Teacher Time Saver

This week I got an email from Jess @ VolunteerSpot asking me if I would be willing write a blog post about Carson-Dellosa.  Since I was already a fan of their bulletin board materials, this was an easy request to answer.  While VolunteerSpot is compensating me, these opinions and experiences are my own.  

Do you find yourself relating to the White Rabbit in Alice in Wonderland?  You know the character who said, "I'm late, I'm late, for a very important date?"  It seems like there is never enough time in our day to get everything done that is on our to do list.

At one of my faculty meetings when our principal was introducing yet another new "expectation" that was being placed upon us, there were some frustrated teachers - to put it mildly.  Hands were shooting up left and right after we heard the latest thing we needed to accomplish in our already packed schedule.  While our principal understood where we were coming from, this was coming down from "above" so her hands were tied.  She told us we need to learn to work smarter.

What does work smarter mean?  I decided to take the approach like many diet programs such as Weight Watchers use.  When you want to lose weight, the first thing you are told to do is to keep a food journal.  You need to know where all of those sneaky calories are coming from.  I needed to know what was using up my valuable time.  I found I wasted A LOT of time socializing.  Maybe it's a teacher thing?!!!  I was always chit chatting before, during, and after school.  I found I saved a bunch of time by eating in my classroom four days a week.  I ate in the teachers' lounge on Fridays.  Closing my door before and after school Tuesday - Thursday cut down on interruptions.  This still gave me Mondays and Fridays to catch up with my friends.  Teachers that had school related questions would still come see me Tuesday - Thursday.  The closed door helped with the non-school chat sessions.

The other sneaky time thief was bulletin boards.  I know some people do not like putting them up.  But, I was the exact opposite.  I loved, loved, loved decorating bulletin boards.  I changed several of mine each month and decorated my door, too.  I found the whole process relaxing.  I had one intuitive custodian that noticed I changed my seating chart or bulletin boards when my class had a bad day.  When he walked into my room after school and saw me in the middle of a revamp he knew I had had a bad day.  He usually knew the culprit since he was in the cafeteria at lunch time.

Now it just isn't in my personality to have the same bulletin board up for the entire year.  I would go stir crazy!  So, how could I simplify things . . . work smarter.  One of the things I did was hung up a giant tree.  I laminated the tree and hot glued it to a wall.  I put a student desk that no one was using beside the tree and made a behavior station.  Students filled out a form about their classmates when they did a random act of kindness.  I used seasonal things so what my students were writing on and hanging on the tree changed.  It took very little time to copy off new seasonal notes.  The tree stayed up the entire year.  When I took down the notes, I sent them home with my students.  These were great keepsakes and parents loved them, too.

Carson-Dellosa has a FREE printable that is perfect for a behavior station.

Click HERE to get your FREE copy.

Here are a couple of trees that would work perfectly for a behavior station.

Click HERE to purchase this tree.

Click HERE to purchase this tree.

I made a couple of signs that you can use in your behavior station.  There is a colorful version and black & white version.

Click HERE to download these signs.

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Nursery Rhyme Time: Humpty Dumpty

At the beginning of each school year, I always dig out my nursery rhyme unit.  It is the perfect unit for kindergarten or first grade because many students are familiar with many of the popular rhymes.  At the end of the week, we usually vote to see which was our class' favorite rhyme.  Humpty Dumpty wins every year!

I just finished a new Sentence Shuffle Trio packet about Humpty.  It is on the 1st grade reading level (1.0).

This packet is on the 1st grade reading level (1.0) and is aligned with K, 1st, and 2nd Common Core Standards.

It includes a center sign that has a white background so you can save on ink.

Directions for the center are included so your students won't interrupt your small group lesson.

There is a black and white version and a colorful version.  Cards are stacked and placed on the page above.

After students make sentences using all of the cards, they will write their sentences on one of the writing assignment pages above.  There are two pages to choose from so you can differentiate the assignment.

This packet contains 24 colorful and 24 black and white word cards.  Students will shuffle the cards and put them on the Sentence Shuffle page.  They will take one card from each stack to make a sentence.  Sentences can be real or nonsense sentences.

There are 8 Built It-Write It-Draw It assignments.  Students will practice reading, handwriting, sentence structure, and fine-motor skills.  This can be used as a literacy center or used for homework.

The paper saver mini book can be used as homework or for a small group lesson.

Click HERE to visit my TPT store.

I also have a Humpty Dumpty Science Station that is FREE for a short time.

Click HERE to read more about this packet.

Need more nursery rhyme activities?  I also have this packet about Mary had a little lamb.

Click HERE to visit my TPT store.

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Nursery Rhyme: Mary & Her Lamb

My absolute favorite picture book is The True Story of the Three Little Pigs.

I always share this book during the first week of school.  I want to share with my students some of my favorite things.  Plus, this book is the perfect tool to teach perspective.  It is inevitable that there will be tattling when you have a group of children.  I tell my students that each student who has a conflict will have a different perspective.  It is important that students talk to each other to share their point of view.  Hopefully, they will learn valuable problem solving skills.

One of my favorite units to use at the beginning of the year is nursery rhymes.  Most students are familiar with the passages. I decided to make a new unit that is loosely based on Mary Had a Little Lamb nursery rhyme.  Your students will be able to read the sentences in my new Sentence Shuffle Trio and tell which nursery rhyme these activities are about.

This packet includes:

This packet is on the kindergarten reading level and is aligned with K, 1st, and 2nd Common Core Standards.

It includes a center sign that has a white background so you can save on ink.

Directions for the center are included so your students won't interrupt your small group lesson.

There is a black and white version and a colorful version.  Cards are stacked and placed on the page above.

This packet contains 24 colorful and 24 black and white word cards.  Students will shuffle the cards and put them on the Sentence Shuffle page.  They will take one card from each stack to make a sentence.  Sentences can be real or nonsense sentences.

After students make sentences using all of the cards, they will write their sentences on one of the writing assignment pages above.  There are two pages to choose from so you can differentiate the assignment.

The paper saver mini book can be used as homework or for a small group lesson.

There are 8 Built It-Write It-Draw It assignments.  Students will practice reading, handwriting, sentence structure, and fine-motor skills.  This can be used as a literacy center or used for homework.

Click HERE to visit my TPT store.

Click HERE to check out my other TRIO packets.

Check out these books:

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Tips to encourage a love of reading

Do you ever look over your school years and examine those years through the lens of a teacher?  Suddenly those teachers that you thought were mean or inflexible are teachers that had good classroom management skills, organized and held students accountable for their work.  

In first grade, I was not one of the stars in reading.  In fact, I dreaded having to read to my Mom when it was homework time.  It was far from being a pleasure . . . it was a chore!  I think part of the problem stemmed from not being read to as a young child.  We as teachers know the positive impact a parent has when they read to their child.  I'm not really sure why my mother didn't read to my brothers and me.  Maybe it wasn't encouraged back then like it is today.

I recently ran across some of my old standardized test scores.  There was a big improvement in my reading scores when I went to 3rd grade.  Third grade is when I discovered reading for pleasure.  Suddenly I couldn't read enough.  When I went to library I checked out a big stack of books.  It would be a week before I could visit the library again so I wanted to make sure I had enough books to last a week.  That love of reading that was first ignited in 3rd grade has never been extinguished.  

Each time my family moves I check out the reading scene.  Is there a library? How many libraries?  Is the library well stocked?  Are there used book stores? I judge a town by it's reading scene.  If I can't answer yes to the questions above, then I know this is not the town for me.

You are probably asking yourself "what happened to me in 3rd grade"?  The answer is simple, my teacher read a book that I connected with wholeheartedly.  Each day after lunch, my teacher read a few chapters from the Little House on the Prairie series.  

This is a book that I could relate to in many ways.  Like Laura, I lived on a farm.  Many people told me that I looked like Melissa Gilbert, Laura, on the t.v. show.

(click)

We even went on a field trip to the Laura's House.

(click)

Click HERE for information.

As teachers, I think we do not always give ourselves enough credit.  When we have a student that enters our class behind academically, it is easy to get into the "wish mode".  I wish this child's parents were more involved and read to him/her.  I wish his/her teacher last year taught reading differently.  I wish I had more time so I could work more with this student.  Sometimes it is something as simple as finding a book that a child can connect to, that makes the biggest difference.

I asked teachers who follow my Facebook page for tips to encourage children to read for pleasure.  Here are a few and you can read more by visiting my FB page:

Paula Chase Bettis "Only read on the days that you eat." That is the quote that I teach my students at the beginning of the year and we do that every day in class. I have my classroom library, magazines...anything that I think might spark their interest.

Debbie Bolen I have reading contests. In K-1 The students who read the most pages, books, etc. earn trip to McDonalds or get a pizza party or whatever. In high school I gave away a $5 star bucks card. Kids read can read and read. It was really fun.

Joanne Richardson Bobbitt 

Read alouds
Read alouds
Read alouds
I try to make every story as dramatic as I can. Adding a new book to the class library, is a major event! (1200 books and counting!)

Brandy Correia I have found one of the best ways to get my students excited about reading is keeping up with modern children's books. I read as many as I can, in as many genres as I can and am always talking about them to my students. It gets them all excited and interested, and then as more and more of them read the suggestions they all begin talking about the books with each other!

Pam Burns Axell I'm with Joanne. I've gotten more kids excited about reading by doing super dramatic, change your voice for every character, read alouds. My kids would rather have stayed in then gone to recess some days. And always try to finish the day at an exciting part. Just makes them want more. Also, reading the first in a series is also a great idea - except the library doesn't have 20 copies of Book 2 

Jennifer Cramer Armour I had a sign in my room that said, "You'll only read on the days you breathe. "

Suzanne Scanlon You're going to laugh but we had a book rack (a small one) on the back of the door in the bathroom. They kept Readers Digests there. When one has time to kill while on the john, well, you reach for a book! Works like a charm!

Nagla A.Razik get an exciting book and start reading then tell the child to find out the end of the story ...that is how to push and encourage them to love reading !!

Katie DaLuga Find read alouds for every subject. It gets kids excited about learning. Also, I had a treasure chest with a mystery item in it that connects to a book. It got them excited about the book when they had to figure out how it connected to the book.

Brenda Whitley I've taught kindergarten for two years and my students love to read. Their parents noticed at home their love of reading. All I do is read to them all the time even during math.

Suzanne Scanlon I think it makes a difference if parents make a big deal of going to the library with the munchkins from the time they're young. Schedule a day as Library Day and stick to it!

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Random Acts of Kindness

Last week my husband and I were on a road trip to Santa Barbara when we had a little accident.  My husband spilled his drink.  Luckily it was iced tea so it didn't make a sticky mess.  But, there was tea and ice cubes everywhere.  We pulled off the interstate into a parking lot of this business:

(click)

While my husband was gathering up the ice cubes, I ran into Bryan Equipment Company.  This business sells farming and vineyard equipment.  I asked the owner if he sold paper towels, too.  He said they did.  I told him I was so glad because we were on a road trip and spilled our drink.  The owner refused to sell me paper towels.  He gave me a roll of paper towels, offered me some 409 cleaner, and also gave me 2 cups like the one below.  He told me that these cups would stay in our cup holder and hopefully prevent future spills.  He was so right!  No more spills!  Not only did we drive away with a cleaner car, but smiles on our faces due to an unexpected random act of kindness.  A big shout out to the kind folks in Gonzales, California!

I appreciated this random act of kindness and thought it would be a great lesson for teachers to use with their students.  Are you on your faculty's social committee?  This would be a great thing to implement with your colleagues, too.  Here is a form you can use:

Click HERE to download this FREEBIE.

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Pragmatic Language Disorder

Do you have a student that is your puzzle child this year?  You know there is an issue with him or her, but you can't seem to put your finger on what that is.  When we teach reading we teach our students to find just right books.  Up until now, you haven't been able to find the just right label of what is happening with this student.  He or she may have some characteristics of autism, ADHD, or other labels but these are not a perfect fit.   Although we know a student is more than a label, we need the label so we'll know what strategies to use to help him or her reach his/her full potential.

A few years ago I had a student that was my puzzle kid.  His previous teacher spoke to me before the year began about her observations.  She knew there was an issue but wasn't quite sure what it was.  

I soon saw what his previous teacher observed the year before.  Anytime my students worked in small groups, there was friction with his group.  It didn't matter how many students I put in his group or who was in his group, at some point I knew a student from his group would be reporting to me that there were problems. 

My SLP stopped by to see me one day about another student during center time.  One of the students from his group reported there were problems (again).  My SLP began to watch the group. She thought the issue might be pragmatic language disorder.  I spoke to the parents about having him tested for this and they agreed.  He was tested, diagnosed, and received support that year.  Within a few months of support the dynamics of my center time completely changed for the better.  My SLP was my new best friend!

Do you have a student who:

-has difficulty getting along with other students

-does not read body language

-does not read social cues

-says inappropriate things for his/her age 

-does not understand personal space

If so, read more about this topic:

Does your child have pragmatic language disorder?

Semantic Pragmatic Disorder

Symptoms

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Swimming Into Summer

You may remember in the fall,  some of my friends Tessa (Tales from Outside the Classroom), Nicole (Teaching with Style), and Ashley (Teacher's Treasure Chest) and gave away some items for free for people who signed up.  Not a giveaway where only a few people got it; every single person received the items!!!!!  They wanted a fun and different way to thank their followers.  Well, they decided to do it again and asked me to join them.

You can receive ALL of this!

To receive the Swimming into Summer items, all you need to do is follow ALL of our blogs and come back and fill out our form.  That's it!  You can enter now through Sunday, June 9th.  We'll start sending them out on Monday, June 10th.  You can go to each blog, by clicking on each button below.

 

Remember, all you need to do to get all of these is just follow each blog and enter using this form.  Even if you're already out of school, you can use these next year! :)
Hurry up though! The giveaway will only run through Sunday, June  9th. So sign up now and we will begin sending out the products next Monday!

Subscribe to our mailing list

Remember!  You only have to sign up or subscribe once.  You can do that on any of the blogs above.  If you get the message that you've already subscribed to "summer frenzy", you are on the list.

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