Newbie Bloggers Blog Hop

You guys have been posting great linky parties that I just can't resist! This linky party (which perhaps is synonymous with "Blog Hop"?) is hosted by Janice at Grade Three is the Place For Me! (click her button below) and is for new bloggers.

Here are the newbie questions:
1. What state are you in?
2. What is your current teaching position?
3. What is your teaching experience?
4. When did you start blogging?
5. Share a blogging tip/blogging resource.

Here are my newbie responses:
1. I am in Virginia.
2. I will start teaching second grade this fall. Yay!
3. I am a new teacher!! However, I have pre-service experiences...during undergrad, I had practicum experiences in grades K-5. During my graduate year, I student taught in third grade during the fall and first grade during the spring. Lastly, for the past four summers I have taught rising kindergartners and first graders in a summer program. I love working with kids and wanted to gain experience to help prepare me for my own classroom!
4. I began blogging to serve as an e-portfolio during the spring semester of my graduate year. Only recently have I started joining in on the regular bloggy fun by participating in linky parties (like this!), adding the followers gadget, and commenting on others' blogs.
5. I suggest joining linky parties because it's a great way to meet new bloggers!


Stop on by the Newbie Bloggers Blog Hop to meet new friends! :)


p.s. Thank you so much, Mona (from First Grade Schoolhouse), Brigid (from Brigid's Daily Lesson Log), and Mrs. Goodwin (from I Live 2 Learn, I Love 2 Grow) for nominating me for the Versatile Blogger Award!! I'll complete the rules over the weekend. :)

 

App Happy Linky Party

I'm so excited that Hope King at 2nd Grade Shenanigans is having an App Happy Linky Party (love the Book Retriever app she posted about!) because over this past weekend I was searching for apps to use with my iPad in the classroom. Click Hope's button to check out other apps that make teachers happy!

Here are a few apps I want to try out in the classroom and thoughts on how to use them:

1. Evernote (free): You can create files of digital notebooks for anything and everything. I want to create a digital notebook for each student and have the notebook serve as an e-portfolio. You can upload pictures of student work, use the audio feature to record a student reading, etc. Wouldn't this be great to show parents at conferences? Soaring Through Second Grade wrote a great post on using Evernote too.

2. Penultimate ($0.99): An amazing handwriting app (the best on the market I've heard)! You can use your finger or stylus to write notes or draw pictures. Penultimate is owned by the Evernote people so for example, if you write anecdotal notes about a student, you can easily send it to that student's notebook in Evernote. I also want to use this app in place of an easel during small group work. If I didn't have this app, I would only be able to type any kind of notes, and I'd rather be able to write them.

3. Show Me (free): An interactive whiteboard app. You can create (and watch) tutorials on anything! The app has a record-voice over feature too so for example, you could (or even the students could!) make a tutorial on how to do double digit addition with step-by-step visuals while also giving an explanation. This could be used as a student assessment. Or you could post your Show Me on your class website for students to review material at home.

4. Puppet Pals (free): A super fun animated movie app (it's won an award too)! I learned about this app at a conference in June from a third grade teacher. In his classroom, he had the students take stories they had written and turn them into short animated movies. He said his students' writing improved dramatically...their stories became more interesting because when creating the movies they needed to have included dialogue and more details in their writing. This app also helped with fluency because students were reading aloud and using expression to, again, be more interesting. You can upgrade to Puppet Pals Director's Pass ($2.99) for a lot more characters and features. I can't wait to experiment with Puppet Pals with my second graders!

I'd love to hear any other ideas you have with using these apps! :)

Monday Made It Linky Party

I love 4th Grade Frolics' Made It Monday linky party because:
1. I love seeing everyone's creativity! and
2. It's a great source of motivation to create things on my to-do list.

I was inspired by Hillary Kiser from Adventures of Teaching to create this Early Birds sign (below). Yesterday morning she posted about what to do with students who finish early. She calls them Early Birds and gives them options like "dive into a book" or write in a whole class journal (as recently seen around Pinterest).

I wanted to share this as a freebie but after reading the artist's terms of use, I don't think I'm allowed but I've emailed her just to double check. I purchased the owl from Crystal Wilkerson's Baby Boy pack. I love her designs and was waiting for an excuse to purchase something from her! I'm in love with the free font Janda Safe and Sound by Kimberly Geswein. I've been using it on everything!


I also finished my teacher's toolbox. The plastic spray paint finally cooperated! It was acting weird at first but it just needed more coats than normal spray paint. I used clear labels for each drawer. You may notice I used Janda Safe and Sound as the font again. :) I may go back and add scrapbook paper but I want to wait and see what it looks like in the classroom.

Happy Made It Monday!! :)

Must Have Picture Books Linky Party

I am linking up with Lindsey (LOVE her and her blog!), The Teacher Wife, to share my top five picture books. Click her button below to read other bloggers' top five or to join the party!

 

My Top Five (so hard to choose just five!):

1. The Pout-Pout Fish: This story is SO CUTE AND SO FUNNY!! The Pout-Pout Fish is very sad because of his pouting lips. BUT THEN he realizes he can choose to be a kiss-kiss fish instead. The kids get a kick out of the smooching parts in the end. They wanted to read this again and again. Such a cute story and good opportunity to teach lesson about how we are in control of our behavior.

2. Pig Kahuna: Another super cute story! Fergus and Dink (the two pigs on the cover) love the beach but will not go in the water. They are collecting treasures along the shore when one day a surfboard washes up. They name the surfboard Dave. But then something happens to Dave!! Will Fergus and Dink be brave enough to save Dave?! You'll have to read to find out! :)

3. Henry's Freedom Box: A fascinating true story about a slave named Henry, who escapes to freedom. The illustrations are beautiful, and the story is engaging. This book would probably be most appropriate for intermediate grades.

4. Unlovable: I seem to be drawn to super cute stories and this is one of those melt your heart books (particularly on pages 24 and 25). Alfred is a cutie patootie pug, who thinks low of himself because the other pets make fun of him. When Alfred meets the new neighbor's dog through the fence, he is afraid the new dog will think he is unlovable too so he tells a lie. What will happen when Alfred and the neighbor's dog finally meet face to face? This is the perfect story to demonstrate true friendship and accepting one's self. SO CUTE!!

5. Can I Play Too?: I LOVE all of Mo Willems' books, especially the Elephant and Piggie series and the Pigeon series. These books are addicting...the kids ALWAYS want to read them. The Elephant and Piggie series is hilarious, entertaining, and teaches great lessons about friendship and problem solving. They are also great for Readers' Theater because the text is already written in dialogue. I cannot get enough of Gerald and Piggie!! There's a new one that will be released on October 2: Let's Go For A Drive. I can hardly wait!

I can't wait to see everyone's top five! One can never have enough picture books, right? :) Have a super week!

Show Me Sunday: Classroom Themes Linky Party

I figured it's about time I joined my first linky party! What better than 3-6 Free Resources' Classroom Themes party since I've been compiling resources for my first  classroom! Most of the items I've bought or made have been different shades of blue and green with accents of black, silver, white, and yellow. I just hope it all comes together when I actually start setting up my classroom!

I'm going to use this file box for students to place completed assignments. I bought it from Target, bought extra hanging file folders from Costco, added post-it file folder labels, and duck taped the lid (it used to be brown) in silver. Each student will be assigned a number and will place their completed work in the appropriate numbered folder. I think this file box method will help me grade efficiently because papers will already be in alphabetical order. After I've graded assignments I will place them in the outgoing mail tray (pictured below) for student mail carriers (one of the students' jobs, more on my plans for that in a future post) to distribute to student mailboxes. This should also make the mail carriers' job easier because again papers will already be in alphabetical order. I foresee this also solving the no name paper issue because students will have placed their papers in their assigned number folder.

Treasures from the Target Dollar Spot! I was inspired by Ladybug's Teacher Files' flipped labels to create my own label for the outgoing mail letter tray (you're probably going to hear that from me a lot this summer! I LOVE Kristen's products!). I want to use the caddy to hold plants...it seems like the perfect size and has holes in the bottom for drainage. Now I just need a plate or something to catch the extra water. The handle would make it convenient for a student to carry it to the sink to water the plants too. :)

I'm an organizing nerd. Love. To. Organize. The flowered binder (from Target) on the left holds Readers' Response graphic organizers (from Made in the Shade in Second Grade and The Teacher Wife). 

 I don't want to take up space on the white board writing objectives so I opted for these dry-erase posters instead. I was inspired by the pictures on Pinterest of using picture frames with scrapbook paper for writing objectives but think this is a cheaper alternative (unless you get your frames from the Dollar Tree). I outlined the perimeter with silver duck tape and cool polka dot tape that I had laying (or is it lying?) around (from Michaels).

 Another Target Dollar Spot treasure! I was SO EXCITED when I saw these I bought several of them. They are going to be great for saving paper in centers or if I'm demonstrating a sample of something.

 A Dollar Tree find, a Crayola Crayon piggy bank! Students can place extra change in the crayon and raise money for a special class treat or donate the money to a charity.

A work in progress, my school supplies tool box! It used to be blue but I'm trying to paint it white. I bought spray paint specifically for plastic objects but the paint is acting weird. Maybe it's the heat? It's been in the 100s for the past week here in Virginia!

Happy Sunday! Have a super week!!

Feelin' Crafty

Hello, All!
I know many of you have recently wrapped up the school year and so I hope you are enjoying the start of summer! I CAN'T. STOP. thinking about school. I am SOOO excited about setting up my classroom and preparing for my second graders.

In addition to reading some great books (the ones I named in my previous post) as well as Guided Reading: Making It Work by Mary Browning Schulman and Carleen DaCruz Payne (excellent text written by two teachers), I have been feeling crafty. Here are the projects I have completed:

Tissue Paper Wreath Inspired by School Girl Style. I have a vision for this hanging in the hallway next to my classroom door as a easy way for my students to spot our classroom.

Flag Garland (school colors): made from scrapbook paper and card stock, strung together with ribbon and glue. I have a vision of this hanging from the ceiling inspired by a post from the Clutter-Free Classroom.

Mini Flag Garland: made from scraps of above garland. I envision this on a bulletin board.

Dear Student Poster (made with Sharpies) Inspired by Better After and Tupelo Honey.

Pete the Cat!!!!! I made him out of colored copy paper. I have a vision for this on my classroom door with Pete's motto: "It's all good."

Hope you feel inspired to be crafty!!

Great News

Hello, Friends!!
I've been MIA but for good reasons. I graduated with my master's degree last week! In the meantime, I'd been in the whole job search process and was recently offered a second grade teaching position!! I can now say I am a second grade teacher!!!!!!! I am SO excited.

I don't have much else to share except I have been reading two books:

The Well-Managed Classroom from the Boys Town Educational Model

 The First Days of School by Harry and Rosemary Wong

 Definitely recommend both, especially for new teachers.

As I plan and create things throughout the summer, I'll be sure to post.

I'd love to hear any advice from veteran teachers as to how to start the school year off!

Take care!