Monday Made It: 4th Grade Frame, Math Notebooks

It's Monday and the start of my first full week with kids!  It's time for another link up with Tara from 4th Grade Frolics!

I always try to get a picture of each of my students on the first couple of days of school.  Well my camera has been MIA this week so I couldn't take my pictures last week.  I figured oh well, that gives me the weekend to make a cute picture frame for them to hold for their pictures. I'm sure we've all seen a variety of versions of the picture below floating around on Pinterest and other blogs.

Well since I missed the first day of school, I made my frame to just say 4th Grade. I have been trying to use things I have at home instead of always going and buying stuff. I took an old chalkboard with frame that we used for Christmas pictures a couple of years ago and decided it would work great for this project!

I took the chalkboard out and painted the frame to match my classroom.  Then I used my handy dandy Cricut to cut out the letters in teal vinyl.  They went on so easy and to keep everything in place I painted a thin coat of modge podge over the whole thing. Here is the final product!

Next, I have my math notebooks.  I started using interactive notebooks when I taught 3rd grade reading.  I really enjoyed using them and the kids did, too!  Last year I knew I wanted to use them again, but there had to be some changes made so that I could use them for math.  We didn't and still don't have a Common Core text book, so these notebooks take the place of a text book.  It was tax free weekend here, so I went and picked up some extra composition notebooks to get ready for the kids to make their interactive notebooks for this year.  I explored A LOT on the pros and cons of using spiral vs. composition notebooks.  I've always used composition notebooks in the past and decided to stick to it this year.

 

Here is how I put them together.  I use two notebooks, stapling the back cover of the first to the front cover of the second.Then I use Duck Tape to hold the two notebooks together.  My wonderful hubby usually helps me put all of these together! After the notebooks are put together, I glue a piece of ribbon in the back for the kids to use a bookmark.  This worked great last year.  I use a different colored ribbon for each class so I can easily identify where it goes if it gets left somewhere.

We will spend part of class this week decorating our notebooks.  I want the kids to feel like they are personalized to them.  I keep separate notebooks for each class because I model the notes and problems for each class.

One last MMI for this week is this little pillow!  I've had it for a couple of years and it didn't match my room any more.  I decided to get out the sewing machine and make a little cover for it to match the rest of my room!  I think it turned out so cute!

Fellowes Saturn2(95 Review

I wrote about buying a laminator at Staples a couple of weeks ago here. I've been meaning to write a review for a while, but with school starting this past week, I've been a little busy.  I have loved having my little laminator at home!

 I bought some 5 mil pouches from Amazon with some gift cards I got at Christmas. The Saturn 95 is a the smaller of the two versions that Fellowes makes.  I've been using the 9 x 11.5 pouches and putting all of my little items with enough space to allow me to cut them all out.  The pouches look kinda fuzzy before they go through the laminator.  I was a little apprehensive about how the pouches would look when they went through the laminator, but I was more than impressed with the results!

 This is how the pouch looks when it goes through the laminator.  The 5 mil pouches are super thick! Sometimes the lamination didn't completely seal, so after being cut out, I would run the small pieces through again to seal the edges. 

Here is a pouch after go through the laminator.  Anything laminated comes out looking great! I have only had one pouch that ended up crinkling but I think it just went in a little crooked.  As long as the pouch went in straight I had no problems.  I'm so happy to have this little tool in my tool kit! 

2013-2014 School Goals and First Day

Today was my first day of school!  August came so quickly!  I had a wonderful day with my two classes.  Spent most of the time doing get to know you activities including a teacher test where the kids are quizzed on information about me (they fail miserably but their answers are funny!) Starting on a Thursday is nice because tomorrow is already Friday and then I have the weekend to recover from my first week back!


I had hoped to get this posted yesterday before school started, but better late than never! I'm linking up with I {heart} Recess for my back to school goals!

Personal: This is my first full school to be mommy and teacher.  I've been pretty bad in the past about staying at school way to late, spending far too many Sundays working in my classroom, and going to bed thinking about school.  Now that I have a little one at home, I want to be able to leave school at school.  It's a transition, but I'm definitely going to work this year on finding a balance.

Organization;  Part of finding a balance is by being organized so I don't waste time trying to find where I put that check sheet.  I'm working on this at home, but definitely at school, too!  Everything needs a home and everything needs to be in it's home.

Planning:  I'm a great planner!  I can come up with the most killer lesson ever on a pretty regular basis.  What I need to improve on is actually getting everything together that I need for that killer lesson.

Professional: With my new technology grant this year, I really want to help my fellow teachers learn all about the technology resources that are available to them.  I'm also hoping that they will be open to learning all the new things.

Students:  I have a different view of my students now that I am a mommy myself.  I really want to get to know my students at a deep level this year.  I think that knowing them deeply is really going to help me teach them better!

Motto: Look for the positive.  It's easy to find things to complain about in the world of education, they are always there.  Focusing on the negative is a total drain on you and your teaching.  I'm going to focus on all the good things happening in my classroom, my school, and my district this year!

What are you goals for the year?

Monday Made It: Chevron, Chevron, and More Chevron

This is my last Monday before I have students!  It's time for another linky with 4th Grade Frolics. Follow the link to see all of the amazing MMI's!

MMI # 1: Chevron Bulletin Board

Here was my inspiration for this product! Here is the tutorial I followed.

Here is my final board. I'm so excited to hang it in my room!

MMI #2: Chevron Stool

This stool was left in my classroom and looked pretty rough.

I got the cute fabric at Joann's and with the help of a little spray paint, it is now a super cute accent to my classroom!

MMI #3

This is my pride of joy of the past week! My class rules! I wanted a few simple rules for my room.  I considered the Whole Brain Rules, but decided they didn't fit my style. 

This is where I got my idea. I found this on Pinterest but the link just goes to the picture. If these rules belong to you, please let me know so I can give you credit!  I liked these rules because they were broad but covered everything at the same time. 

I got some canvases and some paint and got to work!  Here is how they turned out!

 (I can't figure out how to rotate this one)

Here they are hung up in my classroom!  I'm so happy with how they turned out!

Tomorrow is open house and then the kiddos come on Thursday! I'm so excited for this new year!

New Products and Print Center

I'm not only trying to be a real blogger, but I'm also trying my hand at creating and selling products on Teachers pay Teachers.  I created two new products that I am actually using in my classroom.

Owl/Chevron Clock Labels

Owl/Chevron Word Wall Labels

Click on the pictures to take you to my TpT store.

The second part of this post is about my district's print center.  We have copiers in our buildings, but we are only allowed 100 copies a month!  Not enough by any means to have a functioning classroom.  We have a center at the high school whose sole purpose is to print copies for teachers.  You send them what you want copied, they copy it, and bring back it to you.  No more standing in line waiting for the copier.  Sometimes it is a pain; there is a 3 day turn around for orders.  Most of the time it's awesome!  Today is was super awesome, because they not only do regular copies, but color and cardstock copies (THAT I DON'T HAVE TO PAY FOR)!  I spent quite a while there today, but I got a bunch of stuff printed for my classroom in color and on cardstock!!! I actually got my new products printed today!  I am now at home laminating EVERYTHING on my wonderful new laminator!  I can't wait to share my review later this week!

Classroom Pictures: BEFORE

My building finally opened yesterday!!!!  I was excited and overwhelmed at the same time! I moved classrooms this year, so I am mostly starting over!  I had the little one with me so I didn't spend much time up there, but today she is going to the sitter so I can get a LOT of work done!  Remember I have kids NEXT THURSDAY!!!!  Here is what my classroom looks like at the moment.

This is looking in from my door.  The whiteboard is at the front of the class.  I'm not sure if I'm going to keep this round table, because I have another rectangle table. I have an entire wall of windows that I am SOOOOOOO excited about because last year I had none!! I was in the dungeon room! I'm not really sure if/how I am going to be able to do curtains, so if anyone has any suggestions, I'd greatly appreciate it!

This is also looking in from the door but to the back of the classroom.

Still from the door, but looking toward the opposite corner.See all the pretty windows!

This is my teacher area.  I think I'm going to repaint the shelf orange.  It needs some TLC. I also have double the number of chairs I need right now, so I have to fix that!

This is looking at the front of the room from the back.  I'm so excited to have a Smart board this year that actually works! I'm going to use the small part of my whiteboard for date and objectives for the day.  The other side I'm going to use for my math word wall.

Here is my sweet little "helper".  She loved crawling around on the newly waxed floor!

Now that you've seen the what I started with, I can't wait to get it all decorated and organized and share those pictures with you next week!

New Blog Design

I'm so excited to have a wonderful new blog design!!!!  I'm really committing to this blogging thing and I decided that if I was going to do it, I needed a super cute blog to go with it. Well with the help of Christi Fultz at Ms Fultz's Corner and Design by Christi, my new blog is complete!

Let me just say that Christi was absolutely WONDERFUL to work with.  She had a set of questions I answered about how I wanted my blog to look, what items I wanted included, etc.  She took that info and created a layout that was EXACTLY what I wanted.  It makes me just giddy looking at my blog now!  If you want to cutsy up your blog, I would highly recommend Christi!  Thanks Christi!!!!