50th Day of School

This year seems to be flying by!!  Friday was our 50th day of school and this is the third year that our first grade has celebrated by having a 50's day.  We encourage the students to dress in 50's fashions and we have lots of fun related to the number 50.  This year we used the 50th Day of School book by Latoya Reed  It's a freebie and it was great!!  We also had our students bring in collections of 50 items to count and sort.  Prior to the 50th day we had hula hoop contests in our classrooms to get a girl and boy champion from each class.  On the afternoon of the 50th day we had our "sock hop" complete with ice cream sodas and dancing plus the finale of the hula hoop championship.  The champions from each class face each other for a hula hoop showdown.  Just imagine six girls or boys hula hooping while surrounded by 100 screaming first graders cheering them on.  It is a hoot!  We have excellent hula hoopers every year and we end up having to make them start walking around while continuing to hula hoop in order to speed up the contest.  Here are just a few pictures of our 50's day fun!

Counting and sorting our collections.  I have mats for them to use that have 10 circles drawn on and the number 5 is in the middle of each circle to remind them to put 5 items in each circle.

Sock Hop Fun!

Hula Hoop Practice Time and Contest

Some of my fabulous teammates!!

Jessica and Brooke (Teaching with a Tiara)

Mandy and her intern Cari

Tina

Somehow I didn't get a picture of Starla!!

This is a picture of our team from last  year.
 Unfortunately we never got a picture of everyone together this year.
(I'm the one in the red skirt, Starla is in the argyle vest)

Lesson Plan Decision

For several years now I've used a template that I made with Publisher to do my lesson plans.  It worked OK  but sometimes I didn't have enough room to include everything that needed to be in my plans. Since we've made the switch to using common core standards this year I decided that it was time to make a lesson plan change as well.  My problem was that I didn't know what I wanted to switch to.  After much thought and just jotting down lesson plans on notebook paper while debating what to do I finally decided to start using www.planbook.com to do my plans.  I learned about this program through a post from April Walker at www.ideabackpack.blogspot.com that reviewed several different options that could be used for lesson planning.  After looking at the different programs she talked about, I ended up setting up a trial account with planbook.com to see if I would like using it on a regular basis.  I liked it so much that I just paid for my membership (only $12 for one year).  I really like the following options:

• You can set up a daily schedule with classes and times that vary from day to day as needed.
• It's easy to set up special events such as early release days, teacher planning days and holidays.
• You can easily add standards (common core as well as state standards) and when you are ready to add them, the standards pop up with the number and the written description of the standard. 
• You can easily bump lessons forward if you didn't get to something one day or if you need to spend more time on a lesson before moving on to the next lesson.
• You can print lessons one day at a time or you can show the whole week (I like the one day format to be able to leave for a substitute when you have a planned absence).

If you've been looking for a new option, check it out! I know I'm loving it!

I'm Finally Back!

Wow!  It's taken me a long time to get into the swing of things this year and get back to my poor neglected blog. Between implementing common core, stressing over the new teacher evaluations and what they will be using as the evaluation tool in first grade, it all gets to be a little overwhelming !  Between school and home and other obligations it's been crazy.  Now that things are settling down some I promise to get in the habit of blogging on a regular basis!

It's hard to believe that this week is the end of our first nine weeks.  This Friday is a teacher planning day which is a welcome end to the week.  Last week we had some fire safety fun which included a visit from the volunteer fire department on Friday.  Our principal's husband is the fire chief and he comes out every year with some of his crew.  They do a great job and the kiddos are always thrilled to see them.  It was a beautiful day and rainbows appeared as they had some of our little friends helping spray the fire hoses.  But guess who forgot her camera??  How unusual, I always have my camera but walked out of the room without it that day.  We also had our Fall Festival on October 6 and we grossed $28,000 between the sales of chance drawing tickets and the money spent on tickets and food at the Festival itself.  This is the only fund raiser that we do each year and it's always a big event.

In addition to looking forward to our planning day, we are busy planning our 50th Day of School celebration on Friday, October 26.  This will be the third year that our first grade classes have had "Fabulous Fifties Fun" on the 50th Day of School.  We have classroom level hula hoop contests prior to the big day and each class gets a boy and girl champion.  On the 50th day, we dress up and have a sock hop out on the bus shelter with dancing and ice cream floats.  One of the highlights of the sock hop are the contests to determine our first grade hula hoops champs.  The girls battle it out and then the boys take their turn.  It's amazing how long some of these kiddos can go with those things while walking around and showing off for their friends.  We always have a blast!  I won't forget my camera that day and I'll post pictures of our fun.

Tomorrow's the big day!

We had our Meet the Teacher Open House last night and I had 15 out of 18 students show up.  They were a bunch of cuties and I'm sure it's going to be a great year! The superhero theme was a huge hit and I think it turned out well.  I'm really pleased with the things that I made.  Here's a quick tour of the room.  

I forgot to take a picture of my door but I used the superhero clip art and printed out each hero on magnet sheets (I put two to a page) and used a scrapbooking tool to cut them out in an oval shape.  I also used a magnet sheet and made a sign welcoming visitors to the home of Mrs. Cooper's Caped Crusaders.

When you walk in my door, the cubbies are on the wall to your left and there is a long bulletin board above them.  I decided to make a portion of the board a content area word wall (using cards from the fabulous Anna Brantley) and the other half of the board currently has our Warrior's Expectations and our class rules.  The word wall will end up expanding into that half at some point during the year.

I love how my speech bubble title looks.  I found the adhesive speech bubbles in the party section at Walmart.  I didn't know how I was going to use them but they just screamed comic book when I saw them.  I paired them up with superhero masks that came in an activity book that I found somewhere this summer.

The computer area is in the corner next to the cubbies and then you're up front where we have our Smartboard and group meeting area.  This is where I put my Daily 5/Cafe board.  

There is one superhero for each CAFE area: Captain America is Captain Comprehension, Aquaman is Accuracy Aquaman, Flash is Flash Fluency and Wonder Woman is Wonder Word Woman (expanding vocabulary).  I them made the strategy cards for each area and the strategy card shows the corresponding superhero so it's easy to tell which area the card belongs with.

Here's my superhero behavior chart! (Sorry for the glare)

If you stuck through this long thanks for your interest.  I'll post more pictures soon.  I need to get ready to head to bed and rest up for our first day. 

TpT Back to School Sale

I just finished downloading my TpT purchases after getting some great deals at the back to school sale. $41 worth of goodies for only $34, what a bargain! I bought some common core assessments for ELA and Math from The Lesson Plan Diva, a common core aligned unit on fairy tales, a Wizard of Oz sight word game and some new word wall cards just to name a few of the items.  My printer will be busy tomorrow when I get to school.  Good thing I bought new ink cartridges for my color printer at Office Depot's Teacher Day extravaganza on Saturday (sale on HP ink included a ream of HP paper)!!
Tomorrow morning will be our "marathon" faculty meeting but I'll have the afternoon to work in my room.  Our "Meet the Teacher" Open House will be on Tuesday afternoon so everything to do with the classroom appearance needs to be done by then.  Students will come on Thursday so I'll have all day Wednesday to get other things done.  It's going to be a great week!!

It's that time of the year

We headed back to school last week on Wednesday for a day of training before our "official" first day on Thursday.  Wednesday's training included more information on the common core standards that first grade starts this year.  We got both a revised math and reading curriculum reflecting the new standards as well as a new social studies curriculum.  It's going to be a year with many instructional changes.  On Thursday morning we went to the high school for the annual "Welcome Back Breakfast."  I love this event because it's a chance to see friends at others schools and catch up on the news as well as hearing all of the new teachers in the county being introduced by their new principals.  This year was kinda bittersweet since this is the last year with our current superintendent of schools since he is retiring after the election in November.  (This is the man who hired me 25 years ago after I had interned at Shadeville in a first grade class.  I was thrilled to be hired the next year and I've never considered making an employment change.)  He's been a hands-on superintendent who visits the schools during the Open Houses and he's always come to the school several times a year for visits to classrooms.  It's going to be strange to have someone else taking his place in a few months.  Oops, sorry I digressed!  Thursday afternoon we met as a grade level to make some plans for the year and discuss how we would be handling the curriculum changes. Friday was supposed to  to be our data day but due to programs not being ready and uncooperative computers we ended up getting most of the day to work in our rooms instead!  YEA!!!  I've gotten a lot done in my room with my new superhero theme and I can't wait to post some pictures next week after I get everything up.  (One of teaching buddies is encouraging me to sell some of my superhero items that I've made on TpT.  Maybe after I post pictures of my class I"ll upload them and pin them to Pinterest as see what happens.)  Speaking of making items, I need to get busy making a few more signs to finish up my Daily 5 board.

My Summer is Halfway Over!!

I looked at the calendar and realized that my summer vacation is halfway over.  So I decided that I'd better get busy on some of the home projects I need to get done before it's time to go back.  First on the list was to get some kitchen cabinets cleaned out.  I wanted to declutter by putting some of the things that we rarely use on a shelf out in the garage.  (We have a coffee maker that we haven't used in the eight years that we've been married but my hubby doesn't want me to get rid of it!!)  I also wanted to get some things totally out of the kitchen and into the Goodwill donation box. (Let's not wait until December to make our donations this year!!)  Well, as I'm cleaning away, I manage to slice open the side of my right pinky finger on the blade of the food processor!!   Blood, blood and more blood!!!!  I'm trying to get it cleaned up with minimal mess and without freaking out my four year old son (or me).  But Jamie has a new doctor kit and he wants to "doctor" my booboo for me.  It's a yucky looking mess (started bleeding again when I took a bath) and I'm still wondering if I need to get a doctor to look at it and see if I need stitches or something.   At least I did manage to get the cabinets cleaned out and they look great!!

New Classroom Theme-Superheros

I'm looking forward to a new year and a new classroom theme that I think the kids will love.  Superheros!!  With all the superhero movies and related books and merchandise it's easy to find things for the room.  I bought the cutest superhero clip art sets on etsy and I am using them to create a superhero themed behavior chart, posters and other goodies.  I'll be sharing some of them in the coming weeks.

Pinterest

One of my favorite resources for great school ideas is Pinterest!  I have found tons of information and great ideas.   If you're interested in joining Pinterest, let me know and I'll send you an invitation.  If you're already a Pinterest fan, check out my boards.  I'm listed as Beth Cooper.  My Pinterest boards include: Daily 5, reading, Dr. Seuss, writing, math, science, social studies, technology, common core standards as well as seasonal items.


http://pinterest.com/bethbcooper/

Taking the Plunge

After blog stalking for the past year, I decided to take the plunge and start a blog of my own.  I enjoy reading about other classrooms and getting great ideas to bring into my own classroom.  I've always be happy to share my experiences and resources with teachers in my own school so I thought that maybe I should branch out and try to share with a wider audience.  I hope that my experiences and ideas will be helpful to others!!