Team Teaching Tuesday- A New Series

I am so excited to be launching a new series on my blog that will occur on a bi-weekly basis. It is called Team Teaching Tuesday. 

I came up with this idea because I will be team teaching during the 2014-2015 school year with another 1st grade teacher and I could not be any more excited about it! Currently on my team there is one set of teachers who are team teaching. However, all of the kindergarten teachers are teaming this school year and we have heard some really good things from them. Of course some of them dislike teaming, but I think that will always be the case when personalities do not mesh or people are forced into it. Both my co-teacher and I are so excited about this opportunity and we truly think that it is going to benefit the kids because they have a teacher who is focused on what they are teaching. I feel like I have been an okay teacher who is teaching four subjects, but I cannot wait to be a great teacher who is focused on three subjects instead. I thought this bi-weekly link would be a fun way for us to share ideas that work for us and maybe some different things that you have not thought about before in a team teaching situation. 

Today's post is going to be dedicated to schedules. In my opinion one of the first things that you must do when even thinking about team teaching is to devise a schedule that will work for you and your co-teacher. As long as the master schedule does not change at all for 1st grade we will be using something similar this coming school year. 

8:00 a.m.	Students arrive in the classroom/Announcements Morning Routine (check folders/Billie Planners, Morning Work)
8:15 a.m.- 10:30 a.m.	Block 1 (2 hours of instruction time) Miss K’s Class- Language Arts with Mrs. S Mrs. S’s Class- Math/Science/Social Studies with Miss K Morning Recess/Snack from 9:45-10:00 a.m.
10:30-10:35 a.m.	Transition back to Homeroom Classes
10:35-12:00 p.m.	Block 2 (1 hour and 10 minutes of instruction time) Students are with their homeroom teacher for instruction
12:00-12:30 p.m.	Lunch Recess
12:30-1:00 p.m.	Student Lunch
1:00-1:45 p.m.	Block 2 Continued (55 minutes of instruction time) Students are with their homeroom teacher for instruction
1:45-1:55 p.m.	Pack-up
1:55-2:15 p.m.	Chapter Book Read Aloud with both Classes Together
2:15-3:15 p.m.	CAMP/Teacher Conference
3:15-3:20 p.m.	Class Meeting/Wrap-Up the Day
3:20 p.m.	Dismissal to the Hallway

I will be teaching Math, Science, and Social Studies and we will alternate teaching Science and Social Studies every three weeks. My co-teacher will be doing Language Arts, Guided Reading, and Writer's Workshop. I am interested to see how other teachers share their day. 

In my opinion, I think it is important that it is truly a co-teaching situation. This is why my co-teacher and I want to trade for at least two hours daily. I am so excited to be able to do true Guided Math with our students and I know that it will make a huge difference. 

What does your schedule look like on a daily basis if you are in a team teaching situation? I cannot wait to see what others do! 

Do not forget to link up below if you have a post to share about your team teaching schedule. 

Winner Winner Chicken Dinner

I finally had a chance to select a winner this afternoon for the $25 gift certificate to Teachers Pay Teachers. The lucky winner is Callie Thumm!!! Please contact me within 24 hours so I can get your price to you. If Callie does not contact me within 24 hours I will select a new winner. 

Thanks to everyone who participated!

Giveaway Time!

I have had a huge growth on my Facebook fan page this weekend and I want to do a giveaway because of that! I am going to be giving away a $25 gift certificate to Teachers Pay Teachers!! Who wouldn't love to win that? You have lots of chances to enter. If I get 1,000 entries in the giveaway I will giveaway a 2nd gift certificate too! :) The giveaway will end on Wednesday, January 22nd!

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Ah-mazing!!!

I was lucky enough to attend the Texas 1st Grade Teacher's Conference in Austin and AH-MAZING is all I have to say. We all know writing sub plans are a pain, but they were so worth it to attend this conference! I was able to attend two jam-packed days of presentations by some of my favorite bloggers. I feel like I have done well this year in 1st grade, but the past two days have inspired me to do even better!

Sunday night I got to have dinner with Reagan and Kristen. We had so much fun and I brought some of my teammates along too! I stole the picture from Reagan because I did not get one on my phone.

On Monday I attended four great sessions. I went to one about Comprehension Strategies, one about integrating Non-Fiction writing into the classroom on a daily basis, then I went to Deanna's session on Math MAGIC (math tubs), and I finished the day by attending one on technology in the classroom. I would hands down say that my favorite of the day was Deanna's. 

I have quickly discovered how much I love teaching math in 1st grade and this was exactly what I needed to hear. I really like how Deanna described her math block. This is something that I do not feel like I do a good job of right now. I often catch myself just teaching whole group and I would really like to implement math tubs into our math time as well. I am going to start with something small at first and I am going to add her fluency component to the beginning of my math block. During this time we will spend five minutes or so working on facts, ten frames, subtilizing, etc. I think that even though this seems so simple it will make a huge difference. This is something I definitely want to start from day one next school year. I also really liked the idea of her Think Math journal prompts. These are prompts that give students an answer and then they must come up with different combinations to make the number along with a story problem. I am thinking that this would be great as a warm-up at first for my math lessons and then eventually transition this to a rotation during our math time. 

We finished Monday night with a nice little get-together at Papasito's just down from the hotel. How can you go wrong with Mexican food in Texas? It was so much fun to finally get to meet some of my favorite bloggers and catch up with old "friends" too. There were four others who went to the conference with me from my team and I was so excited to have them meet my bloggy friends. :)

Bottom Row: Jennifer, me, Katie, Rachelle, Alyssa, Lisa (teammate of mine), and Kim (teammate of mine)

Top Row: Ari, April, Reagan, Crystal, Kristen, Stephanie (teammate of mine), and Heather (teammate of mine)

Tuesday was by far my favorite day of the conference because I got to hear both Reagan and Rachelle present all day. I probably looked like a stalker because I stayed in the same room all day and only listened to them, but they were just so good!!!

First up was Reagan and she presented on Hands-On TEKS Aligned Math Tubs for the Classroom. I have always loved Reagan's blog, even before I knew I would be teaching 1st grade this year. She just helped me to know it is what I had to do, not just what I wanted to do. At first I was not a big fan of teaching math. However, it has quickly become one of my favorite times of my day. Reagan did such an awesome job of explaining to us different ways that we could set up our Math Tubs. I previously tried math tubs in my classroom this school year back in November, but I got frustrated and decided that I did not want to do them anymore. With 21 kids I found it difficult to make them work. I had to have so many different tubs in order to make my groups small enough. I really like the fact that Reagan implements different rotations such as Teacher Time at the table, Math Journals, Math with Technology, and Math Tubs. This is something that I really want to make happen next year, but I think it will be key that I start it from the beginning. I think I am going to just spend the rest of the year loading up on different math tubs and getting them put together and then implement starting in the fall.

A picture of Rachelle, Katie, and me. We spent the whole day together. :)

Next I listened to Rachelle present about Guided Reading. Guided Reading is something that I feel like I am pretty good at but I have always known that I could be doing more with my students. I also will go ahead and admit it that I do a sorry job of documenting what we are doing during guided reading. I am not exactly sure why it is, but I do know that it needs to change immediately. I loved some of the ideas that Rachelle shared with us. I especially liked how she organized her small group resources in a binder in clear sheet protectors. This makes it easy to pull them out for students to use. You can either have copies already made or simply hand them a dry erase marker to use on the sheet protector. I am hoping to get something similar together for my classroom in the next few weeks. Rachelle has tons of guided reading resources on her blog that are free. Be sure and check them out!

After lunch Rachelle continued presenting, but this time it was about classroom management. She and Natalie have all sorts of posts on their blog about behavior too. For the most part I feel like I do a good job of managing the behavior in my classroom, but at the same time I am always looking for new ways to engage my students and keep them on their toes. Currently in my classroom we use a clip stick that has four colors on it. I also incorporate some Whole Brain Teaching strategies too like the Scoreboard as a whole class management tool. One of the things I really want to implement that Rachelle talked about were her Fast Finisher folders that she has for her students. I hate when my students come up to me and ask what they can do now that they are finished. My answer generally is always get out a book or work on unfinished work. I am looking forward to mixing it up some and giving them different options. Another great behavior tool that she talked about was Team Bieber vs. Team Skywalker. She has students pick which team they would like to be on. They work to earn tallies for their team. The team with the most points at the end of the day gets to listen to their song at the end of the day. My class is currently obsessed with Frozen so I think we could have team Elsa and team Olaf. :) Just trust me, check out her blog because you will find so many great ideas!

The final session that I attended during the two days was another one of Rachelle's, but this one was about creating independent journal writers in your classroom. If you are looking for some journals to implement in your classroom she has a really great pack on TpT. We have a dedicated Writer's Workshop time on my campus and we spend anywhere from 30 minutes to an hour doing it. Rachelle begins her day with their journals and she explained to us that they spend about 30 minutes or so on them. While sitting in the presentation I thought that this would be perfect for my class too. Rachelle mentioned to us that she conferences with each student daily when they bring their journal to her table to be checked once that have completed it. One of the things I struggle with during my writing time is conferencing with my students. I really like the idea of being able to meet with them all each and every day. She also allows for share time at the end of journals each day. I really want to start devoting my Writer's Workshop block to more mini-lessons a little less time to write since we will be doing it in the morning as well. I have so much to think about, but I have got to find the time to make some changes in my classroom.

The conference was so amazing and I am so grateful that I had the opportunity to attend. I was able to take away so many new ideas that I cannot wait to implement in my classroom. Here is to hoping it will not be the last time I attend the Texas 1st Grade Teacher's Conference!

Happy 2014!

It is really 2014 and that is so hard for me to believe! It seems like just the other day we were talking about Y2K and all of that craziness. I have to admit that my 2013 was pretty awesome. Some of my favorite memories would for sure have to be…

- passing my Principal Certification test in July

- getting my transfer approved to teach 1st grade and absolutely loving it!

- being the girl's camp director at the camp I went to as a kid

- doing better with my TpT shop

I can only hope that 2014 will be just as great for me!

To start the new year I wanted to link up with Farley for her monthly Currently link party. 

Listening: I love the Big Bang Theory. I treated myself to a Netflix subscription for my Christmas present to myself and it is by far my new favorite thing. I cannot wait to watch all of the old episodes on there. What are some of your favorite series to watch?

Loving: I have spent quite a bit of my break hanging with family and friends. During the school year I have a hard time making it happen. Some of my best friends are my camp friends, but we all live in different towns. We were lucky enough to get together for dinner and a movie the other night and it was like we had not even missed a beat.

Thinking: I am beyond pumped for the 1st Grade Teacher's Conference in Austin on January 13th-14th. Myself and four of my teammates are going to both days. I am so excited that everything is going to be geared to 1st grade. Plus I will get to see some of my favorites like Reagan, Kristen, Rachelle, and Deanna. :)

Wanting: I have got to get my health in gear. I am going to start by drinking more water and take it one step at a time.

Needing: I pretty much left school at school this break. I went for a little bit on the 30th, but mainly just to get Christmas taken down in there. Did I mention that I also need to write sub plans for two days too?

Memory/Tradition: I always spend Christmas afternoon/evening with my God daughter and her family. It is so much fun seeing her excitement for the season and getting to spoil her is pretty great too. 

13 in 2013

It is hard to believe that in just a few days that 2013 will be over. This has definitely been a year for the books for me!

I am excited to link up with Hadar, Kristin, and Traci for their end of year link party to highlight some of the things that happened in 2013. 

thirteen. favorite article of clothing

Hands down it would have to be leggings. I love that I can wear them with a longer shirt, with a dress, or with a t-shirt and they are all acceptable. 

twelve. favorite move you watched

 Catching Fire. No contest. I think I may have liked this one even more than the first one if that is possible. 

eleven. favorite TV series

I have no idea how they are able to film this show. There is no way I could ever be serious enough to make that happen. I just love Sheldon Cooper. 

ten. favorite restaurant

I live in a small town that has very limited options. Subway is usually my first choice when I want something to eat. I could eat sandwiches everyday and be okay with it. 

nine. favorite new thing you tried

I am not really sure what I tried new this year. Does Sour Cream count? I used to think it was horrible, but now I do not mind it on food. 

eight. favorite gift you got

I may have bought it for myself, but I say it counts. :)

My MacBook Pro!!!

seven. favorite thing you pinned

six. favorite blog post

The one where I shared pictures of my classroom. 

five. best accomplishment

This is hard because I have several this year. 

I walked across the stage in May with my Masters in Education with Principal Certification.

I passed my Principal Certification test on my first try in July. 

four. favorite picture

These are the three best friends that a girl could ask for. We were all at a friend's wedding and there was a photo booth. This just sums up our craziness perfectly. Not sure what I would do without them. :)

three. favorite memory

April 4th…I went to the elementary school to talk with the principal about a possible transfer to the campus from the middle school. I expected to have to go through the entire interview process again, but five minutes later I was offered the 1st grade position. 

two. goal for 2014

I attended a Dave Ramsey Financial Peace University Class this past year and I would like to follow it with fidelity in 2014. Any tips? I want to do 12 budgets and use the envelope system. 

one. one little word

faith.

I want to trust His plan for my life and really dive deeper into His word.

Currently December

You can bet my cart is full for the upcoming Teachers Pay Teachers Sale! This new 1st grade teacher has to load up when she can! My entire store will also be 20% off. 

I am also super excited to be joining Mel and Michelle for their Elf on the Shelf Linky that they will be having each Sunday night. I am hoping that there will be an elf waiting for us in my classroom tomorrow morning, but I think we will have to wait on the magic of Santa to get him there. :) The first linkup will happen this Sunday, December 8th. 

Last, but not least I of course had to link up for the last Currently of 2013. Did I really just say that? December???? Where the heck has 2013 gone? It has definitely been one for the books for me! 

Listening: House Hunters is a pretty much a nightly tradition for me. There is not much on TV at 10 p.m. I have also been listening to Christmas music since November 1st. I am so thankful that my kiddos love listening to it at school too. 

Loving: Is there seriously only 15 more school days before it is time for Christmas Break? That seems impossible to me! We have lots of fun things planned over the next three weeks and I cannot wait to celebrate the holidays with my firsties.

Thinking: I cannot wait to see the faces of my kiddos tomorrow when they find our new friend in our classroom. I did this with my 6th graders last year and they loved it, so it is bound to be a hit in first grade. 

Wanting: These have been on my wish list for a long time and I think it is finally time to bite the bullet. Christmas present to myself…I think yes!

Needing: More time off!!! I am beyond jealous of those of you who had the whole week off! That is something that I have never had as a student or teacher. However, I am glad that I did not have the chance to mess my routine up too bad since the break was shorter. 5:45 a.m. will not be as bad. 

Favorite Tradition: Each year for as long as I can remember we have gone to the store and picked out special Christmas jambes that we wear on Christmas Eve to bed. Yes, I am 25 and I still love this. I cannot wait to do this with my own kids one day, but I think their Elf friend will leave them for them on Christmas Eve instead. :)