Reading Center Groups

Oh, hello there!  It's been what...a month since I blogged last?  Gee willies.  I'm terrible.

In other news - Reading Centers.  Reading centers are AWESOME!!  But they're a whole ton of work.  Really.  You can find me just about every Sunday night slaving away over laminating and cutting up cutesy little activities for the following week.  But that's not what I'm posting about today.  I'm writing about this:

How I organize my groups for centers.

I learned this from an awesome teacher I student taught with (thanks, Mrs. Lee! :)).  I've seen lots of teachers do this different ways, but this way works BEST for me.  I usually have one student of each reading ability level at each group (green, yellow, and blue).  This way, I call back one color (green for example), and the yellows and blues are working together at centers.

First, this cuts down on chit chat.  Every teacher knows the more students you have in a center, the more talking and misbehaving is going to happen.  Second, this makes sure I (generally) don't have two kids who have no clue what they're doing at a center.  If my low students need help reading directions or completing an activity, they always have a middle or high student there to help them.

It's not always fool proof, but it works for me!

Now, we are doing some AWESOME things in Science this week, so hopefully I'll have something much more interesting to blog about soon!  Thanks for hanging with me!

My Simply Magical Classroom

Oh my goodness!  I forgot how hectic the beginning of the school year was!  We started school...oh about...a month ago?  And I'm FINALLY getting this posted!  Whew.  I'm still not done with my room - it's a work in progress. :)  But here's what the Simply Magical Classroom looks like for now!

Here's my Pinterest inspired UP bulletin board.  I couldn't find one exactly like what I had imagined, so I improvised. 

Here's my door!  I love Krista Wallden's work at Creative Clips Graphics.  Almost everything I make has something in it from her - like these chevron papers.  Hopefully I'll have these pennant banners on TPT soon for you!

Here's my behavior chart in action!  I give tickets according to what color the students are on at the end of the day.  One for yellow, two for orange, and three for red.  The kids LOVE it!  You can snatch up my Behavior Chart here.

Here's our daily schedule - again with Krista's papers!

ALL year long last year I tried to think of a way to hide our closet.  I tried everything imaginable to get these curtains to stay up.  My mom walked in this summer and within 5 minutes, she came up with this marvelous solution - bike hangers and a PVC pipe.  She's a genius.

Remember when I made those bookshelves this summer?  Here they are in action!  With an amazing library organizing system from Maria Monore at Kinder-Craze!

Here's the only Reading Centers organization chart that I think will ever work for me.  I'll post more on this later. :)

My Birthday Chart with adorable cupcakes by...guess who!  Krista again! And my Teacher's Pet puppy - the best (and simplest) Classroom Jobs Chart imaginable created by A Teeny Tiny Teacher.

And last, but not least, my hanging lanterns.  It's hard to describe how much this adds to my classroom.  I can't even take a good picture to describe it.  If you are allowed to hang things in your classroom, DO!  It makes life so much happier!

I still have A LOT more work to do to get my classroom where I want it.  But just like learning, it's a work in progress the whole year through. :)

Back to School Sale

If you buy many things on TPT, I'd say you've heard about the Back to School Sale by now.  For the sellers who participate, many of their products will be the lowest they will ever be on sale.  And I really, really like sales.  So I'm giving you a warning here of insider info...you ready?  I'm participating in the sale.  Woohoo!  Exciting, right? Get those products wishlisted and ready because the sale is Aug 4-5!

Here's a cute little graphic to get you excited.  If you're having your own sale, feel free to borrow for your own site!

And I created a banner just the right size for your TPT store.

Have fun shopping!

Happy (Freebie) Friday!

It's Freebie Friday again!  I love having ways to connect to my students outside of school - even before they're my students.  That's why I created postcards to send to my students right before school begins.  Just handwriting them a short note that tells them how happy you are to be their teacher will get them pumped up to come back and learn!  I can remember one summer that a teacher of mine wrote me a postcard and sent it in the mail.  I was SO excited to get mail.  Guess what - kids today still get SO excited when they get mail!

Even if you don't get your class roll early, you can send your students a note just after school begins.  It'll still create the same excitement for learning even if they receive it after they're in your classroom!

These postcards are created for grades PreK-5.  Just click on the picture and snatch them up!  

                 

New School Year, New Bookshelves

So do you remember those bookshelves I got at yard sales in this post?  They looked like this:

They were cheap and in good shape, but they weren't really appealing for a first grade classroom.  And they didn't match.  So to make them beautiful, we looked on Pinterest to see how to paint laminate.  For the record, Pinterest isn't always a completely reliable source...  Pinterest told us to paint them with primer (which took about 4-5 coats just to make it look consistently white) and then use colored paint.  The primer was still coming off through the paint, but overall it looked pretty good.  It took me, my mother, and my mother-in-law about 11 hours to do these shelves.  If it hadn't been for them, I would have spent DAYS painting.  This year we're going to have a big long discussion in my classroom about how to be gentle with the bookshelves - because I am NOT painting laminate again.

Here they are!  We used painters tape and Frog Tape to get the different designs.

And for the record, the princess shelf in the picture from the yard sales is staying just the way it is.  I just don't have the heart to paint over Belle and Cinderella - nor the energy.

Freebie Friday!

Get some superhero writers in your class with this freebie!  This freebie includes posters to remind your students of some of the most important pieces they need for their writing - from punctuation to writing formation.  This resource also includes posters for POW + TIDE, which is a great tool to use for responding to text through writing.  Check it out, print it out, and put it up!

 

 Click the picture below

She's a Beauty!

I am SUPER excited about this!! Just look at this fantastic looking blog right here!  Isn't it absolutely lovely?  Yes? I think so, too.  I could never ever do anything this amazing, but Megan at A Bird in Hand Designs is spectacular.  She seriously made all of my dreams come true in this blog design.  If you're looking for someone to make your blog look fantastic, check her out!