M.i. Tree

Lol I am always so proud if I attempt anything "arty.".

As always it doesn't always pan out how I expected! This is my multiple intelligence tree. I accidentally cut the trunk too large so I can't fit the collage green top! At least I'll have a nice project for this weekend!

Another fun tidbit is that this tree keeps falling off of the brick wall. I made the mistake of yelling, "timber!". The first time that it fell so my little ones keeps yelling it too!

Well after trying MANY types of tape (I'm out of Blue sticky and command strips) I found some wax dots in my cabinets. Those have certainly done the trick! There have been no more "timber!". Yells in almost 24 hours!

I hope everyone is enjoying their time back! I know I'm exhausted and it has felt like Friday since Monday!

Have a terrific Thursday!

Peanut Free Zone Sign

I have multiple kiddos with allergies so I quickly made a sign for it. 

You can download it here for FREE. 

I am just adoring my kids!  They are precious!  I hope that you are feeling the same about yours!

Have a great Tuesday!

Easy to use transportation, money and sick notes!

Each year I try to steam line my notes more and more!  I of course want to write out notes to parents but I often do not have the time to do so!  I had my first upset belly and cut on a finger last week and didn't have time to write a note.  :(

This got me thinking.... it was time for more easy to fill out notes!  :)

The first one is what I send to the nurse.  The next one is the one that I will send home with parents.

These I will upload to my classroom website.  The first is a form parents can print and fill in for transportation change.  The second one is a form that parents can print and fill out if they are sending money to school.  Rarely I'll have little ones bring $20 to school and hand it to me.  I ask what the money is for and they don't know!  :)  Most of the time parents write a note- this just makes it quick and easy for them as well!  :)

A non school related item.... one of my good friends had her owl themed baby shower this weekend.  I scoured the internet and found many SUPER cute ideas!

Here are the party favors that were made:

Here are the owl cake pops:

They went in these:  (I forgot to take a picture of them in the pot!)

(If you live in the central Ohio area- you need this lady!  She is like the Ohio HGTV version of "Cake Boss" or whatever it is called!  She makes purse cakes or anything you can imagine!)

My first full week starts tomorrow!  I need to stock up on some caffeine! 

I barely made it the 3 days last week.  :-(

Enjoy your little ones!

Writing Poster finds and a peak at my writers notebook

I was looking on google images for who knows what and I found some adorable little writing signs! These are super cheap on TPT: (click the picture to go to the TPT store!)

There are parts of a writer posters. There is a boy and a girl version. I think that I'll have my kiddos put it on the back of their writers notebook.  It is super adorable!

My new teammates use a writers notebook. I have always wanted to use one but have never taken the time to put all 20 some together.

Here is a peak at what I'm including:
This is what I'm including behind the "ideas" tab.

This is what I'm including behind the "story helpers" tab.

Drafting Tab- (They will add new drafting pages each week.)
This is what I am Including behind the "resources" tab.

Revising and editing checklists

Phonics dance chunks ( I have to minimize all of the icons to make them fit on one page.)


Word wall pages and lists (I was in the middle of making my own but I ran out of time- so I found this little lovely resource of TPT.)
http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/My-Personal-Dictionary-Essential-Vocabulary-For-Every-Writer


We have Being a Writer series.  I think that I am going to absolutely LOVE it!  I have been creating smartboard slides to go with each unit.  It is very time consuming but it will allow me to teach writing without misplacing my modeling stories and hugging my manual!  :)

Tomorrow is our meet and greet and I CANNOT wait!  I am super excited to meet my new families!  :)

P.S. To answer the question about my chunk cards... I get them here.  They are from the Phonics Dance program.  I HIGHLY recommend it to everyone!  It meets so many different learning styles and the kiddos LOVE it!  :)  The program has an order to follow but I associate them with my sight/ spelling words.  For instance if I am teaching "the", I will pull out the 'th' chunk.  It only makes sense right?  :)

(Thanks for the comments- I LOVE them!)


***The writing items I showed above are from my common core writing rubrics and materials.  Which is STILL not finished! ***

Random organization tidbits and open house stuff

I only have about 2 more hours of work that I can do in my room before open house on Monday.  I'm getting REALLY close!

Here are some tidbits that I was working on today:

Here is how I organize my word wall words and phonics dance chunk cards.

I use plastic DVD holders and simply label it by week.

 

Inside I keep the chunk cards and word wall words that I will need for that week. (The words are color coded by if they can be sounded out by the normal short vowel sound, use a rule or chunk that we discuss in first grade or are irregular words.)

My word wall words have a three week rotation. Week 1- they are on my focus wall. Week 2- I hang them above tables and they become table names. (It forces the little ones to see the word and use it.). Then week 3- the word finds its way on our word wall. This way the kiddos will have 1 new list and 1 review list each week that we work on.

Here is our almost finished hallway display.

Here is a picture of my riesen and extra gum filled items for parents.

I hope everyone is RELAXING this weekend!

Quick and Easy Hallway Display

My first year of teaching I went to the teacher store, picked out one of their welcome bulletin board packs, laminated them and wrote on them with dry erase marker.  I was absolutely sure that I was going to re-use the bulletin board item every year.

Then the second year came rolling along...

I decided I wanted new and did the same thing!  Okay- this keeps repeating...

Then one year I was running out of time and bought fade less star paper:

Add these signs to the paper...

Add student names to stars then dd to the fadeless paper.

Look how many options you have!  I personally love the kid drawn star the third row from the bottom with the blue border.

Then to make the board seem a bit more fancy and complicated than it actually was.... (I am completely inspired by the SUPER cute and time consuming "sweet" board a colleague made.  I SERIOUSLY have to ask her permission to take a picture and post it.  It is by far the CUTEST bulletin board that I have ever seen!  She sure is a super creative lady!)
Add some yellow tulle lining the edge of the board!

BAM!  It is super easy and quick!  :)

Needless to say- with going to a new district this year- I went for the quick and easy out!  Not like the handmade red carpet complete with paparazzi like last year!  THAT took some time!

Lunch Count Graphing

At my former school we only had two choices... packing or buying. 

My new school has 5 choices each day!  WOAH!  The students have to enter a pin number if they buy AND hand the cashier 1 of 4 choice tickets.

One of my teammates had a great way to track and organize the system.  She uses a calendar like pocket chart and keeps the choice ticket cards at the bottom and then makes a little business card with student pin numbers (K doesn't eat at school so 1st grade is the first line of number entering) and keeps them in the other pocket chart slots.  THANK GOODNESS BECAUSE THOSE K TEACHERS HAVE TO DO EVERYTHING!  I THANK MY LUCKY STARS THAT THEY KNOW HOW TO USE THE RESTROOM, BLOW THEIR NOSE (for the most part) AND STAND IN A LINE WHEN THEY COME TO US!  THANK YOU K TEACHERS!!!

This of course got my reels spinning.... :) 

At first I was just going to make a smart notebook log in but then you have to use those tickets as well.  There is NO WAY that the majority of my first grade students wouldn't lose their ticket if I gave it to them in the AM by lunch time.  Heck- I'm sure confident I'd lose mine too!!!

I won a nice little gift card from reallygoodstuff for getting published in their August newsletter and I thought that I might as well spend it! 

I found these desktop easel pocket charts:

I purchased 2 but can probably get away with 1. 

I made buying lunch choice cards to go in the bottom pocket.

Behind the lunch choice cards I will keep the lunch tickets.

Then......

I will have the students use their business lunch cards and "graph" their choices each day!  This way I get to check off my graphing standards!  I sure do plan on asking "How many more..." type of questions daily!  If they are packing- they will keep their card in a "packing" tub.  I can even ask missing addend questions, "If we have 25 students and 13 are buying; how many are packing?" 

I am mentally checking off so many math standards!!!  I plan on typing up common core related math questions to go with this.  I'll let you know when I do!  (Another item for my to-do list.  Shouldn't it be getting shorter???)

Then before lunch each day as students are washing hands- they can come over- grab their card and the corresponding lunch choice ticket!

Gosh, I'm way too excited about lunch count... but hey- I'm getting pumped for next week!

For those of you that have already started- HANG IN THERE!  The end of a week is coming soon!

Do you ever...

Do you ever do what you feel is a good deed and it horribly back fires????

Apparently I have done just that!!!  :-( 
It makes my stomach churn just thinking about it!

I have received multiple emails from followers who are not very happy about my FLASH FREEBIE sale.  :-(  I feel so bad because it was intended to be a nice thing not anything to get anyone upset. 

I was on the computer late working on stuff for school and as I was posting pictures of my classroom I thought... "Hey- I don't have time to have my giant 100 follower giveaway and I just ended my common core giveaway... so I will give multiple people a chance to download something for FREE!"  It looks like about 100 did just that.  (You can see how many have downloaded the products.)

I feel HORRIBLE that I upset some people enough that they emailed me about it.  I know all of the people that emailed me said that they get my emails and it was too late for the sale.  :( 

I know many other bloggers that have flash sales and only once have I benefited from it!  I usually am a minute late and a dollar short!  I know I am always super BUMMED too.

I apologize to any of you that are also upset  by my flash sale.  I PROMISE that it was a last minute thing and only meant to be a good deed.  I actually bought all of the stuff for my 100 follower giveaway months ago (I guess I was just too excited and hoping that the day would come soon!)  I had a Danielle's favorite school things giveaway when I reached 100 followers on TPT.  I have all of the stuff for Danielle's favorite non-school things giveaway.  (Lia Sophia- Maurices, Bath and Body Works etc.)

If you can't tell- I'm all about giving away things because I always give away anything new I make to 1-3 people or so. 

Anyway- I'm sorry again if I offended you!!!!   I PROMISE that I only was trying to do a nice thing and allow more people (who were online as late as I was) to get something for free than just 4 people (like my last giveaway.) 

WHEW- Please accept my apologies!

Classroom Update!... 100 follower flash giveaway! :)

*If it isn't midnight yet- scroll down to the bottom first!!!

I can't seem to get on Ohio time!  I have been sleeping in until 8:00 and struggling to get up!  I have only been making it to school by 12:00 every day!  :)  That means I am there until at least 8:00 each evening.  I still need to email all of my winners.  :)  I've been trying to fit as much as I can into my waking hours!

I gotta tell you- I miss my old staff SO much because they rocked... however I am a lucky girl because my new staff is just as AMAZING!  I've been picking their brains like crazy!

A second grade teacher came walking into my room yesterday holding some traveling soap containers.  She plopped them down and announced that they were extras and offered them up!  My school uses EDM and they give you LOADS of card decks.  She said kids can never get them back in their card board box so they put the decks in the soap containers.  GENIUS!  Here are my not so cutesy containers.

Then my teammate made the cutest Pinterest sign to hang and accidentally (to my luck) made an extra copy of the words.  She backed hers with blue and then zebra.  The zebra made me go zebra crazy... you will see below.  (I have a cute kid sized zebra chair too to add to my room.)

I realized that I forgot one of the signs.  I am going to attach them with ribbon tomorrow.  Gotta love whoever this originated from!  I'm sure a little research and I'll find them.  When I do- I'll pop back and link to them.

So.... then the other zebra stuff took off...

These were purchased for FREE for TPT from MRS CROAK.  I had a ton of points for leaving feedback.

lol.. even on my bus dismissal clip board.

This is a photo from my old classroom.  The fabric will be going around this....

These are the word wall cards from MRS CROAK.

Alright this isn't Zebra- but I'm going to add it.

I had to move my rule signs,  I plan to paint the clips red.

I am going to hang something on the ribbon but I haven't decided yet!  I am going to hang this outside of my door.  ANY IDEAS OF HOW TO FINISH THIS???

I even added a thin ribbon to my black border.  Did I tell you or what about going zebra crazy!!!!

Now- on to my 100 follower flash giveaway...

For the next 100 minutes for my TPT followers and blog followers (it is on the honor system)..........

can download my common core desk plates,
reading assessment,
phonics assessment
Fish Frenzy
and grandparents day items for FREE! 

So... click the links above and download to your little hearts content!  Thank you so much for being followers!  I REALLYappreciate it!  :)

Back 2 School Common Core Style Winners!

I am super excited that I now have 100 followers!  I will have to brew up another giveaway soon to celebrate!  :)

The GRAND PRIZE winner is:

Manakans will be receiving a $10 TPT gift certificate plus all of my common core items AND Michelle Oakes Back to School Basics and Rachelle Smith's Common Core checklists!  :)

The runner ups are:

Stacey- please email me at daniellelasota@gmail.com!  :)

These 3 friends may choose any 5 of my common core products for FREE! 

I'm off to school to work away!  I should be sending my winners (well from this giveaway- you are all winners to me! lol) an email tonight!  In the meantime runner ups- you can start looking around and email me with your wish lists!  :)

TPT sale!!

Dear friends,

TPT back to school sale is Today!!!

I also am having a 20 percent off sale to give you even more savings! Don't forget to put the code in when you checkout to get TPT discount. :-)

Also- please enter my giveaway which is a few posts down. I'm blogging from my phone or I'd post the link for you!

I'm headed back to TPT to start filling up my shopping cart!

Curriculum Night and Giveaway Reminder

Even though school has started yet, I am already thinking about curriculum night!  Curriculum night is the second week of school so I need to be thinking about it already!

Here is a FREE TPT packet that I have for curriculum night.  It has invitation letters, poems, giveaway ideas etc. 

 

In addition to the items in the packet, I also include sight words, math flashcards, my first newsletter (curriculum and weekly newsletter) the EDM homelinks book and a few other practice ideas.

One activity that I complete is to have leveled books on tables.  I have a level C/4, E/8, G/12 andJ/18.  (Those are my quarterly expectations.)  I show parents and allow them to see the difference in levels.  I also include a reading level coresponding chart because many parents want to know what books they need to find when they are at the library.  I also discuss the five finger rule for reading and what they should expect from their child at certain levels/ time of the year.  I hope to put this into a table format.  If I do- I will be sure to share it with you!  :)

As I finish my new slideshow, I'll come back and attach it here!

Also, just a reminder about my giveaway!  Please click the icon below and it will take you to the giveaway post!

Have a wonderful day!  :)

Blogging Roulette, Open House and Giveaway Reminder!

I feel that anytime that I am on the computer, I tend to be busy making some kind of things for school.  I often have the urge to go blog hoppin' everywhere to find new ideas and follow new bloggers but I often fall asleep before that happens!

Since I'm on vacation in Las Vegas, I was inspired by the roulette wheel (my FAVORITE) to do Blogging Roulette.  What I did was click the first blog on my blogging list (down the right side) and left them a comment no matter what!  Then from their blog, I clicked on the first person on their blogging list (or from a comment on their page if they didn't have a blogging list) and went to that person's page.  If I wasn't follower I became one and then left them a comment too!  I did this for just about 30 minutes and I am so glad that I did!  I found some amazing little treasures of blogs that I never knew before!  :)

If you have a free 30 minutes- try it out!  :)  Leave some love for some bloggers!  :)

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I blogged before about some Open House items but I didn't leave pictures!  So here are some photos of items.  :)

I have the sheets below setting on a desk outside of the classroom.

These items are included in a parent folder that I leave on desks:

Welcome letter (NOT finished yet!)

Volunteer Request

Tell me about your child

Mystery Reader Invite

I fill this in with student names as soon as I get my list!

I have parents fill this out at Open House!

One of my new fabulous teammates has an awesome form that had all of the headings.  I just updated my old dismissal form to correspond with what she had!  :)

Student gifts:

I have used a fun poem and bag the last few years with smarties, laffy taffy, erasers etc.  I already made them so I'll give it to my kiddos on the first day of school.  (I'll show picture later.)

One of my new teammates showed me the Back to School Confetti!  I LOVE it!  I made bags up and am going to put that out for Open House instead.  I don't know where the original poem/ idea came from.  I googled for about 10 minutes to try to find it but there are so many people with it on their blog that I don't know who to give credit to!  PLEASE let me know if you know!  :)

I also am leaving a gift for the parents as a reminder of Curriculum night.  It will have 3 RIESEN candies and a pack of EXTRA gum.  It will say, "Here are 3 EXTRA good RIESENS to come to Curriculum Night on ___________________________."



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Also- here is a reminder about my MEGA COMMON CORE GIVEAWAY!  Click the icon to go to the post to enter!  :)

Out to the pool and VEGAS sunshine!  :)