Just a Few Hours Left

I finished my Lucia's Neighborhood packet for the Journeys reading series.

 

 

 

I really like customizing my word work for my class. I can choose what we need help with. I also get to specifically target our grammar skill (adjectives this week) and other skills such as alphabetical order.

 

This was created to accompany the Journeys reading series. This is from Unit 1, story 4 Lucia's Neighborhood

Included in this packet:

spelling practice pages
mats to laminate for clay
identifying spelling words
identifying high frequency words
word family pages
alphabetical order practice
word search
spelling pretest template
practice spelling test template
spelling test template
2 vocabulary test templates
1 partner game (spin, read, and cover) 


A few more hours to enter! I've been wanting a pink one so badly!!!
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14 days down... & New Reading Series

Hello blogland. I've missed you. I haven' really had much of a chance to blog or read many blogs (thank heavens for scheduling posts!)

I've finished week 1 of official first grade Journeys. I know from some replies that some of you use it, too. Thoughts? I was just overwhelmed by how much they packed into Monday (Day 1). I mean...wow. Then, all week we are learning about nouns and types of nouns then action words are on the test?! Not 1 noun on the test...yes we do use the weekly reading tests.

Luckily the Journey's pack (mostly word work for  D5) was helpful.

click here to see what it includes

Well, we made it through the week and I even have plans in the works for next week. I've decided that I'm going to take the new reading series with a good attitude and look at it like I (finally) did with Daily 5. I'm going to make it fit my students, not feel pressured to do everything in the book,  and hopefully I'll be able to transition into the different world of Journeys.

This week we'll be reading The Storm. I was so jazzed to do this story. I even won a really cool weather packet from Stephanie from Falling into First. Now the week I'm supposed to teach this is a 4 day week. (Hey, don't worry about me--I will not be petitioning to have school on Monday) So, I have to 'cram' a week of reading into 4 days...well on top of that I'm going to be out of my room a lllll day Wednesday so I can attend a curriculum mapping meeting...and on top that I'm going to be out of school on Thursday because of a doctor's appt I scheduled in July!

 I can't have subs teaching the awesomness I wanted to teach. They won't invent my Miss Cosbyisms, they won't be able to explain it the way I would, they won't be able to impart this knowledge onto my barely trained firsties. (Okay, exaggerate much?!) I think we all feel this way about substitute teachers--even the best one. I'm actually sure they'll do a nice job but having two different subs in a row at the beginning of first grade is rough.

To help I've made a unit for The Storm (Unit 1, Story 2)

click here to check it out on TpT

It basically includes the same pages but focused on short i, new spelling words, and new high frequency words. After posting the What is a Pal? unit I went back and added more stuff. Here's a preview of what you'll get (not all inclusive)

Included in this packet:

spelling practice pages
mats to laminate for clay
identifying spelling words
word family pages
noun/possessive noun sorting
word search
practice spelling test template
spelling test template
2 vocabulary test templates
possessive noun worksheet
simple sentence unscramble

Daily 5 is hit or miss in my room now. We're doing Word Work, Read to Self, and Read to Someone. My powerpoint with those three activities seems to be working. I have a few more kiddos than last year (and have already lost 2 and gained 1) so it's been a bit much. We're also a very chatty group. We have to talk after everything...and sometimes during everything. I know it's about routine, consistency, and procedures. I have to remember consistency--we'll have a really good day, or really good morning and I'm less 'strict' then it's total regression. I do take blame....but c'mon kids. Just listen to me! I have a loud voice, I'm tall, I brushed my hair, look at me!!!

Oh, and I got my birthday board hung up after school today!!

click here to read more about it

D5 Station Rotation Update!

Hello everyone!! Last year I posted a video about how I automated the transition process of D5. Here is the original link . I decided that I didn't want to manually switch groups after each time segment or move clips, or anything else once one part was finished. I also like trying to use computer stuff. :D

(this video took several attempts and I still cut my name off!!!! At least no pups barked during the making of this video)

Here is my new video with a cuter PowerPoint

Link to updated PowerPoint Here is GingerSnaps' blog
Link to her D5 product that I showed in the video (and used)
**This products requires PowerPoint to work**

Throwback Thursday

Linking up again with Cara from The First Grade Parade to share a Throwback from last summer.

click here to go link up or check out more great blogs

It's another one of my "Just Pinning It" posts. I added some extra comments in purple.

Not quite sure if I'll turn this into a weekly thing but I was Pinning(v.)  today. I've actually not been on Pinterest in over a week. Not sure if you believe me or not but there were actually no withdrawal symptoms. I'm shocked, too.

So, here are a few of my most recent pins.

Click to see all of my Classroom Pins

1. Remind 101
Send a mass text or email to parents without divulging your phone number.
"Pajama Day tomorrow"
"Permission Slips Due"
"Field Trip Thursday!"

This app was awesome. About half of my classroom parents signed up for it last year, and so did I to make sure it worked. You can send out all kinds of reminders. This was great for field trips (where you need special clothes, a lunch, special shoes, etc) and tests. I'll be using it again next year. There's an app too--and you can schedule them in advance. Oh..and it's free. 

2. Daily 5 Rotation Cards
 

I ended up making a digital presentation for my D5--but I began the year using these because I loved the looks of them. 

3. BookRetriever
(I haven't downloaded this  yet, but I plan on it. I just really like that I can add levels and print labels)


This is the Classroom Library Company's accompanying app for managing book borrowing between teachers, parents, and 

students.

It allows you to scan, level, and inventory your entire Classroom Library as well. There's even a handy label printing function that allows you to print through a wireless connection! We have over 178,000 titles loaded with as much reading level information as we can find. We're constantly updating Guided Reading Levels, Lexile, Accelerated Reader, Reading Counts, DRA, and Reading Recovery and we are adding more every day
I did spend my 99cents on this--I was unhappy--left negative feedback...and the creator emailed me the next day. They've made some improvements. Once the school year started I didn't have time to level/inventory my library. I let it go by the wayside but maybe this summer I'll pick it back up. 

4. Dollar Store Photo Album
I'm going to put flashcards into a cheap photo album....POOF...instant dry erase flashcards

I keep forgetting to get photo albums!!!

5. Spiral Bind books



I had my D5 book bound last summer. Fabulous. I plan on bringing some of my other books (Daily math, Daily writing, etc) to Staples and seeing if they can do it with those. I've used one Daily Math book for 5 years and the spine is wearing anyway. 


What was your favorite pin this week?

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S&SS: Sweet & Simple Saturday

I'm linking up today with Tales of Frogs and Cupcakes to bring you something Sweet & Simple for your Saturday!

I went to Chicago yesterday and though it was super fun I'm pooped. So...sweet and simple is all I can muster today.

Not sure if you follow me on Instagram but if you do you may have seen that I was working on labels for book baskets.

Well...I went on a label spree. I'm doing D5 (hehe, well my version of D5) and I got snazzy new book boxes from Really Good Stuff. I label most student materials by number and my book boxes are no exception.

(mine are still boxed up in my classroom with the custodians do their deep clean--so I headed to Google)

{sources 1   2   3}

As you can see they do come with those rectangular labels. They're nice...but I wanted to make my own. I have three different choices for them. I have made them in patterns with different background images. There are numbers 1-30. 

I am going to use them for book boxes but they'd be good for cubbies, sorting numbers, grouping students, lunch/attendance count (with magnets on the board), randomly choosing a helper, etc. 

If you'd like your own freebie numbers just pin them on Pinterest (share the pin w/ me if you'd like) and leave a comment with your email All comments with emails will receive their freebie numbers in .pdf form. :) 

Thanks and happy Sweet & Simple Saturday

It's Friday (finally)

I absolutely love this linky!

click here to link up or check out more blogs

1. Classroom Orders were due this month. I'm an uber nerd and love buying school supplies so I had my order in asap...in excel format. (This makes it easier for me and the secretary too--I hope)

Today I got my first packages!!

Dry erase sleeves from TeacherDirect--perfect when you want an instant wipe surface and can't laminate. ($15.88 for 10) 

HotDot pens (mine were no longer registering correct answers)

2. Book Boxes have also been ordered. My IKEA box ones are in shambles. D5 (mainly the reading part) has been going strong since August...and here are the results.

I also heard IKEA doesn't have these anymore. 

I've ordered these from ReallyGoodStuff

3. In math we're learning about calendar and time. I do a binder page with all this on it EVERY.SINGLE. DAY so hopefully we can breeze through this. I did find that least year the kids were pretty good at it but not so much their seasons.

I made this page and we decorated a tree from each season to talk about season attributes.

I made it at school and quit .ppt before I saved it!!! Aahh. 

4. I love Amazon.com

Today I got the case for my MacBook. Now it's even prettier. I got a gift for a baby shower and 100 Laminating pouches!!! I used FREE Super Saver Shipping and it still came in just a few days. (I ordered Tuesday and all my items came today)

It's a bit more green in this photo than real life---and there's Van photobombing. 

a photo I found on google--more accurate

5. More about that collaborative blog

how cute is that!

This blog is a group of bloggers that will provide freebies, products, tips & tricks, etc. I'm very excited to be a part of this. The first official post was posted today!!! Teresa over at Fun in K/1 posted a great Mother's Day idea (oh my---almost May already!) 

Here' s an image from one of her Mother's Day ideas. (freebie!)

Click here to check out the new blog!

I'll be sharing my first post on there in May! I'm very excited. Very likely I'll share a freebie (hint hint) but I'd also like to provide some kind of tip/trick that could be helpful. Anything you're dying to know more about? (hopefully I know something about it, too--haha)

Playing Catch Up

Really...the last week of October...really?! My birthday is gone...the nice weather is hit or miss. I got my car washed at the fancy car wash (which to me is any car wash where I don't drive it through) and it poured. The leaves changed colors..and fell off. Well, at least there's Halloween to look forward too. I really do like Halloween. I like seeing the kids get so hyped. I don't like the sugar high and then the sugar low that follows but it comes with the territory. (Hmmm, maybe if they sneak candy to school I can take it and have a 3:00 pick-me-up?)

Super busy week this week in Reading. I'm not sure who exactly those people are in the front of my teacher's manuals that write these books but wowza. This week my firsties learned -s, -ed, -ing, possessives, predictions, reviewed short i, and learned naming parts of a sentence. Now, I can teach all of those things. Really, I can, I promise, I've done it. I'm just overwhelmed by doing it in one week. I know, I know...they won't master it this week...we'll review..and review..and recall...but I just kinda want to wave a magic teacher wand and have them absorb it all now. Too much to ask?

We learned that 'apostrophe s' shows ownership. Who doesn't love hearing 6 year olds say apostrophe?

Inside the " 's " I wrote "mine mine mine mine" because it's greedy.

Then we all though of something we owned and wrote it on a post-it and drew a picture. "Miss Cosby's dog" I made them "prove" they owned it by showing me the apostrophe s before they could hang it

We learned naming part this week (telling part is next week). Luckily this is something I've touched on during Mountain Language so we had something to build off. Laying in bed thinking about the best way to teach naming part I kinda thought of a train. (love my drawing, dontcha) Next week we'll do telling part and I'll come back to it.

Organizing our books from our book boxes. We're going 'book shopping' on Monday!

I am LOV-ING the mash-up of Weekly Reader and Scholastic News. First of all the paper isn't that shiny hard to write on crap stuff. The vocabulary and syntax are way more appropriate now. (I so wish my college TAs read this...totally used 'syntax' ...)

I had to share this cutie. The student working on this "Bat-o-Lantern" had to finish it up at home. C is such a creative kiddo and decided to go out of the pumpkin patch on this one. Too cute.

Okay, I've totally been wordy-worderson in this post but I've been away from here so long I had so much to share!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Me trying to show the kids something on my computer with a million other windows open: My computer is so slow!!!

H: Get it fixed at PCMatic

lol, love it! #YouMightBeaFirstGrader

Rotation Organization

I am building stamina with my firsties. I really wish I could say we were consistent and I did it daily...as the name suggests. We are up to 10 minutes in Read to Self and today we try for 9 or 10 in Read to Someone. (I'm pausing them at 10 for a while) I'm excited. They're really getting the procedures down and since we've started actual reading instruction and not just kindergarten review many of them are reading what they can. I will start rotations soon and I found some super cute rotation visuals for the kiddos for grouping. I found pocket chart inserts, clip chart posters, and a few other ideas. Well, these were cute...I even saved some and printed one of them. I practiced the other day with a few rotations to get them into the swing of things. It was difficult since they were back to back. I've since though of a few ideas to make them smoother. One of the ideas I thought of was a timed powerpoint. (This was totally my fave because I didn't have to watch a clock or set a timer) Watch the video below to see how I practiced rotations for our second go around. (I plan to make it pretty and add some cool effects soon...but for now...bare minimum)

Oh, and while I have you...have you used the Storia app?! Amaze. I'll post more about it later.

**I've uploaded the most bare bones template of this to my TpT store for free. Feel free to use it as a starting point. If you decide to do this please leave a comment here or on the YouTube video and a link for me to check it out!**

D5 Questions

I am trying to implement Daily 5 into my classroom this year. We've worked on Read to Self and Read to Someone and are continuing to build our stamina. I have finished our kindergarten review (the first weeks of school in our reading series are review) and I've finished our Beginning of Year (boy) assessments to get a feel of the the students' varied abilities so I'm going to start Word Work soon.

My questions:
Though I have the ability to teach the subjects in any order that I want I do have to use the textbooks and workbooks provided. Which I'm okay with.

That said

1. How many minutes do you 'carve' out for D5? (This might be my main question)
2. In first grade how high do you build your stamina?
3. Do you (in practical teaching land not I wish I could in an ideal situation land) do all 5 daily?
4. How often do you switch the books in their book boxes? Do you do it or do you have the kiddos?
5. I put Ranger Rick magazines in my book boxes...do you think school appropriate magazines are okay?
6. Do you choose to give them the freedom as suggested? I think I'm going to assign them to a group and let them choose an activity within that station.
7. Do you sometimes have the whole class doing one of the five things? (ie whole class Work on Writing time or Read to Self time)
8. When your students are building their stamina and are quiet, still, looking through books, and minding their own buisness but you don't really think they're picture reading or real reading do you think it's okay?
1. Since it's the beginning of the year is it more about reading or more about learning the procedures/rules?

One week under my belt

Monday evening was our Open House. I had 100% participation! I got to meet each student and talk with them a little bit and tell them about our class. I got to meet with the parents too and since we did Open House before school started I didn't have a dozen mini-conferences about progress going on.

Don't hate me...please don't hate me...but I have 15 kiddos. It's crazy! I feel like I've had a bunch of absent students every day. The kicker is I'll get all the move-ins and that is always scary because it's the unknown. I'm sure I'll have a make-it-work moment. (A-la Tim Gunn, haha)

You know what...I'm not sure if it's because of my small class size, or if they're a pretty good group, or because this is my 6th year of teaching (which I had to totally think about other day) but this was the smoothest beginning of the year ever. I had the normal bts jitters and we're completely working on procedures, raising our hand, and the usual but I feel like it's been smooth.

I also started Daily 5. We're doing Read to Self right now. I did the intro lessons...shoes and all. Here is my  anchor chart.

I know it's not fancy, I know this. But it's practical. I'll work on pretty next time (You know I have tons of pink post-its!) I wanted to use post-its so that each day when I revisit the chart with the class we can sort the duties. They're really good at knowing who has which jobs now and I really think it's helped firm my expectations during Read to self.

We're trying new spots around the room each day. I brought out my wiggle cushions as  an option and they were a hit. These are great for squirmy kiddos. I had a great parent donate them to my classroom a few years ago. 

Here are my book boxes. I got the white cardboard ones from IKEA. A coworker told me that they've stopped selling them. Say it isn't so! Aside from those jazzy numbers they're kinda boring. Maybe I'll break out the scrapbook paper and Modge Podge? Or maybe I can let them decorate it and send them home at the end of the year? Suggestions?

We've built our stamina up to 5 minutes...I do not think they're all reading their books but they are genuinely practicing their routines and I do see many reading or at least picture reading their books. I'm going to have tons of Daily 5 questions for all of you!