Small Valentine's Mailbox

This week was a very short week, but I had no time to blog... once again! I need to make a time schedule for myself to be able to fit everything in. :-) Like I promised though, here is another one of my craftivities that you can find in my Owl You Need is Love file.

If you would like the template fort his craftivity and 3 more, you can find it in my file over at TPT just by clicking the picture. This file also includes letter templates and envelopes that are owl themed.

Groundhog's Day Freebie

Groundhog's Day is coming up next week and I will be talking about it next week. I've found a few cute activities that I am planning on doing with my students, but none of them had any facts about groundhogs. I went ahead and made my own little groundhog informational booklet for my students. I am giving it away as a freebie. Click on the picture to get the file for free. If you end up using it your class, let me know how you and your students like it.

 

I am linking this post over at Friday Freebies!

 

Large Valentine's Day Mailbox

Well, the 100th day is over and it turns out that 6 of my students were absent! I guess that's what happens when cold and flu season comes around. Good news for my sub!! Jury duty came and went. I was out by 11:00 because the trial was 3 weeks long and I definitely couldn't be out for that long. Luckily, the judge agreed. Yesterday I promised that I would be back with a how to video of one of the four craftivities that you can use in your own classroom. 

Today's project is a Valentine's Day Mailbox. I wrapped a cereal box in butcher paper and then I completed the craftivity around it.

You can find the template to this activity, as well as three others in my newest file on TPT. Click on the photo to go directly to the link.

Also, this file will be 20% off until the end of today!

Owl You Need is Love

It feels like Sunday, even though it is Monday. I love 3 day weekends. Tomorrow is the 100th day of school and where will I be? I won't be at school if that's what you were thinking. I have jury duty!! Seriously?! Why do they call teachers in during the school year? I know that many people have excuses, but I really wouldn't mind going during summer break. Just getting out of the house is a relief in the summer. Oh well. I left some fun 100th day activities for my students to do while I'm gone. I figured I would recap last week before I get too far into this week.

Last week started with duty. I had duty all week, morning and afternoon. It was the coldest week of the year. No I take that back, it was the coldest week in 30 years. It was in the mid 20's last week. This week it is in the high 40s in the morning. I wish this week was duty week. :-)

 This is cheating a little. I didn't do this last week, I did it the week before. I didn't get pictures until last week so does that count? I have two HUGE windows in my room and I love using it as an extra display. I'm in an outdoor school so it's like I have my own little display cases. This activity is from A Cupcake for the Teacher.

 We have been working on fractions for a while. I do Saxon Math so we are always spiraling. We have done a ton of fraction activities, but Amy Lemons' pizza was by far their favorite.

 I bought myself a new camera. It's the Canon Rebel T4i. I love it so much. I've seen a ton of people on YouTube using it as well as other bloggers.I've always heard great things about Rebels, but I never wanted to spend the money. After my friend got one though and I was able to use it myself, I knew I had to have one. Here is a picture of my adorable little wiener dog (Dachshund) Pippin!

 

You guys want to hear something crazy? My husband and I were getting food from our local Mexican restaurant (my favorite food ever!) My husband saw something and he thought it was a bat or something very strange looking. We pulled up closer and it was an owl! I was so excited. Owls are one of my favorite animals and I was freaking out! It looked at us and I scrambled to get my camera out. I was lucky to get this shot because some guy scared it away. I will never forget those sweet little eyes.

 Speaking of owls...I have been working on a new file for the past couple weeks. I am so excited to be finished with it and be able to share it with you.

 I love owls and I love Valentine's Day. It's probably one of my favorite holidays. There is so much pink, purple, candy, and love all around. I can't help but be happy on Valentine's Day. Also, The Beatles are my favorite band of all time. No joke! I can't express how much I love them, especially George Harrison. :-) They were a major inspiration for the name of this file.

Click HERE to purchase on TPT.

This file comes with so much. There are four crafts included as well as letter and writing templates. I will be showcasing a new craft each day this week including a how to video on each one. You will not want to miss out! For the early birds I am having a sale. You can pick this file up for 20% until the end of tomorrow.  I hope you enjoy!!!

I'm linking up over at...

Before Pictures

Many people that walk into my classroom think that it is such a clean and organized room. Clean... yes. Organized... NO WAY!!

Here is what everyone sees my classroom as...

I love my room and I spent a lot of time rearranging it to make it fit my needs as well as my students' needs. It is a very functional classroom, aside from the organizational piece that is missing. Today I am going to share with you my "secrets". Are you ready for them? I must say that they aren't pretty. Be warned, you are about to see my BEFORE photos. 

 This area looks fairly organized, except for the fact that I don't use ANY of it. I ocassionally lift up the fabric to get the students' reading books and a binder here and there, but other than that, these shelves are taking up prime real estate. 

 One of my few cabinets that lock is filled with supplies that don't need to be locked up.

 Math centers that have never been used because I still have no clue how I want to organize them. Without organization I'm afraid they will turn into a complete mess so instead they just sit in the corner.

 Movies that I hardly ever watch with my class (maybe three a year) as well as old journals and folders.

 Two drawers that are my "junk" drawers. I know houses have junk drawers, but a classroom... really!?

 My math cabinets. Surprisingly, this is pretty nice compared to what it used to be.

 Under the sink, don't get me started. :-/

 My main source of supplies, all crammed into four small drawers.

 Two cabinets that house extra books or materials that aren't used.

 A bookshelf that I bought to solve the issue of limited space. I love how everything is stored away, but I hate the fact that I would like these things locked up since Lakeshore stuff is so pricey!!

 My desk. I try to have a little organization system in place. I think I outgrew it already.

 Yet again, another locking cabinet that houses materials that don't need to be locked up.

 My teaching easel on a good day. By Friday it's packed and today is only Monday.

I hope I didn't scare you with all of my disorganization. I know it isn't too bad, but to me I find myself wasting more time trying to find things then actually teaching. If I had an organizational system in place, it would make my life so much easier. Not to mentioned I would never loose anything again... maybe.

I'm linking up over at Clutter Free Classroom. You can follow my process of organizing my classroom as well as play along with us. Check back later in the week when I do challenge #2, planning.

Weekly Recap

As I mentioned yesterday, a lot happened this week that I wanted to post about. I figured I would just do a weekly recap of how our week went.

 We started the week of like most teachers did, with penguins. We will be continuing with penguins next week before we move onto Arctic animals.

 

We had fun with some other birds as well, Angry Birds!! My students loved this writing project/craftivity. I had them describe what their Angry Bird looked like, why they were angry, and how to make their Angry Bird happy again. Some of their stories were really cute. You can find a link to the craftivity HERE.

  

My students started working with geoboards this week. Look how well they work together and help one another! I have the sweetest class ever (in my opinion ^_^ )

 We also started reading Scholastic News, another Donors Choose project. The students are enjoying Scholastic News so much. I can't believe I have waited this long to get it for my students.

We ended the week with yet again another Donors Choose project. As you can see on the right we got 9 puzzles as well as some picture books. I wanted a quick and easy way to do Fun Friday because I am not a huge fan of Fun Friday. I love giving my students time to have fun and I like the little down time I'm able to get to clean my room before the weekend. Puzzles were the perfect thing. I already had one box bent, so I'm going to have to find an even easier storage option for these puzzles.

I'm linking up over at a few places this week...

AND...

iPads in the Classroom

It's Friday night and boy am I tired. I'm writing this post as I eagerly wait for the pizza delivery guy to ring the doorbell. It's a pizza, movie, and pajama kind of night. I deserve it though because it was the first week back. I meant to write a post earlier in the week, I really did. As you guys know, I love DonorsChoose.org It has saved me so much money over my 5 years of teaching so far. I have received resources I would have never been able to afford on my own. Over the winter break I got eight projects funded!! I will be posting more about each one as they come. I want to share the most exciting one with you.

 An iPad 4!!! Well, I'm not sure if it's an iPad 4, but it's a 4th generation iPad and I love it. We already have three iPads in our classroom, but they have to be turned in at the end of the year. I was sad to find out that iPad 1's do not have the capability to connect to projectors so that's when I decided to ask Donors Choose for one. I love the fact that I have an iPad that I can use for instructional purposes and I can now allow my little darlings three iPads to use instead of just two. Update, this year we don't have any class iPads. Thanks to Donors Choose, by future students can still benefit from having technology in the classroom. 

Have you used iPads in your classroom? If so, what apps do you recommend; either for the class, planning, scheduling, anything you find most useful.

I also wanted to let you all know of an exciting giveaway over at Rockin' Teacher Materials. It's completely grade level appropriate. You get a chance to win a flash drive filled with resources specifically for your grade. I have donated a few resources of my own. For more information visit the link below.