Returning to School in One Week!

I always have ideas to share, so here is two this week. When I get into the full swing of school I will have many more. I am technically on vacation still – 5 more days! And what am I doing – teacher stuff. It is in my blood and I can’t help it!

I never used my plan book for a whole year until I bought one from Erin Condren. For about 16 years, I always started with good intentions of filling out my plan book and after a few weeks, it started to collect dust. I am not saying you should run out and by one, but now that I have been using it for several years, I have found some great value in writing in it. First of all, I am now using last year’s as a guide and a reference to what I am teaching this year. Sometimes I forget when I did something or how long it took us to complete. Second, it helps me plan units (especially math) so that I complete a unit at the natural breaks of holidays and vacations. One of my pet peeves is I hate giving tests on Mondays – I don’t think it is fair to the students.

Anyways, I am already excited to start writing in this year’s planner – so weird how something cute and fun is a motivator for doing something! Here is a picture of my planner this year!

My next tip is Class Dojo – Love it! I have the app too. If you have not tried it – you should check it out. It is free and is a nice way to keep track of positive and negative points your students earn in class for behavior. I use mine as a currency, so students can buy privileges and rewards. I have it displayed on my Promethean Board when I am not teaching and my students are very responsive to it. I also use the app when I go pick my class up at the line-up area. They can earn points for lining-up quietly and if they don’t – well you know. The amazing thing is by the time I get back to the class the points are already there on the Promethean Board – amazing! Each year the company has been improving it – this year it went school wide. So, if you team teach or share students, more than one teacher can give or take away points. Pretty Cool!!! Anyway, check it out at classdojo.com. 

My Summer is Almost Over!

School starts in less than a month and my vacation is almost over! I am glad though! I get really excited this time of year. The start of new beginnings and a refreshed outlook.

This year has its challenges because I have 22 students looping with me. I had them as 4^th graders in my 4/5 combo last year and I am very happy to be teaching a solid 5^th this year. However, as you know, this poses its own challenges, since I can’t use anything that I did last year – books, lessons, projects, etc. So I have already been working on new ideas to revamp my room for this year while getting my students excited about 5^th grade.

One of the new things I will be doing is changing my first day picture book that I read to start class off. I usually use The Important Book by Margaret Wise Brown and Leonard Weisgard. I read it with the class and then we look at the pattern of writing the author’s use in the book. Then my students write about themselves using the same pattern. I also take a picture of each student on the first day of class. Finally, we publish the poem with the picture for Back to School Night. I always get a lot of great comments from parents about them.

This year I will be using another book that was an idea from my partner, LeAnn. She has used The Best Part of Me: Children Talk about Their Bodies in Pictures and Words by Wendy Ewald. After she reads the book to the class, she takes a picture of their body part they want to write about, and then the students write a paragraph about it. For example, a student may take a picture of his eyes and write about how he views and interprets the world through his eyes, while others look into them to learn and understand him. Another student may take a picture of her feet and write about how her feet take her places in her life. I am looking forward to using this book in September.

No matter when you start, all of us have to get things together – shopping for supplies, organizing classrooms, and preparing for a new start. I wish all of you a happy and low stressful beginning to the school year of 2014-2015.