Best of The Best on TpT Linky

Who goes on TpT and surfs around forever trying to find the best products to buy? I know I spend a lot of time reading reviews and looking at how many votes a particular item has. Sometimes that is what helps me decided between one item over another.  Well, I am linking up with Molly from Classroom Confections to help you find the BEST products out there from the BEST sellers on TpT! We talked about what our best selling item was and also our most wish listed item. It's fun to look at those stats.... I am addicted to it. :)

 

So, here is my best selling and most wish listed item on TpT right now. In fact it is wish listed right now at over 400 times.... It is my Fractions On a Number Line set....

Check out the other fabulous items in the links by clicking on the linky party image above to will take you some other awesome products to get you ready for next year!

Show Me The Math!

Okay, I am playing around with some screencast type apps that I can record my math strategies on. I have looked at a lot and there are good and bad about so many. The one I would like to share today is "Show Me" and it is FREE! It is basically an interactive whiteboard with voice recording. I love everything about it. At first it appears that you can only do one page but after watching some tutorials on their site I saw someone who appeared to be using multiple pages. This can be done by pausing after you are done with your page, erasing the content, and then continue recording. I haven't tried that yet but will. Soooo...I am letting you all take a glimpse at my first tutorial on partial sums. Believe me....it is not ready for Hollywood or any award! I was simply playing around and had my kids in the background. I may sound a little ADD.....seriously. I do plan to organize better for the real ones I plan to post for my class.

Partial Sums Tutorial

How will I use it next year you ask? Well, my first thought is to upload tutorials for the week highlighting strategies they've learned. My second thought is to upload problem solving for them to work on. One feature....though it is $5.00 a month, is for you to add groups. You then add students and the students can create their own recording and send it to you....pretty cool. I haven't quite gotten that far. Baby steps...... So get your popcorn ready for this very unedited first time tutorial. :) I am really putting myself out there so....please be sweet.....I hate the sound of my voice.... LOL!  :)

Keeping It Organized!

Hi everyone! I am so excited to be guest blogging for Pamela... even if I am just a little jealous that her toes are in the sand and mine aren't. If you don't know who I am, my name is Gina and I blog over at Third Grade Tidbits. I teach third grade (clearly) and have for the past 5 years. In the past 5 years I have been the WORST at organizing. I change my mind all. the. time. Do you do that too? Binders, folders, binders. drawers, back to binders. Ugh! But one thing two things that I have been using for the past 3 years that work AMAZINGLY- that is what I want to share with you today.

The first thing is what I do to keep my desk less cluttered and keep my brain from being frazzled. See, my first couple years of teaching, I would have books and copies and materials and who knows what else just scattered all over my desk and table. To the point where I felt like THIS was what my room looked like...

 

But thanks to these little beauties fixer uppers, that is not the case anymore...

I have these in the corner of my desk (admittedly this pic is NOT my desk, it is my dining room table). Once I start planning for the next week and making copies/prepping materials/gathering books, I put them in the "next week" drawer. On Friday, I take everything that I am using next week and put it in the correct drawer. Then whatever isn't ready, I finish at home over the weekend and put it in the appropriate drawers on Monday morning. Everything is prepped for the week and I can use my planning time to prepare for the following week. It helps keep me sane and my desk clean. Sometimes I forget what I planned on giving for homework but I can easily check the drawer to find out. If I don't finish something on Monday, I just move it down to Tuesday's drawer.  (If you look in the picture below you will see my desk has no clutter- minus my computer bag that I had thrown up there for one reason or another.)

These don't only help me, they help if I have an unexpected sub. Sometimes I am just too sick to get things gathered for my sub. But this solves that problem. I can easily look at my plans, email them to my friend and she will give them to my sub. The sub can go in the drawer and take out whatever is needed for the day without having to know where anything is in my classroom. These drawers have saved me with substitutes on more than one occasion. And it helps my teammates because they don't have to run around trying to gather busy work for my kids to do if I am out.

The next sanity saver is another beauty work in progress (even though I have been using them for three years). This one helps with collecting student work...

Collecting work had always been an issue for me. Either I would be collecting and a handful of kids wouldn't be done or I would be waiting for that handful of kids while the ones already done sat there and doodled or did who knows what. I finally decided on this method. (What you don't see in this picture is a big stack of class lists. I put about 5 on a page and just run off a bunch of copies and cut them. They are clipped together and sit on top of the drawers.)If we are working on, let's say, grammar sentences, I will get one of my class lists and at the bottom of the list, write the assignment and date. "Grammar sentences 5/3. Then I tell the class "The slip says Grammar sentences in (whatever color I wrote it in) and it is in the grammar drawer." I know this sounds like a moot point, but sometimes I don't get all the old papers out and there are other slips in there, so they need to know which slip they are looking for.

When students finish, they go up to the drawers and highlight their name, put the paper in the correct drawer, then cross their name off the list. Very simple. When time is up, anyone who has NOT finished gets their incomplete work folder (these are hanging in a pocket chart on the wall, I have no pics sorry) and put the assignment in there. The folder then goes in the top blue bucket that says incomplete work.

 

Once I take out an assignment to grade, I look at the class list, put the papers in number order quickly (this helps because regardless of how many times I remind kids, someone will forget to cross their name off), and then list the assignment on the board with the student numbers of anyone who has not turned it in,

Any time students have free time the first thing they must do is their incomplete work. If I have NOT taken the assignment to grade yet, they find the stack in the drawer, put it in, and cross their name off. If I have taken the papers already, they put it in the bottom blue bucket that says Late Work and they go to the board and erase their number from the assignment list.

I know it seems like a lot, and you may be thinking, oh my word my kids wouldn't do that. But I promise you, they will. I had one student this past year (he ended up leaving to go to a different placement) that had a lot of learning disabilities and well, just a lot of problems over all. But after a few tries and the kids reminding him along the way, he remembered how to do it. It saves me time, keeps papers together, and keeps the students accountable and teaches them responsibility.

I hope you enjoyed my long-winded systems. And I am currently working on a new look for those drawers... they will be posted on my blog! Be sure to stop by and see how much better they look now!

-- Third Grade Tidbits

Loving Math Centers!

When Pamela asked me to guest blog for her, I was so excited because I just LOVE taking over other people's blogs! So, thank you Pamela and followers for allowing me this time to share one of my favorite things...MATH CENTERS! I know what you're all thinking, "How do you organize your centers and actually get your kindergarteners to do work?" It's simple. Let's start at the very beginning...

When my kinders come in at the beginning of the year, majority of them are not independent and are ALWAYS calling my name {That actually never stops no matter how hard I try!} So, first things first...they have to learn the routine. I begin by having "Math Stations" in my classroom. There are two teacher lead tables {me and my TA} and two independent tables during this time. Each day we rotate the activities so that all the students get a chance to work with us and have independent time.

By January, my kinders are very good at working independently at their tables and are now ready to have a few choices during math time. We discuss and model what "Math Centers" are going to look and sound like so that everyone understands the expectations! Here are a few pictures of how things run in my room...

 

I believe one of the most important things to having successful math centers is to teach your kids where the materials are located in the room. I have this fancy green cart {that holds a lot of other stuff too} located in the front of my room that houses my math center tubs. Each tub is numbered so students can easily identify and retrieve the correct tub without my help. At the beginning of the week, I print a small choice board for my kinders to keep in their work folders. Before we begin our new centers, we discuss each activity and whether the kids will need to get extra materials from our math shelf to complete it. Tub 1 and 2 are always teacher lead while the other tubs are review and extra practice on skills we've already covered. I even have a few FREE centers included such as pattern blocks, big blocks, & Promethean Board {online math games}.

This is an example of our choice board. As you can see, I have a tub number in each box so the students will know which container to get for their activity. These activities are created by me and you can find them in my Teachers Pay Teachers store. I simply take screen shots {Promethean Board camera tool} of the activities to create these choice boards. I also create a simple flip chart page for my Promethean Board so students can sign-up by moving their name to the box they choose for that day. I can easily print the page for my own records which I think is better than keeping a checklist. Who has time for that...RIGHT?

 

One of my rules is that only 4 people can sign up for each tub per day...this keeps the noise down and insures that other things besides the FREE centers get chosen. My kinders LOVE the freedom of choosing their own center which is great for me because when they get rowdy I can simply say, "Oh, you must want me to pick centers for you from now on?" This one little sentence really clicks with them and I hardly ever have to say it again!

 

Once students complete an activity, they put it in the "finished tub" and are allowed to pick a math bucket {manipulatives} until the timer rings. Our centers last between 20-25 minutes each day, which seems to be more than enough time for everyone to complete their task.

I have been teaching kindergarten for 10 years now and have tried a lot of different ways to have a successful math time. At first, using a choice board seemed like a crazy idea for kindergarteners but just like everything else if you spend enough time on the routine the kids will get it and succeed! My students' math achievements were out of this WORLD this past year and I give this method majority of the credit. {I get a little...RIGHT?}

Thanks for stopping by and spending a little time with me! Please come visit me at my blog, Lanier's Lions! {Click on my button to be directed to my blog}
 

NicoleLanier's LionsFacebook

Ok, but next time, I’m serious!

Hey guys and gals! This is Ashley Sanderson from Flying High in First Grade and I am so excited to be a guest blogger today!

Today I want to talk about consistency. We hear it all the time. Be consistent. Be consistent in your teaching. Be consistent in your classroom management. Be consistent in your discipline. But it’s easier said than done right? Of course it is!

This is my 5^th year of teaching and I still struggle with this, but I hope that this post gives you a little insight into how I have grown over the years and made my classroom a more consistent learning environment.

It is important to start on day 1 with consistency and expectations. This is the first day your students will see you and you have to show them what you expect. I’ve heard the rule, “You have to be mean till Christmas. Then the kids will know what they can and cannot get away with.” I completely agree with this! Maybe not the mean part, but the principle that you have to stand strong in what you expect. Both in academics and behavior. Your students will thrive off of your expectations! I promise!

How do you promote consistency? Here are some ideas.

1.       Start a behavior system on day 1 and stick to it. I use a clip chart. You can use any behavior system. You must make sure to clearly lay out what deserves a consequence and what deserves praise. I use the terms “peacemaker” and “peacebreaker”. We brainstorm what a peacemaker and peacbreaker is the first week of school and put it on an anchor chart that hangs RIGHT by our clip chart. After the brainstorming is done I introduce the clip chart. (See my Teachers Pay Teachers store to look over the clip chart I use in my classroom). We talk about how if you do any of the peacemaker actions, you will get to clip up. And if you do any of the peacebreaker actions you will have to clip down. No arguments. And if you do argue, you clip down again! This one was a hard one for my firsties. They would argue with me about EVERYTHING! I have helped most of them stop doing that this year. Thank goodness!

2.       When a student breaks a rule, there is a consequence. NO MATTER WHAT! I understand that there are extenuating circumstances and you have to use your judgment, but I’ve learned from experience, if you let them get away with it once, they will try again and again and again to get away with it!

3.       Also, make sure that even if one of your sweet ones breaks a rule, you have to give the same consequence you would to your trouble student as you would your sweet student. I find myself sometimes thinking “oh, they won’t do it again”. Again, I say, consistency!

4.       Keep a schedule! This helps with academic consistency! We are in our last 2 days of school, but we are still doing our calendar and problem solving till the LAST day! And guess what? My students expected nothing less. We do it EVERY morning and they know this is what we do. This also removes the chance for behavior because they know the schedule and know what’s coming next in the day. This way they won’t sit there and think “well I don’t know what we’re doing, so I’m going to goof off!”

5.       Set expectations EARLY! At my school we do the workshop model for reading, writing, and math. In writing my students can write for 30 minutes STRAIGHT! Yes, I know, I’m very proud of them! Of course, we didn’t start there, but the 1^st day I introduced writer’s workshop to my students, they were told that eventually we would reach 30 minutes of independent writing time. And we did reach that! We wrote EVERY day this year at the SAME time, upping our writing time every day. They knew we wrote during that time. And if we didn’t (very rarely happened), they would ask “why aren’t we writing?!” They really do thrive off schedules!

I hope that through this post you learned a little bit about consistency and you can try it in your classroom. I promise you won’t regret it. Have a good week!