Squirrel's New Year's Resolution

I just wanted to announce a quick little sale in my TPT store.  20% off of everything Sunday the 30th and Monday the 31st!  I didn't make a graphic for it so just imagine something fabulous...that's what I did.

TPT Store

Have you ever read Squirrel's New Year's Resolution?

Click here to check it out on Amazon!

Adorable.

I picked it up at the Teacher (super discounted) Scholastic Book Fair a few weeks ago and decided to make a few companion materials to go along with it for when we return to school (in a few short days....BOOO HOOO!)

It's a pretty small pack but it's packed full of hands on, engaging activities!  In it you will find:

-2 word building worksheets where students use the words "new year" and "resolution" to build and list new words.
-Retelling page where students learn the definition of resolution, record each characters resolutions and brainstorm other resolutions that could be made.
-Writing prompt with additional writing page for students to write their New Year's resolution, why they chose it, and what things they can do through the year to achieve their goal!
-Word work sheet where students can read, write, color, pyramid write, & cut/glue the word "resolution"
-Sequencing page where students can color and cut out pictures of the animals in the story and then glue them in the order in which they made their resolutions.
-8 mixed practice story problems with multiple addends.

Click here to check out Squirrel's New Year's Resolution!

During the sale it will be marked down to $2.00!

In the Preview you will find a FREE whole group activity/printable about what resolutions are, what resolutions the animals in the book made, and what resolutions students could make!

I hope you all have a wonderful new years!

Adventures with Ozzy!

Do you Elf on a Shelf? 

A few years ago one of my students came to school every morning talking about his elf Oliver's escapades.  Before we left for the holiday break I asked his mom about Oliver and she told me the story of Elf on a Shelf.  I loved it so much that I considered scooping up one for my classroom but before I could that sweet Mom surprised me with my very own Elf!

I love doing the elf with my class!  If all I have to do to keep their behavior in check is move an elf around the classroom I'm all for it!  I wanted to share pictures of our elf adventures this year!

Ozzy arrived via hot air balloon/solo cup attached to a paper globe the day we returned from Thanksgiving break!

We were just starting persuasive writing so I had my students write letters to Ozzy "convincing" him to ask Santa to put them on the nice list.  They asked if they could read their letters to him when they were done.  How could I say no :).

For the next three weeks leading up to break Ozzy explored every nook and cranny of our classroom.

He brought tootsie rolls...I might call them elf poop next year :)

Ozzy napped it out in the Kleenex box, rode the ABC caterpillar, occupied real estate in the hundreds pocket and took an elf bath.

Everyone was being so good that Ozzy surprised them with peppermint hot chocolate one morning.

During the last week he brought them kisses from Santa, kicked it with our book buddy, had a marshmallow fight, hung out of a paper globe, and scrabbled "goodbye, be good" while he cuddled with the Grinch.  

I hope you all are enjoying the holidays with your family and friends!

Helping Children Cope With Tragedy...

Like so many of you I haven't been able to tear myself away from the news coverage about the tragedy at Sandy Hook.

Over the last 7 years I've imagined what I would do in that situation every time we practice our code red drills.  I've contemplated buying a fence cutter to keep next to the window and a big knife to keep on a shelf in a cabinet that I can't even reach.

I hope for the bravery that the teachers and administrators at Sandy Hook showed in any situation where I have to stand up for my students.  The courage to love and protect them no matter the personal cost.  As heart broken as I am, I've never been prouder to call myself a teacher.

On Saturday morning the parent of a former student contacted me to ask what she should say to her daughter who has seen the news coverage and is devastated.  I didn't know what to say as I don't have children of my own and we are on break so it wasn't something I was considering having to confront.  I started looking online and found the web site for the National Association of School Psychologists.

They have tons of resources, this one in particular is about helping children cope with national tragedies.  Children grieve differently than adults and sometimes aren't prepared to talk about an event until days, weeks, or even months after it happens.  I wanted to bookmark this for myself and share it with you in case it is needed for future reference.

Just a bit of fun!

Looking through portfolios is a great pick-me-up :).

I was filing my students mid year prompts in our writing portfolio's and I'm always amazed at the wonderful progress students make in just a few short months!

The development with illustrations, use of upper and lower case letters and punctuation marks are just a few impressive leaps this student has made!  They obviously aren't consistent but he's getting there!

I don't know how many of you are familiar with the Sid Shuffle.  I posted about it here.  Well my students are obsessed!  We usually shake our tail-feathers on Fridays but some of my girls just couldn't wait.  They asked me to record their shufflin' at recess!  Enjoy!

Pumpkin Day

I'm pretty late getting this up but thought I'd share anyway :)

Every year, during the couple of days leading up to Thanksgiving we always have Pumpkin Day.  I'm sure you've seen ALL the pumpkin books, journals, and activities out there.  My co-worker Cheryl and I have been doing this for years and it's always a great time!

Essentially, we do a whole bunch of math and science activities.  Students bring in those tiny decorative pumpkins.  They describe and illustrate what their pumpkin looks like and how they feel.  Students do informal measurement and weight activities, use a string to measure the circumference, and do a sink of float activity with a large pumpkin.

Then we cut it open, they help scoop out the guts and describe how it smells, feels & what the guts look like.  

Once we finish scooping out the guts we predict how many seeds are in it and count them up.

Finally, we end the day with a little pumpkin pie!  Students taste a small piece of pie and they write a story persuading people to eat or not to eat pumpkin pie.

 Looks like I have one who doesn't like it.  What's wrong with him!!!

We ended the day with a little science experiment (as seen on Pinterest).  We put soil and water in the pumpkin with about 12 seeds on Monday and when we returned from Thanksgiving break the next Tuesday the seeds had really taken off!  I would recommend putting a pan underneath the pumpkin if you try this at home.  The actual pumpkin rots pretty fast.  Gross!

Holiday Jams

We listen to music.  A lot of music.  Some might say too much and to them I'd say, there's no such thing!  I'm going to share our top 3 Holiday Jams this year.

1.  Alvin and the Chipmunks-Christmas Song
I....I mean WE could listen to this one all day.  I love listening to my kids sing along to "I still want a HOOOOLA HOOOP!"

2.  The Twelve Days of Christmas-John Denver & The Muppets
Miss Piggy "FIVE goooold rings, BAH DUM BUM BUM!"  We just can't get enough!

3. All I Want For Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth
I couldn't find the song on the cd I have in my classroom but this is a pretty cute version.  Every time we hear this one they start wiggling their loose teeth...GROSS!

What holiday jams can't you get enough of?

MTSS Monday

I've been wanting to start blogging about what I'm doing during MTSS (Multi-Tier Systems of Support) formerly RTI (Response to Intervention) formerly tutoring that teachers did on their own before someone felt the need to dictate exactly what they need to do and how they need to do it...WHAT?

Did I digress?

I know myself well enough not to commit to doing this every Monday but hopefully I will be able to share what I'm doing in MTSS at least once a month.

I actually enjoy MTSS.  We do it every morning for 30 minutes, school-wide.  In the past we have had to split every single student in all 8 classes on our grade level.  Splitting up 135 students right after you get them settled into the school day was, as I'm sure you can imagine, pure chaos, and not very effective.  Now we are able to do it in our classrooms with our own students.

Instead of collaborating over which student needs to move up or down a tier and how each of our students are doing in all 7 of the other classes they are spread amongst we actually get to share activities and how each of us are addressing specific needs.

We hold our grade level meetings and PLC's in different classrooms each time so we can see each others system for running MTSS (as well as literacy and math centers).  I don't know about you but sometimes I can get more out of visiting another teachers classroom than I can an entire Professional Development workshop.

We decided to have a general form of data tracking so that when an administrator comes in our room they will see the same thing.  I'm going to share it here for free.  I've already changed it 3 times and I've got a couple of new elements I'm thinking about adding so when I update it I will repost it in another MTSS Monday post.

You can grab these tracking forms here for FREE!

At this time I don't have any Tier 3 students.  I do have 4 Tier 2 students and the other 16 are Tier 1.  I split Tier 1 up into a medium and high group.

The students in the high group are working on enrichment and high order thinking activities.  My medium students are provided extra practice with skills and concepts we are working on in class (they are the biggest group, of course).

The Tier 1 recording sheet is pretty basic, I just list the activity they are doing, Readers Theatre, for example, the students names, materials they need and there is a place for notes.

Finally the Tier 2 students are given activities for remediation in areas that I have identified a deficiency.  For example, we spent about 3 weeks working on Kindergarten high frequency word identification.

In the Intervention Focus I wrote KG HFW.  I listed their names with their baseline scores 12/20 (meaning they were able to identify 12 out of 20.  Each week, after retesting, I recorded their new scores 15/20 then 19/20.  Once students show good growth or achieve the standard I move onto another area of focus.

I like this system because I can also throw in a couple of Tier 1 (medium) kids who need a little extra practice as we remediate different skills.

I have our MTSS time set up like centers so I am free to work one on one with students or in small groups.  I try to meet with each group once a week and my Tier 2 students one on one and in a small group once a week during our MTSS time.  I will post more about all of that another time.

*Please note-I created the MTSS tracking forms because they are useful to me and my colleagues.  If you have any suggestions I'm open to hearing them.  I'm considering separating Tier 2 and Tier 3 and adding a chart to Tier 3 with Time, Program and Frequency.

For more information about MTSS check out these Educator Resources!