Welcome to Room 117!

I have not been able to do too much to the room because I have just been trying to keep my head above the water. I wish I had taken some before pictures because it was a disaster area when I first got there. You can bet the room will have more of my own personal touches if I get to stay in it for next year.

 the view from my desk area

 my parts of speech signs that I made

 view from the back corner

 here you can really notice how off center my letters are, I just haven't had time to fix them

 The table! This is where kids pick up and turn in everything. It is my lifesaver!

 I have a crate that houses the extra copies for each day of the week. Students can get a replacement here but it will cost them 5 points.

 the turn in trays

 Absent Crate- I have a sheet that I fill out for the students and then attach their work to it. When they come back they just look in the folder for the day of the week that they missed and they will find their work.

 view from the front of the room...the last teacher left all of those books, but they need to be organized

 view from the door

 here you can see my desk area, it needs some color

Hope you enjoyed the look around room 117!

Head Above the Water

For the first time, I really feel like I am not sinking in the ocean. I have the whole week planned and I do not have stacks of grading waiting for me to do it. 

I also promise that I have classroom pictures coming, the camera is in the car, but it has not made it out of it yet. Now that I am all caught up, I am hoping to do that tomorrow. 

Today I got all signed up with Scholastic and I cannot wait to send home some book orders with my kiddos. Do you send a letter home with yours or how do you do it? I am pretty sure I will be doing the online parent ordering too. 

I am super excited about my lesson plans for this week. Last Friday for reward day at the end of the 6 weeks I showed Tangled to my classes. After thinking about it for a little bit, I quickly discovered how I could connect it to what we are doing for our weekly selection this week. We are reading Yeh-Shen and Sootface. I just finished making a Fairy Tale Comparison chart as well as a graphic organizer to describe the characters in each story. We are going to be covering things like internal and external conflict, character traits, antagonist, protagonist, and sequencing too. I thought that it was going to be a fun activity before the TAKS test next week. Of course we are also doing some review for that and using our KISS statements, showing our P's and Q's, and defining our words. I am so ready for the test to be over with though! 

I also have my third and final observation on Thursday of this week. I am a little nervous about her coming to MS this time, but am excited for her to see what I have done too. It is hard to believe that I am about to be a fully certified teacher! 

I will be back later this week with some documents and pictures hopefully too!

Exciting News

1. I am finally getting around to taking some pictures of my classroom tomorrow. I have to warn you now though that it is not too exciting. 

2. I set up my interview today for the 3rd grade job. It is on May 2nd at 10:30am. The principal told me today that I also have to prepare a 5-10 minute reading lesson plan that I could use in a 3rd grade classroom. Any suggestions or ideas? I am thinking I want to do something with a guided reading strategy because that has been a lot of the focus lately on the campus.

Happy almost Wednesday!

Well I had That Sub...

Yes, you all know which one I am talking about. The horrible one. 

First she was late, about an hour late. Then she did not even follow my lesson plans. This sub did not leave me a note either about the day! The kids had nothing but bad things to say about her too. Hopefully I will not have her in my room ever again. 

I also got an email today from the elementary principal where I student taught for 4th grade, and I have an interview in May! I am so excited, but nervous all at the same time. It is for a 3rd grade position which I think would be great. I have fingers crossed, and I am also still hoping to hear something about the possibility of just staying in 6th grade. I am just excited to even be getting an interview though. 

Speaking of 6th grade, I am still loving it! I am not enjoying the 45 research papers that I have to have graded by Friday though. Oh wait, did I mention the 45 book report projects I have to look at too? Or the 12 parts for a Biography Project for 20 kids in my regular class? I am not a fan of the end of the 6 weeks. I just hope I can make it out alive. 

I also found out today that we are going to be going on a field trip the first week in May. We are taking the entire grade level to Sea World. I am not too sure what to think about this quite yet. The kids are already complaining because all of the rides will be closed and just the exhibits and shows will be going on. I think it will be fun, but it sounds like it is going to be a logistical nightmare. I am trying to stay positive, but we will see.

Sub Plans

I have my first sub coming on Thursday because we are having a Language Arts teacher planning day. I am excited to get to finally talk with the other LA teachers and also plan for the rest of year, but I am nervous about having a sub too. The poor sub is going to think I am crazy with the sub plans that I left, but I wanted to make sure that they did not have any questions. 

Yes, it might have been 3 pages long, and yes I might have written way more that I need to, but that is okay with me. I am sure you all have been in the same boat before, and left way too detailed plans for the sub. What kinds of notes do you like to leave for your sub? Do you have a notebook for them that has important information about the class and such in it? 

Do you have a form that you leave for them to fill out about the day? My new mentor teacher sent me a rubric that she used to leave for the sub to grade the class.

I am nervous, but I know the day will turn out just fine. I just hope that my kiddos are on their best behavior.

You Know You're A 6th Grader Teacher when...

I am loving Abby's blog hop at the Inspired Apple and decided to join in on the fun too!

1. Almost all of your students are taller than you. 

2. Your students appreciate your humor and sarcasm and love to dish it back at you.

3. Your students don't care about the super cute letters or border that you put up in your room. 

4. They choose not to tell their parents anything because they think they are stupid. You can bet that the note that you typed up and sent home will not get to the parents. The only way for that to happen is to email them a copy of it too.

5. You are grading research papers for days.

6. The kids think you are stupid, but what they don't know is that you pulled the same tricks on your teachers back in the day.

7. It is torture trying to get your students to read a book for fun and not because they were told to do so.

8. You can't seem to ever have enough copies of something because they all keep losing it. 

9. You have to give the boys your teacher look when you hear them talking about googling Spring Break when they are supposed to be working on their Biography Project in the Library. 

10. The students love to correct your mistakes, especially on things that you type. Darn you auto correct!

It is a Giveaway!

Not only do I love finding other blogs that like to blog about teaching, but I also love when I find an upper elementary or middle school teacher! Katie from Katie Lately is amazing and you should for sure go and check out her blog. 

She is also hosting her first giveaway ever and I am loving what it is! She created a novel study for Sideways Arithmetic from Wayside School that is meant for the 3rd-6th grade classroom. If I am still in 6th grade next year, I would love to use it to connect the different contents in my classroom. 

Be sure and swing by her blog for your chance to win!