Freshening up my Bulletin Boards

I am so sorry that I have all but entirely disappeared! James and I are headed to England in a few days (our first real trip!) and I have been up to my ears in trip plans, not to mention sub plans... 

Things have been crazy daisy around here and I do not have a fabulously exciting blog post of incredible and inspiring teaching ideas.  Sorry.  I do, however, have some inspiring new bulletin boards up!  A little while ago sweet Heather from Creative Teaching Press offered to let me try out some of their brand new classroom decor items!  

I was THRILLED to receive this package. Have you seen all of their adorable new stuff?  I can hardly wait to use it in my classroom next year!  In fact, I couldn't wait and I decided to freshen up a few of my existing bulletin boards.  It was like the spring cleaning of bulletin boards.  And it felt great!  The peppy colors and patterns make me smile whenever I look at them.  Take a look! By the way, forgive the darkish quality of these late-night phone pics...I am hoping for a new camera any day!

This is my multi-purpose board used to display whatever we don't have space for elsewhere in the room.  Aren't those spring cut-outs so fun?

I love these chevron letters and I used them throughout the room to label the boards.

 This lime green chevron is probably my favorite of the Creative Teaching Press borders!

I love the Dots on Turquoise!  Reading Strategies here.

My Math Wall definitely needed a facelift.  We just began our unit on measurement and will use this board to display anchor charts, vocabulary words, and whatever else we may need to display and remember.

There you have it!  I hope to post one more time before I head off on my first real adventures.  Be on the lookout for the The April Packet and an exciting announcement!  Have a great night!

1

Freshening up my Bulletin Boards

I am so sorry that I have all but entirely disappeared! James and I are headed to England in a few days (our first real trip!) and I have been up to my ears in trip plans, not to mention sub plans... 

Things have been crazy daisy around here and I do not have a fabulously exciting blog post of incredible and inspiring teaching ideas.  Sorry.  I do, however, have some inspiring new bulletin boards up!  A little while ago sweet Heather from Creative Teaching Press offered to let me try out some of their brand new classroom decor items!  

I was THRILLED to receive this package. Have you seen all of their adorable new stuff?  I can hardly wait to use it in my classroom next year!  In fact, I couldn't wait and I decided to freshen up a few of my existing bulletin boards.  It was like the spring cleaning of bulletin boards.  And it felt great!  The peppy colors and patterns make me smile whenever I look at them.  Take a look! By the way, forgive the darkish quality of these late-night phone pics...I am hoping for a new camera any day!

This is my multi-purpose board used to display whatever we don't have space for elsewhere in the room.  Aren't those spring cut-outs so fun?

I love these chevron letters and I used them throughout the room to label the boards.

 This lime green chevron is probably my favorite of the Creative Teaching Press borders!

I love the Dots on Turquoise!  Reading Strategies here.

My Math Wall definitely needed a facelift.  We just began our unit on measurement and will use this board to display anchor charts, vocabulary words, and whatever else we may need to display and remember.

There you have it!  I hope to post one more time before I head off on my first real adventures.  Be on the lookout for the The April Packet and an exciting announcement!  Have a great night!

1

Management, Crayons, and some Freebies!

Our second week in first grade has come and gone and I have to tell you I cannot be more thankful that it has ended with a 3 day weekend!  Labor Day always has good timing.

This week we practiced, reinforced, and practiced a bit more all of the good habits that we learned in our first week.  In my class I present my expectations not as rules, but as "good habits".  We chat about good habits (saying please and thank you!) versus bad habits (picking your nose...) and what kinds of habits we should form in the first grade.  Our habits include hallway behavior, carpet behavior, following the attention signal, and moderating voice levels.  

Together we do a looks like/sounds like chart for each habit (I taught one each of the first 4 days of school).  I model the habit, then I have a small group of students model the habit, and then I have the entire class try it out, all the while I am praising and reinforcing like crazy.  If I feel like they can handle it we even model a non-example, which they always think is wildly funny.  We hang up our charts by the door and reference them often!

This has worked like a charm for me and I know my students know exactly what I expect of them throughout the day!  Hurray for a beautiful management start to our year!  That is certainly an answer to many prayers!

In other news, I made these cute little crayon cans to help with the crazy crayon chaos that is first grade.  Starting day one there were lost crayons on the floor, someone couldn't find their pink (and was pretty sure it was a life and death situation!), etc. So, I decided to end all of our suffering.  I put these little crayon cans up next to my pencil buckets and student supply area and it has been such a beautiful thing!

And super easy.  Grab a bunch of 8 oz. cans of tomato sauce and some pretty papers and you are good to go.  I just cut the paper to size, and wrapped/glued it around the can.  I pasted on my own little labels, which you can grab here if you like.  Also, wanting them to be especially sturdy, I wrapped my cans with packing tape to give them that protective laminated effect.  These have worked out great!

Another little bright spot of my week was when this baby was delivered to my classroom.  

It came in a big mysterious bag during our math workshop and the kids, for whatever reason, were so excited.  But not as excited as teacher!  This is the best pencil sharpener of my life.  It sharpens so very quickly (like 2.8 seconds) and it is so so quiet.  It also has a little light that comes on when the pencil is satisfactorily sharpened, which is very handy for when I let a few students sharpen pencils at the end of the day.  You know how they always seem to jam and crank the pencils into the little hole like there is no tomorrow?  Problem solved!  My pencil sharpener came from office depot, {here}.

To go with our fancy new pencil sharpener I created these little sharp/dull labels.  I just slapped them on some of those little buckets you can find anywhere (like Target of course) and we are good to go!  Click on the picture below or right here for these little labels!

Life in first grade is good.  This weekend I have been working hard to take a mental break from things and I feel better equipped to tackle next week and this next month!  I love September and I'm really counting on it to be a beautiful month!  Here is my September Currently.

Have an amazing Labor Day!

9

Management, Crayons, and some Freebies!

Our second week in first grade has come and gone and I have to tell you I cannot be more thankful that it has ended with a 3 day weekend!  Labor Day always has good timing.

This week we practiced, reinforced, and practiced a bit more all of the good habits that we learned in our first week.  In my class I present my expectations not as rules, but as "good habits".  We chat about good habits (saying please and thank you!) versus bad habits (picking your nose...) and what kinds of habits we should form in the first grade.  Our habits include hallway behavior, carpet behavior, following the attention signal, and moderating voice levels.  

Together we do a looks like/sounds like chart for each habit (I taught one each of the first 4 days of school).  I model the habit, then I have a small group of students model the habit, and then I have the entire class try it out, all the while I am praising and reinforcing like crazy.  If I feel like they can handle it we even model a non-example, which they always think is wildly funny.  We hang up our charts by the door and reference them often!

This has worked like a charm for me and I know my students know exactly what I expect of them throughout the day!  Hurray for a beautiful management start to our year!  That is certainly an answer to many prayers!

In other news, I made these cute little crayon cans to help with the crazy crayon chaos that is first grade.  Starting day one there were lost crayons on the floor, someone couldn't find their pink (and was pretty sure it was a life and death situation!), etc. So, I decided to end all of our suffering.  I put these little crayon cans up next to my pencil buckets and student supply area and it has been such a beautiful thing!

And super easy.  Grab a bunch of 8 oz. cans of tomato sauce and some pretty papers and you are good to go.  I just cut the paper to size, and wrapped/glued it around the can.  I pasted on my own little labels, which you can grab here if you like.  Also, wanting them to be especially sturdy, I wrapped my cans with packing tape to give them that protective laminated effect.  These have worked out great!

Another little bright spot of my week was when this baby was delivered to my classroom.  

It came in a big mysterious bag during our math workshop and the kids, for whatever reason, were so excited.  But not as excited as teacher!  This is the best pencil sharpener of my life.  It sharpens so very quickly (like 2.8 seconds) and it is so so quiet.  It also has a little light that comes on when the pencil is satisfactorily sharpened, which is very handy for when I let a few students sharpen pencils at the end of the day.  You know how they always seem to jam and crank the pencils into the little hole like there is no tomorrow?  Problem solved!  My pencil sharpener came from office depot, {here}.

To go with our fancy new pencil sharpener I created these little sharp/dull labels.  I just slapped them on some of those little buckets you can find anywhere (like Target of course) and we are good to go!  Click on the picture below or right here for these little labels!

Life in first grade is good.  This weekend I have been working hard to take a mental break from things and I feel better equipped to tackle next week and this next month!  I love September and I'm really counting on it to be a beautiful month!  Here is my September Currently.

Have an amazing Labor Day!

12

First Week!

My goodness!  I apologize for all but disappearing for awhile there.  You may have heard that it is back to school season...

We had our first day on Tuesday and gosh, it has been an amazingly exciting AND exhausting experience.   My new little friends are adorable and eager to learn!  They are also very naive and clueless as to what we do at school, so this week was spent teaching, reinforcing, and reteaching first grade routines and habits.  I put a lot of planning into this and it is turning out so very well.  Thank goodness my summer nightmares of classroom chaos haven't come true yet.

 On the first day my school had a little photo op. out front.  It was kind of really awesome.  And kind of really awkward.  Not knowing what to do with my hands, this is me awkwardly holding Oliver Twist... 

Anywho, I'm feeling pretty good about life so far.  As to my classroom, it is turning out pretty well although I do have a few loose ends to tie up here and there.  I probably always will.  There is always something to improve, but for the most part I'm loving the functionality of my room this year.  I looked at 14 trillion Pinterest pictures and about that many teacher blogs to figure out what elements I wanted in my calendar area.  

I also knew that I needed to make my personal teacher space as functional and as comfortable and as true-to-Bethany as possible.  So here it is.

This right here is my favorite little corner of my room.  It is a little bit of home for me.  A cozy lamp from Target {here}, a picture of my dear husband, Yankee fragrance spheres {here}, my favorite lotions EVER {here}, my reminder to keep calm and sane and that it is not the end of the world {here}, and of course some Cherry Coke.  

I was a pretty extensive planner this summer, but I could never quite decide on a classroom job chart that I loved and that would work perfectly for my room.  Yesterday I realized I'd better get that up in my room soon or I would loose order (and sanity) very quickly.  So I got out my jumbo glue stick and threw one together.  Easy. 

I got a white poster, some little crayon die cuts from Walmart, these cute little pockets {here} and a sharpie.  

Piece of cake. Click here for my "Class Jobs" header, if you're interested.

Alrightsy, there is a tiny glimpse into my classroom this week.  Hopefully I can tie up my loose ends soon and post more pictures!  Until then, have a beautiful and most relaxing weekend!

0

First Week!

My goodness!  I apologize for all but disappearing for awhile there.  You may have heard that it is back to school season...

We had our first day on Tuesday and gosh, it has been an amazingly exciting AND exhausting experience.   My new little friends are adorable and eager to learn!  They are also very naive and clueless as to what we do at school, so this week was spent teaching, reinforcing, and reteaching first grade routines and habits.  I put a lot of planning into this and it is turning out so very well.  Thank goodness my summer nightmares of classroom chaos haven't come true yet.

 On the first day my school had a little photo op. out front.  It was kind of really awesome.  And kind of really awkward.  Not knowing what to do with my hands, this is me awkwardly holding Oliver Twist... 

Anywho, I'm feeling pretty good about life so far.  As to my classroom, it is turning out pretty well although I do have a few loose ends to tie up here and there.  I probably always will.  There is always something to improve, but for the most part I'm loving the functionality of my room this year.  I looked at 14 trillion Pinterest pictures and about that many teacher blogs to figure out what elements I wanted in my calendar area.  

I also knew that I needed to make my personal teacher space as functional and as comfortable and as true-to-Bethany as possible.  So here it is.

This right here is my favorite little corner of my room.  It is a little bit of home for me.  A cozy lamp from Target {here}, a picture of my dear husband, Yankee fragrance spheres {here}, my favorite lotions EVER {here}, my reminder to keep calm and sane and that it is not the end of the world {here}, and of course some Cherry Coke.  

I was a pretty extensive planner this summer, but I could never quite decide on a classroom job chart that I loved and that would work perfectly for my room.  Yesterday I realized I'd better get that up in my room soon or I would loose order (and sanity) very quickly.  So I got out my jumbo glue stick and threw one together.  Easy. 

I got a white poster, some little crayon die cuts from Walmart, these cute little pockets {here} and a sharpie.  

Piece of cake. Click here for my "Class Jobs" header, if you're interested.

Alrightsy, there is a tiny glimpse into my classroom this week.  Hopefully I can tie up my loose ends soon and post more pictures!  Until then, have a beautiful and most relaxing weekend!

0

My Classrooms and Alphabet Posters

(more on this in a minute!)

I feel a great excitement at the prospect of a new school year!  I also feel a great overwhelming wave of fear and anxiety and stress, but for now I'm going to focus on the excitement!  

I've been looking back at photos of my classroom over my two years and the all-prepped-and-waiting-for-the-cute-firsties look of a classroom has been giving me those butterflies again.  I cannot help but reflect on the good, the bad, and the ugly of my first two years and know that I am making little steps each time.  This will be my third year.  Third time's a charm, right?

Year One.

Year Two.  (I moved across the hall after my first year so the room's layout is opposite.)

Year Three?  Who knows what is coming!?  But the little part of me that is not absolutely trembling with fear (have I told you I'm a worrier?) is so very excited to meet my new sweet friends.  

3 weeks!

By the way, I feel like my classroom improved from one year to the next, even if it was just a tiny bit.  I knew what worked for me and my students and I knew how to make things a little more functional.  Now, with my recent discovery of teaching blogs and TPT (huzzah!), I am hopefully also able to make things a little bit cuter.  I am going to reason that this is totally important as well because we all have to spend a whole bunch of time together in this room and it might as well be happy and pleasant!

I made a new set of alphabet posters to help in my decorating goal.  They feature chalkboard, polka dots, and happy rainbow colors and can be used in a variety of ways!  Stick up in front of your room, use them on the word wall, or even use them as flash cards.  

When you display them in a line you will see a rainbow of colors!

   

    

Click on any of the pictures above or right here.

Have a lovely evening!

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