I'm Back

Well it's been a while, but I am back.  It has been 5 long weeks since school has started and I have been busy assessing and training and training and assessing and it still not over, but it has become almost second nature already.  I have 1 more week before our first intersession, so this will be my first real test of all this training, will they remember after our week off? I sure do hope so, I feel like I can just record myself and put it on autopilot this year.  I don't ever remember what the beginning of the year is like, but when school starts, it slowly comes back.  I think I purposely block it out.  I can't wait till all this training ends, but does it really? Well, I am starting to see these kids become a little more independent and those that have already caught on are begin to help me out by helping those that still need more practice.  My curtain partner tells me I was spoiled last year when I looped up with my kinder students to first grade.  I guess I was, they knew me and I knew them.

Well my year is going well.  I love my new classes.  We are all departmentalized this year, so I have a morning and afternoon class.  I teach Math, Social Studies and Science.  I really like our departmentalized schedule, but I miss the Language Arts part of teacher too, but I do get a little taste of it during my RtI hour.  We are finally finishing up the kindergarten skills review and beginning the meat of our curriculum.  I also have introduce a Saxon Math Journal to my kids.  I really like it, the kids are all engaged during calendar time and I don't have as many disruptions during calendar time.  I am also beginning to see how students are using the calendar to find answers to my questions.  I really like the calendar journals this is my first year using the calendar journals and I don't see why I didn't start them any sooner.

It took me a while, but we began stations about the 3rd week of school.  I mean we had been doing some exploring, but we actually began our rotations about the 3rd week of school.  I am still having students stay still and rotate their stations, but I think I am ready to try moving kids around this week, keeping my fingers crossed.  I have created a new station packet to use for my kids when we come back from intersession in September and because I am excited about football starting, I have created it with a football theme.  Click on the picture below to visit my TpT store to see my new stations packet.

 

Are you ready for some football? 

In honor of me surviving my first 5 weeks of school, I will send this packet free to my first 5 followers.  Just leave me a comment and your email address and I will get the packet out to you.  

This football package features 7 math stations:

1. I have who has cards with number words up to twenty
2. Quarterback Sneak: That sneaky QB has hidden the ball and it is up to your students to find it. They must first ready the number from 0-50 to look behind it. (You can also differentiated by having students put the numbers in order from 0-50)
3. Are you ready for some football? This game features cards with doubles facts (up to 10+10) and addition +1
4. Roll, Say and Keep: using the same cards from Are you ready for some football, kids take turns answer the cards on the board.
5. Feed the Pig: Purchasing items up to 12 cents using pennies
6. Graphing Mats: This activity has 3 differentiated worksheets for kids at all levels
7. Number Replay: Before and after numbers

Meet the Teacher

Well last night was meet the teacher.  I was able to meet the wonderful new students and their wonderful parents last night. I must say that I am really excited about starting this school year. This will be my true test. I have 23 brand new kiddos. I had it easy last year, of my 22 kids only 5 were new to me.  No I didn't fail 17 kids, but I looped up with them from Kinder the year before.  I loved those kiddos, but my new kiddos look like a great bunch!  So I worked hard this week getting my room ready. I didn't take any before pics, I meant to but I was just so excited about putting up my new things. I have always been a primary color kinda girl. I mean I taught in Kinder for 5 years prior, so primary colors were my life, but I love all the new colors coming out so I changed it up a little this year. Now I also meant to take pics before my new kiddos and all their stuff showed up but I was hot gluing and putting up things to the last 5 minutes before they entered and my curtain partner was yelling at me to put up my hot glue gun. So here are the pics and again excuse the mess.  

 So this is the back of my room. My colors are lime green and turquoise. I wasn't sure about the lime but let me tell you I LOVE it. It is such a cool color and so relaxing in there.

This is the view from the back of the room to the front of my class. See that horrible mess of collecting supplies?  I absolutely hate collecting supplies and figuring what to do with them. So that's were I am heading today to get that mess cleaned up before the kids get there on Monday. 

A closer look at the front of the class this part of the board will be used to my anchor charts that I create.  After we have discussed them then I will hang them in the back wall of my classroom so the kids are able to see them and use them. 

That's why this part of my room looks so empty.  But in a few weeks it will not be as empty.

This is my calendar area. We use Saxon math and I just hate the calendar that domes with their program so ugly, so I use my smart board to do the calendar but after the smart board is off, I need a calendar so the kids can use so I went with Mardel's Renewing Mind calendar.

Here is my skills wall (cabinets). I covered my cabinets because they are this ugly grayish color that I didn't like so I covered them using fadeless paper. I thought of fabric, but I had already spent way too much this year and I did fadeless paper last year and it held up really well. This year I am teaching math, science & social studies, so on this cabinets I have a math skills wall, my Saxon Math Problems Solving Cards, What do Scuentist Do board and a space for my science word wall. This year we are using Nancy Larson for science can't wait in past years we had C-Scope and well I really didn't care for it. 

Here is my helping hands board (I really need a title on this wall and maybe some color).  To the left I have my file folders that will house important information like fire drill procedures, class rosters, dismissal information and any other file that I need to have at my finger tips as I walk out the door. 

Here is a picture of my birthday chart. I will be taking pictures some time next week to place up on my birthday wall.

Finally a picture of my hallway display wall. I wish I would have taken a closer picture of my owls, they are so cute. If I remember I will take a closer pic when I go to school today. 

Well this is my classroom ready for my kiddos on Monday.  Leave a comment I would love to hear from you. 

Getting Ready

So today I am going to give you a sneak peek into a few things I have been working on this summer for my classroom.  As I have mentioned before I work at a year around school and we begin back to work in a few weeks.  Last week I met up with a few of my coworkers and we worked on some wreaths and signs for our classrooms.  This year my theme in class will remain the same, I started the theme last year, but because it was my first year in First Grade, I quickly added a few things and then started to learn the new curriculum.  This year I decided to keep the theme and add to it.

I love a new school year, it is so exciting for me and I try to make it just that for my new students.  Here are a few items I have been working on for my classroom.

This upcoming week is my last week of summer vacation and the hubby actually has a week off Woo Hoo! I have never been able to get him to get a week off, but his week our second oldest has his new student conferences at Texas A&M - College Station.  We are driving him up on Wednesday and staying up there a few days, so this week will be the first time we can get into our classroom and I am not going to even think about it (yeah right!) but I am going to stay strong and wait till next week when we are required to go back.  Before I leave I am going to leave you with a freebie.  These are the cards I will be using for my new "Where are we" board.  If you pick one up leave me a comment and let me know when you go back to school.

If you would like another theme for your Where Are We cards, leave me a comment and I will be glad to add them to my TpT store.

Blogging World

Hi everyone!  I wanted to introduce myself and let you know a little about my blog. My name is Esmer, I am a first grade teacher. This upcoming year will actually be my second year in first grade before that I was in kinder for 5 years. I loved kinder, but I was asked if I wanted to move up so I agreed. I was lucky enough to loop up with my kids and I L-O-V-E-D it. In fact my kids were asking me at the en of this year if I was going to follow them up next year. I don't know how I felt about that. I know I was honored that they would want me again as their teacher, but I think it was time to separate some of the kids in the class and the rule is if you loop up ALL the kids had to be moved up (unless a parent request a move).  Anyway, my school year begins in a few weeks, I know crazy considering that I'm reading how some of you just finished your school year. I work at a year around school and I love it. The schedule is what keeps me there. I use to work at a district that had the whole 3 months off during the summer and with four kids at home I was always broke by the time school started back.

Anyway back to the blog. Last year 2nd semester my curtain partner and I along with 2 more teachers down the hall piloted a departmentalized classroom. I absolutely loved it. I was in charge of math, science and social studies. This year our whole grade level will be moving to this type of schedule.  There were a few kinks along the way, but I think we have made it work.  I hope this year runs a lot smoother now that we have things settled.  This blog is meant to document our journey through the year. Along the way I hope to post a few things that has helped my class master the skills necessary for first grade.  Along with questions that you might be able to answer for me. I also would love to hear some comments on how to make my blog better it is both here for me and for y'all (yes i am a Texan and I do say y'all a lot) too. Thanks for tuning in, for now I leave you with a freebie for your first day week of school. I don't know about y'all (see told y'all) but the first week of school how the kids get home changes from day to day, I guess parents trying to work out their own schedules, so I use a dismissal form to remind me the first couple of weeks of school how kids get home daily and it's yours for the taking.

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