Back to School Giveaway!

Hey bloggers!

Sorry for my absence! It has been a crazy few weeks! I had a few days of Professional Development about Common Core Math with Math Solutions and then I had meetings regarding my student teacher this year! Then I obvious spent quite a bit of time setting up my classroom, in back to school meetings, and getting ready for Meet the Teacher!

*This is a huge post...but there is a giveaway at the end! :)

I'm super bummed that I missed out on "Teacher Week" so I'm just going to do an all in one abbreviated version :)

Monday-Who:

I am in my fifth year of teaching first grade! I love it. I have 24 little lovelies this year :)

This is my first year of going back to school and having a baby! It has added to the chaos. Haha. My little guy is almost 10 months old and he just started crawling a few weeks ago! He's a pretty cool kid.

We spent a lot of time this summer at Hub's baseball games! And they finished in second place in the league-so that was exciting.

Tuesday-Where

My Classroom! The theme in my room? Well, I guess it's mostly rainbow...rainbow polka dots, rainbow chevron...yep! The school theme this year is Space so I incorporated that in the hallway.

Top Left: My small group table. I use this during math workshop for guided math groups, during writer's workshop for writing conferences, and during reader's workshop for guided reading. The chevron is contact paper and the pink is duct tape!

Top Right: My paint sample calendar. This is a calendar that will only have activities/dates that pertain to the students (so it will not be filled with all of my meetings!).

Bottom Left: Our "how we go home" chart! Quick & simple and by the door.

Bottom Right: Our "where did you go" chart. I have kids in and out of the room constantly (bathroom, reading recovery, special ed, speech, OT, PT, etc) so it is helpful to quickly see who is where! (I showed the magnets in a Monday Made It this summer here)

Top Left: Student mailboxes. Any papers/projects that need to go home can be found in their mailboxes!

Top & Bottom Right: Our classroom library! The bookboxes are on top of the book shelves.The green, yellow, & red tubs are leveled by difficulty. The blue tubs and fiction and nonfiction books organized by topic. There is a puzzle mat on the floor that I got from amazon and a rug I got from Ross Dress for Less on top of it. It's super comfy for reading time! :)

Bottom Left: This is our computer area and word wall in the back of the room! (More detail about the word wall on a post from last year here)

This is my back to school hallway bulletin board. As I said previously, our school has a space theme this year! I made the rocket ship out of construction paper and the flames from tissue paper. The kids loved it! We didn't have large black paper at school so I used wrapping paper for the background!

Wednesday-Why

I have definitely become more organized over the last year. My goal last year was to organize because I knew I would be taking my maternity leave and wanted my sub to be able to easily find things when she needed them. I have continued organizing because I have a student teacher this year! I want her to be able to find & put things away easily as well. Here are some of my organizational tips...

Meet the Teacher Organization:

I had stations set up for meet the teacher night. Our school does an open house format for meet the teacher. I got the picture frame holders on sale at Michaels! I love them.

This was how the students showed me that they had attended Meet the Teacher...it also allowed the parents to see the smartboard in action!

Here is a close up in the library. I made the labels myself and got the bins at Deals.

Close up behind my small group table. I got the white cubes at Target, and the cube bins at Big Lots. The rainbow carts are also from Big Lots. The cart drawers are labeled as well. The clear containers with blue lids are from walmart, I use them for my guided reading groups-books and notebooks go in them for each group.

Close up of my guided reading books. I love these magazine holders to organize them!!

Close up of the listening station. We use this during reader's workshop. The tables are from walmart. The green stools are from ikea and the soccer stools are from Hobby Lobby.

Close up of student supply organization at their desks. Each group of desks has 3 plastic drawers. The top drawer holds math manipulatives (cubes, place value cubes, ten frames, etc). The second drawer holds their writer's workshop folders and pens. The bottom drawer holds their extra school supplies.

At the end of each year, I ask the students to donate any crayons they don't want to take home. These are used as extras for the incoming students in case they don't have any or lose some throughout the year. This is where extra crayons, scissors, and glue sticks are kept.

Close up behind my desk...it's not the most organized but I try! The teacher toolbox holds paperclips, pencils, staples, rubberbands, brads, etc (more about it here). The square bulletin boards are for pictures and reminder notes (more about those here). On the left, I have a drawer for each day of the week to hold papers or books that are needed for each day. The "iHelp" is our job chart.

Thursday: When

Our Daily Schedule

Our Math Schedule

Our Reader's Workshop Schedule

Friday: What

What do I like to teach? Well, math was always my favorite when I was in school so I feel like teaching math comes easiest to me. I actually really like writer's workshop as well though. I love that the kids can all work at their own pace and I LOVE seeing the progress they make from the beginning of the year to the end! It's amazing.

I have an item posted that is all about the Writing Helpers that I use throughout the year (personal narratives, poetry, how to books, all about books, realistic fiction, & persuasive writing)! It has pictures of anchor charts that we make, writing paper templates, ABC & Blend charts, & more!

WHEW! That was a huge post. Thanks for sticking with me! And because you stuck with me for that whole thing, I'd like to give you a chance to win a pencil sharpener from Classroom Friendly Supplies!

Here is a quick video about the pencil sharpeners:

You can enter using the Rafflecopter below! One winner will get a pencil sharpener mailed to them from Classroom Friendly Supplies (color of your choice!). 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Good Luck!