Sunday, August 21, 2011

It's here!!!

Tomorrow is the first day of school! I've spent the entire weekend finishing last minute projects and working in my classroom. I'm exhausted and the week hasn't even started.

But I did get to use my new laminator tonight and I love it! I can see that I will be laminating a lot more than last year :)

Off to dream of fabulous lessons and perfect students!

Saturday, August 13, 2011

A Few of My Favorite Things

No pictures of awesome classroom decor today...I went to school but was the most unmotivated person EVER.  I think I'm in complete denial that school starts in a week.
So I decided instead to show you some of the things that I could not live without in my classroom:

Okay, so technically I can live without these since I just started using them!  But ohmygosh they are the most awesome pens ever!  I love the way they write and they are so much better than blah boring old ink pens.


This is a flat staple remover.  I bought mine at an office supply store and I swear to you I could NOT function without it.  Those hinged staple removers are for the birds!  I especially love it for removing staples from the wall. 


Speaking of staples...this palm stapler is my life when it comes time to hang anything on the wall.  So much easier and it even has a wrist strap :)

Alright, let's talk pencil sharpeners.  I've had every electric sharpener known to man and NOTHING compares to this baby.  I do still have an electric one in my room that works pretty good, but once I paid a whole $20 for one of these I was hooked.  It's so simple and functional and I love it.






BrainPop, BrainPop Jr, and Discover Education United Streaming are the absolute best websites that I use on a daily basis.  They all have videos over any subject you could ask for.  They do require subscriptions, but our district buys them.  If your school does not have access to these, then you need to start begging! 


My students and I love to listen to Pandora radio!  It's free to sign up for a basic membership that gets you around 40 hours of music per month.  They have customizable stations (our favorite last year was Disney Channel Stars) and it is perfect for holidays.


Every year I say that I'm going to cut back on the amount of Coke I drink.  Ha!  Even my students know when I need one. 

Have an awesome weekend!  I'm off to play on Pinterest!  Follow me here.


Thursday, August 11, 2011

Getting Started

Hey y'all!  I wanted to post pictures in progress since I figured that would be the only way to actually get them on here!

This is my CAFE Board set-up:
I got my headers from the Peony Room and/or Daily 5 and CAFE message boards on ProTeacher.  If you are at all interested in doing Daily 5 or CAFE you must check out these resources.  Everyone is great about sharing their ideas and creations.

Last year I tried having the students write the cards that go underneath each header, but found it slightly time consuming and that caused me to not really follow through with CAFE like I had hoped.  This year I am planning on using pre-made cards (you can find some here) or creating my own on the computer.  Depends on how much I get finished in the next couple of weeks!

They are really getting tough on us about paper on the walls, fire codes, etc. so I am trying to limit my wall decor this year.  But the other day when I was playing on Pinterest, I found these super cute quotes from the blog technology rocks. seriously.

Sorry for the weird angle, but the reflection was TERRIBLE!

I saved these as jpeg files and sent them to Walgreens to print as 5x7 photos.  Some of them came out a little cropped but it isn't really noticeable.  I bought dollar 8x10 frames from Dollar Tree and just mounted the photos on scrapbook paper I already had.  I think they turned out super cute!

Have a blessed day!

Getting Ready For A New Year

Oh My Word!!!  Where did the summer go?!?  I'm sure you are all working hard in your classrooms like me (or already teaching!).  I hope to FINALLY get around to taking pictures of my classroom and posting on a blog for my own personal reference as well as to give ideas to anyone who wants to look!  I am finally able to arrange furniture starting today so I will try to take lots of pictures as things progress.  Have a blessed day!