Featured Center of the Week

We spend a big chunk of our day doing our Fairview Rotations. Fairview Learning is specially designed reading/language activities for Deaf/Hard of Hearing students. One of those rotations is centers. My language arts centers are meaningful activities that the students should be able to do independently while I am working one to one with a student on Guided Reading. Since I love seeing simple, low-prep centers that other teachers are using, I thought it might be fun to feature a center a week here on the blog.

I am in the process of re-vamping my centers binder. The recording pages are waaaaaaaaay out of date, ugly and boring. Here's a little proof. It's kind of embarrassing to even show you. The top is my old centers binder. The bottom is my new, in progress, centers binder. I was able to update 13 of my centers this weekend, so that was a productive weekend

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Since I have kinder through 6th grade in my class during rotations, I have to have a wide variety of centers to use. Most of the centers use simple Dollar Tree finds, or basic supplies that most teachers already own.

This week's feature: Gumball Words. Students press on the gumball dispenser and a "gumball" or two falls out. They read their word (or in our case, they sign all three ways to sign "do"), then they record their word on a gumball on their recording sheet. At then end of the activity, they read all their words to an adult before the center can be signed off.

I found the little gumball dispenser at Dollar Tree. I filled it with little flat glass marbles that I found at Micheal's. I typed up the Adapted Dolch sight word list on sticker paper. I punched them out with a little circle punch, and adhered them to the bottom of the marble. So far, they seem to be sticking really well. I have a set for each list, pre-primer through third grade.

Five for Friday, January 17th

Happy Friday! I survived the first week back from winter break. I couldn't be more excited that Monday is a holiday! I am exhausted! But, in an attempt to blog more often, I'm linking up with Doodle Bug's Five for Friday linky party. Here are a few random things from our week.

I am working on getting my very first products for my TpT store ready to upload. Now that I have read all the forums at TpT and tried and LOVED Power Point to create things, I am excited to get some products in my store! I have a bunch of ideas swirling in my head.... if only there was more time in the day to sit down and create!

My older group is learning about informational writing. This week we studied about diagrams and the students created their own. I always love their drawings.... they are so much better than mine. I am NOT an artist!

My new laptops arrived this week! I am SO excited about them! I created this Tech Check out chart so we know who has what device. I found the perfect circle magnets at Target that I covered with paper added the students initials. They worked out really well today.

This afternoon we created our classroom tech rules and learned the procedure for checking out the laptops and how to take care of them. The students were beyond excited that they had computer time! We started with a simple lesson on turning on the computer, plugging in the mouse, starting up Word, typing some simple information, saving, and shutting down the computer. Friday afternoons will be the perfect time for some computer training.

In math, my younger students are learning about telling time. We used this simple telling time scavenger hunt I found on TpT. The students love to get up and move around the classroom!

Have a great three day weekend everyone!

Tech Savvy

We're starting the new year with a computer unit. We are set to take the new Smarter Balanced Assessment this spring and my students are NOT ready with the tech component of taking the test on the computer. We visit the computer lab once a week and practice our typing skills and do other activities, but we are not ready.

So over break I searched high and low for some simple computer units and activities to do with my students. I honestly couldn't find very much. So what's a girl to do? Create her own!

We started our computer lapbooks today, and put up our first tech vocabulary words up onto our computers word wall. One of my kiddos called the mouse a "remote". Yup, we've got lots of work to do here. We'll do an Arthur's Computer Disaster read-aloud later in the week using all the new activities I've created.

By the end of the week my FOUR new laptops should be arriving. We are going to be 21st Century learners for sure!

Math Manipulative Storage

Happy 2014 everyone! I cannot believe it's a new year already! Winter break flew by and now it's back to work. My new year's goal is to blog more often. Now if I could find an extra hour in the day, that would be ideal.

I spent a little bit of time browsing the Dollar Store this weekend. I found some fun things to use in the classroom.

A while back I pinned this bright idea about storing base ten blocks. I have looked everywhere for these containers. Apparently I finally hit the Dollar Store jackpot and found them! The matching labels make my little type A heart happy. No more open baskets that fall off of shelves or little ripped up ziploc bags. I'm already in love.

Polar Express Party

What a week this was! We started the week off with our Polar Express party on Monday. I wasn't too sure about doing it that early, but I figured it was the only open day we had all week. And I'm thankful I did it then, because my kiddos at home ended up being sick with a fever on/off all week. I had to take Thursday off so my husband could go back to work and I ended up coming down with an extremely nasty bug on Thursday afternoon. I pretty much felt like I was dying. Today is the first day I have felt more like myself and I can actually stay awake rather than sleeping the day away.

When the kids arrived at school Monday morning they were very excited about our Polar Express party. I printed off these golden tickets and laminated them. We punched them later when we started the movie.

I bought each of the students a little hot chocolate tumbler from the dollar store. I took out the Christmas picture and quickly printed up their names. We made hot chocolate in the classroom and they got to sip their coco while watching the movie.

Each of the students also got a silver bell necklace. This was a special day for the kids and they seemed to really enjoy the movie.  Later in the week we compared the movie and the book. During our Fairview rotations they completed the Polar Express center activities that I won from The Teacher's Club House and Queen of the First Grade Jungle. They were the perfect activities to complete right before vacation!

It's so nice to finally be on Christmas break and to be on the mend. I am ready to enjoy some quality time with my girls and my family. Enjoy your holidays! See you in the new year!

Five For Friday the 13th

I am linking up with Doodle Bugs for her Five for Friday weekly posts. Here's a look at five random things from the week:

This time of the year is so exciting for children. You can feel the buzz in the classroom, that's for sure! It's hard to get them to focus. So I'm trying to channel that excitement. 

 

We wrote our letters to Santa. The kids were very excited to show and tell me all about the things that they'd love Santa to bring. Since I teach 1st-6th, there is a wide variety of toys on their wishlists. From innocent little princesses to Grand Theft Auto. Awesome.

We've been reading the Polar Express and doing various activities about the book. I just loved this little activity I pinned on Pinterest. It was perfect for working on adjectives and our "I See" train turned out adorable.

I am super excited that I won my very first giveaway! It's huge! I won this amazing Polar Express Unit and Centers pack from Teacher's Clubhouse and Queen of the First Grade's Mini Polar Express Unit. There were over 2,600 entries and I was the lucky one. Crazy! It's perfect since we've been reading the Polar Express and Monday we're having our big Polar Express Day! I started to prepare the centers for next week. So many materials to choose from that I'm in Heaven! Thanks Amanda and Katie!

We started to work on our parent gifts. Thank God for Pinterest. Really, what did we do before it came along? These Dollar Store potholders (2 for $1) turned out perfect. I pinned this last year and loved the idea.

 

 

No Christmas would be complete without the school photo parent ornament. These little plaster ornaments were 70% off at Michaels.  So parent gifts cost me a whole 78 cents per kiddo this year. Perfect!

 

I'll be back next week to post all about our Polar Express party! It's going to be fun!

Promises, Promises

I keep promising myself that I will get to blogging today. Then it never happens. I haven't posted since October! Where in the world did time go?!?

Fall is pretty rough for me personally and professionally. Lots of stuff at home. Lots of trainings and IEPs this past month.

Sadly my Feedly has 1,000+ unread blogs. This time of year is tough for me to keep up the whole working mom gig.

Anyhow... no more excuses.

My goal is to get back into blogging and post a Five for Friday this week. See ya then!