Saturday Sayings

 I am so excited to be joining Tammy at Forever in First for Saturday Sayings. I look forward to reading her Saturday sayings every week. They are always insightful and give me plenty of food for for thought. So when she asked for people to join her, I knew I had to get in on this party. So I signed up for the first week. All week long this has been on my mind about what I was going to post. I had plans for reading my book "Making the Most of Small Groups" and finding the perfect quote. But no such luck. So I got out my kindle with the Growing Readers book I've been working on reading since this summer. I was hoping to find a great quote about reading instruction that would just blow everyone's mind. But I found this one instead and felt like it was perfect!

I read this and thought this is what I want to post. I think this describes what blogging has done for me and reading these Saturday Sayings. I love to learn. I'm always trying to read more about reading instruction and other areas of teaching. But I do tend to like to talk to other teachers who feel the same way that I do. But we always learn more from those that think differently than we do. An example of this for me, was when a colleague was talking about how memorizing books wasn't reading. This got me thinking about my reading practices in my room. I'm big on fluency and repeated readings. After my fellow teacher said this to me, I really worked on trying to find evidence to support what I was doing in my classroom. It definitively helped solidify my thinking and practices in my room. On a side note, I recently read an article about the common core and some myths associated with it. This researcher was talking about close readings and how texts needed to be reread to gain better understanding. While this isn't what I'm doing in my room in Kindergarten, I believe it gets them ready for this close reading as they progress with their reading ability. (You can check this article out here)
So I want to challenge you to first, go check out Saturday Sayings at Forever in First and the other bloggers joining the party today. Then to talk to other teachers in your building that might not feel the same as you. Read blogs that you might not agree with and use that to help solidify your own thinking. Thanks Tammy for letting me join the party.
I will be back later today with the magical product swap post. I forgot about that being today and had committed to this project.
I almost forgot. I have an update on Regan that I've been asking you guys to pray for. He went to St. Jude's Monday and they spent most of the week testing and evaluating him. They came to the same conclusions as they had in ATL. He has brain cancer. But they are starting chemo and radiation on Monday. Please continue to pray for him and his family. I have been so amazed by the community I live in. Our whole county has gotten behind this family with fundraising and praying. Thursday was his 12th birthday and Chick-Fil-a donated 100% of their proceeds to the family. It was incredible. So please keep praying!

A peek at our math stations for the week

I have only been back to work two days this week and I'm already way too busy. It's 5:15 am as I'm writing this post. I had every intention of posting last night but we took dinner to friends that just had a baby. It was way more fun holding a sweet baby and playing with their almost 2 year old. So here I am posting. I didn't intentionally get up at 4:30. I just woke up. I think I might have overdone it yesterday with my knee. So I'm blogging and icing it before work. I'm sure I'll be paying for this early wake up at about 6 today when I slow down. Anyway, I spent Monday at school not getting all the things done that I had planned for the work day. Instead I did a lot of talking. I surely hope I'm not the only one that has this problem when they return to work. I had lots of catching up to do. But I did get some things finished up yesterday. Part of that being updating my math workstations for the next 2 weeks. I am finally feeling like I've gotten the routine of getting them together down. Now if I could just get the routine of finding the time to do them down. Yesterday, I accidentally stayed outside a little longer than I should have. Whoops. I'm not going to feel too guilty because it's January and the days you can go out and play comfortable are few and far between. Anyway, I took some pictures of the different activities and I thought I would share. Some of them come from my Warm Up with Wintery Workstations pack. (You can find it here on TPT)

  I had a parent donate some money to the classroom as part of a holiday she celebrates in her culture. So I used it to buy these drawers at Wal-mart. This is the best way I've found to organize my math work stations. I keep it in the back of the room next to my desk, mainly because that's the only room I had for them. But they are on wheels so I can wheel it to the front to the room when I'm explaining what they need to do. (This is an area I really need to work on. The showing the workstations. Now that I'm creating some of my own and they stay similar I'm hoping that will help.)

 The white drawers have the games they can play in them. I usually have 2 pairs of students playing games so I try to have 3 options. Usually one option is a have to and one pair has to play that one first. I also try to have one game that both pairs can play. (Certain games they love) I've tried to make them games that we've played in class too so they already have some experience playing. One of the games is a subtraction game below. The game has two spinners and a game board. I like to put my games in the page protectors and it cuts down on lamination. This game they spin the first spinner and get a number. The second spinner tells them to -1 or -2. If they do it correctly, they move one space on the board. The game board has different things like move up 2, move back 1, and take another turn. (This is from my work station pack)

 The next game is bump. My kids are obsessed with bump. It's one of their favorites. I'm really not sure where this version came from. The file doesn't have a cover page or an author. I know I found it on someones blog last year. I hate that I don't know where it's from. If you made it, please let me know. I know Sunny Days in Second and Mrs. Lirrette's Learning Detectives make a lot of these.(A reader sent me the link. This one can be found at Spotlight on Kindergarten)

 I think the have to game is this addition matching game from my work station pack. It has the numbers 1-12 and then addition sentences that equal those. My kids are getting pretty good at this. Jennifer Knopf had a great fall one and then I made one for Christmas and one for winter. We probably will do something different next time. (My workstations usually last about 2 weeks or longer depending on the activity and what they need practice with)

 The next drawer has the ipods in it. I didn't take a picture of those because there is nothing exciting about them. I do need to work on adding some new apps. That was one of my to dos on Monday that just didn't happen. I'm thinking I'll bring them home over the weekend and work on it then. The next activities are problem solving activities. I'm not actually sure that other people would call them problem solving but it's the way I think of them. I have number cards for 1-50 and 3 different work mats. Two of them are working on number order and one is working on comparing numbers. They pick the numbers and then work through it. I should probably include a recording sheet but I don't have one right now. This is the first time we're doing this and I want them to explore some first. This is from my pack as well. (side note, I'm in love with these penguins. They are from the wonderful Nancy Messenger. Love her clipart. You can check her penguins out here)

This next drawer is for graphing. I try to have a different graphing activity each time. I noticed in some of our beginning of the year assessments this was an area of weakness. This time we're doing a survey. This is the first time I've had them do something like this so we'll see how it goes. We're short on copies at our school so I use the function that makes things half a page a lot. There are 2 choices. One has to do with making a snowman and the other hot chocolate. I got these from a winter surveys pack from the blog Of Primary Importance. (I'm now realizing the importance of cover sheets and putting my blog on freebies.) If you click the link, you'll be taken to her post with this freebie. She had several other choices for the surveys. 

 The last drawer is exploration. This time they are working on creating shapes different ways with pattern blocks. I took the sheet from our math series. It was something we worked on but I usually send these home for homework. They really enjoy being about to explore with different manipulatives

So those are our workstations for the next few weeks. What kind of activities do you use for work stations? Now that I have the stations all set up I need to work on meeting with small groups to focus on some skills. That's the next step to work on.
I have one last picture to share with you. Now that we are in the second semester I wanted to move the kids' desks. I haven't moved them since the first day of school. I can't do it by myself with my knee and I'm technically still suppose to be on light duty and not doing anything too strenuous at school. My assistant was going to stay yesterday and help me. But I had no idea where I wanted the kids. So after school, I took small post its and made a little chart to help me. Thought I would share the tip. I used those post it flags and had 4 different colors. It helped me to color code for each group so I could split some of them up and not have them with the exact same kids. So here's the finished product:

I love the colorful post its. Please tell me I'm not the only one obsessed with post its and school supplies. How do you move kids' seats around?

Organization love and a freebie

I don't really have the Sunday Blues; it will probably be more like a case of the Mondays when my alarm goes off. Once I get up and get going it won:t be bad. I just am dreading having to get up to an alarm in the morning. I don't think I've set an alarm once this break and it has been so nice. My husband's alarm has still been going off but I can just ignore it. Tomorrow won't be a bad day. It's a workday so hopefully I can work and actually get some things done. My friend that just got married isn't going to be there so that should cut down on some of the chatting. I also have a follow up appointment for my knee. I'm off the crutches but having some awful swelling my leg and foot. Currently my foot looks like Fred Flintstone's foot. So I refer affectionately to the foot as Fred. I have a few random things for you tonight.
Since it's the new year, I'm trying to get better organized. It's a constant struggle for me. I do pretty well at school but at home it's a different story. Being married and having to share my space helps some. I also now finally have internet at my house so I'm really going to be serious about blogging and creating. To do all these things, I of course had to go shopping for some things to keep me organized. Yesterday we went to TJ Maxx which is always fun and not Chris's favorite place to go. (He hates it) I had seen these organizing things for desks there a few days before. We got one for our mail and then I of course found lots of other things I wanted. It's much more fun to get organized with pretty things. I got a divided organizer for my bathroom ane then these gorgeous black and gold notebooks. They came in a pack of 3 and were only $4. Here's one:

I'm using one to write down Bible verses as I read this new Beth Moore study I started last night. We also went to Books A Million after the TJ Maxx stop. I had 2 gift cards and it didn't take me long to spend that and more. I love to look at their sale items. I found 2 valentine's books on sale: Curious George and Tucker's Valentine. I was originally going to take them to school but I think my niece Sophie will like them more. I might have to go back and get a couple more copies; for my other niece and my class. They were that cheap. I also got another really cool notebook for only $2. It had a B on it and I just couldn't pass it up. I had seen someone's organization new years resolution post about a notebook they used and I was inspired. (I can't remember who it was. If this looks familiar, let me know.)
I split the notebook into several sections and it's going to be my go to book for keeping notes about future posts I want to write, my to dos, math ideas, reading ideas, and unit ideas. I just used small post its to make the tabs.

Hopefully it will keep me organized and focused. The last thing I needed to help me stay organized and together was a pouch for my portable hard drive. I usually kept it at school Monday-Friday and then brought it home on the weekends. But now that I have internet at home, I want to bring it back and forth. I wanted to keep it protected and it needed to be cute. My sister in law sells 31 so I asked her if she had any small zipper pouches she wanted to get rid of. I'd buy it. She wouldn't let me pay her. She's a good one.

I love 31! It's kind of a problem
So I have all my stuff to keep me organized and I've done a fair amount of organizing and cleaning at home. Tomorrow I'll tackle school. Or at least some. I need to get my lesson plans done first. As part of my OWL, I am really trying to be more intentional with my planning. So tomorrow I'm going to do some small group planning. I've got 2 books I'm working on reading about differentiated Math instruction and small group reading.

This is the book I'm working through now. I'm not that far into but I'm jumping into the planning aspect with 2 feet. I created a couple of pages to see if they will work. I haven't tried them and will probably change them as I get into it. But I thought I would share them with you.

Click here to check it out. Let me know what you think. I would love to hear how you keep yourself organized and how you keep track of planning for groups.
I'm linking up with Manic Monday at Classroom Freebies. Be sure to check out all the other freebies there.

 

Facebook Scavenger Hunt Details

Kind of a quick post today. I wanted to let you know that I'm joining some of my friends on facebook to host a scavenger hunt. The fun starts at 3 pm central time on Sunday. You follow some clues and you have the chance to win some amazing things. 

So here is the deal 

There are 16 bloggers participating and each is donating a fan-ta-bu-lous prize

To win all you have to do is follow the clues and leave a comment on the person's FB page with 

the correct answer

Shuna will give the first clue on my FB page here at 3 p.m. central time on Sunday

Once you figure out what fabulous blogger my clue refers to leave their name or link in the 

comments! All fans who answer the clue correctly will be entered into the individual drawing as

well as the big drawing!

To find the next clue you will hop over to that person's FB page, you can get to it by visiting their

blog and clicking on the FB button in the sidebar,  and read your next clue

There are 16 clues so that is 16 chances to win

There will be a winner for each clue 

Each winner will then be put into the big drawing where they will have a chance to win it all!

Before we look at the prizes here are the rules

* you must follow each person's FB page!

( You can do this before hand but we will check to make sure that you are a follower!)

* You can only comment once to each clue {So make it good}

*You can comment between the times 3p.m. central time and 7p.m. central time

*Winners will be announced at 8p.m.

( If the random number thingy chooses you as a winner and you have not followed each FB
another winner will be chosen)

Take a look at the prizes that will go into the big drawing

Looks like loads of fun. I wish I could win all these fabulous prizes.

I would blog more but I have a few goals set for the weekend. I need to clean the house really well, get all Christmas put away, get all my new clothes put away and do some freezer cooking. I also need to finish up a baby blanket I've been working on and a new packet that I'm thinking about. I start back school on Monday and I would like to begin the semester at least kind of together.
One last thing before I get to the cleaning. (Yuck!) Thanks to all of you that are praying for Regan and his family. It means so much to me. I wanted to share that he will be moved to St. Jude's on Monday. So keep praying for him and his family. God can heal all!

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Confessions and Common Core

So I'm starting with some confessions about myself. I hope that I'm not the only one out there like this. I'm hoping there are some other teachers who feel the same way I do. First confession is I love to learn. I love to  read books about different topic and learn more about them. I absolutely love reading professional literature. I know, I know I'm a weirdo. I also love to plan and use my assessment data to plan for my students. I don't actually enjoy writing lesson plans but I do enjoy coming up with ideas to do in my class and planning good lessons. But once school starts and life gets crazy, sometimes I don't take the time I should to learn new things and to plan out in depth lessons. But I'm getting back to my roots this new year. My one little word is intention. I really want to work on planning with intention for my students. So to start this plan out, I've been digging a little deeper into the common core. I have been looking at the data I have about my class from our Star testing we just did and from a Discovery Education Assessment (Anyone else use this assessment? I'm not sure how accurate it is.) And I have some distinct groups in my class. I have about 4 students that are reading way above grade level and 2 of those challenge me at every turn to give them more. Then I have about 9 students who are basically on level with where they should be. They are reading fairly fluently. Although 5 of these students are ELL students and have some language barriers still. Then the last 3 are not where they need to be at all. I'm good with my on level group and I'm good with my group that needs a little more help and time. But where I'm challenged is with my kids that are reading above grade level and have no trouble with anything I give them. My plan for after Christmas (which would be starting Jan. 8th) is to push all my students no matter where they are. To make them work harder and to challenge them to do the best they can do. I started thinking about what skills I needed to work on for comprehension according to the common core. I looked at Kindergarten, first and second grade, since I'm in first grade. I wanted to look at where my students should be. Ok confession time again. I feel like this is the first time I've really looked deeply at the common core standards. I've read them and I refer to them when doing my planning. But this was the first time I focused on one particular area in all three grade levels. It was helpful to see what the distinctions between the grade levels. I found a lot of the kindergarten standards have the words with prompting and support. Then these words are taken away in first grade. First grade has a lot to do with identifying different information while second grade is describing and applying. It was also interesting to see the same threads of skills in each grade level but the expectation is raised just a bit each year. I looked at the literature and the non fiction. One of the biggest areas of weakness on my part is looking at the author's argument or points in a piece of non fiction. I haven't even started tackling that skill with my students. I'm not even sure how to tackle that with my students. But now that I know about what I need to, I think I'll be more successful which means my students will be more successful. If you haven't checked out the common core app, you should. I have the tool on my blog. Look to the right and check that out. It has a lot more explanation than I have on my file that I keep in my lesson plan book. I took the 3 grade levels and the different skills and made a document to help me in my planning. I've attached the document and you can get it for free if you are interested. Click Here for the link.
So I took what I learned from this research on the common core and created these sheets. I hope that you can use them. I took the characters and settings standards and made a response sheet for each grade level. I hope that this will help me differentiate with my various levels in my room. Let me know what you think and if this looks like something you could use more of. click here for the link The clipart is from Melonheadz and the font from Hello Literacy. Love both of them.
I am linking up for the first freebie Friday at TBA. Be sure to head over there and check out the other freebies.


One last thing before I let you go from this really long post. I got a lot of sweet responses about the student at my school, Regan, and his family. I was wanting to post this prayer card before but I wasn't sure I was allowed to. But I found out that I could and there are trying to get as many people as they can to like the facebook page. His page is Rootin' for Regan. You can search for it on facebook and ask to be a part of it.

Thanks followers for praying for this student and family. It means so much to me. His family is having such a profound impact on our community and school.
I forgot I do have one more thing to mention. Sunday I'll be participating in facebook blog scavenger hunt. You can win all kinds of cool stuff from other bloggers. Be sure to follow my facebook page to find out more.

Currently and a facebook giveaway

I love Farley's Currentlys. They are a fun way to record what is going on at this moment in time. They are also fun to read. I love reading everyone else's currently. I'm actually not that late to the party this month since it's on the second.

I really want to clarify my thinking one and make a plea to my readers. On of our fourth grade teachers has 3 boys. The youngest has been in the hospital since the first of November. They orginally thought it was a virus attacking his brain but this past weekedn we found that it is brain cancer. He has 3 tumors on his brain. This family has been so strong these past few months. The boy is in the 6th grade and he has the most precious smile. His name is Regan and he needs so many prayers. Please pray for healing for Regan and comfort for his family. I have been so amazed at this family going through so much, yet living out the Christian life. His dad has asked me everytime I see him, how I'm doing and how my healing from surgery is. I have faith that God has great plans for Regan and that he can heal him. It has been so cool to see our community and school come together and Root for this boy. The other explanation is for my one little word. I want to be more intentional with my relationships with people and try to reconnect with some old friends. I also want to be intentional with my teaching and my planning and try to find the best ways to meet all my students' needs. I also want to be intentional with my blogging and creating. To blog about real ideas and things going on in my classroom. To also create things that I truly use and not just to create to create. Last thing for today, is I'm having a giveaway over on my facebook page. You should check it out if you haven't Yet. 

Happy new year!

I hope everyone had a very happy new year's eve and is off to a good start in 2013. I fixed a big dinner and Chris and I watched The King's Speech. I was asleep by 11 but then woken up at 12 with some fireworks across the street. So far today we've already been to the outlet mall which I have been wanting to go to since right after Christmast. It was pretty good. Not too many people and still some sales going on. My favorite stores to go to are Ann Taylor Loft and J.Crew. Everything in The Loft was 50% off and then 20% off at J. Crew. Then my husband found a few things at Eddie Bauer Outlet and I found out they give a discount if you are a teacher. So that was exciting. I keep thinking of starting showing some of my outfits on here like Abby does over at the Inspired Apple. But I'm just not sure I'm really that stylish. I think I just like to look at style blogs and pins on pinterest. Speaking of pinterest I'm part of a new collaborative board you've got to start following if you don't. There are some great kindergarten and first grade ideas on it. Check it out here.
I also am pretty excited because I finally started a new facebook page for my blog. You should like it. I plan on offering some special flash freebies on there sometime later this week. If I can get my winter math stations finished. You can check it out here. I've already gotten several likes which makes me feel pretty good. I had some good friends promoting me on their page. Some fellow Tennesse bloggers. You should check these guys out if you don't follow them already.


  Ok I'm done promoting myself and my friends. It's one of my goals this year to be a little more out there with promoting myself and trying to grow my blog and store. So on with my New Year's Goals. Jennifer at The Teacher's Cauldron is having a party and it is New Year's Day. So I'm joining the party.

One resolution for your personal life and one for blogging was the gist for this linky. I wanted to do one of the week long ones going on and hosted by a variety of people. I just couldn't keep up with it. So these are my resolutions or goals for the year:
My personal goal is to be more intentional with my relationships. I have let several friendships from high school and college slide. I know that's part of growing up and it happens. But I really miss some of these friends. One just had a baby and I got reconnected when I went to her baby shower.
My blogging goal is to try to post more. I'm hoping that when we get internet at the house, it will help that goal a lot. I also want to try to promote myself a little more and create more. I enjoy creating new units and activities for my class and sharing them.
My professional goal is to work on my groups more. Last year I wanted to start Daily 5 and now I've got this going pretty well and then I also have gotten my math work stations going pretty well. The next step is to get the group part and differentiation part down.
So that's where I'm heading this year. Anyway, be sure to check out Jen at The Teacher's Cauldron's party.

What are you planning on working on this year professionaly, and personally? I love reading about other people's goals and plans.