Classroom Reveal 2015-2016

The moment you all have been waiting for...my classroom reveal for the 2015-2016 school year. 

My new school is itty bitty and I absolutely love it! We have one teacher per grade level Kinder-5th grade. I currently have 16 second graders in my class. The former 2nd grade teacher who had been in my room retired at the end of the past school year. I did not think to take any before pictures of when I started to work, but I do have some photos of her classroom in May. I am excited for you all to see the difference. 

As soon as I saw the room when I went to observe in May I knew the first thing I wanted to do was get rid of the teacher desk. I also knew I wanted to bring my shelves with me and get rid some of the massive storage units. It was just too big for my taste. It was really neat during our Supply Night/Meet the Teacher when the old students would walk in my room and say how different it looked. Many of them informed me they loved it. I have a feeling part of that may have something to do with our seating options. :)

I cannot wait for my first day with my Second Grade Superheroes on Monday!

Classroom Tour 2013-2014

One of my absolute favorite things to do is look at other teacher's classrooms!!!! I have been obsessed with 1st grade classrooms forever and I am so excited to share mine with you all! I am in love with how it turned out and cannot wait for my 21 firsties to join me there tomorrow!

 When you enter the 1st grade hallway, I am the first classroom that everyone sees. My bulletin board is also huge, I could not even get the whole thing in the picture. I knew that I wanted to do something that could stay up all year long and I love how it turned out. I attached a clothespin to each one of my student's dots so I do not have to staple their work up, I can just clip. :)

Here is our classroom door. To the left is a board with my student's names that will stay up all year long. I made the wreath last year with a friend. 

As you walk through the classroom door, this is what you see. I was going for a look that was bright, fun, and welcoming. I think I accomplished what I was going for. :)

 On the back of our door is our Going Home board. Students will each have a clothespin that we will move to the way they get home. I like how easy it will be to change their clips if we need to. 

 This is our writing area. I love, love, love the little table that I got at Ikea and I know the kids will too. In the drawers will be different kinds of paper the students can choose from. 

 My wonderful backpack hooks that my dad made for me, our Brag Tag Board, and the green pail is for our lunch boxes. One of the things I am most excited about this school year is using Brag Tags. I think they will be a huge hit with the kids. Each one of my students is starting the year with three tags. 

They will be able to earn more for various things. We also will have a clip stick in our classroom that travels with us to our specials and if a student gets to move from green to perfectly purple, they can also earn a star bead for their necklace. 

This our birthday display...I cannot believe that I do not have any January birthdays!

This is a panoramic view from the door that connects my classroom to my neighbor's room. 

My whole group meeting area is one of my favorite spots in my classroom. In our building we do not have any bulletin boards so we have to create our own if we want them. Some teachers just put their things up on the wall, but I need them to be noticeable and to help separate the subjects. I used fabric and stapled it to the wall. 

The green wall is our math wall and the pink one will house our Language Arts things that we will need throughout the year. I will have two separate word walls for the subjects. 

The majority of our classroom library is housed in these shelves. Books are organized by themes but each book is also labeled for Accelerate Reader tests. I know several of you will ask, I found my rug on Overstock and got a great deal on it. 

This is our computer area. We are lucky enough to have three computers. Each teacher will also be getting an iPad this school year too for classroom use. Above our computers are our Whole Brain Teaching rules. 

 We have some amazing built in storage in our classrooms that I am so grateful for. I did so much purging this summer to get rid of things that were left that I did not need. This is also where I display our color words. 

 Here is a better view of all the storage. My mom was sweet enough to make the chevron curtains for me. 

This is the view from the storage unit. You can see the dual board (don't get excited because it is not SMART brand), our alphabet, our job chart, and our DAily 5 Read to Self book boxes. The chart tablet that is mounted will be used to write our objectives each week. 

 This is my teacher corner and kidney table. I wanted a little bit of "me" space and that is on the walls. The baskets to the left of the shelf are favorite characters and the things to the right are mine for teaching. 

 Big Books for Read to Someone and another view of the shelf. 

This is the view that you see from the guided reading table. 

That's where I will be spending a majority of my time this school year. I am hoping to share photos on a monthly basis with you all to show how it changes throughout the year. Feel free to leave any questions you might have, I will try my best to answer them!

Classroom Sneak Peek!!!

I just could not wait any longer! Here is a sneak peek of my classroom! I am absolutely in love with it! I will take a good camera with me tomorrow and get some more photos to share! For now, enjoy the peek! 

Summer is Over!

It is s hard to believe that today marks the end of my Summer Vacation! Tomorrow we start our week of in-service, really I should not complain because we only have 4 days since Friday is our County Fair Parade and pretty much the whole town is involved in it. :)

Even though my summer was crazy busy, I loved every minute of it. I learned so much as myself as an administrator while I was the camp director and I know that this will help tremendously when I am ready to be a principal now that I have passed my certification test. I am looking forward to returning again in the summer to the same position and continuing to grow as a leader. 

Summer may be coming to an end, but I am so excited for the upcoming school year and my new adventure with my 21 firsties! I thought I would create a top 5 list for the things I am most looking forward to about this upcoming school year. 

one. I am excited to see the growth that my class will have over the school year. In 6th grade I could see it a little bit, but there is just so much more in 1st grade. My students are on a variety of levels and I cannot wait to see their individual growth. 

two. I am excited to be teaching multiple subjects. Don't get me wrong, I still love Language Arts and everything that is associated with it, but I am thrilled to be teaching a variety of contents. We embed Science and Social Studies within our ELA block, but I am excited to be adding math to what I am teaching. 

three. In 1st grade we are going to be implementing the Daily 5. I was lucky enough to hear the Sisters at their conference in 2012 and loved it! When I was double blocked in 6th grade and had two hours to teach ELA, I ran a modified Daily 5 with my kids. I am excited to implement from Day 1 this year (actually I will probably introduce on Wednesday of Week 1) and teach my students the independence of Daily 5. 

four. I cannot wait to see my students grow as writers! Last year was the first year that Writing Workshop was implemented in 1st grade, and the teachers have just raved about it. I dreaded teaching writing in 6th grade mainly because my kids hated it. I want to help create a love for writing with my kids. Hopefully that will be possible through Writing Workshop. 

five. I am thrilled to be a part of an amazing team and am so looking forward to collaborating with them. In 6th grade I was only with one other person for planning purposes which was difficult at times. I also was already told that I am on the Language Arts planning team and am thrilled about that! 

I promise to share pictures of my new classroom soon...I really think I will be finished with it today! Happy shopping during the Teachers Pay Teachers Back to School Sale! I know my cart is loaded up and I am still not done looking! :)

Classroom Makeover

There is no denying that I am beyond excited to start my third year of teaching with a new adventure in 1st grade! I think my favorite part of it so far has been transforming my new classroom! Since I work as a camp director during the summer, I do not have as much time in my room, but I have been able to get in there at least once a week during my off time. 

I have been making a photo journey of the process and I try to snap a few before leaving each time I work in there. Here is the only photo I have of the room before I even started. A lot of the stuff in the picture is still from the previous teacher. Our maintenance crew was nice enough to move all of my things for me...isn't that wonderful? I plan on having a big basket of goodies for them when we go back in August. Here is room 102 in her glory before I even started!

 The amazing thing is that pretty much none of this remains in the room. I kept the tables and the kidney table, that is really about it. This was on the last day of school when I went by to visit. The colors in the classroom were not what I was envisioning, so I stripped everything off the walls and have started fresh. The issue though was that I had to wait until the end of June before anything of mine was even moved to my new room.

This was when everything finally got moved to my classroom. I had no idea how much stuff I had accumulated in two years. I think part of it was that I was holding out for that 1st grade job I always wanted! One of the first things I tackled were the shelves. The storage there is great, but a lot of things were left that I did not want. 

 This happened last Saturday. All of my things had finally been moved and I could get started with a few things. My first goal was to figure out where I wanted my shelving so I could get a feel for the room. I also got my bulletin boards up for my group area. At this school, we do not have any actual bulletin boards, we have to create them. I use fabric on the walls to create that space because it holds up so well. I love how they turned out, but sorry they are a little blurry. Thanks to both my mom and dad we got all of my bulletin boards, well at least the large ones, knocked out this day. 

I am all about the brights and chevron craze this year!

My mom and I went up again this past Thursday to work and we got a lot accomplished. We organized my shelves, cleaned bookcases, placed the tables, took all of the extra staples out of the well, removed the clips from the ceiling, and we hung my number line. I would call it a productive day. I think my favorite thing about my room right now is my rug. This picture does not even do it justice because it is flipped over. It is black and white chevron and I ordered it from Overstock.com. I am in love with it! 

Yesterday I also made my first trip to Ikea ever!!!! Oh my goodness, I am now in love! I got some things for the classroom and I cannot wait to get them in my room! I will post about that this coming weekend along with an amazing giveaway from Office Max! 

Believe it or not, I also found some time to get my craft on! I do not have a desk so I wanted some of the Teacher Organizers that are all over Pinterest...I love how they turned out! 

They are actually a really pretty teal color and this does not do it justice! 

I promise to keep sharing makeover pictures with you all!

I almost forgot...I am now a certified principal!!! I passed my test on July 17th and it is such a huge relief. Not quite ready for that, I sill love the classroom too much at this point! 

1 down, 35 to go

My first week of school was simply amazing. I am really hoping that this was not just a Honeymoon week, and that this is how my year will be all year long. In honor of such a successful first week, I thought that I would share my top five moments with you. 

One. Whole Brain Teaching is amazing! I was so hesitant about using this technique at first, but I am in love with it. My kids kept telling how much they loved it too. In my opinion it seemed that my students were much more engaged than when using traditional teaching techniques. I cannot wait to see how WBT progresses as the year does. 

Two. Interactive Student Notebooks are still the best invention ever! I do not know what I did last year during the fall semester before I implemented them! My kids seem to really be enjoying them too and I heard several times that they didn't mind taking notes/working/learning this way. That sure made my teacher heart happy. 

Three. My room has been a huge hit. You can find the photos I posted here. I have gotten so many compliments about the decor. Since I have implemented WBT this year, one of the rewards they can earn with their scoreboard is to work with the lights off and we turn the lanterns on. I had no idea how excited 6th graders would be about that!

Four. I was dreading using CSOPE for my curriculum this year, but it too has been wonderful! I had heard many negative things about it, but I was excited to just have a scope and sequence for the year. I am happy to say that I am actually loving CSCOPE. My fellow Texans, if you are in a district that uses it, do you have to use the ELA one?

Five. I got out of AM Bus Circle Duty already. You have to love school holidays! 

I will be back soon with some answers to some of the questions that you all have asked. If you have one for me, just visit here!

Wonderful

Today was absolutely wonderful. Maybe it was due to the fact that I did not have the nerves of a first year teacher, or possibly just because I knew how great this group of kids was going to be. If today is any sort of indication of what the school year is going to be like, I am going to be one happy teacher! 

One way you can tell that it is the first day of school is the amount of school supplies that occupy your room.

 The sad part is that I actually will end up with at least twice the amount of tissues that are pictured because at least half of my kids did not even bring their supplies today. Unfortunately, on my campus the ELA teachers are supposed to house the tissues for the entire grade level, but too bad I do not have anywhere to put all of them. You can bet I will be passing these out to the others rather quickly. 

After we got all of our housekeeping things take care of in my classroom, I knew that I wanted to do an activity that I saw earlier this summer over at Dandelions and Dragonflies. I think it was a big hit and I was able to learn a lot about my 6th graders. We did go through 600+ sticky notes today though. 

I am pretty sure this is going to be my go-to BTS activity from now on. 

How was your first day of school?

And so it begins...

It is hard to believe that I am getting ready to begin my second full year of teaching at 8:00 a.m. tomorrow morning. My classroom is ready, I have my copies taken care of for the first three days, all I need now is my 108 6th graders to come walking through my door. 

It seems like just yesterday that I was working in a first grade classroom with an amazing teacher while I was still in high school, and now I have my own classroom. Where did the time go?

There are so many things that I am looking forward to about this coming school year:

1. Implementing Whole Brain Teaching

2. Having more students whose lives I can influence

3. Having a Scope and Sequence (it is amazing what a difference this has already made!)

4. Being part of my campus leadership team and helping to influence the other staff members to always be doing what is best for the kids.

5. Implementing my Interactive Notebooks from the beginning of the year

What are you looking forward to this school year?

Where I Teach Wednesday

I have been looking forward to this day for so long because I am finally ready to share my classroom with you all. Last year I went with a Hollywood theme and it looked a little something like this. I liked it last year, but I knew I wanted something more bright and colorful this year. 

Let me give you a little background info about my classroom during the past 4 months. We were told back in April that we would be displaced from our classrooms for the last 3 weeks of school because they wanted to get started with our construction that was approved through a bond package during the past school year. I was so glad that they were going to get started early because I was wanting to get in my classroom in plenty of time before school started to get it all set up again since we had to pack up every single thing. Well, this is what the state of my classroom looked like August 4th, the day I got back from camp. 

To say I was freaking out would be an understatement. At this point I was pretty sure that there was going to be no way possible that they would get this finished before school started. 

Last week Wednesday, this is what I walked in to. 

What a difference some time made. It is hard to believe that this room once looked like the picture above. With the bond, in our 6th grade building we received new AC units (we can now control our own classroom), fresh paint, a complete ceiling redo, new carpet (that was a surprise), and updated wiring for the technology in our classrooms. 

Well, are you now interested to see what my room has turned out to be? After spending all day up there Sunday with my parents and sister, we got it finished!  Here is where I teach each day!

This is the view as you enter my classroom. You will notice my new air return system on the wall. I am not too thrilled about the amount of space that it takes up, but I am so grateful that it is at least magnetic! My anchor charts are going to have such a great home now!

This is my whole group area. I saw so many of you mention the Chevron rugs from Big Lots and I knew I had to have some for my classroom too even thought I teach 6th grade. The easel was also something I got this summer and I am so excited to use it when we are meeting as a whole class. Thanks to my sweet dad who strung my lanterns for me. The blank wall will also have a whiteboard on it when it comes in sometime after September 1st.

This is one of my newest additions to my classroom. I had a family friend who built several book shelves for me this summer and I absolutely love them. I had to paint them, but it was so worth it because my baskets really pop now. The bigger crates will be home to our Interactive Notebooks while the black crates will be where students can pick up their graded work out of their number folder. I hate passing back papers, but this makes it so easy! This shelf is also home to our turn-in drawers and my mentor text books.

Another view of my bookshelf and material tower.

Who says you can't use markers, crayons, glue, and scissors in middle school? We do every day!

a closer view of our Interactive Notebook homes

Pick Up Crates

This is the view from my chevron rugs and easel. I wasn't exactly sure about how I wanted to organize the desks, but I love how much room this arrangement leaves me with. Don't mind the missing ceiling tiles, they are not 100% finished yet.

The view from the corner of my teacher area to the whole group area. The bulletin board is going to be the home for our Mountain Language board. I just haven't got it up quite yet. :)

My teacher corner/small group area.

This is how I stay organized without a desk. On the top are my crates that say grade, file, copy, and one for my teacher aide too. The second shelf has a box for each day of the week and this is where I plan on keeping my materials that I will need for that day. The last one is a spot for me to put things for the next week.

View of my room from my teacher corner

The view from the front of the room near our CRAFT board

I shared this earlier this week as one of my must haves, but I figured you wouldn't mind seeing it again. I got the board header from Kristen.

A reading area for my students, but this will also be a great place for my SPED students to go when they just feel over stimulated.

view from the CRAFT corner

Yes, that is 24 feet of bookshelves that fit perfectly underneath my chalkboards. Be jealous! These were built by a family friend too and I am obsessed with them. All of these baskets contain our classroom library books as well as our book club books.

a closer view of the book baskets

the view from the back of the room

my word wall...I got this from Erica

I am implementing WBT for the first time and I am so excited about it! I of course had to make the rules match my classroom :)

a final view from the side of the room

I hope that you have enjoyed my classroom as much as I have! I cannot wait for my 6th graders to see it on Monday since they were unable to go in for Meet the Teacher last night.