Meet the Teacher: A give-a-way & Movement Math!

If you've been following me from my transition from PreK-land to 1st grade, you already know that I was wanting to ensure I have plenty of sensory & movement opportunities for my students. I've been busy accumulating ideas this summer. I came across a Melissa & Doug store this summer while on a spa day with my Mother-in-Law. LOVE! Love her, love the store, too! 

I did some damage in that store and one of the items I bought was this hopscotch puzzle mat. It looks kinda baby-ish, but I thought some great math skills could be incorporated into a math station that let's kids hop around while learning some good stuff---especially at the beginning of the year! 

Aligned to the common core, students can play hopscotch and graph, practice number writing/formation, compare numbers, order numbers, add 2 numbers, add 3 numbers, and more!! It's aligned for K-1. I hope my students like it!! You can see it HERE! 

Also---I've been thinking about those first few days of school. I've created a "Meet the Teacher" slideshow so my students have a great visual and can get to know me (and a little about my family) on the first day. Would you like one? First 5 people to leave their E-mail address in a comment on my Facebook page can have it FREE! I think I will like doing my intro. this way! You can check it out HERE! It is completely editable so that all you have to do is pop in your own pics! Here's just a few of the slides. All seasons are included, favorite foods, and more!! 

Thanks for stopping by!! 

 

Cutsie It Up!!

Normally at this point in the summer, well---maybe a week from now, I wander in to my room with the excitement for new furniture arrangements, new decor stuff, and DREAD. I absolutely dread removing my furniture from a huge heap in the middle of my room. It's heavy, bulky, odd shaped, and there's so much of it. I love re-arranging, don't get me wrong....but that big heap of tables, chairs, bookshelves, etc. is so overwhelming at first. 

This year, however, our maintenance staff was AMAZING! Those ladies sure know what they are doing, and I cannot thank them enough! They took pics of my room and put EVERYTHING back exactly where it was. Even my "teacher space" on my counter (I don't use a desk). It looked phenomenal. And soooo clean! I'm excited to see them again & thank them repeatedly-----they made my coming back so easy! 

I only re-arranged a little bit this year, and moved 2 centers. With the extra time the maintenance crew saved me, I was able to tend to my I-feel-like-organizing and cutsie-it-up mood! Here's the results & if you want the EDITABLE labels, too....click on the photo(s)! Lord knows we all have these plastic drawers in our classrooms!!!!!

These are the drawers I use to keep my copies or anything that gets handed out to the kids. I used some washi-type tape (not really washi, but some off brand or something from Walmart. LOVE IT!) to adhere it to the front of the drawer. This little decorative tape is one of my new favs! 

I think this is my new favorite spot in my classroom. I really wanted comfy places for the kids to read this year. I know there may be some arguments over this one---but we'll get it figured out! I have a lovely 31 consultant/teacher-friend who feeds my addiction to cute bags & bins! 

Here's a bunch of little odds and ends that you'd probably find in a teacher's desk. Like I said, I don't use a desk, so I keep my randomness stored in these drawers on the counter. Also----as of last year, band-aids are a kid-accessible item. I got WAY to tired of fetching band-aids at inconvenient times. Fostering independence here, people! 

I LOVE my new Ikea 3-tier cart. It's stocked with everything I need for small groups/reading instruction---including my new personalized binder I'm using for assessments! If we have to assess all the time, it might as well be easy on the eye! 

More places to store my stuff! I'm a big fan of chalkboard labels & chalk markers! 

Oh yes....we must have a place where completed work should land. 

Now, it has a matching label! 

Here's my new Ikea rug, more labels for types of paper that the kids will need access to. Last year was such a whirlwind, it never got labeled. They managed....but this year, I'll sleep better knowing this is done. HA! 

I also keep my activities sorted for lang. arts and math by skill. Shown above is a box of word work activities for short vowel & cvc word blending. Look REALLY close in the bottom right corner of that tote and you'll see the cute little logo/graphic from my friend Julie at Make-Take-Teach. She makes some GREAT products, and that's where I keep all those bad boys! 

Another show of my "teacher space". And another 31item. 

Love me some fold-n-file boxes!! 

And finally, here is my new trash to treasure----the bookshelf! 

YES! It's one long bookshelf a colleague threw out, and I snatched it up! 

So lucky!!! 

Happy Back To School & Happy Decorating!!!! 

The Goodies Are Rolling In!

The goodies I've been ordering for my classroom have been rolling in! Don't you just love a box or two on your porch this time of year?! I know I do! Thank goodness I'm home to grab them before the husband sees, and tries to guesstimate how much I've spent....only to be shocked by the credit card bill how much it actually was. It's better he just sees the bill, freaks out & I'm like, oh yeah....I bought some stuff for school. By then, it's stashed in the trunk of my car or somewhere around the house, and there's no going back....only forward....to my classroom! So here's what came 2 shipments ago. This isn't even the latest stuff I've bought. I went on a girls day on Monday with some relatives to the Spa & there happened to be a Melissa & Doug store in the resort. All I can say is that I LOVE Melissa and Doug----and my own 3 children scored some sweet pool toys/diving games & my classroom will reap some rewards from that little shopping trip as well! More on that later....

Back to my Amazon goodies.....

Take a good look! You will see....

1. 1. My "Mrs. Powell" monogramed binder from Zazzle.com. It's BIG. And cute! All my assessments info. will be put into this binder this year. I always use a binder to store my running records, MLPP testing (letter/sound knowledge, concepts of print, etc., sight words data, DIBELS info., and DELTA Math info.)....it seems as if I have my Data Binder out every day, so this year I wanted to make it super cute. And for a reasonable price, I snagged this binder!
2. GIANT Magnetic Base Ten Blocks. I was really wanting some of these last year. I mentioned it to my principal as he did a walkthrough last year while I happened to be trying to model with base ten blocks that it would be really great if I had some that I could put on the whiteboard at our group area. Is it super sad I didn't even know they existed?!??! I'm ashamed to admit it. Glad I googled that one! It led to my wish coming true! 
3. Foam Bath Letters & (not pictured) the crab letter links for the water table. I bought two sets of the crab letter links and 2 sets of the foam letters. I figured I'll rotate sets so that the kids stay engaged/interested in them & purchasing 2 sets of each will ensure that there are enough vowels for kids that are spelling a variety of lengthier words! Check out this FREEBIE for your students to practice their sight words at the water table! Just post it on the wall above your water table. 

   

   Click HERE to grab this FREEBIE!
   
   

   

   Click HERE to grab this FREEBIE! 

4. Soft Number Dice. I also desperately needed these last year. What a perfect math station to just roll & add. You could add 2 numbers or 3 numbers. You could graph how many times you rolled a number. There are so many possibilities. Check out this FREEBIE for you using number dice. Don't want to purchase number dice? Simply download a template online, or use a sharpie and write numbers on a wooden cube.....I'm sure you have some of those! If you happen to like the number dice freebie I gave you, you can get LOTS more for your classroom in my Number Dice Activities Pack

5. 

   Click HERE to grab this pack! 
6. Belkin Rockstar headphone adapter. I'm very excited to get some of my audio books on an iPod or iPad this year so that the kids can listen to them digitally. That's a whole blog post for another day....but I am seriously excited about this little techy purchase. I'm such a geek! 
7. Letter Beads. These are great. I am very excited to add these to my word work station this year. I do have beads already, but some are old, some too small, and the pile has dwindled over the years. I'm re-stocking & plan to use them with my new items from A Differentiated Kindergarten! Thanks, Marsha!!