Five for Friday

I am once again linking up with Doodle Bugs Teaching for their Five for Friday Linky Party.  I have been on Spring Break this week.  It has been so great relaxing and attempting to get things checked off my checklist.  I had high expectations for getting a lot done this week.  

We celebrated Easter on Sunday by attending a sunrise service.  The Easter Bunny also visited.  She got a lot in her basket but her favorite item was bubbles.  They have been entertaining her all week!

I was determined to get a garden planted this week.  We don't do a big garden because our "green thumbs" are not that great.  Four variations of tomato plants were planted as well as four types of bell peppers.  Bugs or rabbits usually ruin half of our garden each year.  I'm searching for ways to keep them both away.  

One of the favorite memories growing up was going strawberry picking.  My mom made the best jam and pies with the freshly picked strawberries!  We got to introduce my baby to strawberry picking and she loved it!  

Even though I have been on break I have been working on addition centers for next week.  I am currently creating a carnival themed addition pack of centers.  Four centers are included in the pack and some of the centers can even be extended to multiple centers for differentiation.  I have also been prepping for my Plant Unit to start next week.  I am planning on writing a post about how we study plants next week.  

Lastly, we are prepping for my baby's 2nd Birthday Party.  We are keeping it simple this year and just doing a party with immediate family.  It's hard to believe that she is already 2 years old!
I hope that all of you had an enjoyable week!

Five for Friday

It has been SO long since I have blogged!  I have been busy with teaching , being a mommy to a busy toddler and life in general.  I am so excited to get back into blogging.  

In October we found out that we are expecting baby number 2, June 2nd.  It was a tiring first couple of months and extra tiring with a toddler.  This is a pic from last week's ultrasound.  I think it looks like she is praying.  

This week we have been busy doing Easter Activities in both ELA and Math.  I came across a great recording sheet for plastic eggs from Simply Kinder.  There were three recording sheets to choose from. One where the kids read the word and draw a picture, one where they can record on the eggs and the last one was for plastic eggs that have three pieces. I haven't seen these eggs, but according to the blog post they are available at Meijers.  These recording sheets helped create a quick activity for two centers this week.  

We also used Easter Addition Centers that I created.  My students enjoyed working at the three different centers that allowed them to add in different ways.  

In my Work with the Teacher center in the Daily 5 Rotations we used The Therapeutic Teacher's Comprehension and Phonics CVCe Books.  These books are a great resource and provided great insight into my student's abilities.  I realized that not all of my student's were ready to work independently in these books.  I loved that the book provided students 5 opportunities to read the book each week.  There were also pages for activities to do each day that related to the story.  I am planning on using these with my higher leveled students each week.  They should be able to do these independently with minimal assistance from myself or my assistant.  This will allow us to work with lower leveled students.  

I have been getting ready for the week after spring break.  We will be starting our Plant Unit.  Plant journals are ready, seeds will be bought next week and the living and nonliving center activities are ready.  

Next week is Spring Break!!!  I am looking forward to spending the week with my little family and my dad who is is town for the next two weeks.  I have plans to create centers that will get me through the rest of the school year.  

Kinder Tribe Linky Party-Getting to know this Kinder Teacher

I am linking up with the Kinder Tribe for their first Linky party. Below you will find a little bit about me.

Ever since having my daughter I have learned to love coffee! I drink it with lots of flavored cream or just lots of cream and sugar.  I have found that I function better when I have had a cup of coffee in the morning than on days that I do not.  

I absolutely LOVE flair pens!!! I just went and bought a new set yesterday and don't remember them being that expensive but they are worth it because I love the way they write.

I discovered Sneezy the Snowman a couple of years ago and have found that it provides a story that can help teach many different standards.  My students love making predictions while reading the story, revisiting the story and recalling the details in order and adding on to the story using their imaginations.

Mrs Wills' always has such great inspirational ideas on her blog!  I love how she writes as if she is having a conversation with you.  

My absolute favorite part of teaching Kindergarten is seeing the major growth that EVERY child makes throughout the school year. Even my lowest child makes drastic improvement from the beginning of the year.

I hope you have enjoyed learning more about me!  Click here to go back to the original post and get to know other K teacher bloggers.  

Five for Friday

I am once again joining with Doodle Bugs Teaching to summarize my week.  I feel like it has been an  uneventful week, but after traveling for two weeks I am perfectly ok with that.  

Luckily I have amazing in laws who were willing to watch our crazy dog while we were away.  He did get boarded over the 4th of July weekend so that they could go away as well.  While he was boarded he must've picked up kennel cough, he got the shot for it when he got to the vet but apparently it works best if given a couple of days before boarding.  He has been on cough medicine and antibiotics all week.  It is a very odd sound to hear when he coughs.  

Since being home my baby is now more of a walker than a crawler.  She will still crawl periodically but prefers to walk.  It is a whole new "ball game" now that she is walking.  She is into everything and I feel like it is harder to keep her interested in things because she always wants to be on the move.  I love and hate it all at the same time!  

This week involved lots of unpacking of bags and suitcases.  I  feel successful because I was able to unpack and put away the majority of our stuff while keeping the baby entertained.  Usually I would've saved this for nap or after she is in bed but there was so much to get done and unpacked.  

I got a Lilly planner!  I am hoping that it helps me to stay more organized both personally and professionally.  I am planning on keeping it in my purse so that I always have it on me and can use it for both home and school.  I have been feeling overwhelmed and as if I am not getting anything done.  Hopefully making lists in the planner helps.  

Our 2 year anniversary is Sunday and for anniversary/birthday presents we decided to get Fitbits.  They are supposed to be delivered today and we are both excited for the UPS truck to bring them.  I am sure I will have updates next week.  

Hope that you guys have all had a relaxing yet productive week!  Check out what other teachers have been up to this week by clicking here and looking at the bottom of that post.  

Five for Friday

Happy Friday!!! I have taken a break from this Linky Party for the last couple of weeks because I've been busy simply enjoying the summer and spending time with my baby.

These past couple of weeks have also been busy weeks of traveling which included visits with family and friends. We made it to Michigan Saturday afternoon!  I get so excited when I see the Pure Michigan sign.  

Being "home" also means we get to visit all of my favorite places that I miss so much! Guernsey's has the best ice cream I have ever had. A. has never wanted or liked ice cream before, but she loved it from there. She must just know good ice cream. 

We also went to the splash pad near my dad's house. It was our first time visiting a splash pad. It took her a while to warm up but she ended up loving it. 

Since we are "home" my family has been eager to entertain my little one which has left me with some free time to work on my classroom decor packet.  The numbers and letter are already posted in my TpT store I am currently working on center signs and job cards. I also have many more ideas to include in this packet. I am hoping to have it posted on TpT by next week.  

I also worked on finishing some TpT items that I started in the Spring as part of the TpT Sellers Challenge. My students loved these centers and they truly helped solidify their subtraction skills. I noticed a few mistakes in them when using them with my students so I was finally able to look at them more closely and correct (hopefully) all the mistakes.

I hope everyone has had an enjoyable week!! Check out what other teachers have been up to by clicking here and scrolling to the bottom. 

Have a great weekend!!

Rock Your First Year Teaching Linky Party

Happy Wednesday!!! I have joined up with Teaching with Crayons & Curls and My Mommy Reads to offer new teachers advice and to help them learn from my mistakes.  I am very late to the party!  I had started this post about a week ago and never finished it.  This weekend was a crazy weekend and we are preparing for vacation so I have not had time to sit down and finish it.

Your first year of teaching is something that you have envisioned for a while. It is a time full of mixed emotions-excitement, fear, happiness and stress.  All of these feelings are perfectly normal and I'm sure the majority of teachers can relate to them. I always have these feelings as the beginning of the school year approaches and this will be my ninth year of teaching.

1.  Take notes of what went well and what you could do better. I always had a lot of ideas that I thought were great but when I actually did them there were lots of room of improvement. 

2.  Find a good support system to collaborate with at your school.  They may be other teachers on your grade level or teachers not on your grade level.  These people will help keep you sane, develop lessons and help you to realize that things will be ok and it's not the end of the world when your lesson does not go as planned.  

3.  Take time for yourself. Do not immerse yourself in work that you are not giving yourself time to breathe.  Go for a pedicure, go out for drinks with friends, read a book, visit with family.  Do whatever makes you relax and get back to your happy place.  You will be a better teacher knowing that you have had time to yourself.  

1.  Do not stay at school working until the wee hours of the night.  You SHOULD NOT be closing the building down each day.  While it is good to be prepared and plan for the following day you need to take time to be with your family or by yourself and enjoy time away from teaching.  Working and having your brain think about teaching all the time will eventually leave you feeling burnt out.

2.  Don't stress if an observation doesn't go as planned.  There is always room for improvement.  This is where a good support system really helps out and helps you realize that while your lesson did not go as planned it also wasn't as bad as you think it was.  

Enjoy your first year! Know that you will make mistakes and that's ok. It will be a year full of learning for your students as well as yourself. Learn from your mistakes and know that the following year will be even better. I feel like my second year of teaching was my best year of teaching.

I hope that this provided some guidance and insight to help you have a successful first year of teaching.  Click on these links here and here to see what kind of great advice other teachers are offering!  

TPT Challenge Week 1-Makeover Madness

I am participating in the TPT challenge that will take place over a four week period with a new challenge each week.  This week the challenge is called Makeover Madness.  This is something I had planned to do this summer with many of my products.  I choose to makeover the Polka Dot and Chalkboard Alphabet Posters.  My classroom theme last year was polka dots and chalkboard and this was one of my first products I created for TPT.  I used this in my classroom this past school year and realized some changes needed to be made to this product.  When it was originally created, the product consisted of 2 alphabet letters on each page.  This was a great size for word walls, but I felt that it would have been nice to have them on a full sized page.  I also noticed that some of the vowel pictures as well as one consonant picture was slightly confusing.  The vowels used the long vowel sounds rather than the short and the letter G had a picture of what should have been a glove, but actually looked like a mitten.  I wanted all the vowels to be uniform in their long vowel or short vowel sounds.  Initially, the sounds that we teach for vowels are short vowels, so it made sense to have all short vowel sounds on the cards.  Also the cover on the initial product was boring, not colorful, had no pictures, and did not accurately describe the product.  

The revamped version contains a bright, colorful, picture filled cover.  It also has two sizes for posters-half sized alphabet and whole page.  There is a preview of the different sized pages available below the cover picture.  This product is on sale for the next four days.  Check out product makeover's from other teachers here.