Who, Where, Why, When, What???

Happy Saturday everyone! 

I just finished my first week back to work--and wow--I am tired! 

So glad Kristi picked up the slack and blogged EVERY day. 

Can you believe it?

I'm going to chime in here (and link up with Blog Hoppin') with what may be picture overload, but hey...I know I love picture-filled posts so here goes...

This is me and hubby--attempting to take a selfie. We need a little work, I think. :-)

We've been married almost 18 years! We were "high-school sweethearts" except we didn't go to the same high school. We met at church. We have lived in the same small-town area all of our lives--except when we went to Phoenix, AZ for hubby to go to school at UTI. Talk about culture shock! Still miss the weather there though--loved it!

Here's our kids on the first day of school:

Last year, I started teaching at the elementary school I attended for K-6. One of the things I love about it is how close I am to work...

Now for a peek in my classroom...

Now remember I said this is where I went to elementary school...SMALL classrooms. When I went here, we had combo classes (1st/2nd, 3rd/4th, and 5th/6th) and there were only 6-8 kids in a classroom! Now the two towns that make up our district combine for K-2 here in my town and 3-12 in the other town.

I only have 16 students this year! Hooray!

Last year with 23 it was so crowded!

Here's just a couple close ups because I really didn't change a whole lot this year. You may have seen these birthday cupcakes that took Pinterest by storm last year...

These are the same ones! All I did was swap out the candles. If you want directions on how I made them, see this post from last year. Weird Side Note--my class has no summer birthdays (the one in July is mine) and I have two different sets of two students with the same birthdays.

As far as decorations go, this is really it. I added "Seuss Club" which is really Mastery Club. I found the editable documents in the pack were not very user-friendly--but here is what I came up with...

I will put stars on their name tags as they complete a challenge. When they get 16 stars, we will move their name tag below the Hall of Fame words and add their picture. I love the idea of this, and I really think my kids are going to enjoy it. 

For the why of my post, glance back up at the pictures with my desk groups. Each group is a color team. You will notice the blue team has blue book boxes, but down below they also have a team tub of supplies and a math tub. I started this last year and it works so much better for me. There is less waiting to get out supplies. This year, I also added dots to my desks inspired by this pin (click the pick to go to Owl-ways Be Inspired and read about them):

I love these dots! In two days of school, I have already used them several times. For example, I might say, "Green dots get your team's supply bucket out," or "Yellow dots please come help me pass these out." LOVE IT!!!!

Also loving that I got rid of my job chart, but I'll post more about that later.

Now here's a peek at my schedule:

All I can say is that I can't wait to actually be using this schedule! The first two days were...well, you know. Basically a list of things I hoped to accomplish! 

Finally, what I love to teach...I don't even know how to pick just one thing! I absolutely love teaching--and I love my new class! Thursday was by far my easiest first day--ever. :-)

"I'm engaged to my book!"

Last week, I used Laurie's idea (from Chickadee Jubilee) and taught her lesson on the three types of readers.

 

Pretender

Dutiful

Engaged

 

It was perfect! My kiddos were so excited to tell me how they were engaged in their books the rest of the week--although it was cute to hear some of them say, "I'm engaged to my book because..." I did explain that we were not talking about being "engaged" to be married, but many of them stuck with that idea. Ha!

 

I'm also linking up with Angela from:

 

 

 And Jean from:

 

 

 

For:

 

 

 

I love the entire idea behind this linky! Click on over to one of their blogs to read more about it.

 

Here's two of my quick tips this week.

 

Checklist!!!

 

 

If you've been following our blog very long, you may have heard of this little time-saver before. I have my list of things I need to do every day slipped inside a page protector. As I accomplish things on the list, I cross it off and when the week is done I can use it all over again. The best thing is that it keeps me focused! PROVEN - I leave SO much earlier each night when I actually USE the checklist. Love it!

 

Dojo Prizes Simplified!!!

 

 

I have been using Dojo a lot this year. I found this awesome prize book from Mrs. Goodwin at ilive2learn ilove2grow (I changed it up a little). I was struggling with the "choosing" part. It was taking up my entire "Fun Friday" time which I usually like to use for accomplishing things on my Friday checklist. It took me long enough...but I came up with this idea. Slipped the pages into page protectors. Now the kiddos sign up during Fun Friday and I don't have to walk around asking them what prize they want, waiting for them to decide, and finally recording what prize they want. Last week I walked them through it because it was new, but this Friday I will be free to work while they are having some FUN!

 

Hope you're having a great week! Head on over and link up your quick tips!