Five for Friday! {10.24.14}

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Hey y'all!

Welcome to Friday...we made it... and my very first Five for Friday Link Up! This week has been a fun week full of many firsts. I am really getting into my routine in the blogging world and I am putting the finishing touches on a product I hope to roll out this weekend. Be on the lookout for a flash freebie...maybe? :) Let's get this party started!



FALLabulous Bulletin Boards

Fall is by far one of my favorite times of the year. Having the privilege to work in the primary grades makes this time even more special. While walking down the primary hall this week I stopped to take a picture of one of the Kindergarten bulletin board. This classroom is undeniably one of the coolest classrooms, and Mr. Gordon does an amazing job with all of his minions. His bulletin board transformed from Assemble the Minions at the beginning of the year to Assemble the Pumpkins for the kiddos' fall activities. The skills present on this display made me stop dead in my tracks. I hope you find the display as impressive as I did...

Fall Fun With Poetry



I would like to bring more poetry into my classroom, but I need ideas. I wrote this poem for my little sweeties when we started studying fall at the beginning of last week. I have been going crazy thinking about fun poetry activities to help them understand the concepts embedded in poems. I want my kiddos to have a love for reading all genres. What do you do with poetry in your classrooms?

Product Preview

I have been working hard on my SMARTIES math rotation pack. I started with a chalkboard background with a light blue theme and loved it. When I printed it, I realized I needed more POP and added frames then reprinted. Then I wanted some circles for the rotations instead of squares, so I made the changes and reprinted. The list keeps going...you get the picture. A LOT of ink and A LOT of cardstock. I really want this pack to be special and effective in any classroom. The students love these rounds and I even have a colleague incorporating them into her classroom now with the same results. I need more feedback to be sure it is everything teachers expect in a rotation management system. Provide some feedback on my page or email if you have ideas on what you are looking for in a rotation management pack! :)



Comprehension Challenges

What do you do with your children at home? My second grader is having difficulty with complex text questions and delving deeper into fictional text. We bough a Spectrum workbook from the local B&N that has been helping. We complete one page nightly, and believe me that takes A LOT of time. {This may or may not be because I require her to always find text evidence for every answer! :)} This is a special time for me and my little munchkin. It is like our own little guided reading session. We are able to have text conversations that I can make meaningful for her. It truly is my most special time of the day.

Time for your FREEBIE!

As a thank you for reading through my first Five for Friday I am offering a FREEBIE. Head on over to my TPT store and pick up your free set of Visual Directions. These cards are invaluable in my classroom. Use them to sequence events in your classroom and ensure students understand what they need to do to complete their assignments. I hope you enjoy them. If you want even more visual directions, please support my little store by purchasing the full pack. Link is on the freebie page. Click the image below to snag your freebie. ENJOY!

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Wordless Wednesday: We're Really Regrouping 10.21.14

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Well friends....it is that time again. What time you ask? Well regrouping time of course! I learned a lot last year teaching second grade for the first time. I learned these little sweeties need lots of time and practice to get this concept down! In retrospect, I did not allow the students last year enough manipulation time in order to master the skill of regrouping. Therefore, we are taking things nice and slow this year. Maybe it is because I have an inclusion class this year, or maybe it is because I have become wiser with age (ah-hem), but time needs to be spent on mastery and not just covering everything on the pacing guide. Can I get an AMEN?!

I adjusted my plans this week to reflect a longer unit encompassing addition and subtraction with regrouping. We have spent two days on modeling tens and ones and modeling making a ten from ones. This visual using the document camera and SMART board really helped keep my students engaged and help them understand how to solve these types of problems. When I sent my sweeties to their seats to demonstrate their understanding using their own base ten blocks...well let's just say I was amazed and disappointed. I was amazed at how excited they were and how well they were doing, but I was disappointed that I did not take the time to do this with last year's class. Sigh!

The goal is to live and learn with these sweet kiddos I have this year. Inclusion is teaching me more and more about what's important...the needs of the students. 

So I ask you this...what are some of your most favorite ways to teach regrouping to your sweeties? Until next time...

The Sunday Scoop: Feltsie Firstie! 10.18.14

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Welcome back!

I know....two blog posts in a week! Whatever will you do?! Let's just say I am starting to get the hang of this blogging thing.

I feel like my lists could have been soooo much longer than what I typed. My to-do list is never ending. How does your list compare on the weekends?

Wordless Wednesday: "Fall"abulous Text Features 10.14.14

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Happy Fall Y'all!!!

What do you do to review after a long break? Today was our first day back from intersession, and my first day back to blogging! Yay us! In order to keep routine and some spice to first nine weeks topics for review, I decided some Fall action was in order.

We began with a read aloud of Awesome Autumn by Bruce Goldstone. This book is top of my list when it comes to helping students understand how the senses are used to describe autumn. I wanted students to be able to identify words that are indicative of Fall as well as tell me the text features they notice during the reading. We came up with "fall"abulous words, which turned into some phrases. This allowed me to see which students remembered text features, and which may need additional support in the coming weeks. The students really enjoyed this review and we even extended the learning with some written comprehension practice! Double score!!

Not super fancy, but helped with some difficult standards. We will be working with this book the remainder of the week. Stay tuned on my blog for more!

New Product ALERT!!: Let's Get Visual!

I have been working hard on figuring out ways to reach my new sweeties, and had an Ah Ha moment last week!
I told my babes...Go to your seats, grab a pencil, write your name, color, cut, then glue. I got ALL SORTS of "Say whaaaat?" stares, and I thought...oh wait! Maybe I should slow down a bit. I broke the directions down one by one for my class and that seemed to help, but they needed a little more. They needed to be able to look up and have a visual reminder!
DUH! Amber you taught ELL students for two years. YOU SHOULD KNOW THIS!

So I sat down and started making some visual directions for them. Do you want a peek? Of course you do!

 

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So head on over to my store, leave feedback, follow me, and be on the lookout for the full product coming soon!!!

2014 Classroom REVEAL

As most of you know, I teach at a year round school. I am teaching 2nd grade for the second year in a row, and I love it. I have been MIA on my blog for a bit because after two back-to-back conferences and vacation in AL, FL, and SC, I was exhausted! On top of that, I had to come back and immediately being setting up my classroom. No biggie...I am superwoman right?!
Many of you may have heard me say that I am teaching Inclusion this year. I was approached with a co-teaching model that would put an EC teacher in my classroom and we would share planning and management. After weeks of thinking that is what the plan was, we lost some EC positions, which in turn meant that all my sweeties would have me all day and have push-in ELA services as outlined by their IEP. Not exactly the picture I had mentally painted, but again, I threw on my cape and hit the ground running!

After two weeks I feel like I have a grasp on my schedule and what these guys need in order to be successful as I help pave the road to third grade. In order to get started off on the right foot, I decided I needed to minimize a bit. I removed three large tables from my room, which opened it up tremendously! I also updated the classroom library and other sitting areas to making reading more fun for my little ones. [sidebar: the chairs are such a hit that my custodian comes in daily for his coffee break...hehe]

I think it is time to let you decide what you think of my classroom this year. Boards and walls are still a bit bare, but that is because I add as I go in the form of anchor charts and such...

   

 

 

I hope you can see the BEFORE and AFTER the way these pictures are laid out. It was definitely a work in progress, but I am thinking this will work perfectly this year!
Leave your comments below and let me know what you think! :)

ISTE Recap!!!

Let me just say...ISTE was overwhelming, but I took away so much! First of all, if you are ever thinking of going to ISTE...take an empty rolling suitcase each day! Begin scrolling to see the MULTITUDE of T-shirts I picked up at ISTE....

Yes, I know...I have a giant arm in some of them, but HEY...FREE T-SHIRTS!!! I was a happy camper. I must say that as difficult as it was to leave my three sweet babies with my husband's mom, it was great to spend the time with just my husband. I mean...who doesn't just love this face??

 

 

 

 

We spent every morning at my third home...Starbucks...and we spend the evenings in our second...THE GYM! Can we say Grrrrr!!!! [intense photo warning :)]

Although ISTE was overwhelming on the information side of things, it was relaxing at the same time. I met so many lovely teachers and learned so many new tips and tricks. I have still YET to go through all of my ISTE items. This year-round business is going to be the death of me! Stay tuned for the classroom reveal....