Student Letters

We just started our second week and luckily they hired a new teacher! That means that instead of 28 students I have 22 (good for having less students but I had kind of gotten attached to my little ones that left). I have been working on independent reading with my students for the last week. My students come in first thing in the morning and read (Thank you Tara from 4th Grade Frolics!). 

On Friday I had my students write letters to me about what they were reading a la The Book Whisperer. I modeled a letter and showed them how I wanted to hear their inner voice, not the plot. Then, I set them free to write the letter. Here is one...

Then, this weekend I wrote the students back in their reading notebook. Here is what I wrote to this student...

Some of my students DID write about the plot even though I had modeled writing about the inner thinking. Here is what one student wrote along with what I wrote back...

In each letter I tried to encourage the students and compliment them on what they are doing well, and what they can improve on. The students LOVED that I wrote them a letter back and we get to practice our writing skills!

Pin It Now!

First Days of School and an Anchor Chart!

Oh blogging, how I have missed thee! Even though it has only been about a week, I have missed blogging and blogstalking! I am almost through with the first week of school with my 25 new students and I FINALLY am starting to feel like I am treading water (not drowning). This week has been SO busy and I am actually sore from how much walking (and running) I have been doing around the school.
My students are just awesome and I am already loving how the school year is going! We have been VERY busy talking about listening to your inner voice when you are reading and what that inner voice is saying. Today, we talked specifically about listening to our inner voice when we come to a word we don't know. Here is the anchor chart my students created:

I loved their thoughts! I especially love that yesterday we were discussing making connections and using a dictionary and both popped up in their conversation! Super proud teacher alert :) More to come later! Pin It Now!

Monday and Made It and Back at Work!

Well, today marks my first official workday back at school! Bring on the coffee! Only four days until I get to meet my new students at Meet the Teacher! I am so excited (and nervous). 
Once again, I am linking up with Tara at 4th Grade Frolics for Monday Made It! This week I have two made its. The first I are my take on bathroom passes:

I got these cute printouts for FREE from Elizabeth over at Fun in Room 4B. I know lots of people have placed these on hand sanitizer, but we already have hand sanitizer in the room mounted on the wall. I still wanted to use these for students to place on their desk when they go to the bathroom. That way I will have a physical reminder where they are and how long they have been gone. So, I took large binder clips as the base and hot glued the passes to them. Then (to cover up the ugly hot glue mess I made) I added the ribbon. I think the boy's pass looks kindof like a tie :)
I also decided to make a few anchor charts this week:

I was inspired by the scientist anchor chart over at First Grade Parade. My students will have to fill in the rest of the charts and then I will hang them in the room. I want my students to know this year they will become scientists, authors, readers, and more. 
Well, I need some more coffee and then off to work I go!

Pin It Now!

Interactive Notebooks Galore and some FREEBIES!

This week I have really been working on getting as organized as possible for the first week of school. This has included doing a LOT of paper shuffling! My students are going to have 5 (yes, 5) interactive type notebooks this year. Whew! Makes me a little tired just thinking about it. There will be math, science, reading, writing, and social studies. The set up for these notebooks takes a little time, so I will show you what I have found to be a great time saver:

1. I pre-cut everything out that I will be using for the notebooks. I know I will probably not be able to keep up with this throughout the school year, but for the beginning of year it is do-able and will save SO MUCH time in my room.

2. I took quart baggies (and some sandwich bags) and made a bag for each student with all the pre-cut materials inside for that notebook. The one pictured above is for our reading notebook.

3. All of those bags go into one big gallon bag, the bag gets zipped up, and ta-da! It is ready for the first day of school! I create one large bag for each notebook so all I have to do is get the bag out and go.

4. I also pre-made my interactive notebook (things like the title page and all the items they will be gluing in for that day). I have a document camera in my classroom and will be placing my notebook under it to show the students while I free to walk around and help them.

Now for some FREEBIES! Below you will find my writing notebook title page and my math notebook title page.

Images courtesy of DailyClipArt.net

Pin It Now!

Punctuation Posters

I was up late last night blogstalking (must stop this seeing as school starts soon) and I came the cutest punctuation posters by Hilary at Fifth Grade Fancy. She made hers with a cricut and sadly, I do not have one yet. But, I was inspired to create my own. Here is a sampling of a few that I made:

There are 10 in all including:

1. Exclamation point

2. Period

3. Question mark

4. Apostrophe

5. Comma

6. Hyphen

7. Colon

8. Semicolon

9. Quotation marks

10. Parentheses

If you would like your own set of punctuation posters, you can find them at my TpT store {here}. The first two people to comment below with their e-mail can have it for free :) Have a great Wednesday everyone! Off to work in my classroom!

Pin It Now!

Monday Made #9 (The Meet the Teacher Edition)

Happy Monday everyone! I know some of you have already started school, but this is my last official Monday off. Next week we have teacher inservice and meet the teacher and then...school starts! I have once again linked up with Tara from 4th grade frolics for her ever popular Monday Made it! I decided that this week I needed to work on items for meet the teacher next week. My first made it are these popsicle easels.

I decided this year that I did not want anything taped/contacted papered to desks. The kids always have the compulsion to pick at it and by the end of the year, they look awful. So, instead I made these popsicle easels. They will be sitting on their desk during meet the teacher night along with a piece of cardstock and markers. The students will make their name and set it on the easel of their desk. I was inspired by a pin on pinterest to create these, but the blog for the link has been deleted.

Here is a sideways view of the easel in case you want to make it yourself. I just took hot glue, made a v, added a leg in the back, glued two popsicle sticks together for the front, and added them on! 
I also made welcome bags! 

The page on the front of the bag came from serenade to second grade. On her blog you will find the paper FOR FREE! These will also be sitting out for meet the teacher. That's it for me! Everyone have a great week!

Pin It Now!

Quick Classroom Before and After and Giveaway Winner!

I have been totally M.I.A. from the blogging world since Monday (not even any blogstalking) and this has been due to the fact that I received keys to my room! I really wanted to get my room together this week so I that I would have next week to work on our curriculum (our kids start on the 27th, but we have teacher orientation week starting the 22nd). So, here we go with the before and after pictures! Here is the before...

This is the during...

and here is the after! This is my word wall, filetastic, science tubs, and writing folders area.

This is my writing center.

This is my bulletin board area and my library.

This is my meeting and turn-it-in area

Last but not least, this is my small group/teacher area.

So, there we go! Miss Nelson over at Run! Miss Nelson's Got the Camera! is having a linky party for before and after pics of your classroom, so link up if you haven't already!

Swimming Into Second is also having a linky party to show off your classroom. If you haven't yet linked up, get over there and do so :)

I also wanted to give a huge congrats to Kristin, my 100 follower giveaway winner! Your TpT gift card should already have been e-mailed to you. Thanks to everyone who entered! Later on I will be posting close up pics of the room and how I plan to use some of the spaces.

Pin It Now!