Elf on a Shelf

Merry Christmas!

Ok, I know it's 25 days away, but I'm getting into the spirit pretty early this year. I saw an ad in Scholastic Instructor magazine that northpoleplayground.com was giving away 500 free Elf on the Shelf sets to teachers. I'm actually quite lucky, so I wasn't surpised when I got mine in the mail! BTW- northpoleplayground.com is the Teacher Resource Center for Elf on the Shelf. I thought my kids might be  too old for it - but I was wrong! He arrived yesterday morning and was sitting atop our SmartBoard! I forgot to take a picture, but it he ever climbs up there agian, I'll get a pic ;)

He left a special message on the board, even crossing out part of our morning work (the kids are designing their own business' for our communities unit)...

After the kids went to their special, the elf decided he wanted to give a go at the coloring page! 

He didn't move while we were at lunch (lazy elf!)... The kids are looking forward to where he will be on Monday!

Of course we gave him a name, by voting on our favorite. Our Elf's name is Buddy! Which I found out is the most popular Elf name. Go figure.

The next three weeks of school should certainly be interesting!! :)

Happy Weekend!

Melissa

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I'M BACK!

Hello hello,

I've been a terribly negligent blogger! As I said in September, this year is a challenge! LOTS has happened in my classroom and I feel like we are running in place. Sighhh. The first trimester is almost over and I can't believe we made it! I have BIG plans for the rest of the year...So stay tuned.

Updates on my life as an educator:

A friend of mine from college talked me into opening a TpT store, and I'm so glad I did. I decided to go with the free membership, which allows me to keep only part of the sales money, but I'm still raking in some bucks! The things I make I would use in my classroom anyway, so I might as well share the love. Check out my page and help me buy Christmas presents! hehehe... Here's my page: Melissa's TpT Store
I also must give you a link to my friend's page. She is incredible. Check her out and buy some of her amazing work!! Mrs. D's TpT Store

I recently made a comment on the Simple Solution's pinterest pin about their Common Core aligned math book. If you aren't familiar with Simple Solutions, talk to your math/curriculum director and get it! I've never been a fan of workbooks, and I use them minimally in the classroom, EXCEPT for SS! I LOVE IT. Each "lesson" is a review of math skills and concepts that the students have already learned in earlier grades or earlier in the year. There are 15-20 questions each day. I have the kids do it for homework each night. There are also quizzes that I give each Friday (average them into a test grade), based on the skills covered that week. It is a FANTASTIC way to spiral the curriculum even if your district/school doesn't do that already. (We don't. sadface.) Plus, there are a wide range of questions and the kids don't mind doing it. A former student of mine even said "This isn't math! It's Simple Solutions!" :) ANYWAY, I asked about when the CC aligned program will be out (can't wait to use it next year) and SS is SO awesome that they wrote a whole blog post for me and had their graphic people make my kids a math worksheet AND a smart board file! Here is a link to the post. Third Grade is a HOOT!   I feel famous now :)

We have of course been celebrating the holidays in my classroom with some cute artwork. 

Always looking for some good Christmas crafts. If you have any ideas, send them my way!

That's all for now. Off to do some grad school work. I leave you with a picture of my sister and I... she was married on November 10th! :) yay meggie and eddie! :)

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What a month!

Hello blogger buddies,

I can't believe it has been nearly a month since my last post! Things have been so crazy the past few weeks! During my first week of school, my mom-mom was admitted to the hospital. I went to visit her after school on my 2nd day (Thursday) with my mom and some of my aunts. Unfortunately, she was diagnosed with a heart condition and flown to a bigger hospital for surgery. I spent the night at the hospital with my mom, aunts and uncles, but unfortunately, my mom-mom passed away. So, I was absent on the third day of school, and then again one day the following week for the funeral. I also missed a grad class due to the viewing. We were all very devastated especially because the diagnosis and outcome were so unexpected. Things are sort of getting back to normal now though..

Amid the family chaos, I'm trying to get control over my very energetic class. I have students whose learning style I am not familiar with, including disabilities and English learners. Interestingly enough, I'm taking a special education course and an ESL course this semester. Hopefully I can get things figured out to ensure success for all!!

Now for some good news! I am SO EXCITED to have a SmartBoard in my classroom this year. One thing that really gets the kids' attention and control is when I use it! I'm spending this weekend finding some resources for the week ahead!

I also purchased a USB camera to use as a document camera. It was only $70 on amazon. http://www.amazon.com/IPEVO-Point-View-USB-Camera/dp/B002UBPBTC



It has some flaws: such as when you put your hand under it to write, it refocuses, but, it's great to project something for the kids to look at or read, and the picture quality is great. We are currently raising ladybugs, so I am able to point the camera at the ladybug land and get us up close to them! Here is a picture of our ladybugs in the pupa stage:

Cool huh?!

If anyone has any smartboard resources or ideas, send them my way!
Have a great week!

Melissa :) Pin It

All ready!

Hello, hello!

Only 4 days left of the summer! Many of you are already back in school, and I'm a little bit jealous! I can't wait to get the year going! 

I finished up my classroom this week, so here are some pictures!

My Good Reader's "bulletin" board! Made my own strategy cards, and I-Pick good books from Pinterest :)

Library/Carpet area with my owl chair and dry erase board!

 Behind my desk/small group table. Paper, art supplies, files, etc.

 My desk!

 Teacher Toolbox, inspired by pinterest!

 Cabinet in the corner, job chart, previous class pictures..

 Maps, Rules, Schedule, Supplies (painted some Foldgers containers! coffee yum....)

 View from my desk..

 My new dry erase board that I scored from the principal and had it mounted! WOOO!

 SMARTBOARD!!!!!!!! (waited 2 years for this, super excited.) Plus HW board, calendar,
bdays, prayer corner, and another carpet area in front of the smart board

 Can't wait to meet my flock!! Or shall I say "clutch". A group of baby owls is a clutch. Group of adult owls is a parliament! Fun facts! :)

I also made a "Room 33, Where are we?" chart for the back of the door!

 Here's a link.. feel free to revise, edit, and share. Where are we?

Here's a link to the strategy cards I made for the board.. Strategy

Let me know if you are going to download something! 

Have a Happy Labor Day and good luck this school year! :)

Melissa :)

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Math Journals

Hello Friends!

As you can tell by my header and "about me" section, I have a passion for literacy. I never liked math as a child (heck, I never liked reading either, but at least I wasn't terrible at it...) so, as a teacher I'm not too crazy about it either. However, I know it is important (yadda yadda...) and I should probably be doing things to make it easier and more enjoyable for the kiddos. Last year my school "implemented" the common core standards. I use the term implemented lightly, because we were all really stumped as to how to implement it successfully, so we really just winged it. Our report card changed too and we need to give a grade for mathematical communications. I figure that in order to do that the students are going to need to know the words to use! Also, problem solving is a grade, and its huge in the common core. I've been reading about a lot of you who are doing math journals, so I'm gonna try it. Daily problems of the day, explaining how they solved it, note taking, etc. etc. It should be interesting, since its not something I've researched as deeply as say, balanced literacy. But it can't hurt right??

I decided to create some inserts for the back of their math journals to use as references. I created them landscape so that they can be cut in half and glued down on a marble notebook sized page. Feel free to download, use, revise, and share. :) Leave a comment and let me know if you are downloading, and let me know how you help your kids problem solve and communicate mathematically! I can use all the help I can get!

First, key words to look for in word problems to help the students figure out which operation to use.

fuzzy, sorry... that's just the jpg. To download the PDF click here: Word Problem Helpers

Next, here is a math word wall for the kids. The words are all the Common Core math vocabulary words K-4. They are in alphabetical order, rather than grade order. I thought that would be easier for the kiddos to navigate!

Link: Math Vocab

I have to make these pdf instead of word, because of the fonts I use. (They are from a CD download.) If I made them word docs and you don't have the fonts, they won't show up. If you want word docs, let me know and I'll get it to you.

Again, let me know if you are going to download and how you're going to use it. I'd love to hear about it! :)

melissa :)

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Refurbishing!

Hey there!

The long shelf that I am using this year for my book baskets wasn't very attractive (until today!!). The past two years I've had it behind my desk holding papers, cleaning supplies, etc., so it didn't need to be all that nice looking. I decided that since I was going to use it as an inviting classroom library for the kiddos, then it should look pretty! I've been reading about modge podge but I don't like anything complicated, so I bought adhesive shelf liner at Target ($5.50!!), and I completely changed the look of the ugly shelf!

Check it out! 

Before:

After:

It was so easy to apply, you can re-position it if you mess up, and it will be easy to wipe clean with Lysol wipes after the kids get their hands on it!

I got all my books out and got up my faux bulletin board paper and border too.

I'm really excited for how it turned out! :)

ps: book baskets available at the Dollar Tree! :)

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Setting Up!

Hello!

Today was my first day of setting up for the coming school year. For the past two years, I've pretty much had the furniture arranged the same way, but I wanted something completely new this year! I'm getting a SmartBoard installed, and I got some awesome easels and dry erase board so I'm planning on doing a lot more teaching from the carpet.

I didn't get all that far, but considering at the end of the year we have to pack up EVERYTHING, clear the walls (we can just cover bulletin boards), and move all the furniture to one side of the room (ourselves, btw), I had a lot to move today! They move all the furniture out and wax the floors so that's why. I wish we had wall to wall carpeting!

Tentatively, I have 28 students this year (whoa), so I have 4 groups of 5 and 2 groups of 4.

             Here is the view from the front door..My desk is in the back left corner, library to the right...

View from my desk, looking at the front door...The smartboard is going where that X is on the board.

Small group instruction table..

Carpet area! A much bigger space than last year. Amazing how a little rearranging makes such a difference! Still have to unpack, sort and separate my books into their baskets! And I can turn my chair and easels around to use at the small group table.

But clearly, I still have a lot of packing and decorating to do!! Plan on covering most of the blackboard with backing paper and making faux bulletin boards too.

Where do I start?!? Three weeks til the kids arrive!

More pictures to come when everything is set up and pretty!! 

:) melissa

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