Grandparents Day & Living vs. Nonliving Things

School is in full swing....& I am TIRED!!!  I always forget how hard the first couple weeks of school are, but the kids & me are finally getting in our routine. With Grandparents day coming up, I made some writing templates and graphic organizers that could be used to write about Grandparents.  I can't wait to see what my kiddos write about their Grandparents. Click HERE to get this mini writing unit for yourself.

 

 

Since we are finally getting into our routines we will be starting Science soon!  Right now, I've been teaching some Social Studies...culture, custom, rules, etc.  You can grab that mini unit HERE for free.  Back to Science...next week I will be starting Living vs. Nonliving things.  I can't wait! I love this unit.  You can grab this booklet at my TPT store HERE.

 

Hope everyone has a GREAT weekend!! :)

My Classroom

Ok, here it is! My second home...

This year, I bought bookshelves for each of my tables.  So far, I love them!  We will see how they work tomorrow!  In these bookshelves I will store the "team" materials.  The kids will keep their math materials, crayons, scissors, etc, and will each have reading baskets where they will store their books and whisper phones.

This is looking at my room from the reading corner.

This is my reading corner/whole group area.  I just got a bigger rug, but don't have a picture of it yet.  We spend ALL of our time here.

This is still in my reading area.  I added BOGGLE this year, and I'm excited about the kids being able to choose to do this during word work.  You can also see my writing center...

 

This is my writing center.  I snagged this table for $5 this summer!  It reads "each day is a story". 

This is another table I painted a few years back.  This is my "thinking center".  I throw different activities in this center, like retelling stories, sequencing, etc.

This is part of my word work center.  These are actually two bookshelves put together.  They were really ugly and also the focus of my room last year, so I decided to spice them up!  I hot glued some fabric I had on there, added some cute flag border and bam!  The bookshelves are magnetic so the kiddos can make words on it.  LOVE!

I like to have carpet and lamps everywhere!!  It makes the room so much more homey!  Plus I love for the students to have different areas int he room where they can "buddy read" at the end of the day.  This is when they will need their whisper phones and book baskets that I mentioned above.

This is my new best friend! My rockin' behavior chart.  I got this guitar  idea from the inspired apple! 
I made fun little guitar picks with their names on it to move up and down the chart.  You can get these guitar picks for free at my TPT store HERE.  I can't wait to use this, this year!  I also made a packet of notes to send home that you can also check out HERE.

The front of my room/guided reading table. 

& lastly my awesome new milk crate seats I made.  I'm really excited about these.  I am going to have the kids store their guided reading books/materials in the drawers throughout the week.  That way I don't have to keep up with the books but can have them pull them out of their seat! :)

That's my room!  Hope everyone has a FABULOUS year!

Freebies!

I made a few freebies!!!!  Who doesn't love a good freebie?

The first item I made is a poster that can be displayed to help your students when they are engaging in partner talk.  Partner talk is EXTREMELY important! I have found that the kiddos learn SO much more when they do the talking opposed to me.  I got the idea for this poster from a math lead teacher who suggested making something like this so the student can refer to how to partner talk properly.  It is important, however, to model and practice this type of talking before students are ready to do this on their own.  Click on the picture to grab it!

Then, I made some fun writing folder labels.  I like to use folders so the students can take their work out, add more, etc.  I also like to put a lot of resources in their folder for them to refer to.  You can grab these free writing labels by clicking on the picture.  NOTE: I used Avery labels.

ENJOY! :)

Skippy- the take home adventure!

Who's ready for school to start back!?!?  I guess I am.  I'm really excited today because I found something I've been looking for and it is PERFECT!!!  To explain this new project, we're going to have to take a trip down memory lane....

When I was in 3rd grade I had the BEST teacher ever!!! Not only was she my favorite teacher but she was my neighbor.  She was wonderful & I loved school because of her.  Well, in 3rd grade we had a class pet and his name was Scruffy (he was a stuffed animal).  Every weekend she would let one of us (her students) take it home.  IT WAS AWESOME!  I loved getting to take Scruffy home.  Once I became a teacher I knew I HAD to do this in my room, but the problem was finding a cute class pet I wanted to use.  WELL look what I found...

Seriously!?! How cute, is this?  ANDDDD it was only 10 bucks! So, Skippy will be my class pet.  He will go home with a different student each weekend.  Skippy, the backpack, a Skippyjon Jones book, and a journal.  I can't wait to do this.  SO, if you'd like to jump on board I made the needed documents. To find this cute little guy go check out Kohls!  Click on the preview to get your own documents.  ENJOY! :)

Reading strategy bookmarks

So, this is something I made when I taught third grade.  I used these reading strategy cards as bookmarks.   Each student was assigned a job for the week in their reading group. I printed out a few copies of these so I would have plenty to use for all my kiddos.  They loved having a job and they knew what to work on while they were reading.  These are best if you do a literature circle then students talk about what they found in the group the next day.  Click on the picture to grab these bookmarks for your classroom! Enjoy! :)

Tens Frame Posters & Calendar Chart

I just added these fun and very educational tens frame posters to my TPT store!  These can be used to post for students to refer to when counting or they can be cut in half (where you seperate the number from the tens frame) and used as flashcards or as a matching game!  Click the picture to get to my store! 

Lately....

Ok, so I've not blogged much lately because I've been SO busy! Mostly with working on my master's and photography.  Here are a few pictures I've been working on...thought some of you might enjoy seeing some fun pictures!

...these are just a few of my favorites! 

                                        If you liked them then you can check out more HERE!

Bravo Board!

This is used for giving students points when their team (or table) makes good choices. I made different colored stars for my colored tables. I cut these out and taped them on a clipboard sized whiteboard where I can give points with a dry erase marker and carry it around the room with me.

This is what it looks like:

& you can download this freebie by clicking on the picture! 

behavior

So, I have decided to change my behavior plan for this coming year.  I'm really excited about it.  I got the great idea from the inspired apple- check it out on her blog!  It's a rockstar theme! :)  I made a giant guitar (can see on her blog) which I've not taken any pictures of yet.  Anyways, I made a few things to go along with the giant guitar. This includes: behavior notes to send home when students make it to the top of the guitar or the bottom of the guitrar, a behavior report to send home to the parents each week with their behavior grade recorded, 2 notes home to the parents explaining how the guitar system works, guitar picks to be placed on clothespin to be moved up and down the guitar (on the pick you can add in your students' names). Hop on over to my teacherspayteachers store to snag this by clicking on the picture!

More baby bird life cycle & weekly assessment sheet

 Happy hump day!  So, first of all...this sweet little message from my kiddos at recess just made my week.  "Mis Nida is the most best teachr evr"...how presh. I LOVE my class.  Summer will be bittersweet...I'll hate to say goodbye to such a great group of kids.

Anyways, If you've been following me at all you know about all the fun things my class has been doing with the baby birds that hatched on my back porch.  I wanted to share how we ended our little unit on these sweet babies.  A wonderful cohort of mine found a book that was super similar to my story with the birds.  ((See below))

We read this book that has excellent pictures of baby birds that were so similar to the ones I have taken.  Then we made a venn diagram to compare and contrast.

 We completed the baby bird fun by writing about the two types of birds.  It was great and my kiddos loved all of it.   Click on the picture below to snag it for FREE.  ENJOY!

This is how I displayed it in the hallway before we added the compare & contrast writing.

Also, I've been thinking ahead to next year and have started revamping a few of my most used documents.  Check out this most used document of mine and click the picture below to grab it as well. 

Hope everyone has a wonderful rest of the week! 

Today is def. a Monday!  I am WORN outttt...TCAP week is tiring & we're not even taking the TCAP. ..but I'm hoping for a better day tomorrow!  Today I decided to revamp my spelling test sheet.  It just needed some pasaz...you can grab it for FREE by clicking on the picture.

Also, everyone has got to check out my soul sista in teaching's new blog!  It rocks!  There we are...on our last day of our first year teaching.  Check her blog out here: http://teachingincardigans.blogspot.com/

Cinderella Unit

I have made a few more things to use for the Cinderella unit I will be doing this coming week.  It includes the following:
*Fairy Tale Element Poster
*If I had a fairy godmother writing
*Venn Diagram to compare & contrast Cinderella
*Illustration sheets to show a current day "slipper scene"..from the prince and cinderella's point of view

It should be a fun week of reading!!

Check out the unit by clicking on the picture below!

Next week we will review comparing and contrasting.  We will do this with different versions of Cinderella, while studying cultures.  Check out this freebie HERE!!!

Life Cycle of Bird Photographs

I've been using my "Life of a Bird" booklet and my kiddos have loved it.  These are the series of pictures I've been showing them to show how they've grown and changed.  You can get these pictures for FREE at my teacherspayteachers store by clicking on the above picture.  Have a great weekend! :)

Ok- Check out THESE cuties!! They are growing under my porch!  That's right...baby birds!!  I'm in LOVE with them.  I go out and look at them ATLEAST 10 times a day...okay maybe not 10..but A  LOT!  They are so cute & I've NEVER seen a bird grow like this!  Then I started thinking...man this is so exciting...I bet my kiddos would LOVE this!  SO I started documenting their lives every day!  I have pictures & videos! Then I decided...this is not only cool but a STANDARD! So I made this...

What is it?  It's a booklet that includes actual pictures taken of my birds by ME!  This booklet allows students to document the birds lives for themselves and to observe and state the changes they are seeing in animals.  (sound familiar?!) 

THEN***

I made a video!  I put some video (including video of the mama feeding the babies) to music and BOOM!...an amazing lesson! Here is an example of the video...

You can download this fun activity for your kids HERE!

Okay friends! I found an amazing master's program that I am starting THIS May!   You even get an Ipad with the program and it's all online.  I'm super/nervous to start it...but it should be great!  Check it out!
http://www.bethelsuccess.net/programs/maed/

Types of Sentences

I am totally enjoying my spring break this week! Here is a poster packet I made to use when studying the different types of sentences 

Check it out HERE!

Also, we did this really fun activity with the different types of sentences for Valentine's Day.  My kiddos loved it.  It was really fun but challenging at the same time.

You can dowload this fun FREEBIE HERE!

Common Core Standards

Hello all!  I wanted to share a checklist I made to help me keep up with my literary standards using the new common core. 

It is what I always refer to while planning & I use it very frequently! You can check it out HERE!