Saturday, October 12, 2013

Table Organization

21 first graders and big, long, WIDE tables.  Not something I was used to after teaching EC and having student desks for 7 years. I had to decide how I wanted to organize my tables with materials for my students to easily access. 

After much searching for ideas via Pinterest (the new Google), I stumbled across two ideas that I was going to combine and add my own lil spin to it. 
Each table got a Table Caddy (these were def only .97 cents at Walmart during the back to school (college) sales. I printed out Table numbers, threw some ribbon on them, and BAM....ready to go. 

Here's a picture of what goes inside each table caddy
Each student has a cup of crayons
They share a cup of markers which has two packs of markers in it 
Their pencils 
Under the table caddy are National Geographic Explorer magazines which I rotate out weekly
The orange folders are the student's morning work folders 

At the end of each table are my crate shelves which look like this:
On the top of the crates there is a basket (hello fun neon green from Big Lots basket) which contains a cup of colored pencils, 4 pairs of scissors and the students library books. We also have our alphabet cards for Imagine It! stored in these baskets.  
Beside the larger basket is a short skinny basket which includes back up pencils in case a pencil breaks or becomes dull, and 4 glue sticks. 
The shelves hold dictionaries to use for writing, writing journals,and their IKEA book bins to be used for Read to Self  (in the above picture we had not yet decorated their book bins) .
Recently we have added their Imagine It! folders as well. 

Each table also has their own personal trashcan. (pictured to the right side of the crate shelves) 

The organization is paying off as things are running oh so smoothly and the students have been taught how to manage their materials. 

Coming soon.....I'll share how I use table leaders, table numbers, and table of the day! 
Woop woop.

Monday, September 2, 2013

Open House stations and candy land inspiration

Moving from EC to first grade is a lot like starting over. So I have been busy getting my life together and "starting over" in the world of teaching. Last week was our official first week with the students and sadly I am just now posting updates on Open House. 

I decided to go the "station" route for Open House. With many families trickling in and out I felt it would be more beneficial to have stations for parents to float through. Here are some photos


Station 1: Parent check in table. Sign in sheets , parent helper sign up sheets, the works

Station 2: Transportation -because knowing how the lil loves are getting home is crucial 

Station 3: forgot to take a picture: Donation/Wish list station
I wrote out various things we were in need of for the classroom on die cuts shaped like a crayon box, ,and parents could pick them up if they were willing to donate the requested item

Station 4: Sweet Surprise
Parents wrote a note to their children and I taped them to their seat for the first day of school. So happy with all the parent participation at this station! Talk about easing the 1st day Jitters

Station 5: Information Packets: These folders contained all the open house back to school goodies, paperwork, etc. I was able to answer questions and talk to parents at this station


Here are all the notes that the parents wrote

Outside my class I have my Candy Land themed display for student work
I changed it to "HawkLand" since I'm Mrs. Hawk
 Found the candy banner and cupcake liners at Hobby Lobby
Drew out the game board pieces for the label
Colored construction paper

I love it...bunches! 

Coming soon...classroom pictures.

Tuesday, July 16, 2013

Erin Condren teacher planner

Somehow I got sucked into the world of all things Erin Condren
(thanks to all the teacher blogs I follow, instragram etc)
How can you not fall in love with all the patterns, colors, ridiculous organizational goodness?
So I splurged and ordered myself the teacher planner. Why not? New grade level...new adventures. Totally fitting right?
Here's a little sneak peek into the contents inside the teacher planners for those who are debating whether to order or not.
I had a really hard time choosing the style/design I wanted but decided to go with the Paisley 

First page- all about me section and then Tabs, tabs, tabs. Apparently the previous teacher planners didn't have tabs so this was an upgraded feature.

 next page: substitute information 

 Dates to remember section for each month
 absentee log 
 Monthly calendars

 checklists...boom
 stickers galore-
folder for keeping papers, clear holder and those are cute sticker labels

and then they send you all these 10.00 dollars off your next purchase which is a given that you WILL shop again.....
Life planner anyone?

How much do you love your Erin Condren planner and why?

Monday, July 15, 2013

Monday Made it 7/15/13 and BIG change.

I've been a special educator for the past 7 years. Those 7 years have been spent in a self contained classroom setting teaching students who have behavior and emotional disabilities. This year I had 13 students ranging from K to 4th grade. During the school year I took my Praxis so that I could teach regular education which brings me to my big transition......(drum role please......)
I'm going to be a 1st grade teacher!!!! 
Woop Woop! 

As I have been preparing for this new journey I stumbled upon a $20.00 laminator at Costco and began laminating my life away (wasn't much of a laminator in EC) 
found some cute FREE visual directions from TPT

Then after endless searching of Behavior Clip charts to use for classroom management with a large group of students I found a super cute FREE one from TPT 

Then I busted out my Mr. Sketch markers to give my clothespins a 'watercolor" feel
Going to put their numbers on them and I think I am going to tie pretty ribbons for their "hall of fame" recognition.

I also made myself a wreath for my new classroom.



Be sure to link up at 
and check out all the other awesome teacher creations posted every Monday


Friday, July 5, 2013

Classroom Management/Organization from this past school year

My past year was one of the most difficult years I have endured as a teacher thus far. This left me NO time for blog writing nor blog reading.  There are some changes/transitions coming up for me as a teacher and I will post about them as soon as I can.  In the meantime I thought I would share some things from my class this past year.

Mini Trashcans:
I found these at Dollar General when they were on clearance and ended getting them for .30 cents a piece. I bought enough for each "pod" or grouping of desks so that students wouldn't have to constantly get up and throw trash away. At the end of the day our "neat and tidy" helper would empty the smaller trash cans into the big trashcans as part of their class job.



Classroom Finger Signals:
These are taught at the beginning of the year as we cover our Survival Guides (all the expectations and procedures for the year). Works wonders and eliminates all the blurt outs and constant questions. 

Line Expectations/Reminders:
I found the 4-S line on Pinterest last year. The Line expectations poster is a reminder of how we are to line up (which is covered in our Survival Guides). Super great reference to have for lining up. We don't exit the classroom until the expectations are being met. 
It includes visuals for our emergent readers as I had K-4 this past year.

Class rules tied into PBIS.
Our school mascot is the Eagle so at our school we SOAR which is the acronym for our core values (show respect, outstanding conduct, achievement, and responsibility). Each of our classroom rules got plugged into which part of SOARing they reflected. When students are asked how they were SOARing during various activities, they knew which one of our rules they followed (or did not follow). 


More posting coming soon. Trying to get back into the swing of making my presence known in blog land.  
PS. I am on BlogLovin so please don't forget to come follow me!

Wednesday, July 3, 2013

Follow Me on BlogLovin!

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Jumping on the bandwagon and following all my favorite teacher blogs! Be sure you follow my blog as well:)