Classroom Reveal: It's SUPER!

Happy beginning of the school year! I *think* I finally have gotten my school groove on enough to blog about my new classroom. I am sure I am preaching to the choir but starting back to school and getting back into the groove is ex*haus*ting!!!

I LOVE this!! I feel like this every day. It's a good tired because I love my class but it's beginning of the year tired. You get it! I know! 

We have a new block schedule that I am getting used to and just feel I can't fit everything into my day like I did last year so that has really thrown me for a loop. And my class is split for special area so I feel a little disconnected from the special area teachers that I really love. I am sure the stars and planets are also misaligned that is also adding to my loss of class/school mojo, too! LOL! I'll get there! 

What I do LOVE is my class! I say that every year and I am lucky to have another great group of kids to love on for the next 180 (now 170) days. I am SUPER excited to have created a super hero classroom for them! Now, I will have to admit that I am not a super hero aficionado (my hubby and kids are) but I thought, I could incorporate so much with character ed into it, too! Kids also love super heroes and they were so excited to see the decorations in my room! I didn't take pictures of everything in my classroom-- just a few! We've been busy! Here's just a few highlights! 

This bulletin board is outside my door. I used 2 Super Teacher's Clipart, typed their names on the kids,  and made buildings with construction paper. Very easy to do! 

This is also in my hallway and perhaps my favourite! I wanted to create a "Metropolis" feel to my classroom so I wanted a "city" of some sorts so I built this city! LOL!  I used reposition-able black vinyl to make this city. It was a 2-man job as one person had to be on the bottom to remove the backing and the other person had to be standing above you to hold the vinyl taut to make sure it didn't bubble. I linked you to the one I bought (I love Amazon Prime!!) as it was a perfect width for what I was making. If you plan on doing this, I would make sure you get the one that is removable as there are ones that are "permanent". It can get pricey. I looked at Michael's for this type of roll and it was way expensive for the amount I needed to use. I still have more than half a roll left! There are rolls with less footage but I didn't want to make a mistake and not have any leftover. 

My table signs! My husband said that they needed a cape! So each table lantern has a cape! It's hilarious! 

Super words for super kids! 

You can download my Superhero Creeds for free {HERE}! 

I love my little job chart! 

I love the idea of this little pocket on the back of the job cards to hold the little super heroes my kids made! 

I did not give them a pattern for these little heroes! They moaned and groaned about it but they did it and they are as CUTE as can be!! I only gave them a head and arms! I love the cape on the little guy on the left! So clever!!! 

I love the idea of ten frame days in school. The kids are loving it, too!! 

You can see more of my Super Hero Decor at my TPT store {HERE}. Tons of cuteness to make your classroom super! 

As always, here is our annual picture! I say it time and time again! I love these girls! They make coming to school worth it. No matter what stinky thing our district may do, we always have each other and I am so thankful for them. Some of us have been teaching together for 10 years and I think that is amazing! Here's to many more years together! Love you ladies! 

I hope you are having a great start to your year. Or if you are gearing up for your year to start, best of luck with all your preparations! 

Stay tuned for my blog series on starting Student Data Notebooks. I am very excited to share with you how I have set them up and how you and your students can best use them! 

Take care! 

Classroom Reveal!

Yesterday was my 12th Meet the Teacher! I must say it was the hottest one I ever had. 

HOT. As in temperature,

We had no AC in the whole school!!

Yeah... I know! LOL! You cannot control these things and we did the best we could! 

I was so excited to meet my new babies this year in my new classroom theme: Under the Sea! I tried to create an underwater theme in my room without breaking my budget (which we all know as teacher is very hard to do!). Luckily I was able to reuse some of the things I already had in my room! It came out fabulous! I could not be any happier! 

My bulletin board outside my room. I do this board every year. Nothing fancy here! Just some bulletin board paper and imagination! I really love learning about oceans-- in fact it's a personal favourite of mine! It's a theme I usually do at the end of the year but since it's my theme this year, it will be one I will incorporate all year! 

Who knew these would have multiple uses??

I wanted my kids to feel like they were walking through seaweed so I just took leftover grass skirt material (I found them at the Dollar Tree! So easy to cut and made great seaweed.)

View from my doorway. Again, I cut up the grass skirts into strips and hung them from my ceiling. I realize that some of you may not be able to hang stuff from the ceiling. So sorry! 

My math focus board. I put some of the math strategy posters from my Math Strategies Poster pack. I do not intend to display all of them at once. I will change them as we focus on one or two strategies at a time but for now, I wanted to put "something" up! 

A view of my ABC line! I couldn't wait to put this up! It's part of my Ocean Decor set!! It's a combo of ocean and beach! Just brightens up my room! 

Number line and class rules! They are eye level with the kids when they sit on my carpet and serves as a great reminder for them! You can download my Reef Rules Posters for free here.

My class library-- "School of Readers". These fish are from Creative Teaching Press and each have my student's names on them. Too cute!!  I bought my net from Oriental Trading. I've had it for so long-- there are a few tears but I think that makes it authentic! 

Reading Counts Board. I laminated the point cards so that I just have to write on them and done! No more cut outs and moving pieces! You can download them for free here. 

Reading Beach Library

Isn't this fabulous?? I found the tutorial from Party City. It was super easy to do once I got all the pieces I needed. Several hot glue mishaps (may have burned off my fingerprints, too! ha!) and I love my masterpiece! 

A close up of my blow fish! Just took some lanterns and cut some fish parts. Again, easy and reused things I already had! 

I love my manta ray! You can't see it but it's hanging over my desk. I took some black foam board and seriously, just free handed it. I know-- I'm like that. I work off lines of symmetry and drew what it would look like (first on scrap paper and cut it out as a sample) and then I cut my ray one half at a time from the foam board. That's why you see some tape on his tail (that, and my little one broke his tail! LOL!). After I cut them out, I taped them together. I had intended for the wings to be uplifted once hung on my ceiling but didn't work out that way. I still love it! 

Finally, my team this year! I love these girls! I come to school every day knowing that I have true besties that work with me. They are like my sisters and I am so blessed to be with them! Could not ask for a better team to teach with. I love them! 

So, that is my looonnnggg classroom reveal! Hope you gathered some ideas for your class! School starts Monday for me! 

Have a great week! 

Let's FOCUS here!

Ha! Must tell myself that ALL.THE.TIME! I am what they call a piddler, wanderer, absent minded... okay-- maybe a little ADD. Staying focused is sometimes hard for me, especially, now that I am almost back to school. I do not want to enter my classroom and see it so empty of children and life and worse--cluttered. That's when I lose focus! But I am not here to talk about me being focused!

Let's talk about FOCUS BOARDS! We all have them in one form of another. Do you have a 

word wall

data wall

calendar wall 

writer's tips wall

what is science wall

etc... you get it, right?? 

**by wall I mean some area or space designated to learning!**

If you don't have wall space dedicated to this, no worries, there's always magnets, clips, charts that you could use! 

SO, what a FOCUS BOARD?

1. Easy to set up!

2. Easy to change

3. Are colorful and inviting

4. You can refer back to your learning target in a large, visible way

5. Children will flock to it like moths to a flame when needed

This is what I had to work with last year-- still do...

I put Reading Counts points and Star Student of the Week. Now are these useful? Yes, but I wanted my kids to interact with the wall and content!! You cannot see my calendar wall, which is just as sad because I moved to a digital one on my ActivBoard but that was sad, too (sorry, no picture as I am still on vacation!). It just had shapes, months of the year, a 100s chart... Not much-- it really didn't convey what we were focusing in class. 

This year, I got smart (it took me a while! LOL!) and I started creating math and writing focus boards in my classroom. Those were two areas I wanted to work on hard this year! I am working on student data notebooks and there is that reflective piece that comes along with it! 

I created a focus board for math that would help students FOCUS on the strategy we are working on. I plan on setting this up instead of a calendar wall and making it a math focus wall. That way, I can refer to the one strategy we are working on and focus on that! Again, this comes back to that reflective piece-- when working on your data notebooks with your students and looking at their test and data, you can ask them, which strategy they used, did it work, could you have used another strategy? Kids just need that visual!  

click on the pic to grab it! 

I plan on just pinning sheet protectors up on my board so that I can exchange the strategy of the week or put them in as I need them. 

I also created a key ring set of math strategies that the students could keep in their desk so that when they are working at their seats, they can refer back to that. 

I hope to have some pictures of my finished math focus board soon! Not allowed in my classroom, yet. :-( Really excited to work on this with my students this year! And hoping I stay focused enough to get my classroom de-cluttered and organized!! LOL! FOCUS!! 

The Valentine's Day that came and went...

This is the image I always get when I think of Valentine's! I know that Valentine's day is over but I was just on my sweet friend Marie's blog, The Hands on Teacher in First , reading what she did last week and thought, Hey! That's not such a bad idea! I'm going to do that, too! Please read her page to find some cuuuuttteeeee stuff and ideas on there to pin and save for next year! 

So last week was all about the L.O.V.E! We read the story

and I sang the book to my class! I swear they were enchanted! We talked about how in the story the man was trying to send his beloved a letter. So the kids in their writing center wrote letters. We talked and reviewed the parts of a friendly letter:

The writing center was to write a friendly letter. I gave them some pretty paper and some envelopes and some chose to write a letter to me and my sweet intern:

Totally melts my heart!!

Then they made these cute mail trucks to put their valentines in! One of my room moms is a retired teacher (I lub her a lot!! She is great!!) showed this and made it for me and I think it's a keeper!

It was super easy to make! So pin away! 

We also worked on my homophones center!

They loved putting the mail in the mailboxes! And of course the par-tay on Friday! Another sweet blogger friend, Katie from Teacher to the Core has got some pretty smart tips for keeping my next Valentine's Day par-tay sane! We do not write names on the cards-- just sign who they are from-- which is a great tip she gives along with others! You can read about it here! 

This month also is Dental health month! I saw something similar to this on Pinterest a while ago (if you are the orginator of this idea, please let me know so I can give full credit) but I decided to make a Guess the Smile board outside my classroom! 

My sweet mom again (DO you see why I lub her???) took their pictures (I asked her to hold a small paper with their names that I just cut off after they printed) with their smiles and then numbered them on the back according to their mailbox number (or however you want to label it that will help you stay sane!) and assigned a number to the photo. I *tried* to make it more interactive by placing some answer sheets so that kids can write who they think is who on the line. 

Click on the pic to download this for your class! The kids in the hallways have had fun trying to see who is who! 

Hope you could find and use some ideas for next year! It was fun but exhausting! Check back later for a SHOWDOWN-- place value style!!