Welcome Back!

Ok ya'll I have worked my toosh off! My room is 'somewhat' done!!!! I truly think teaching is one of those professions that you are NEVER done. No matter how late you stay, how many hours ya put in on the weekend, you are.never.done!!! I have tons more to do in the room but honestly this is the most organized I have been ---EVER so, here's hoping for a great year! I met the parents of my sweet nuggets today, can I just tell ya, they are adorbs!  They were taking notes ya'll!!!  They were asking questions, they were even filling out the forms we told them to worry about later!  A bunch of over achievers, SIGN.ME. UP!   They even PILED my bins outside of room FULL of supplies! It was like freakin' Christmas! My team was a bit jealous! I gotta say, quite exciting when school hasn't even started and I am loaded with supplies and parents asking to help! Woot! Woot! 

If you don't put boxes out for Parent Night or your First Day of School - START!  The parents sort all the stuff for ya, then you can shove it into your closet/bathroom/shelf - or dare I say it, a cutie-patootie bin??  I'm KICKING myself for not taking an "after shot" of these boxes, they were OVERflowing, talk about this teacher being GIDDY! 

Here's a little glimpse of the hallway and entrance to my room! 

Cute, right?!?!? I didn't take a picture of the massive pile of junk under my desk - which I SAY I will get to "later."  We ALL know, that ain't happening!

Here's my back wall - it is a TON of Goodwill (I popped tags!) frames spray painted fun greens and blues.  We are putting the sweet nuggets work in those frames - cute, cheap and showcasing their work, YES PLEASE!  I bought Command photo holders to clip their work into - quick and WON'T fall of the wall (doesn't that drive you to drink make you crazy?)! Here's a link to the hooks I bought from Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/17505-Photo-Clips-With-Strips/dp/B002QR94XE/ref=sr_1_17?s=office-products&ie=UTF8&qid=1407207301&sr=1-17&keywords=3m+paper+clips

Here's some more glimpses of my room! 

Tomorrow is another packed day of meetings, then we get to meet our Sweet Nuggets on Wednesday!  When does your school start??

Top Ten Vegas Take Aways!

Hey ya'll!  I just got back from the I Teach K Conference in Vegas!  Mercy me,  I am EXHAUSTED!  Everyday I left the conferences my brain was MUSH, filled with such WONDERFUL ideas!  I thought I would share ten USEABLE take aways with ya!

 This sweet ladies website is here, ya'll check her out! I mean how adorbs????

I am SURE ya'll have heard of Cara Carroll, but if NOT, go visit her awesome blog.  I am telling you, she is preciousness packed in an itty bitty body!

Head over to my dear friend Greg Smedley's blog, The Kindergarten Smorgasboard to get this idea along with a TON more!

Amanda Bistline is gonna be one of my new blogs I stalk, her session was amazing!  I mean I was writing the WHOLE time!  The pool noodle number order is just one of the ideas I am stealing from her! 

Have ya'll heard of Peter Harry?? I am psyched I got to meet him!  His presentation was amazing, I am incorporating this idea along with a lot more! I will be referencing him more throughout my school year!  Here's his blog!

#7 (typo on my slide, there shouldn't be two #8s....I am too lazy  busy to fix it) and #8 come from Heidi Butkus, go grab you one of her CD's or DVD's, they are amaze-balls!  Here's her site!

How cute is this idea?!?!?  Katherine Pederson was amazing!  I thoroughly enjoyed her sessions!

Hello?  I am star struck, I met THE Deanna Jump, and honestly one of the sweetest people!  Love her!  Check her blog out!


I had an amazing time at the conferences, but my ALL time FAVORITE thing from all week is that my hubby was drug on stage during Zumanity Cirque du Soleil!  It was absolutely HILARIOUS!  My stomach STILL hurts from laughing so hard! 

Five Minutes in a Teacher's Head

I need to plan centers.  What should I plan? I should look on Pinterest.  Did I order laminating pouches?  I have a MASSIVE amount of laminating to do.  I have a mound of cutting out I need to do.  I need to call Johnny's parents to set up a conference.  That's not going to be fun.  I better get a good end of the year gift from them.  This calls for a stiff drink tonight.  My guided reading plans need to be beefed up.  Wonder what all those super star teachers do??  I am going to bloghop and find out.  I forgot to put my Science grades into gradespeed.  I should plan a field trip.  Oh wait, out district won't allow us to take field trips during testing.  I HATE testing.  I wish I could just TEACH!  No wonder my kids behavior hasn't been that great.  I have been sitting over at a table testing one kid at a time.  Why do we test all the time anyway?  It's a bunch of data we don't do anything with.  What does it prove?  Why am I being evaluated on my students scores?? That is really dumb.   I need to get more words up on my word wall.  I need to post my standards.  I need to get my students work up on the wall.  I have to send home all my kids work.  I need to print out a new calendar.  I really should drink more water.  Oh I can't, that would make me have to pee. I can't pee during the school day.  I should buy more clip art.  And fonts.  I love fonts.  And units.  And centers.  My hubby put me on a tPt freeze this month.  Have I made any money??  My kids love my stations.  It's all worth it.  I need to laminate.  I need to be cutting stuff out.  I wish I could get my classroom library organized.  OH!  I should buy bins!  I love bins!  Target has bins.  And that Dollar Spot.  And colorful pens.  I love colorful pens.  Maybe colorful pens will help with my lesson planning!  EEK! I haven't had anytime to plan!  I need to get on Pinterest.  I love Pinterest.  I need to differentiate.  Sarah is too smart, I need to meet her needs.  I need time to meet with just her.  How?? I have all these kids below benchmark.  Where does the time go?  Did I eat lunch today?  I am tired.  Have I had any planning time this week?  NO!  I have been in meeting after meeting after meeting.  That is SO annoying.  None of these meetings help me with TEACHING.  I wish I could just TEACH!  I wish Eric would stop blurting out.  Maybe I should make a "Blurt Chart" like I have seen on Pinterest.  Oh I love Pinterest.  I love Post Its.  I need Post Its.  Target has Post Its!  I should make a list.  I have got to get started on my report cards.  Do my parents even LOOK at the report cards?  Do they even understand them?  Maybe I should do a workshop on how to understand the report cards.  I wonder if people would come. I could provide snacks.  If you provide snacks they will come.  I will look on Pinterest.  I bet my team would help.  I wish we had funding for the workshop.  What's another $10?  Will my husband speak to me if I plan this?  That's ANOTHER night away from home and money out of our pocket.  We need a date night.  I'm tired.  So tired.  Poor little Sam seems to be really tired lately.  I should contact his parents to see what time he goes to bed.  I need to add that to my list.  I need a list.  Why does my list keep getting longer?  I feel overwhelmed and unorganized.  I should look on Pinterest for organizing ideas.......

Eric Carle Extravaganza!

First off, Happy Mother's Day to all you Mommas!  I am telling ya what, being a Momma is exhausting & exhilarating, energizing & depleting, emotional & aggravating.  It is positively THE best, most toughest, most rewarding, and biggest blessing of my life!

Before I begin my "Peek at my Week," I have to say that we begin DIBELS, our program practice (YAY!) and our end of the year Fountas and Pinnell running records/reading assessments.  SO, we are doing a ton of what I call, "productive busy work."  We need our students independentally working for longer than normal in order for testing to be completed.  I SO wish we could get a sub for a half day to knock it all out and move on to teaching, but that's a whole other ball of wax.....

So, onto my week!

Monday in Math we are continuing with place value, math fluency and a review of addition and subtraction.  We will be testing the sweet nuggets every day on their fluency with these awesome tests made by my good buddy, Kindergarten Smorgasboard!  I have been doing these for the past couple of weeks, my kids LOVE it!  I put an online timer on the projector, I think they feel like they are big kids!  I have noticed a ton of growth, these tests truly take the guesswork out of who "gets it" and who is struggling!  I plan on doing these MUCH earlier next year with my students!  Seriously ya'll, BUY this!  Best $6 I have spent for true formative and summative assessments! 

In Reading we will read The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle.  This is one of my favorite Eric Carle books!  We will discuss the beginning, middle and end of the story.  I made this for my graphic organizer, I mean, seriously, TOO CUTE! 

The students will then make their own caterpillar using a freebie from my store!

On Tuesday we will do our "Flash" math fact fluency tests.  We will put the numbers 1-20 in order using this FREEBIE from The Bubbly Blonde! 

In Reading the sweet nuggets will sequence The Very Hungry Caterpillar by making this caterpillar! 


I found the pictures of for sequencing here.





On Wednesday we will continue our fluency "Flash" tests and then review subtraction from 10 using gloves, similar to this activity! 

 

 The sweet nuggets will use a math subtraction sheet to assessment purposes from this spectacular unit!  Go check it out!  I am in LOVE with everything in this packet!  I love that it is all interactive!

In Reading we will move onto The Grouchy Ladybug by Eric Carle.  We will talk about the sequence of the story using what the grouchy ladybug did in the morning, afternoon and night.  The fantabulous site, Golden Gang Kindergarten offers this free download to help the sweet nuggets organize their ideas!  We will also make a ladybug and write what makes us grouchy!  Too cute! Here's the Golden Gang Kindergarten grouchy ladybug craftivity that my sweet nuggets will be  doing!


 On Thursday we will continue with our "Flash" math fluency test and we will do a math review page from the Subtraction Fun, by From the Pond. 

In Reading, we will read The Very Lonely Firefly we will make a big story map of the book and then listen to a myon story about fireflies and we will all make a firefly and pick one fact to write about it!  These ideas came from Mrs. Plant's Press, go check her out!




On Friday we are going to the Nashville Zoo for a field trip!  It is going to be a great week!

If you give a.........teacher muscle relaxers

I thought I was never going to get out of bed.  Seriously ya'll, I could NOT move last night. My neck was KILLING me!  It has been for three days now, I went to the doctor today and she asked if I was under stress...HA! Me, a Kindergarten teacher with three boys under the age of 7, nah, no stress here.  Really, I am having muscle spasms in my neck down my should blade and back, this is miserable. On the BRIGHT side, I got muscle relaxers, which I am going to take tonight.  Maybe I will get some SLEEP! I figured I better get this blog post out BEFORE the muscle relaxers so I make a little sense. 

So here it goes! A Peek at My Week: 


Laura Numeroff (if you didn't catch that from the title post) and we are continuing on with those Tricky Teens/Place Value.

On Monday in Math I made a little review game for the Sweet Nuggets. You can get that FOR FREE here!
 

 In Reading we will be reading If You Give a Mouse a Cookie and discussing Circle Stories.  I found cute sequence pictures here (for FREE, score!!!!) that I am going to use to show the kiddo's the sequence of the story going in a circle, like this idea I found on Pinterest:
 We are then going to talk about Cause and Effect, I made an anchor chart that you can get the font/border from my tPt store!  I am going to use the pictures from the circle story illustration to show the cause and effect relationship within this story.  The students are then going to make their OWN cause and effect using the pictures from the story. 

On Tuesday we are continuing with those Tricky Teens, I found this wonderful idea from Keepin' it Krazy with Mrs. Berns in Kinder and knew I just had to have it!  Go check it out! 









In Reading we are going to read If you Give a Pig a Pancake!  Love this story! Just like Monday, we will make the circle story using sequence pictures and make a Pig Craftivity!  The example shows the writing to be If you give a Pig __________, I am changing it to have a "Cause" in one hand and the "Effect" in the other!  ADORBS!  Go check this blog out and snag this freebie!




On Wednesday we will do a little Rainbow Math!  We will start by reading the story A Rainbow of My Own.  Then I will pass out rainbow patterns to each of my sweet nuggets, toss markers their way and I am a SUPERSTAR!  I will give them 4/5 minutes to color and then pass out base ten blocks to get our "Math on!"  This wonderful blogger, Kroger's Kindergarten posted this Freebie and I knew I had to do it!  Talk about hands on!  Love it!  AND it is already differentiated for me!  Woot!  AND it has a record sheet that I can grade!  DOUBLE WOOT!  Seriously ya'll, go check this blog out, you will find some gems, including this one!



In Reading we will read If you Give a Cat a Cupcake and "circle" sequence the story using the pictures I found at Fairy Tales and Fiction by 2.     We will then make our OWN cupcake using shaving cream, yep, SHAVING cream!  I love me some messes, and to top it off, it makes the whole room smell good!  Anyway, mix up some shaving cream, glue and your fave color food coloring and voila you have a puffy cupcake picture! 
 


I found this cutie patootie cupcake from here. I just put it into powerpoint, made it as BIG as it could get to fit onto a piece of paper.  We will "Shaving cream paint" it and then put the pictures of the story in sequence around it!  Messy?  Yes!  Fun?  Yes!  Based on standards?  OF COURSE! 
We will also write about what happened First, Next and Last in the story using this FREEBIE from Rulin' the Roost!  



On Thursday we are going to do a "Grab Bag" of Teens!  I saw this on Pinterest and I thought, sheer BRILLIANCE!  This will be super fun! This activity came from Froggy Friends Fun!
 
I will make ten bags with different amounts of various objects.  I will partner my sweet nuggets up (above average student with an average/below average student) to do this activity.  The students will take the objects out of the bag, place on the tens frame until it is all full and the "leftovers" will be put below.  The students will write down how many objects are in the bag total.  The above average kids will have to write 10 + 5 = 15, my average/below average kids will simply write the total amount. 

In Reading we will read If you Give a Moose a Muffin and make this adorable craft from my good pal Kindergarten Smorgasboard!  On the back of this moose, we will add causes and effects of the story.  We will also complete a venn diagram comparing this story to If you Give a Cat a Cupcake.

On Friday we are having Muffins with Mommies!!!!  This is always a special day for the Moms and kids! I love it!  As a Mommy myself, I get all choked up around Mother's Day.  Kids grow up too fast.  Guess the saying, "Time flies when you are having fun" is true!

In Reading on Friday we will make our very OWN circle story!!!  I found this cute idea from Mrs. Bumgardner's 1st Grade Class  Blog.  What a PERFECT way to end the week! 

Tricky Teens and the Rainforest

A Peek at Next Week

Next week we are continuing rainforest research and in math we are heading into the Tricky Teens!  Here's what I have planned:

Monday
In Math, we are introducing place value using pool noodles!! I cut a pool noodle in half and cut half of the half into 9 parts.  Instant ten rod and ones!  Woo hoo!  We will model how to make various numbers using the pool noodles.  The students will use these awesome FREE mats and pretzel rods and marshmallows to model the number.

In Reading, we will be studying the canopy layer of the rainforest.  We will begin by reading The Umbrella by Jan Brett. We will act out the story using masks printed from Jan Brett's website and a green umbrella. 

We will talk about what types of animals live in this layer, including my favorite the SLOTH!  We are going to make this sloth: 

Cute, right??!?!  This craft came from Tippytoe Crafts!  I love that it uses my sweet nuggets shoe as it's body! 

Tuesday we are continuing with place value!  While trolling Pinterest, I found this wonderful idea! ALL Aboard!  These ideas came from Learning with Mrs. Parker!  Love her blog! If you go to her site, you will be able to download a workmat for all your sweet nuggets to use while you model!  Perfection!

In Reading, we will move to the Understory Layer of the Rainforest.  We will discuss all the animals that live in the understory and make a red eyed tree frog!  We will be writing three facts about this amazing frog!

On Wednesday in Math we will be making paper chains to represent the Tricky Teens! 

In Reading, we will discuss the Forest Floor layer of the rainforest.  The students will be making a piranha. I got the pattern from this unit I bought off of tPt:   Rainforest Learning Adventure.

On Thursday, we are going to use bean sticks and beans to represent tens and ones. I am going to use the FREE mat and practice pages I found on one of my favorite sites, Kindergarten Crayons!  

In Reading, we are doing a review of ALL of the layers of the rainforest and making these adorable safari people!

On Friday in Math, we will play Roll it! Make it!  Expand It!  According to common core, Kindergarten only needs to know place value up to 19, so one of my cubes will be just the numbers 0 and 1 and the other will be a ten sided dice.  We will also use this FREEBIE as an assessment!

In Reading, we will continue making our safari guide books/people!  We will also make our very own safari hats!


It's going to be a FUN week!  We are also doing our Mother's Day crafts, but that is a SECRET!  SHHH!

What's on your plate this week??