School's Out For Summer

Yay, summer is finally here! Our last student day was last Wednesday, June 18th, but today was actually my last day that I had to be anywhere for work. This week we had a Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol (SIOP) training and got our new district issued "Yogas", AKA tablet/laptops. Today I worked in my new classroom and got some things put away... the movers kind of left it a mess. My summer plans include lots of rest, time with my family, training my puppy, and getting some projects done around the house. I'm super excited about my first National Boards bonus and can't wait to go on a mini-vacation with my fiance! Below are some pictures of before and after in my room today! So much to do but it's a start!

Pinkalicious

Several weeks ago my school had a "book character/vocabulary word day". It was a fun day. I dressed up like Pinkalicious. Some other characters of the day were: Little Red Riding Hood, princesses, The Magic Schoolbus, Mr. Slinger, Amelia Bedelia, Fancy Nancy... It was super cute! If the kids didn't dress up they wrote a word on a card with the definition on the back. Some cards were: optimist, monochromatic, rumpus, loving, funny, artistic, etc.

We were so lucky to have the author Barbara Jean Hicks speak at a school assembly on the same day. She was a wonderful presenter and shared a lot about her process as a writer. She also shared about her work with the movie "Frozen" and the books she has wrote using the characters, which our kids loved. My second grade colleague and I read aloud to the school her book "A Sister More Like Me", which was very fun!

It's Been Awhile

Wow, I can't believe it's been over 2 years since my last post. I'm currently teaching second grade and love it. I completed my National Boards certification in literacy and passed! Maybe that's why I haven't posted anything in 2 years... I've also moved school and homes, so that may have something to do with my absence to blogging. 

I just recently started a new blog about the adventures of my Great Dane puppy Gus, called Muddy Paws and Slobbery Kisses. He really keeps me busy, but I love this adventure of having a puppy. My second graders love to hear stories about Gus and all the trouble he gets into. I wish I could bring him to school everyday, but I am lucky enough to have a puppy nanny (sister-in-law) that stays home with him during the day. 

It's the final countdown at this point, only 18 1/2 days left of school. I've been very lucky to have a student teacher this spring, so I've had a lot of time to reflect on my own teaching and get some planning done for next year. The big stress right now, is that I may have to move my classroom again next year! I've had to move my classroom 9 times in 10 years!!!! I really don't want to move again... but if it's what's best for kids, I'll do it!

Classroom Library

I love books and organization, so this year I am really trying to get my classroom library running smoothly for my students and myself. I taught sixth grade for five years, so I don't have as many books as I would like. I have really tried hard to build my library this year to have a lot of choices for my kids as well as have all the books leveled.

I use scholastic bookwizard:  http://www.scholastic.com/bookwizard/ to level my books, as well as Fountas and Pinnell book lists: http://www.fountasandpinnellleveledbooks.com/. My library is leveled based on guided reading levels. In the past I had used AR level, as my old school used AR. So switching things over has taken some time. I swear, I could still spend a week just working on my library and it wouldn't be done!

Here is a picture of what my library looked like in the fall.

I love thrift stores and the goodwill! You can get great books for cheap! A thrift store in my little town sells

books for 25 cents each! I have found great book label levels on TeacherPayTeachers and other teacher blogs! There are so many teachers willing to share their materials, I love it!

Happy Reading!

Tiff

Classroom Pictures

Here are some pictures of my classroom this year! I have had a lot of fun decorating this year!

http://www.flickr.com//photos/78564290@N04/sets/72157629709903301/show/ 

Thanks for taking time to check out my pictures!

SIOP and Learning Objectives

SIOP, which stands for Sheltered Instruction Observational Protocol "was developed to facilitate high quality instruction for ELs in content area teaching" (http://www.siopinstitute.net/). I was lucky enough to attend three days of training around the SIOP model as well as a short site based training at my school last summer. My biggest "take away" that I would like to share are about objectives. Objectives for each lesson should have a content objective "I CAN" and a language objective "By" to help students understand the purpose for their learning in simple, "kid friendly" terms. This is a total work in progress for me and I only know a teeny, tiny bit about SIOP. But I have learned so much about writing learning objectives and my students are learning better than ever because of this model. Below is a picture of how I post objectives in my classroom.

It's not the best picture, I will post a better one later. Notice the bug catcher; that is our objective catcher. To make the process a bit more fun, each students reflects upon their learning on a little laminated bug. Similar to an exit ticket, students put their bug reflection the catcher each day to share their learning of the day's objectives with me. This really helps guide my planning and instruction. Students that are not strong writers can copy the objective and give a smiley or frowny face to show their learning.

Classroom Management--- The Clip Chart

I stumbled upon the idea of the clip chart this year and LOVE it! It works great and motivates my firsties to act like little angels, most of the time! Every student starts out at "Ready to Learn" at the beginning of each day. As they are doing a great job and following directions, they get clipped up to the next color. If they are not "Ready to Learn" they get clipped down. Each time they get clipped they only go up or down one color. So once students get clipped down, they can easily turn it around and start going back up the chart. Once students get above "Outstanding", which they do, I wear their clip on my clothes to recognize their wonderful behavior. They LOVE this and are so proud. At the end of each day, the top students get their names on the board. The next day they get to sit with pillows at their desk, have a special chair at carpet time AND write with a "flower pencil" for the day. First graders LIVE for this stuff!

Check out the link to find out more: http://www.newmanagement.com/ebooks/clip_chart.html.