First Day of School

I survived... the first day of school! Wow, I always forget how much talking is required during the first week of school with explaining class guidelines and procedures. I even use a microphone, and my voice was still tired by the end of the day. Maybe I just got too excited, and couldn't handle talking quietly :).

Remember these? I posted these letters that my kiddos wrote for the incoming second grade class at the end of last school year. This morning, they were waiting on the desks of my new students, along with a summer memory page. They were able to read the letter and work on the page this morning while we were getting supplies labeled and put away. Once we were all cleaned up, I was able to use these two activities as an icebreaker. We talked about their summer (because you know you can't get anything done until they have shared about all the fun they had), and they were able to share things that they looked forward to in second grade because they had read the letters.

This year, one of my teammates had the idea of having a photo booth on the first day of school. I did not have so much of a "booth", but I did make a fun frame and set aside an area with leis and giant sunglasses. I bought the picture frame at a thrift store, printed out letters in a fun font on card stock, and then traced them on to foam in my classroom colors: orange, lime green, red, and teal blue. Once I get the pictures printed, they will go up on the "Second Grade Smiles" board in the front of the classroom.

I couldn't resist having my teammate take a picture of me with the frame. I am excited that this is now my seventh first day of school, if that makes sense! It seems like I just started teaching; time sure does fly!

You might be wondering why I have a picture of two and a half brownies in a tray on my blog post. This is all that is left after my "following directions brownie activity". Here is how it goes: I displayed a simple brownie recipe and told the students that we were going to make brownies, but I "forgot" a lot of the ingredients. We substitute flowers for flour, and soda for baking soda, along with a lot of other things. It made a gross looking, gooey mess. I put them outside in the sun to "bake" and right before lunch, we realized that they had not made brownies. My students recognized that I had not followed the directions on the recipe, so in turn I got yucky brownies. We talked about how that applies to our school work when we forget to read the directions before starting. We want yummy brownie papers, not yucky brownie work. Luckily, I had some brownies already made, and my students were stoked to eat some brownies on the first day of school. I will keep referring to this activity throughout the year whenever students forget to follow directions on an assignment. It is such a great illustration that really connects with them.

If you started school this week, I hope that the rest of the week goes smoothly. Enjoy meeting your new students and figuring out how to engage them in learning!

Show Off Your Space Linky

Hi everyone! This week has been crazy with training and preparing my classroom for the new school year, but now it is ready! Well, I guess it better be ready, since my kiddos come tomorrow. Now that all of the clutter is out of the way, I have some pics of my classroom, and I thought that I would share them by linking up with Swimming into Second's "Show Off Your Space" linky party.

Okay, first thing that I want children to see is my door. My students know that each and every day I am happy to see them, even if they had a rough day before. Having a welcoming sign that they see every morning when they first walk in is huge!

On my whiteboard, I have the directions for where to put all of their supplies when they come into the room. As you can see, some of the baskets for supplies are on my desk.

Remember when I mentioned starting up the "Look Book" and the "Reminder Binder"? Here they are, all ready to go. I will definitely let you know how this new system of behavior management goes!

Here is a view of my room when you first walk in. I am in a bungalow, so it is not very big. I have to be very creative with the space; it can definitely be tricky trying to figure out where to fit everything! 

This is my reading corner by the door (all nice and clean now). I also have some of my baskets that I use for centers over here. On my "Awesome Authors" board, I store all of their writing throughout the year. When parents come help out in the classroom, they like to flip through and see their child's progress.

Here is another view of my room. The light blue baskets are for the computer headphones, and I used fabric to cover up a bookcase that stores a bunch of games. It was an eyesore before, and I think that it looks much cuter now!

This is my "Emergency Cards" chart. These cards are used for bathroom breaks. Students get five free chances a week to use the bathroom. Each time they go during class, they have to move that card to the back of their stack. If they use up all five before the end of the week, and they still have to use the bathroom, then they owe me a penny of their class money. I am trying to teach them to be responsible to use the bathroom during their breaks, but there are still chances for them to go in case of an emergency. 

Well, that's it for today. I will post tomorrow about my first day! I am so excited to meet all of my new second graders!

Back to School TPT Sale- 20% Off!

Hey guys, its almost time for school to start again! I just wanted you all to know that I am joining up with the TPT Back to School Sale! All of my items are already on sale, and you can enter in the promo code shown above to get an additional 10% off the remaining price. This totals an amazing 28%! I have a few back to school products, some adorable pennant banners for kindergarten through grade five, and some fun literacy activities. Please stop by to check it out: http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Engaging-Second-Grade. The sale only goes through Monday, so don't miss out on all of these savings!

This adorable sale banner deserves the following credits:

Kylie Healey Designs
http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Kylie-Healey-Designs

Erin Palleschi at Once Upon a Classroom
http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Erin-Palleschi

Kevin and Amanda
www.kevinandamanda.com

Five For Friday

                                     

Thanks to my last post, I received a comment from Kelly over at Sliding into Second Grade about this linky party. I still feel like I am just getting the hang of this blogging thing, and I am learning a ton through it. Anyways, I am excited to announce that this is my first linky ever (you gotta start somewhere!) 

This linky is one day late, but better late than never. I will now share five random things from my week:

#1 Celebrated three years with my husband

August 20th technically marks three years since we met and two years since we got engaged. We celebrated with a yummy dinner at Donovan's Steakhouse (my first time going!) Then we took a walk through the lovely little park where we got engaged.

#2 Spent some time with my doggy!

This is Radley. I adopted him from an animal shelter four years ago, and I love him! Isn't he so cute? I don't get to spend as much time with him during the school year, so I have been cuddling with him a lot!

#3 Starting to make a school bag

I have been falling in love with all of the different Vera Bradley bags, and decided to get one for school. When I showed my mom, she decided that we should make one instead. She is much more talented than I am at sewing, so I will mostly be there for support and pinning. This is a picture of the fabric; I will post a picture of the finished product once it is done.

#4 Met with my second grade team

Our second grade team has a few new members this year, and we met as a team for the first time this week. There are so many great ideas going around for how we can better our practice this year. One idea from our new team lead that I loved was a new behavior management system. It involves using a "Look Book" for positive reinforcement and a "Reminder Binder" if they need to get back on track. I will be letting you guys know how it works throughout the year. Click here to get more information.

#5 Baked some honey bran muffins 

I love baking, but I don't do it that often since it isn't that healthy for me. Lately though, I have been on a kick of making these honey bran muffins that do not involve any butter or oil. I use applesauce and bananas to keep them moist. They are so delicious! I just made some on Wednesday, and I am already out.... maybe I need to make more!

That is it for my first linky post ever! I start training on Monday, and I even get to partner with one of my teammates to do a training on using Teachers Pay Teachers and Blogs for great teaching ideas. I will let you know how that goes!

Classroom Tour

Training starts next week and I can't believe how quickly the summer has gone by! As much as I love summer and my time to relax, I always anticipate the start of school again. Last week, I posted some of the recent "remodels" that I did to my room. This week I thought that I would take you on a quick walk through a few other parts of my room.

I must state my disclaimer first by saying that I do not have desks set up yet, and not everything is perfectly where I would like it, but that will be taken care of next week during the afternoons.

This first picture was posted a few weeks ago, but I had to post it again, because it is one of my favorite things about my classroom. I used twine to string the pennants together, and then I hung them above my Smart Board. I am selling these pennants for kindergarten through fifth grade at my Teachers Pay Teachers store, and they are on sale through Saturday. You can buy them here.

This next picture is my reading corner. As you can see, I still have some organizing to do on top of the bookshelf, and there is a clock that needs to be hung on the wall once I replace the battery ;). I love this corner though because it is the perfect size for a couple of comfy beanbags. I also like how well organized my library is. Each basket is labeled with a few guided reading levels. Every book in my classroom is also labeled. Students are tested each quarter to see what level they are, and then I give them three levels that they are allowed to read from. This ensures that they are reading books that are slightly challenging, but not so far above them that they won't comprehend. The light blue bulletin board will be my "Awesome Author's" wall, but I can't hang up the folders until I get my class list.

I am laughing at this next picture; I should have taken the time to straighten out the names, although I will be making new names once I get my class list. This is my whiteboard. I have a Smart Board in my classroom, so I don't use my whiteboard very much. I have turned it into an organization area for my centers. I will have to do a whole other blog post later on how I do centers, because it is a bit complicated. I originally got the idea from Serenade to Second Grade. You can read Tasha's blog post here. I took her idea, and then changed it to fit the way I teach. Look for another post about this soon.

This is my corner. Now, if I am not careful, this corner can easily become messy and cluttered. I did my "summer cleaning", so I am hoping that I will be able to keep it a little neater this year. I love using a pocket chart for my schedule because it is so easy to change it around each morning. On my calendar board, I also keep track of table points with a mini whiteboard.

This last picture shows my classroom jobs. It is a little difficult to see, but I love these because I don't need an entire bulletin board for them. They are hanging with magnets on my metal cabinet. Every student has a job every week, and I can change their jobs easily because their numbers are stuck on with velcro. The students LOVE their jobs, and will remind me Monday morning if I forgot to switch them.

As I get my classroom back in order over the next few weeks, I will be posting more. Since school is starting soon, I thought I would post a few things that I made for my first week.

I love reading the book "Never Spit on Your Shoes" to my students during the first week of school. This is an adorable "craftivity" that goes along with the book in which students get to brainstorm their own silly class rules and illustrate them. Click here to be taken to my store where you may purchase this.

I use this next activity with the book "The Berenstain Bears Forget Their Manners", but it could be used with any book about manners during the first week of school, or in the middle of the year, when students might need a little reminder. You can purchase this activity here.

Well, that is it for this week. I hope you all have a great first week of school!

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!