Monday Made It

So I realized as I was typing this post that the Monday Made It linky party is now over for the summer, but I am too stinking proud of these boxes for them not to get their own post!
I'm starting Daily Five this year, and I knew that I would be needing book boxes. Ideally I wanted ones that matched my classroom, but my #1 was that they needed to be plastic not cardboard. After the sticker shock of looking at some teacher stores, I decided to go with ice buckets from Walmart. I brought them into my room and let them sit for a few days before taking them back home to paint! Since my room is teal and read, I went with doing 10 teal and 10 red. After talking to the very helpful man at Lowes, I went with a primer and then my color of choice. Now all I had to do was wait for it to cool down! We were having a heat wave, so I waited until it cooled down a bit. Finally, about two weeks after making up my mind to paint the boxes, I had a perfect, 85 degree day! I did all of my painting outside on the picnic table that I covered with a dollar plastic sheet. Next time I would also use gloves since my hands ended up a total mess!

Ready to get started. 

The future teal boxes out on the table. I primed them, let them sit for about an hour, and then spray painted them. 

The teal boxes are done and the red are primed and ready to paint! 

My finished boxes! I love the way they turned out. I let them cure at home for about a week before I brought them to school and filled them with books.

The finished product! I made the numbers to match, though cutting out circles was a nightmare. I'm sticking to squares from now on! They were a lot of work, but I think they look great and really help tie the room together. 

Back in the Swing

This three day weekend is perfectly timed! We just finished up our third week of school. Routines are starting to flow, but my to do list is a mile long! Yesterday I didn't touch anything related to school for the first time since school started. Now I can tackle my list a little more relaxed. Since I am still relatively new to the iPhone world, I keep forgetting that I always have a camera around. I have managed to snap a few pictures.

Day one and already hard at work! It is amazing how attached I was to last year's class, but this new class is sneaking its way into my heart! Overall they are a very sweet class, though I am already racking my brain for ways to control my little chatterboxes. 

We love Go Noodle! Seriously, I use it just about every day. We have a three hour block of instruction time in the morning to do math and ELAR, which is great, but so hard to keep little minds and bodies focused for so long! Depending on our needs we usually do a Zumba or Airtime break in the morning and a running one in the afternoon slump. They adore it as a reward for good behavior and it always perks them up when we are having a bad day. I usually can't help but join in, it is so much fun! 

My Whole Brain Teaching rules. We say them every day after morning prayers and again after lunch. This is my second year incorporating some of the WBT methods, and I am always impressed with how well the kiddos retain our lessons. 

I have a confession to make: I am not at all artsy. Crafty? Yes. Capable with a marker in hand? Absolutely not. To make anchor charts I find the one I like, project it on my board, and start tracing! I usually trace the basic outline and then add in my own flair. I found this image here, but there is no blog post to it. If it is your anchor chart, please let me know so I can give you credit! I made the punctuation names and people before the lesson, then we described each type and wrote examples together. 

Our tattling vs reporting chart. I got the idea here, but then added some of my own. This one the kiddos directed me in the difference between the two with some gentle guidance. I also have a tattle box for those who can't help but tattle. Whenever they come running up during recess my first questions is always "Is this a tattle or a report?" and for the most part, they have gotten the difference. 

Original chart found here. 

Between making this chart and doing WBT motions, everyone in the class rocks at identifying nouns! I was so happy to have everyone pass the grammar assessment this week. 

Happy Labor Day! 

! 

Lesson Plans, Finals, and Graduation Week

In just a few days I will be in possession of an undergraduate degree! I am so excited, but sad to leave my school behind. We already had Convocation, and now have finals this week and graduation next weekend. But to get to graduation I have to first take finals! I am having trouble finding motivation to get work done. I already have a job and am doing well in all my classes, so even failing the finals I would still have passing grades.

One of my final projects this semester is to adapt a lesson plan to accommodate ELL students. We had to choose a pre-written lesson plan and add to it what different levels of ELL students would need. Having worked in Texas public schools, I was familiar with CSCOPE, but also with many teacher's distain for it. My professor suggested checking out a website called Read Write Think. I spent hours on it looking at lesson plans! Great lessons, all are TEKS/Common Core aligned.

I wanted to chose a lesson that I could use next year, so I looked for second grade lessons. There were so many! The one I ended up picking taught some economic vocabulary using Fancy Nancy and the Fabulous Fashion Boutique  

An adorable book and a cute lesson to lean some difficult words. I modified the lesson some to accommodate for ELLs and to add a spiral station work, but other than that it was a wonderful lesson as is. I know I will continue to reference this in the future!