Back to School Goals 2014-2015

I'm linking up today with I {heart} Recess for her Back to School Goals link up. School (for the kiddos) doesn't start up until August 25th, and even though I don't have to report back until August 13, with all of the PD I'm taking part in this summer I'm already thinking about different goals I have for the upcoming year, so here are some of mine:

Personal: Last year, once the school year took off, I was so wrapped up in reading professional books/articles/etc or working on stuff for school or the kiddos, that I lost track of making sure I have enough time for me to just read for fun. I push that idea with my kiddos so much, I need to remember to give myself that same chance as well. This year, my goal is to give myself a little bit of time each day, even if its 10 minutes before bed to just read a (non-teacher/professional) book.

Organization: On the whole I was pretty organized last year...except for the piles of paper I inevitably always had on my table in my classroom. I would either get it graded but not enter the grades at the same time or get it graded but forget to hand it back to my kiddos, or there would be 50 million things my admins would need from me right then and there and I wouldn't get a chance to grade the work right away. My goal this year is to implement a "touch it once" grading method so I can get the papers back to the kiddos ASAP. One of my teammates and I are planning on doing "grading parties" on Friday evenings each week so we can get everything graded, entered into the grade book, and into our kiddos mailboxes so they can go home on Monday.

Planning: Now that I have a year of teaching under my belt, and I'm staying in the same grade level, I have some plans I can reference as I write my new plans for this year. Having last year's plans as a resource will be helpful in planning and hopefully I can plan at least 2-3 weeks ahead.

Professional: Nevada requires teachers to complete 6 credits of CEUs every 5 years for license renewal. Now even though my license is good through 2017, I was able to complete 3.5 of those credits during the 2013-2014 school year. I'd like to get the rest of the credits done this school year so that way I'm not stressing about them once it's time to submit my renewal application.

Students: We used technology in a whole bunch of different ways in my classroom last year, but I noticed alot of times when I would give my kiddos group research to do, they would always ask me to find things online for them, or just still to their textbooks and other resource books we had in our room. My goal this year is to get my kiddos to be more self-sufficient with completing research online and more familiar with using technology as part of their own presentations in my classroom.

Motto: "New school, new year...things will be better" I loved almost everything about teaching last year. But the admins at my building were ineffective, didn't support the teachers, heavily played favorites, and there was a severe lack of communication all around which led to the entire staff having a depressingly low morale. Working at a charter, we're able to put in transfer requests to our sister schools, and I was lucky enough to get a 4th grade position at our charter's brand new campus for the 2014-2015 school year. The admin team for the new school is amazing (we've already had staff team building days and their communication is quick, on time, and clear). I'm also lucky since two of my teammates from my other school are transferring with me so we'll all be together in 4th grade again. Which is why I keep telling myself that this year will be a better year than last year. 

What goals are you setting for yourself? Link up and share! Or...leave a comment below!

I'm Back!

Hi everyone! I know... it's been an INSANELY long time since I've posted. Honestly, I thought I was going to be able to keep up with posting and tackling my first year in the classroom, but thanks to having administrators from hell an interesting first year experience, I had to put my blog on the back burner. The good news is I am transferring to a brand new campus this upcoming year with two of my teammates (we're all getting to stay together in fourth grade), which is super exciting, so I should have some more time than I did last year to keep up with all the awesome blogging going on. As far as my first year teaching 4th grade...my kiddos were amazing and I loved every minute of being in my classroom.

My summer has been filled so far with both teacher-y things and relaxation. School ended for me on June 4. I've also gotten the chance to hang out with some coworkers and it's been nice developing those friendships. In early June, I spent a week taking a class on literacy, and ways to implement a more effective literacy block in my classroom. I also spent a good amount of time going to Wet n Wild, the water park that is about 10 minutes from my house as well as catching up on reading some books (I think I managed to get through about 8 books in June). I also ordered and got my new 2014-2015 Erin Condren Life Planner. I had the teacher planner last year, but this year decided to use the life planner so I can keep track of my school and personal life stuff all in one place.

Isn't it pretty!!!

We may only be 4 days into July, but this month is already shaping up to be pretty busy. On the 2nd, I let my uber book nerd out and finally got my Hunger Games tattoo, bringing my tattoo total to 9. 

My tattoo artist is awesome!

May the odds be ever in your favor! It's a little hard to see with the lighting, but my tattoo is shaded with all sorts of awesome golds and browns.

Tattoo number 10 will also be book related...it will be the Dauntless symbol from Divergent (I'm getting it on my left leg above the ankle) and the plan is to get it next month about a week before school begins again. 

Next week I'll also be attending SDE's Differentiated Instruction Conference. I'll also be at the Teacher-Blogger Meetup that is happening on Wednesday night of the conference. If any of you are going to the conference or the meet up, let me know in a comment below. I'd love to meet up and say hi to my fellow bloggy friends. 

Now, my summer has not all been tattoos and water parks. I have started working on some stuff for my classroom. First, I've worked on getting several more books for my classroom. I was super excited about finding this one:

I use the "Who Was" series for a biography project I do with my kiddos in November. They are each responsible for reading a biography and researching the person. They then have to write a biography on that person and create an artistic representation of the person they wrote about. When they present their completed projects, They dress up as the person they researched and present as if they were the actual person. Parents are invited to the presentations and the rest of the students are expected to ask questions during each presentation. This project was a huge success last year and I can't wait to do it again this November. 

I've also started working on a new set of numbered magnets for my kids for my check in/check out board. I'll post more pictures once I have the whole board completed. I did change the way I made the magnets this year. I finally tried using Glue Dots, and OMG they are amazing. I don't know why I never tried using them before, but they totally made putting the magnets together so much easier, and the adhesive bond is super strong - I tried pulling the glass stone off the magnet and it wouldn't budge one bit.

New magnets that will go with my new decor theme this year (more on that in a future post)

These have made my teacher-crafty projects so much easier!!!

So... I think thats about it so far for me this summer. What have you all been up to? Let me know! And don't forget to let me know if you'll be at the SDE Conference or the Teacher-Blogger Meet Up!

Back to School Blogger Exchange

I was a part of the Back to School Blogger Exchange that Covered in Glitter and Glue hosted. It was like a Secret Santa for teachers for the start of the new school year. We each got paired up with another blogger and were told a little bit about them and then got to go shop for some stuff for them. My partner was Marisa from My Classroom Is My Runway. Her blog is awesome so make sure you check it out. I was super excited when I got my package from her and couldn't wait to get into my house and open it.

Sorry all, I'm keeping my address hush hush for now lol.

Then I opened up my package and read the cute note that Marisa wrote me. I absolutely adore that she even put graphics on it that match my classroom theme!

Finally, I dug into all the goodies she sent me. I am in love with everything and am already planning uses for everything in my room (especially the paper lanterns...they are totally adorable and I have the perfect spot to hang them near my curriculum corner and the dry erase pockets which I plan on using in my differentiated centers).

I really got a ton of awesome stuff... pencils, paper lanterns, a cup, stickers, erasers, post its, bird labels, bookmarks, nameplates, and dry erase pockets! I'll post a picture once I get my lanterns up so you can all see how awesome they look in my room! 

I must also take a moment to extend a very big thank you to my blogger exchange partner. THANK YOU Marisa! 

Be sure to click on the button at the top of this post to check out everyone else from the blogger exchange and see what they received too!

Classroom Setup...A Work In Progress

It's been a week since I was first let into my classroom. Alot has gotten done, but alot more needs to be done too...which makes me stress because we start our Back to School PD and training stuff on Wednesday, so my set up time will be limited. I still haven't gotten my class list yet, but I should be getting that next week and then the kiddos come back to school on August 26th.

So... here's the progress of my room...

First I built my shelves and sorted my books into their categories and bins (labels still have to be laminated and attached). I also built a garment rack to hang my flip charts/anchor charts from (at $9.95 it's way cheaper than the $300 it costs to buy the easel that hold chart paper)

Then I started moving around furniture... I moved these bookshelves and created a curriculum corner. I'll keep textbooks, reference books, etc over here as well as use it as a place to store my student centers and task cards.

I also moved my student desks into the set up I wanted them in. I will have 25 students in my class so I decided to go with groups of 5.

View from the doorway

View from the library

I kind of did things backwards and set up my desks before installing my bulletin boards, so I had to go and move everything around and now my room feels uber chaotic...

This will be my math bulletin board

This will be my social studies board

The small board is going to be for calendar, student jobs, etc and the big one is for reading and writing

And finally today I got the boards covered with fabric and put up the border too. I tried my hardest to get the fabric as smooth as possible, but as you can see the fabric won that war in a few spots. Hopefully once I get some actual stuff on the boards the wrinkles won't be as noticable. The goal for tomorrow is to get my room looking neat again and then work on actually getting some stuff on the boards.

Math Board

Social Studies Board

Reading/Writing Board

Calendar/Jobs board

First Day In My Room...

It's August 1st, which means we were FINALLY allowed into our rooms today. Unfortunately, we weren't allowed to do much because the janitors still have painting and floor cleaning to do, so until that is all done, we aren't allowed to do any desk set up, wall decorating, etc. I did take some pictures of my room in it's before state and thought I'd share them with you. I'll take more tomorrow when I go back to work and build my bookshelves and bulletin boards, and of course once we are given the all clear to set up I'll take some then as well. But for now, here's my room as it was when I first got in this morning.

First up...my room from outside my door. I was originally supposed to be in room 49, but got told this morning that they switched my room and put a 5th grade class in 49. I was a little bummed because 49 was a corner room near the bathrooms, but the fact that I'm in room 47 and the number 47 was my sorority number makes me all sorts of happy.

This pic is the view from right inside the doorway. Way in the back you can see my storage closet and my file cabinet. The piles of student desks and chairs are hiding my teacher desk. I do plan on keeping those three items where they are located now because I like the idea of having a little teacher's nook. You can also see the rain gutters the previous teacher put along the bottom of the whiteboard to display books. I've put in a request to have those removed because I really won't use them and they are already kind of falling out of the wall on the one end.

Here's the view of the front of the room from where I plan on putting my classroom library. You can see my teacher desk a bit better from behind the student desks. Also, I plan on using the side of the file cabinet as my display space for my kiddos brag tags.

This is another view from what will be my class library to the other side of the room. In the far corner where the black wheelie chair is, I plan to move the two book shelves that house all of my curriculum materials (you'll see those in the next picture). The horseshoe table I'm on the fence about. I've asked about possibly having taken out of my room, but we'll see... it's all going to depend on space availability once I get my room set up how I want it.

And here is the last spot in the room I have to show you...where I plan on putting my library. The vinyl letters were put up by the previous teacher, but I do like what is says. The janitors may or may not remove them when they come and do whatever painting they have to do in my room. We'll see. I'll be okay either way because I can always just design a poster through Vistaprint with the same saying. The computers will stay where they are (obviously they will get pushed up against the wall though) and the bookshelves in this picture are the ones that I will be moving to that other corner. The shelves I bought today will be the ones I put into this corner. I'm also stopping at Walmart on my way into school tomorrow to see about picking up a rug for this area. And, at some point in the relatively near future, I'd like to get a bean bag or two for my library area. 

So that's my room as of now. Let me know what you guys think/any suggestions you have for set up...this is my first year doing all of this so I'd love to know how you all set up your rooms too!

When Do You Go Back Linky Party

It's that time of the summer where all of us teachers slowly but surely all start reporting back to school, so I thought I would join up with Jessica from Literacy Spark for her When Do You Go Back linky party.

At my school, we (teachers, TAs, secretaries, etc) officially report back on August 14. HOWEVER, with all the crazy that's been going on with the new campus opening and the old faculty from my school moving over to it (or at least waiting to as the building hasn't been fully completed yet), we (the new faculty) have not had the opportunity to go into the building or our rooms at all this summer. The faculty that is transferring over to the new campus should have all of their stuff in the multipurpose room at this point so that it can all get loaded up and moved over within the next few weeks. So, we have been told that we can finally access the building and our rooms starting on August 1, so most of us are treating that like an unofficial teacher report date and are all heading in to get to work on our rooms since that only leaves us 2 weeks before our Back to School meetings, PD, etc all begin and only 13 days before the Parents Meeting on the 13th (no word yet on if they will be coming and seeing the classrooms but alot of us are aiming to have them mostly set up by then just in case). Students report for a Back to School Orientation Day on the August 21 (it's really only an hour so the kids can meet the teacher and see their rooms) and then the first day of school is August 26. 

When do you all start back to school? Be sure to link up with everyone else and let us know!