I'm O-FISH-ALLY in 2nd Grade! FREEBIE

      Our Meet the Teacher night is coming up soon, and I can't wait to meet my new 2nd Graders!  It is  going to be weird seeing bigger kids! Haha. The last 5 years, teaching 1st Grade, it has been so different because the kids are so tiny coming up from Kindergarten!  I know being in a new place and meeting new people is hard for some kiddos, so I wanted to give my new 2nd Graders (I can't call them "firsties" anymore....geez! What do you call 2nd graders?  Secondies?? That just doesn't sound right!! haha) a little treat from me to welcome them, so I made these little gift tags to put onto a bag of goldfish for a snack!  These tags actually have a page for 1st Graders too... so one page says "I'm O-FISH-ally in 1st Grade" and one says "I'm O-FISH-ally in 2nd Grade."  Click the picture to download!  Enjoy!!
            - Beth

Clip Chart Behavior Management System with Monthly Calendars FREEBIE

**** 7-30-18 Update!! The NEW 2018-2019 Clip Chart Management System & Calendars are available on my TPT Store at the following link ****  

https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Clipchart-Behavior-Management-System-with-Monthly-Behavior-Calendars-2018-2019-3957103

Hey ya'll!!!  Summer is almost over.... :( Boo hoo....I can't believe the school year is about to begin!! It's so bittersweet.  I'm super excited to start a new school year (I LOVE new beginnings and a fresh start!) but also sad to give up my days of sleeping in and being on my own schedule.  I'm pretty sure my husband does not feel bad for me though....haha.  I think he'll be glad for me to start back so I can't be home spending money! ;) 

    Anyway, I don't know about all of you, but with the start of a new school year, one of the first things I want to have firmly in place is a behavior management system...and a good one at that!  I have tried several different systems over the past several years, and the one that I used this past school year seemed to work the best out of all the ones I've tried, so I am going to do it again!  I did some tweaking to the clip chart system I used last year, though, and changed "Outstanding" to "Outstanding LEADER" since my school does The Leader in Me and focuses on developing the 7 Habits and Leadership skills in our students.  I also made monthly behavior calendars to go along with the clip chart system to help me communicate behavior daily to parents.  This is going to be a change for me since before I was using a weekly behavior communication sheet.  I liked the weekly sheet because I had more room to write in notes/comments, giving parents more detailed information about good things their child did that day and more info about poor choices they may have made too so the parents had some info to follow up with the child at home.  But it truly was getting difficult and time consuming to write notes.  So I came up with a behavior code with numbers that correspond to different behaviors, so I can refer to the numbers to let parents know what specific behaviors their child struggled with (I always feel that is important so the parents have some info to address things at home effectively).   I think I am going to like the monthly calendars because they are going to be more manageable and less paper to have to copy each week.  They are also very self explanatory, so I hope parents will find them user friendly and communicative.
   Along with this management pack is a parent letter to explain the system, student award certificates for when the students reach "Outstanding Leader" and a "Outstanding Leader Hall of Fame" poster for students to retire their clips when they have reached Outstanding Leader 5 times.  The first 3 teachers to comment on this post and leave their email get this pack for FREE!!!  Or if you would like to purchase this behavior management pack, click on the picture to go to my TPT store.  It's only $1.99!!
    Does anyone use monthly calendars in their classrooms now?  I'd love to know what you think about them, how they work for you, and any tips you have!!
    Happy Teaching!!

               Love, Beth

Top 10 Tuesday Linky Party

 

         Well, I just got back from working in my classroom.  My BFF (that just sounded really high school.....whatever :)) and fellow blogger Katie came down today to help me set things up.  After 4 days of staring around the room wondering where to start, I figured in needed to call in back up!  And Katie is the ONLY person I could have who wouldn't get totally aggravated with how long it takes me to do stuff because she's just as OCD as I am.  I heart you Katie!!  Thank you for all your help today! 
     Anyway, I got home from school and saw Courtney over at Swimming in 2nd's Top 10 Linky Party and decided I had to join since I'm new to the 2nd grade family, so here goes!!  By the way...these are in no particular order!

1) My Silhouette Cameo

  My fab husband got me this for Christmas, and I LOVE IT!  It was a little pricey, but totally worth it.  I have made all kinds of cute things for my classroom, and my hands don't have carpel tunnel from cutting things out with scissors all the time!! :)  It is so much better than the Cricut, because you don't have to buy cartridges! It's all digital...

2) My Digital Clipart

   I LOVE making new resources for my classroom, so having great digital clip art, borders, fonts, etc is a MUST!  Some of my favorite digital clipart designers are MareeTrueLove, Print Candee, and KPM Doodles (all of their stores are on Etsy.)

                                       (Click this picture to go to Print Candee's Etsy Store.)

3) My Scotch Thermal Laminator
     
      Sometimes I just don't have time to wait for my stuff to get laminated at school (we aren't allowed to laminate our own stuff), so this is a LIFE SAVER!

4) My IKEA Shelves (no particular one...I have like 10)

    My classroom would be one sad place if it weren't for my FABULOUS IKEA shelves.  If I were to purchase stock in an product, it would be IKEA shelves.  I heart them!  Here are my two favorites... my classroom library shelves and my math manipulative organizers.

5) My Math Game Board Organizer (courtesy of The Container Store)

   This picture below only shows it with a few insets, but if you look carefully at the sides you can see the tiny slits for LOTS of inserts. I have about 15 different drawers in this thing that hold my math game boards for our Everyday Math Games.  It is the perfect solution because the space between each insert is really small so it holds a ton of different categories of stuff and doesn't take up a lot of space...

 

  6)  My Rotating Desk Organizre

      I have reserve supplies of lots of stuff like paperclips, rubber bands, staples, etc.  but when I just need one or two of something this is perfect!  It holds just a small amount of everything...pens, pencils, scissors, white out, rubber bands, staples, sticky notes, my calculator, a ruler, and MUCH MORE!  I just refill it every now and again.

7) My Hanging Reading Assessment Organizer
   
    This thing is large and in charge...but it works so well! After I finish a Dominie Reading Assesment with a child, I file it in the child's pocket, so I can easily see what level I did with them previously and if I have a RTI or IEP meeting on a child I can just grab their reading assessments and go.  Because it hangs on the wall, this works so much better than filing them in a file cabinet, because they are visible and accessible.

( I cannot find a picture of this to save my life and I don't have a picture of it in my classroom..oh well!)

8) My Lesson/Paper/Printables Organizer (Black Storage Cubes)

   I have all my printables that I need for each subject organized into these spacious black storage cubes with drawers!  It got them at Office Depot a couple of years ago.  I also keep Box Tops, Reading Awards, Weekly Readers/Time for Kids, etc. in them.  It keeps stuff organized and not visible to reduce clutter!

    

9) My Dymo Label Maker

    I mean....it makes labels....'nuff said.

10) My Hallway Chalkboard

    One of the teacher tasks I LOATHE ENTIRELY (anybody catch the Grinch reference here??) is cutting out letters with the di-cut machine in order to give my bulletin boards and/or student work displays a title.  It takes entirely too long, and it's a waste of time because right after you put it up you practically have to take it down a few weeks later.  I solved this problem this past school year by putting up my hallway chalkboard.  I just erase it and write a title for my next hallway display.  1 minute tops!! :) I LOVE it!!

 

 

What are your Top 10 Teaching Must Haves??

Have a blessed day!!   Love, Beth

Consonant Blends Word Work Game....and Some News!

So....the past few days have been a little bit of an emotional roller coaster for me.  I just found out that I am changing grade levels this coming school year.  I am going to be in 2nd grade now.  I was a little shocked at first and a little sad, because I love my team and I love first grade...and I've worked SO hard to get really good at teaching 1st Grade Common Core.  But, on the flipside, I've started to think of lots of benefits of moving to 2nd too, and I'm trying to focus on all of those!! :)  I think I'm just a planner to a fault, and I feel behind already since this is something all new.  But here are the PROS I've come up with about teaching 2nd grade as opposed to 1st:

       1) They will already know HOW TO READ....since I did such a FAB job last year and all,
           you know?!!!   Haha. Yay!  (This may be my favorite reason!)

       2) I will get my kiddos at the beginning of the year where my firsties were at the END  
          of the  year....wow, what a difference that is going to be!

       3) I might have some of the same cuties I taught last year!
  
       4) I will know exactly what my kids learned last year in 1st grade, so they can't ever say,
          "Mrs. So-and-So didn't teach us that last year!"  haha.

If any of you teach 2nd grade, I'd love to hear all your favorite things about it!!

   But, anyway, now that I'm moving to 2nd, I'm trying to finish up all my teaching resources that were more 1st grade oriented and get them posted on TPT so I can start making some 2nd grade things!!  So, I had been working on a Consonant Blends Game (they were one of my favorite things to teach in 1st), and it is finally done!  The game is in a puzzle format and is a lot of fun, so I hope your kiddos enjoy it!  Just click the picture to download at my TPT Store.  

   AND...for the first 3 friends that comment on this post and leave me your email, I will send it to you for free!!   Have a wonderful week!!

          Love, Beth

Fairy Tale vs. Fractured Fairy Tale Unit & FREEBIE

Once Upon a Time....
     Whew!!  My how this summer is flying by...and my how long it has been since I posted anything to this blog!  Sorry, friends... :)  Anyway, I have been working on this fairy tale unit FOREVER (meaning I started this TWO SCHOOL YEARS AGO....as in 2011-2012), and I am just now finishing it up.  Sad, I know..  But all I can say is, perfection takes time.  I kind of like to start something, then teach the unit, then see what worked and what didn't...and then make changes as necessary.  It's a process... :)  But alas, it is done and I'm finally sharing it with you!!  This sounds weird, but I love this unit because it is NOT interdisciplinary!  So many fairy tale units I've seen have math activities where the kids measure beanstalks, or random science experiments, and they try to integrate other subject areas..which is fine.  But our math curriculum is really strict and we can't just not teach the curriculum and do "fairy tale" themed math activities instead.  So I like units that just focus on one subject at a time.  My fairy tale unit is an ELA fairy tale unit, meaning it has multiple reading response activities and writing activities, but NO math, social studies, or science. You're welcome. :)  Click the picture above to go to my TPT store.  Click the picture on the below for a Fairy Tale Story Map FREEBIE!!
        

                 
      THE END...

Common Core Assessments

Common Core Assessments are back!! I had posted some assessments a few months ago on the blog, but I have decided to go back and create them by standard instead of unit. The summative assessments were long, and I needed more formative assessments to help guide my instruction throughout each unit. This has been more beneficial for me to determine what my students know throughout the unit, and I can see exactly where each child may need help :) I decided to share my first unit for FREE with all of you! Let me know what you think... I would love your feedback as I am working on the other units this summer. 

Oh...It's been raining ALL week here in Georgia. Feel free to send some sunshine down this way if any of you have some nice summer weather! Happy RAINY Sunday :)

Number Sense FREEBIE!

Schools OUT for the SUMMER!!!!! Yes... That song has been in my head all week :) Does anyone else start thinking about the next school year as soon as summer starts? Although I love trips to the lake and beach, I start planning activities for next year between vacations. 

Now that I have implemented the Common Core standards for a year (and we are getting a new math series), I wanted to work on creating a unit and activities to build number sense. I feel like that is one area that many of the math series are week in, and I think building a strong foundation in number sense is so important. I am working on some activities with ten frames, hundreds charts, rekenreks, etc. I would like to hear about any activities you may use in your classroom with number sense.  I have included two freebies from my unit (which I am hoping to finish this week). ENJOY!