Five for Friday - Precipitation, New Student, and Daily 5!

Hi there! 

It's been awhile since you heard from me. 

Mostly because when it was my turn to blog, I was having computer/internet problems. I think I've got that all sorted out now. 

And more recently I've been a little consumed with getting my online presence started for my book. Things are really falling into place fast now! Eeek!

Linking up with Kacey at Doodlebugs!

Now for a random peek into the last couple of weeks:

1

We've been learning about the water cycle in science, so I was looking for some quick and easy experiments we could do. I even took some pictures, but when I went to put them in here... I must have deleted off my phone. :-(

Anyway, here's the pin (and pic) that inspired our experiment and the kids thought it was pretty cool. I loved how many times I heard the word 'precipitation.' Ha!

2

If you do not have new student bags, you need them. I found out late last Friday that I would have a new student on Monday (odd for a new student to start on a two-day week, but hey...). My new student bag was a LIFESAVER (old pic). 

3

Since we only had two days this week AND a new student, we spent some time reviewing and practicing our Daily 5 procedures. I miss using my PowerPoint (I don't give "choice" until 2nd semester).

My technology problems have not just been at home, but also at school. We have had internet problems--still can't connect our iPads. :-(  

I've also been without my projector for about a month. I realize I am SUPER spoiled, but I miss it. A LOT. We are "this close" to me having a working projector again. Cross your fingers? Say a prayer for me? ;-)

4

My son (17 years old) first started asking to take piano lessons when he was 4 years old. I put him off for three years because I did not want to have to make him practice. He has played the piano for ten years now and I have never had to make him practice!

In fact, his desire to practice far exceeds my desire to listen! Please understand, I love to hear him play, but the piano is in the living room. We have only one television in the house, so we are constantly running him off the piano when we are ready to relax. In fairness to him, I know he plays the piano TO relax so I had a crazy idea...buy him a keyboard to have upstairs in his room.

It took some trial and error, but we found one he likes at an affordable price. 

Happy Birthday and Merry Christmas to him! 

He is thrilled. 

We are thrilled. 

Everyone is thrilled. :-)

5

Last, but certainly not least.

Here's where you can follow along with me and my writing (hoping there will be more than one book someday):

Twitter

Facebook

Website/blog (not active yet, but getting there)

I attempted to use WordPress instead of Blogger based on several recommendations for authors. It has been a learning process! I think I'm almost there, but still a few tweaks to make. 

Hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving and are enjoying the extended break! 

Five for Friday: Video Tour, Science Success, and Back to School Fun!

Happy THREE day weekend!

After our first full week with students, I need it! My week has been crazy busy and last night was the first evening I made it home before 8:30. 

Exhausted is an understatement, and I've decided the world will be lucky if I get out of my pajamas today. ;-)

I've got LOTS to share with you today, so if I blow past FIVE I'm sorry (but there is some good stuff toward the end so hang in there).

Thanks, Kacey, for a great linky!

1

I love task cards, so we started practicing our task cards procedures right away with this "Get to Know Me" roam the room from Amanda Madden. 

P.S. If you don't follow her, you should. She gives amazing freebies to followers now and then, and I'm pretty sure this was a freebie at one time. Priced at $3, still a great deal!

2

Um...did I mention I love task cards? 

These were new to me this year and perfect for teaching my kids how to read QR codes (another thing I love) using the QRafter app.

This "Back to School Fun Quiz" is a freebie from Teacher's Toolkit.

3

Read to Self stamina is at 10 minutes after 7 days of school. We tried 12 on Friday, but...well, let's just say that ended in an impromptu lesson on "stamina breakers" (activities, not students though maybe I really would have liked to name names!) and "stamina builders."

P.S. I love two things about my tiny room (okay, three).

1. Two walls are covered with whiteboards (no wasting chart paper for this stamina graph).

2. One wall of shelves.

3. One wall of windows.

So the walls. 

I love the walls.

The space between the walls is tiny!

4

 We are also building our Work on Writing stamina. I think I have a group of authors because this has been easier than read to self!

Friday we tried Read to Someone, but that also needs more work. Volume is a biggie for this bunch!

5

We also got busy with some math this week using two of my favorite resources.

Math Helper on the right.

HOTSHOTS on the left.

6

This is one of the good ones, so I'm sorry the explanation is long!

In case you don't know, I teach 2nd grade, but I am also the K-2 science teacher. This year I have 1st and 2nd grade combined for a 20 minute science block (and then K for 20 minutes while 1st/2nd goes to music). That's 30 students in science at one time. 

I know, I know. Some of you have 30 students all day, but for me that is a large group!

The first week was a great success because of this blog post! You must check it out. She literally has everything you need for a great first week of science and it was all FREE!

I stretched her five day plan into 7. We watched the books suggested on YouTube because I didn't have them. The "Super Scientist" procedures and badges (see red arrow in picture) made it possible to do a non-chaotic experiment with 30 kids! I'll be using her "Super Scientist" procedures all year for experiments. I just cannot explain how excited I am about how the week went!

7

And finally, last Saturday I made a video tour of my classroom on Facebook. In case you missed it, here is the link.

I wish I would have dressed up a little--or maybe even fixed my hair--because it has about 2,400 views now! But oh well, that is the real Saturday me. :-)

If you have questions about anything you see, leave them in the comments here or on the FB post and I'll try to answer. I'll be making a video later today to explain the Fluency Tubs so keep an eye out (and I promise I won't be in my PJs ;-))! 

Have a wonderful Wednesday!

Five for Friday - Back to School Style!

WOW!

First week back to work complete.

I am exhausted!

How is it that an experienced teacher can never be completely prepared for the physical and emotional back-to-school demands?

I set up my room the first week in August. I lesson planned for the first weeks and have my year long plans done. I started waking up at 5:00 a.m. a week ahead of time. I was taking about 10,000 steps each day during my final weeks of summer.

And still, I came home from the community cookout and scrimmage last night feeling a lot like this:

I seriously limped to bed. :-(

Anyway, let me give you a peek at my week Five for Friday style!

Thanks Kacey for this weekly link-up!

1

The Christian Teachers Facebook Group leaders have put out a prayer journal for this school year (started Monday). It is based off of Psalm 119 and covers four verses a week. I'm accepting the challenge to memorize it! I love this app for practicing my memory verses. 

2

Monday morning it was back to work for inservice. It was plagued with technology issues. Ugh! I felt so bad for our administrators who had planned good things, but nothing was working correctly. One of the drawbacks of a small school...no full-time tech person. I did manage to score some goodies though! Can't wait to read this book!

3

No tech person means we have get to do a lot of techy stuff ourselves. I had an issue with my computer/projector connection all last year, so they promised me this Google Cast thingy would solve my problem. I was a bit skeptical, but happy to report that it did solve the problem after I spent an hour installing it and setting it up. I fear it will only work when our internet is working though. Can anyone confirm that?

4

Thursday was our first day of school, so of course, I had to make my kids get in a picture with me! He's a junior. She's a sophomore. Me...well, I'm a 2nd grader (year seven).

Also, from the first day of school, my students working/playing with their morning tubs. 

This is new for me this year, but so far I'm liking it. We have our morning meeting in the gym, students come to my room and do their lunch count, check their GO (getting organized) book, and then head to breakfast (if they choose to). The morning tubs keep the non-breakfast eaters busy and encourage the breakfast eaters to be quick! I rotate the tubs each day and as the year progresses, I'll add different activities. The first few weeks, we are sticking to Legos, Play-Doh, and Pattern Blocks.

5

Day two (yesterday) we started building our stamina for Daily 5. The students did 3 minutes really well, so they wanted to try 4. It really went better than I expected based on some of my littles this year!

We are also building our stamina for school right now. This bunch is doing pretty awesome in the morning. The afternoons are a little rougher, but we will get there I'm sure. So thankful that our administration agreed to a morning and afternoon recess PLUS our kiddos get PE every day. :-)

I even got things done during my PLAN time (if you've followed us long, then you may remember I did not have a plan time during the school day the last three years) so I do not have to go work at the school today! I think I'll go up for a few minutes just to make a video classroom tour for you though. We'll have to see the how the day goes. ;-)

Have a great weekend!

Five for Friday!

Hey there!

This week felt like a roller coaster ride.

The ups and downs and twists and turns just about did me in!

In fact, if you had heard me yesterday during my too short 20 minute break in the afternoon...I'm pretty sure you would have said something like this:

"Stop whining!"

"Be quiet!"

Or maybe you would have had mercy on me and said:

"You need a nap!"

Ha!

Seriously though.

I was without internet for three days.

In a row.

That makes things difficult when you plan for kids to use internet based programs on the iPads or when most of your files are saved on OneDrive or when you can only connect to a printer at the school via internet...you get the idea.

And then my computer to projector is not working right (this has been since I got a new one on the first day of school--so a month--but it is getting worse now...). 

For Kindergarten science, I had planned to watch a video about science safety. The five minute video must have "shorted out" 8-10 times. It would come right back up, but you know Kinders just can't handle that sort of thing...so when I got to break time I was DONE. :-(

I took my computer to the office--everyone else in the building had internet yesterday, I'm the only one without now--and tried to print some things I needed for next week. The poor secretary had to hear me complain for a good five minutes as I worked. #notproud #beingreal

I really am flexible and can go with the flow...for a couple of days. Third day apparently is all I can take! Guess I need to work on that!

Okay, on to the pictures!

1.

My son has been waiting and hoping to see my Acadia reach 100,000 miles. Ha! He missed it, so I took a picture 3 miles too late. Hubby was driving, don't worry!

2.

We are rocking Daily Five! So excited to get going and see the kids doing so well with it!

3.

Remember...ups and down?

This class keeps me on my toes, but they are so kind hearted!

They have really gotten into filling our classroom bucket!

4.

Friday's recess entertainment. They decided Mom was carrying Baby so we went with that! One of the Kinder boys insisted I take a picture!

5.

Volleyball is keeping me busy! 

In fact, I'm on my way to a tournament as I write this. Last week, we got 2nd at our home tournament. Going for GOLD today! 

Our varsity is 10-2. JV is 4-2.

That's my daughter Harley with the headphones.

That's all I've got! ;-)

Have a great weekend!

Daily 5 Progress and Math Rotations - Five for Friday!

Happy Friday! 

I tell you with Labor Day off this week, I had my days all messed up and strangely it seemed like a longer week than normal. Short weeks are always like that for me though!

So here's what we've been up to in 2nd grade:

We went over Check for Understanding again before we started practicing Read to Someone. We only have one thing left for next week - Listen to Reading. 

These kids are rocking out the Daily 5! Don't hate me, but we were doing 15 minutes of Read to Self the 2nd day!!! Thank you, dear first grade teacher! :-)

Today I even tried some math rotations...

This is group is playing our I Have...Who Has...? Time to the Hour and Half-Hour game. It is our all-time best seller and I can understand why--great for 1st grade and the beginning of 2nd grade! :-) Also available in our Telling Time Mega Pack. 

This group is working in their Interactive Notebooks. They are loving these things and so am I! The students are so engaged--all of them and all the time. These pages come from the math INB pack I'm working on, but I'm kid-testing (and teacher-testing) it before I list it. :-)

This group is working with pattern blocks. First they had to cover some shapes on a paper from Saxon and then I let them explore (play) the rest of the time.

These two are practicing one of the card games from Dealing with Math Homework. I have had a great response on what I'm calling STAR Homework (idea from Amanda Madden). I've adapted it a bit for me, but the kids and their parents are loving playing these math games and the new style of homework in general.

Don't forget to link up with Doodle Bugs Teaching!

Have a restful weekend!

I Surrendered to the Power of Choice!

If you've followed our blog very long, you know that Kristi and I were both skeptical before beginning the Daily 5. We just didn't know if it would work for us.

 

 

Of course, when we actually tried it, we fell in love! And so did our kiddos!

 

I was teaching first grade and attempted letting them choose what they did in each round, but it just took way too long and it was hard to keep track of their choices. I quickly gave up on choice and created a rotation chart which worked wonderfully for the control-freak in me.

 

I started the Daily 5 in second grade this year that same way.

 

Then I was reading (again) about the power of choice in the Daily 5 reading structure. That and the feeling that my kiddos were getting a little "bored" with their routine had me thinking...

 

2nd graders, end of the year, surely we can do it...

 

So I did it.

 

I surrendered.

 

I told the kids we were going to try it on Thursday and Friday.

 

And guess what?

 

It worked...wonderfully.

 

Afterwards, I asked the kids if they liked it. All of them except two raised their hands. The first boy (after my own heart) just likes structure and routine. The other one said, "I didn't just like it. I loved it!" LOL!

 

Guess that means the power of choice is here to stay in my classroom. I have a few ideas on how to manage it this time so the students and I will be happy! I'll talk more about that and let you know how our first full week of choice goes next Monday. 

 

P.S. If you have purchased our Telling Time Mega Pack, go redownload it. I've added 8 worksheets that can be used as practice pages or assessments! Enjoy!

 

 

D5 Update and Some Funnies!

Last week we started our Daily 5 rounds. It went good....a little bumpy the first couple of days, but by Friday the kiddos were doing pretty well. You may remember that I was using my projector and a PowerPoint presentation as a rotation chart...well, on Thursday my projector stopped working! Ugh! We went on to Plan B and I printed out the slides. Thankfully, it was a minor issue and my projector is up and running again!

 

Our secretary stopped in to snap some pictures for the school newsletter one day last week... Here's one of the first shots she got:

You might not be able to tell, but the cubes on the bottom right desk say, "dr__unk." Wonderful! Then she snapped another picture...another little sweetie had written on the top of her page "crap." Now I did know that the cubes had potential for these questionable words, but my kiddos last year would have notified me that they rolled a bad word. Then I told them not to write it down. I didn't want to start the activity by telling them that...well, you know then some would have tried for the bad word. Anyway, the secretary promised not to include those parts in the newsletter! Ha!

 

Maybe I should rethink those cubes for next year...

 

Here's a picture of my kiddos in music. We pulled out the bells this particular day. Anytime I pull out the instruments, I am a "rockstar teacher." LOL! Instruments even work on Kindergartners (who are making progress, by the way). 

 

Here's another funny...

A first grader in music, " Are we having a program?"

"Well, of course we are," I said.

First graders cheer as if I had just done something amazing.

 

Then I thought...hey, it will be amazing if I can get these kiddos ready for a program. And then I wondered...were they thinking the same thing? Ha! ;-)

Daily 5 Launch!

Today was the big day! We officially launched our Daily 5 rounds today. Hooray!

 

It was not without some hiccups, but for my 2nd graders first experience with the rounds I think we did pretty good. They did some similar literacy centers in 1st grade so that helped a little. The big difference is that in 1st grade, the groups rotated to each station together. My kiddos had to check the board each round to see where they were headed (haven't tried the power of choice yet).

 

My rotation chart last year took up so much space that I just don't have this year. I decided to try using my whiteboard. This is what gave me the idea...

 

Sandy from Soaring Through Second Grade has this freebie.

 

I like Sandy's and may convert to using it later on. Last night as I remembered I needed to have the rotation chart ready [yes, Mrs. Organized (Kristi would say) is still scrambling...hope I get a routine going soon], I couldn't get to Pinterest (it's blocked HUGE :-() so I just made one Powerpoint slide for each round. At the end of the round, I just clicked to the next round and it told the kiddos where to go. I really liked it!

 

I'm also loving this Pinterest find...

Meet "Mr. Check In" courtesy of Lyndsey at A Year of Many Firsts. We've even pulled this guy out of our book boxes during Writer's Workshop to discuss how we can add details to our stories. Another freebie!

 

Another new thing I tried this year that I really think I'm going to like is not doing the rounds on Mondays. I found when working with a basal, there is so much to introduce it was hard to fit it all in my small groups. I can't remember which blog gave me the idea, but I really like it...

 

Math is another story... Any Saxon users out there? How do you handle the pages? Do you do the guided practice (side A) every day as a whole class? Do you ever give any independent work? I like the extra fact practice that Everyday Math didn't have, but I'm trying to find a way to make the pages more manageable--for the kiddos and me (on grading)! I also don't give math homework every night, so... Suggestions welcome!

 

Have a great evening!