A Classroom Makeover

Well, it has been very difficult to find time for blogging with all this relaxing! I taught summer school during the month of July, and now I have had a few weeks of rest before school starts up again. Since I only taught until 11:00 everyday, that meant I had a little extra time in the afternoons to redecorate my classroom. I do think that having a well-organized, bright, and cheerful classroom does lend itself to students who are engaged in learning.

This first picture is my Language Arts bulletin board. We use the Open Court curriculum, so every week I have the story, genre, comprehension strategy, spelling words, and vocabulary words posted on this board. We refer to it a lot, so I thought that it needed a little makeover. Doesn't it look so much brighter and happier now?

I don't know how many of you have bucket slip boards in your classroom, but I love mine! When I first put it up last year, I had thought I would only keep it up for the first half of the year. By the end of the year, it was still there. I couldn't take it down because it was so sweet to see how much the students enjoyed writing encouraging notes to their classmates. Once summer hit, I realized that my board was starting to fall apart, so here it is now, fresh and new, ready to go for the beginning of the year.

I was picky about the color of the pockets, so I took apart an old pocket from last year, traced it, copied it onto construction paper, and then cut out and glued together each pocket myself. I also designed the labels and the Bucket Filler sign. After I got them laminated, I put them up on the board. Hopefully this will bring many more smiles of happiness this year.

Last classroom makeover that I wanted to share for now is my student work bulletin boards. I don't know about you, but I spend a lot of time putting up new artwork. I literally get out a ruler and measure to make sure that I am spacing everything correctly. If I don't do that, it ends up driving me crazy. I decided that it would be adorable to put up some twine and mini clothespins for student work. This will save me a lot of time in measuring, and my hope is that it will look really cute once it has student work on it. Here is one of my boards.

That is it for now. I will probably post more once school is ready to start. I did recently make this new addition to my Teachers Pay Teachers store, and I want to make sure that you see it in time for your first week of school. It is a booklet that you can use to review your classroom guidelines during the first week of school. I have found that the first week is the time to drill those guidelines into their brains. It makes for a much smoother year. You can buy this product here!

Well, that is it for today! I hope that this was helpful, and that you are able to get your classroom all cute and ready for the beginning of the year! Happy decorating!

End of the School Year

Okay, so this summer has definitely flown by way too fast. I know it is already the end of July, but I am just now completing my post about the end of the school year! Sorry this is so late! I hope that all of you teacher readers have had a wonderful summer off so far! I had a week off before I started summer school. I am now on my last week of summer school, and I can't believe that it is already almost over. Then I will have about three weeks off before starting school again.

I wanted to share this end of the year gift idea. I think I got this idea off of Pinterest, but let me tell you, it was such a cheap and easy end of the year gifts for my students. They loved it!!!! I bought the bubbles at the Dollar Tree, so those were super inexpensive, and then I created the cute little tag that went with them.

These next pictures show one of my favorite activities that I do with my students. This activity takes place on the last day of school. My students are filling them out to give to my future students. I put these on their desks on the first day of school. 

I think that you can probably figure out the kinds of things that students wrote on each flap. We brainstormed a little together before each flap to get ideas flowing. On the first flap, for "Something I learned", I had the students show an example of what they had learned. It is really funny to read "Something you should know about Mrs. Berga". I got things from, "She is really funny and pretty," to, "She really likes to drink coffee." On the last flap, students wrote a friendly letter, wishing the future second grader luck with their year. It was a great way to encourage my future students, but also to review our year together in second grade before they move on.

Well, I highly recommend these activities to you next year, if you so choose to do them. I am already excited to put these out on the first day of school, which is coming quickly!

Oh, and really quickly, I made a few new items for my Teachers Pay Teachers store. Here is one of them:

How cute does that look hung up in my classroom? I printed these out on cardstock, and then used some thick twine to string them all together. The directions are included! I would like to also get these made for other grade levels, so be on the lookout! If you are interested in purchasing, you can visit my store: http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Engaging-Second-Grade. I will be posting some other new items in the next week or so.

Happy relaxing!