room. This year, I'm expanding on that and you will see nautical and pirate items throughout my room. I'm super excited to create a super cute room this year! The ideas just keep coming to me for this year's classroom.

Summer G.O.L.D. Program

At the end of this year, I offered my students and their parents the opportunity to sign up for a FREE program via email over the summer. This program is one I've created to help keep them learning over the summer. I named it Summer G.O.L.D. (Getting Organized and Learning Daily). The goal of this program is to keep my students learning over the summer.

Since this is my first summer doing this, I'm going to share the items on my blog for others to use. New newsletters and activities will be posted every Tuesday for download. Spread the word!

You can get the first newsletter here: https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B7NHbGd4HpUbU282RUd5VlZHblU/edit?usp=sharing

Feel free to use it and modify it for your personal use!

Changes, Changes Everywhere

I decided at the end of April that I wanted to start a teaching blog. I spent part of May working on the layout and deciding what I wanted to focus on. The problem is, I never quite was able to pick one simple focus. There's too much that goes on in a classroom - you can't quite box it in, even for a blog. So, the focus will be all things teaching - sort of a hodgepodge. In this decision to focus on whatever fits, I forgot to figure out the first post. I knew it would be on June 1st, but I didn't know what my topic would be. Then, suddenly, I found my topic!

 Afterschool yesterday (a half-day), I got an email from my principal requesting a meeting at 1:00pm. I spent a couple of hours wondering what the meeting might be about. I made a mental list of possibilities before heading to the meeting. The item of discussion was not one of the possibilities I had prepared myself for. I was told I will be moving from second grade (where I've spent the past 3 years) to first grade. While this is a surprising change, I'm looking for the positives and hoping for an awesome year. It's just another change in my constantly changing life.

So, I spent today packing my entire classroom up so that it can be moved to another classroom. I had awesome helpers, including my parents and close friends on the grade level. We got it done for the day even officially was over. Yes, we had our final workday on a Saturday this year. I am officially confused about what day of the week it is!

So, since I'll be moving from second grade to first grade, this blog will follow some of that transition. My summer posts will mostly be about second grade stuff, but I'm sure first grade will start slipping into there.

"If we don't change, we don't grow. If we don't grow, we aren't really living." - Gail Sheehy