Happy Monday!
I finally ventured back into my classroom today. I actually went in early in August to drop off a bunch of the stuff in my classroom. But today was the first time I actually worked on some things. When I went in early August I dropped my summer projects off and moved everything out of the giant pile in the middle of my room. I was afraid the sight of all that stuff stacked up in the middle of the room would keep me up at night.
So I quickly moved the big stuff to the right places and left.
One thing that took several hours today was my book basket labels. I am not completely done with those yet so they will be my next Back to School post.
I worked on organizing my supply tubs today. Since I have two separate classes that share the same space, I have had to get creative with my supplies. I used to keep all of the supplies that the students bring in and give them out as needed. But it was really hard for me to keep track of which class and which students were using the supplies. I decided to let the students keep their extra supplies in their cubbies. When they needed something, they went to their bucket and took it out. When that supply was out, I sent a note home for the parents to send in more. It really helped out a lot and took a lot of the stress of it away from me. The only issue I had last year was that the students couldn't keep track of which bucket was theirs. I used two different buckets in the cubby with two different lids, but both lids were white. This became confusing to the kids. So this year I decided to paint the lids to help them know which one is theirs.
I have never spray painted plastic before so I wasn't sure what to expect. I had read about spray paint chipping as soon as it dried so I made sure to get the paint especially for plastic.
I am really happy with how they turned out and I think they look great in my cubbies. There is no way the kids will get them confused this year!!!
Spray painting is kind of addicting! I went ahead and spray painted all of my clothes pins too. I really want to paint some more things now! What have you painted for your classrooms?
It isn't even August yet and my back to school dreams have already arrived in full force! Last week, I woke up at 2:45am and had a thought about something I needed to do for school. I thought to myself that I needed to get a pad of paper to write my ideas down when they come to me in the middle of the night. But the more reasonable side of me won. "It's 2:45 in the morning, don't be ridiculous! Just write it down when you wake up!" Sadly, I woke up and didn't remember what it was! I STILL to this day, all these days later, have NO clue what it was that woke me up!. Oh well!
I am slowly but surely, getting geared up for this new school year. I brought home several different projects to do this summer and one by one I have been checking them off my list of things to do! I will be sharing them with you in the upcoming weeks as part of a Back to School series of posts I intend to do.
But first up is all about Parent Communication. I think every teacher has a love/hate relationship with parent communication. I think we would all agree that there should be a college course, when getting our degrees, devoted to parent communication, right!?!?
My approach to communicating with parents has evolved over the years, just as I suspect most of yours has as well! For me it has been a lot of "guess and check". Try this and see how it works. Use what does and get rid of what doesn't! A few years ago, I embarked on gaining my National Board Certification and communication with parents became one of my focuses as I reflected on my practices as a teacher. One thing that I have noticed regarding my communication with parents is how it has changed as I became a parent. I have often said that I became a better teacher when I became a parent. I also think I became a better communicator with parents when my children went to school.
I have tried a variety of things that were all working for me. I just felt like a huge amount of time was devoted to communicating with parents. I was maintaining a class webpage, facebook page, weekly newsletters, emails, remind app, and volunteer spot. I was doing a great job with communicating with my parents but I felt like that was ALL I did. On top of everything we have to do in addition to communicating home, it just got to be a little much. As you know, one of my teaching mantras is to work smarter not harder. So I needed something that would help me in this area.
Last summer, I came across a blog post talking about a new app that was changing communication. With a change in my teaching I thought I would give it a try. It is called Bloomz. I am here to tell you, it was AMAZING!! I teach in a 50/50 English/Spanish immersion program. So I have two classes of students that I share with a teaching partner from another country. I teach fully in English and he teaches the exact same thing I am teaching in Spanish and our classes flip between us each day. So I have a different class every day than the day before! It also means that I have 2 groups of parents to communicate with. Each class is different, they have different personalities and needs. I don't teach identical days with both classes so communicating with parents is a tricky thing. I loved lots of things about Bloomz! I loved it so much, I recorded a VLOG about my 3 favorite things that I loved the most. I hope you enjoy it. However, there are some disclaimers about my VLOG.
1) It is the first one I have ever done.
2) It is still technically summer so I do not wear makeup or do my hair in the summer.
3) I have been sick and couldn't talk for more than 15 seconds without hacking up a lung so I filmed it in snippets and then put them altogether.
I hope you consider trying Bloomz this year. Click here to check it our for yourself! It has really made communicating with parents so much easier, quicker, and more efficient than ever before! If you try it, leave me a message and let me know how you like it!
Anchor carts. Where do I even begin? When we began Writers and Readers Workshop all those years ago, I don't think I realized the extent to which my teaching day would revolve around Anchor Charts. I have come to love and appreciate their use and existence in my everyday routines. I love how students can give input to create the charts and reference the charts when necessary. Over the years, I have had to come up with a procedure for how long to keep charts and when to take them down. I have also gone through those rough stages of charts becoming like white noise. The students no longer see or use them!
2 years ago, I was fortunate enough to participate in a Professional Development about the book Smarter Charts by Marjorie Martinelli and Kristine Mraz.
I loved the way this PD forced me to really think about what the purpose for my charts were. I was always so worried about my drawing and my handwriting. But I learned that the focus always needed to be about the students and their needs. They didn't need to be perfect, just thoughtful.
Fast forward to this summer. I had the wonderful opportunity to attend a summer intensive workshop with the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project. It was amazing!! If you ever have the opportunity to attend one, I highly recommend it! The project works hand in hand with the Smarter Charts book and I learned about Chart Chums, the blog of the writers of the book. It is such an amazing resource. I also fell deeply in love with the Large Post it Notes that are encouraged to be used on anchor charts.
As I explained in my previous post, I am embarking on a new spanish/english immersion program. As you are well aware, it is vitally important to have students give input and help create anchor charts. As this year began, I realized I was running into a slight issue. I began one chart with my blue class and then began a second chart with my green class. I was going through chart paper like crazy! I discovered that I could use the Post it Notes to my benefit. I could create them ahead of time and put them up as the current class and I made the chart. Then at the end of the day, I could take them off and use them again tomorrow with the class that came the next day. After the chart was completed, I could hang the one chart on the wall that both classes created. I have saved a huge amount of chart paper!!
I take a picture of the anchor charts and put them in my students' Readers/Writers Notebooks. This way they can reference the chart if needed. It also allows for me to not worry about taking the charts down. If they need to reference a chart that has been taken down, they can look in their notebooks. I also use the picture that I take, in a plastic sleeve. Once the chart comes down, I can place the post it notes in the plastic sleeve and save for next year. I keep all of the plastic sleeves in a 3 ring binder.
I love how the charts help me to work smarter and not harder. It helps simplify the process of anchor charts and helps my classroom run so much smoother! Not to mention, the post it notes helps make the charts so cheerful and colorful. Here are a few of the charts my classes and I have made so far this year:
It's Sunday! Does your brain work extra hard on Sundays like mine? I try so hard to take care of school things on Friday afternoons and some Saturday mornings and spend the rest of my weekends relaxing. But something happens on Sundays. I begin thinking about the upcoming week and everything that I haven't gotten done!!!
I am embarking on a new adventure this year. I am teaching in a 50/50 Spanish/English immersion program. I am paired with a wonderful teacher from Chile and we have a class of 24 and a class of 23 students that we share. We teach identical days, me in English and her in Spanish, and our kids flip flop back and forth between the two of us. So each day I have a different class than the day before. When all is said and done, I will have taught each class for 90 days in English.
This week we were working on representing numbers in standard form, expanded form, base ten blocks, and number words. WOAH! I found myself at a loss when it came to the number word form. I am unsure if it is that my students are bilingual, or just a rough year, but I found myself needing number words for my wall that covered numbers to 999. By no means are these fancy, but they cover all numbers in standard form and number word form from:
1-10
11-19
20-90
Hundred
I printed them, mounted them on colorful card stock, laminated them, and hung them on my wall. I am hoping they will be a huge help and resource to my students as they learn how to spell these number words. Click on the picture below to pick up your own free copy!
Hello everyone! Juli is in Hawaii!! While I am....in curriculum writing. Could our summers be more different???
Juli is enjoying a much deserved, kid free vacation with her hubby. I am sure she is getting some amazing pictures and will be hopefully posting them for us to enjoy when she returns.
Now onto the ever exciting world of curriculum writing. The first day I was treated to a thrilling introduction to UbD (Understanding by Design). Yesterday I was able to gain a deeper understanding of Performance Tasks. For the rest of the week I get to dive in to curriculum maps and design for K-2 ELA. I imagine Juli is doing her best to control the enormous amount of jealousy that must be bubbling up inside of her. She will unfortunately have to content herself with sand, palm trees, and tan lines. Please feel free to take a small moment of your time to extend your thoughts to Juli and her suffering.
But seriously, in all honestly, going through this has really deepened my understanding of not just my curriculum but the curriculum before and after second. If you have not done much with vertical alignment, take some time to see the curriculum beyond your world whenever you get the chance.
That said, given the chance - I would rather be in Hawaii!
Oh my word! Does Spring Break totally refresh and rejuvenate you like it does me?!? This has been such a wonderful week. I hate to see it going by so quickly! It has been filled with nothing but fun and relaxation! We had an egg drop at our church this week. We dropped 20,000 eggs out of a helicopter. My kids loved that!!!
We have had beautiful weather that has allowed for endless hours of playing outside, riding bikes, and enjoying sweet treats in shorts and T Shirts!
I have also enjoyed a little extra time to get some school work done. Heather and I are embarking on a very new and exciting adventure next year. I am sure you will be hearing lots about it in the upcoming months. But I needed some new baskets, so my kids and I had a fun excursion driving from store to store looking for these cute green baskets. After visiting 5 different stores, I think I finally have enough. You may remember my blue baskets from my post here. Next year I am going to have 2 classes. A blue class and a green class. So naturally, with adding another class full of kids, I need some baskets! :-)
But the one thing that Spring Break does for me is make me LONG for summer break. How about you!?! We officially have 47 school days remaining and 70 days left until Summer Break and I can't wait!!!
Spring may just be my most favorite time of the year!!! Especially with the extra long winter that we have had this year, it is a welcome sight in my eyes. Since summer in North Carolina can be a little rough, Spring is just the best time. Warm temperatures, abundant sunshine, Carolina Blue skies, and no HUMIDITY!!! Perfection, if you ask me.
One of the things that I love to do most with my class is garden. Typically, I begin planting with my kids in late January and early February. But considering this winter has been horrible and just last weekend it was 24 degrees, gardening has been delayed!
I think now that our freeze warnings are behind us, it's time to get our hands dirty!!! A local nursery donated brand new dirt for us and we shoveled it in this week.
I am excited to get my kids out there in those beds and begin planting. We will be partnering with our PTO this year as an economics lesson. My students will be growing, harvesting, and then on Fridays selling their plants at our school's Farmer's Market! All the money earned will be donated back to our PTO. I am so excited to get started!
First up this week is one of my favorite activities from a fellow NC blogger. Rachel Lamb, also known as The Tattooed Teacher, has made a really cute little gardening activity that I highly recommend. I always begin my gardening with this cute activity. Be sure to check it out!!
