Designating Task Days

I'm loving Clutter Free Classroom's new daily posts, especially Teacher Time Saver Tuesday.  I am working slightly less this year than last, and I feel more relaxed, but I still greatly envy those teachers I know who don't work all weekend long.

This past Tuesday was possibly the most brilliant and "duh" time saving tip possible:

Designate Task Days

Take a look at Clutter Free Classroom's post here.

Basically, figure out what you do every week and plan when you will do it.

So, here is my plan.  I'm going to try my hardest to stick to it starting tomorrow.

Monday:
Before school: Copy things for today and put everything else I need for the week in for copy helpers.
Prep:  Laminate and cut anything I need for this week
After School: Hang student work and/or do something off of my still to be done for my classroom list.

Tuesday:
Before School: Plan Social Studies or Science for next week
After School: Check off homework/classwork (ungraded things), week-specific things
Aide Time:  Grade and enter spelling test from last week, file student work

Wednesday:
Before School: Plan Math for next week
After School: Check off homework/classwork (ungraded things)

Thursday:

Before School: Plan Reading for next week

After School: Check off homework/classwork (ungraded things), week-specific things

Friday:

Before School: Plan Writing for next week

Prep: Update bulletin boards

After School: Check off homework/classwork (ungraded things)

Weekend:

Grade and enter (except spelling tests)

Make any worksheets/activities that I didn't make during planning times

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Although this doesn't leave my weekends totally free, it leaves them much freer than they have been in the past.  I really feel like this plan is do-able, except maybe when I have meetings with parents before school, which happens about once per month.

Thanks for the tip, Clutter Free Classroom!

Back to School Night

Is there anything that can make a four day week feel longer than Back to School Night?

Last night was the night.  For the second year in a row, I was sick.  As in, I'm only going to school today because it's Back to School Night sick.  And around noon, I lost my voice.  My voice is almost completely back now.  It just took a vacation for the time I had to talk at all of the parents.

Enough of my pity party.

Last year, our back to school night was a full month after school started.  This year, it was two weeks.  It was a very different dynamic.  It also meant making my room perfect way sooner!!!

I wanted to share with you (and document for myself) some things that went well and some things I'll do differently next time.

Went Well:

• Having a power point, but not just reading from it.  I love that this year I know enough of what's going on to not just read from them.  One parent told me this morning that it was the best Back to School night she'd been to for just this reason.
• Side note:  I HATE just talking at the parents the whole time.  It feels so strange to hear my own voice for 40 minutes straight!
• Giving handouts of the powerpoint.  Made it less of a big deal that I didn't get through all of the slides (see below). Also, parents aren't frantically writing.
• Having lots of student work and class made charts on the walls. Most of the parents didn't even try to talk to me before because they were so engrossed with the room!
• Having two copies of everything on my kiddo with divorced parents' desk.  I thought they were going to hug me they were so happy to each have their own copy!

Change:

• Have someone else proofread my power point and handouts.  I found two mistakes during the presentation (embarrassing!)
• Open my door a few minutes earlier so that everyone is in, signed in, and ready to go right when it starts
• Time myself better.  I still had about 7 slides to go when it ended!
• Tell parents that they have to write a letter back to their child.  The kiddos all had letters on their desks to their parents, and there were some sad faces from the kiddos whose parents didn't write back this morning.

Major TGIF this week for me!  :)

Currently and Monday Made-It

Thank goodness for Labor Day weekend!  I got tons of work done and still took half a day completely off from anything school related (except, of course, blogs!).

As my kiddos excitedly pointed out to me on Friday, it is now September.  This is exciting for them because at the end of each month, any unused bathroom passes become raffle tickets.  With only eight days of school in August ... let's just say we have a very full raffle bin!

So, first up .... Currently!

Thanks Farley for hosting!

First off, I have to say that I LOVE this month's currently template.  I am all about bright colors right now.  Let's hope that lasts since my classroom is covered in them! :)

I absolutely adore my class this year!  With the exception of two (aren't there always), they are so well behaved and so excited about what we're doing!  I have quite a few space cadets (Student #1: "Is this social studies or math?" (holding up a worksheet full of addition problems).  Student #2: "Uhhh ... I think we did that one during social studies." No. We didn't. We did it during math).  I prefer space cadets to naughty kiddos, though.

Favorite Things:
1.  I got a Kindle this summer.  I am reading so much more now.  I used to read constantly.  Then college happened.  I was a Literature/Creative Writing major, and I stopped reading for fun.  Being able to instantly get new books on my Kindle is making me love reading again!
2.  Last year's plan binder was plain white (that is, except for the stains on it...).  This year's binder is pretty and that makes me happy every time I take it out!

3.  No, I don't have a new couch.  I just didn't appreciate it all summer like I do at the end of a day of teaching.  So it makes the list!

And now ... Monday Made It! (with freebies for you)

Daily 5 Board
So, I'm not quite done making these, but I created, printed, cut, laminated, and cut.  All that's left to do is arrange them in the pocket chart!  I'm going to post more later about how I am adapting Daily 5 to fit my classroom, but basically I'm doing Daily 4, calling it Reading Workshop, and giving some must-do and some may-do activities for each choice. Here are the labels for you!

Noun Sort
My first Word Work activity!  Students will sort the sentence cards into the four categories, then record the nouns on a recording sheet.  Lots of laminating and cutting here! Here are the sentences and recording sheet for you!

The sorting page.
Their recording sheet doesn't have the "not nouns" category,
 but there will be cards that go in there!

Card baggie is stapled to the back of the sorting chart.
Each set of cards is also a different color.
Crossing my fingers for no supplies lost!
They sort by the underlined words.

Writing Wall Name Tags
Lots of typing, printing, coloring in the parts where my printer was running out of ink, laminating, and cutting.  I think they are going to look great next to the black backgrounds for their writing!

California Regions Fact File
Most of the first chapter of our social studies textbook is on the four regions of California.  The textbook takes three lessons to do this and each lesson talks about all four regions.  By the end of it, I even have details about the regions mixed up!  This year, as we read those lessons, the kiddos are going to organize the info by region.  Here is the document, if you want to use it!  They need to be printed double sided and then folded into a booklet.  Note:  There is one page that I am doing some old fashioned copy-pasting, so it's blank now!  You can put your own map of California there!  Font from Kevin and Amanda!

The page on the right will have a map.

That's all for now!  Have a wonderful week!

Math Workshop

First full week of school complete!  I wasn't sure I or the kiddos were going to make it those last couple of hours, but we did. 





We're starting to get into full academic swing now.  As I mentioned in my Monday Made It post, I'm trying out Math Workshop this year.

I'm really excited and nervous about it.  We switch classes for math, but we don't have the same kiddos all year.  We've divided the curriculum into six parts.  The first we do with out homeroom kids at the beginning of the year, the second we do with a leveled group.  Then, we each take one of the remaining four parts and teach it four times, once to each leveled group.  It works out to having each group for just over a month.  One group I'll have twice (first and last rotation).  I love getting to really focus in on one part of the curriculum so that I can develop awesome lessons, but the rotating kids makes establishing routines difficult.

I decided to spend time this week really getting down math workshop with my homeroom kiddos while still getting through what I need to in order to be ready for our first rotation.  Since I'll have some of them in each math group, I hope that their knowledge of my routines will help others learn them faster.

We did two full rounds of math workshop this week, one on Monday/Tuesday and one on Wednesday/Thursday.  Each day, students did two rotations.  On the first day of the round, I did a short whole class lesson first and on the second day, I gave a short quiz at the end.   Friday was the test for the topic.

My plan is to continue with that basic schedule, except when we do investigations or longer problems that take a whole math class.

What I'm Loving:

• Meeting with every kiddo in a small group.  I don't think there was any point last year that I had such a good idea of where individual students are as I do now.
• Quote from a (somewhat difficult) kiddo on day two: "Are we doing math workshop again today?"  Me: "Yes we are."  Kiddo: "Yes!" (complete with celebratory arm gesture)
• I'm actually fitting in automaticity practice.
• The quick quizzes have shown me holes in their understanding and knowledge that can be so easy to correct once I know they're there.  On the first quiz almost everyone missed "What is the value of the underlined digit?" questions.  The next day, I taught them what the question asked.  They almost all got it right the next time!

Challenges:

• Math took almost an hour and a half every day this week.  Once we start rotating, I get an hour.
• I haven't found time to correct their At-Your-Seat work.  I'm worried their practicing incorrectly and that they don't feel accountable for it.
• Of course there are those trouble makers who aren't actually working when they aren't at my small group.
• I want to spend more small group time with my struggling kiddos, but since it is a rotation, if I don't keep the time of each one equal, they aren't all getting to do everything.  Maybe I need to make it more workshop-like. Hmmm...
• This week, our pacing was one lesson per day, so I did two lessons per rotation.  Next week, we're doing two or three lessons per day.  I'm not sure how to fit all of that in!

Even though my challenge list has more items than the things I'm loving list, the ones on the things I'm loving list are so important to me and make me feel like I am doing the best for the kiddos.  All of the challenges are things I can play around with to try to work out.

How do you structure your math time? Have you figured out how to deal with any of my challenges?

Monday (Thursday) Made It Time Again

I can't believe I forgot about Tara's Monday Made It!  When I logged onto blogger Monday morning for my short burst of wake-up blog reading,  I was excited to see everyone's made its.  Ah, too bad I don't have a made it to post about my 5am brain said.

WHAT?

I have made so much in the first week of school!  It seems like every time I have a moment to breathe I'm making something!  I realized this after I got home.  My brain was apparently working better last night.

BUT ...

I didn't have any pictures.  So I'll take pictures tomorrow and post tomorrow night.

Tuesday night:  I forgot to take pictures.

Wednesday night: Took pictures but just too tired (didn't get home until 9:30!!!!).

So here I am now, somewhat awake, knowing that I have made things, and armed with pictures to prove it.

My Math Board

I'm trying Math Workshop this year.  My district is starting to heavily heavily suggest we do a Daily 5 type structure for math.  Since I'm just dipping into Daily 5 for reading this year, I don't feel ready to do it for math too.  When I read about the Math Workshop Rotations on Clutter-Free Classroom, I realized that would fit perfect!  I just changed my M from Math Facts to Mental Math.  Because of that change, I made my own board items instead of buying Clutter Free Classroom's.  Once I have a  few days of workshop under my belt, I'll post about that, but for now, here is my board:

The whole board.  The student's names are listed under their group in the blurred out area.

Close up of assignment part of board.

Close up of rotation schedule

Behavior Clip Chart

I'm trying out the ever-popular clip chart this year.  I'm not sure where I first heard this idea from (let me know if you know!), but here's my incentives:  Get to Excellent Effort, get a sticker on your clip.  Get 6 stickers on your clip, get a new, prettier clip.  Repeat until you get the gold sparkly clip.  They're into it, and it's been working great so far ... until today when I basically forgot it existed so the entire class was still on Ready to Learn at the end of the day, even though they were fantastic.  Oops!

I just printed black letters on white paper and then used scrapbook paper to make it colorful.  I laminated each one with a thin piece of cardboard behind it.

I'm excited the monthly Made-Its start next week.  With back to school night next Thursday, I know I'll be busy this weekend making more!

First Week of School

Wow! Two posts in two days!  I'm on fire after 3 weeks of no blogging. :)

We started school on Wednesday, so I've had three days with my kiddos.  They are still being perfect little angels, and, boy, am I enjoying it!  Aside from the fact that I have a TON of planning left to do to be ready for tomorrow, I'm excited for school.  That was rarely heard from me last year.

Some great things from my week:  (Sorry, no pictures of most of it ... I didn't take ANY with my kiddos this week!  I'm so beyond grumpy with myself for that!)

• Teambuilding.  My new principal supports us spending time team-building/building community in our classrooms even if it isn't content related!  Yay!  We did puzzles in groups (all 8 groups with the same puzzle.  Thanks Dollar Tree!) and Saving Fred.  Then we spent time talking about what worked well and what didn't.  Thanks for these ideas,  Lorraine at Fabulous Fourth Grade Froggies!  For those of you who don't know about Saving Fred, Fred is a not-so-smart worm (of the gummy variety) who went boating even though he doesn't know how to swim.  He brought a life preserver (gummy lifesaver), but wasn't wearing it when his boat capsized.  Now the life preserver is under the capsized boat and poor Fred is on top.  The students have to work in groups to save Fred ... BUT ... they can't touch Fred, his boat, or his life preserver with their hands.  They have to use paperclips only.  I had them use toothpicks instead because I don't want them to think there can ever be a undone paper clip in my classroom (I think I'm a bit neurotic about that, but my first lesson of my first student teaching placement had a opened up paper clip poking fight interrupt it, so I'm forever scarred).  It was an awesome way to end our first week of school!
• My Classroom Library.  I reorganized my classroom library big time this year.  Moving classrooms inspired me to take the time because the books got unorganized anyway during the move.  Gotta love little helpers.  I don't have a picture of my library from last year, but imagine two tall book cases (taller than many of my kiddos) jammed in a corner between cubbies and the door.  Imagine them jam-packed with books.  All you can see is the spine, which has the AR level taped to it.  They are organized by level.  Here is my library this year:

It looks so much more friendly.  Books organized by genre, author, and series.  You can see covers.  Every kiddo can reach every book!  I was happy with it before any of my students laid eyes on it, but their excitement confirmed mine.  We spent some parts of the morning gathered near the library (it's my whole group floor area too), which I know was a tease of the library for them.  After recess, we brainstormed how we choose books, and I introduced IPICK.  We went over library rules and being respectful of books.  They were practically drooling to look at books at this point.  I gave everyone an independent activity to do and then called small groups over to choose a book.  They were so excited for their turn and were hugging the books as they walked back to their desks.  All they wanted to do was read.  It was WONDERFUL.  Almost every student asked to take a book home to read.  I love the excitement over reading!

• My rainstick.  I got a rainstick during student teaching.  One of my professors ordered them in bulk and then sold them to us.  They were cheap because of buying in bulk, but they are really high quality.  For some reason, I never used it last year.  This year, it was my first attention getting method I taught the kiddos.  They are doing FANTASTIC with it!  The look so quickly every time and are completely silent!   When my new principal came in to introduce herself, they did it just as perfect as they had before, and she was impressed.  Nothing like having your kiddos impress the new principal during the first week of school!
• Privacy screens.  For state testing last year, I had a parent laminate file folders to make privacy screens (sorry no, pics, but it's two file folders end to end).  This year, I have them where the students can get them any time they want.  About half of my class has chosen to for every independent assignment we did this week.  They were silent while using them.  I'm hoping that will last!

I hope all of your first weeks went/go well!

My Classroom

Yikes!  It's been almost 3 weeks since my last post!  Since I got my classroom keys, I have been so focused on getting the room ready and going to my district professional developments.  But now I've survived the first three days, so I can take a breath.  Right?  

I've been so excited to share pictures of my room.  It is so different - more organized, brighter, more welcoming - than last year. My BTSA mentor was amazed when she walked in for the first time!  I just wanted to wait until it was "all done" to post about it. Silly me, I forgot our rooms are never all done - just done for now.  So yesterday afternoon, I finally took pictures of my room in its "done for now" state. (To be completely honest, there are a few corners I skipped because they don't even qualify as done for now).

Ok, enough with the rambling, here are some pictures!

View from the door.  The board with the pink boarder will be my science board, the board with the blue writing you can't read is my writing board, the map is for our culture project (I mentioned it here and will post more about it once this group of kiddos does it).  My desk is in the back right corner.  I didn't have a desk last year, and I'm not so sure how I feel about it yet.

View from my desk.

Right next to the door.  Social Studies board and We're So Proud board.  For We're So Proud, students choose assignments they want to put up.  More about that later.

Cubbies and we're so proud.  I love how nice and neat the cubbies are at the beginning of the year!

Classroom Library
I am so excited about how it turned out.  Last year, I had two tall book cases.  I arranged the books by AR level, spines facing out.  This library is so much more welcoming and easy to find interesting books!  The AR levels are still on the spines, so they can check that, but they are organized by genre/series/author.  In the bottom right, you can see my make-shift chart paper easel.  It's a bookcase for front facing books.  The chart paper is in it and then I used pushpins to hold the top to the wall.  It's working, but not great!

Math board and mailboxes that my mom's boyfriend refurbished from his work for me.  Sorting student work to hand back is going to be a breeze now!  There are 36 cubbies for my 32 students, so I'm using four of the boxes for extra copies of worksheets, newsletters, etc.  That way the paper passers don't have to hand them to me and the students they skipped accidentally don't have to ask me!

Right side of my whiteboard.  I'm really excited about my When You Finish Early list.  I have a bunch more options laminated and cut that I will slowly introduce.

Close up of my desk and student supply table.  My new turn in boxes are working great!  The black magazine holders on my desk are for all my copies.

Science board, computer area, birthday board (not done yet, but the border is super cute cupcakes!), and the edge of where students' writing will hang.

 Now I'm off to spend my Saturday at a professional development.  And I still have to plan for next week.  Busy busy weekend!

I hope you enjoyed seeing my room!

Edit:  I was just reminded of classroom pictures linky parties and blog hops from Fearless in Fifth's post.  So I'm linking up!  Head on over to these blogs to see some fabulous classrooms!