Reading Buddies

First of all, happy Friday! It has been a week full of mild chaos change: losing a student (her family moved), math testing, and inside recess (due to all the miserable much-needed rain). But, we ended it on a good note - Friday book buddies!

Every other Friday, each of my students reads to a 6th grade book buddy. We alternate classrooms, and it's always a big treat for my kiddos to visit the 6th grade classroom (which is outside in a portable building). I look forward to seeing a few of my former students (sadly, many of them move away after first grade). Some of my students are nervous at first, but they seem to warm up to their reading partner pretty quickly.

At the beginning of the year, we spent a lot of time in the areas of read-to-self and read-to-someone, (from The Daily 5), that my students were able to transfer their good reading habits to their book buddy time. I was very impressed and proud of my students and their partners as they found a good spot and got busy reading immediately! Since my students' book boxes are full of self-selected books, they stay engaged in reading for the whole 30 minutes. Some of the partners are pictured below.

I spend this time quickly monitoring my students reading and making note of the level and genre of their book choices. It is nice to see the 6th graders, some of whom have had some behavior issues (typical 12-year-old angst), participating wholeheartedly during this time.

I've partnered with the same 6th grade teacher for the last several years. Do you do book buddies in your classroom/ school? We usually extend the classroom partners to include Valentine's Day exchanges and an end-of-year ice cream get-together. If you have done book buddies, what do you do beyond the reading buddy time?

Holly Bloggy Christmas

I know what you're thinking, it's January and I'm about 20 days too late to be posting about Christmas :) But, I would be remiss if I did not post about the fun and exciting Holly Bloggy Christmas that Caitlin from Ms. Preppy and Sarah from Kindergarten Korner put together for us. I just got my blog up and running, so I can link up and share with the other participants (blogger peer pressure - ha!)

Here's what I put together for Kristy over at Teachin' First: some monogrammed stationery and matching holder, fuzzy socks, a "K" ornament, some Bath & Body Works lotion, a bag of chocolate, and a Santa bag so that she could put it under her tree until Christmas Day.

My gifts for Kristy

Here's what Kim from Mrs. Patton's Page got me: fuzzy red & white calf-length socks (that I put on immediately), a silk green scarf with Santas, reindeers, and Ho Ho Hos, handmade teacher notecards and Christmas cards (almost too cute to use), and T's for monogramming my things. It's like she knew me :) On a side note, Kim's gift was the first present I opened!

Kim's gifts to me

This exchange helped us get to know each other a little better and connect with other teachers.

Over the Moon! The Liebster Blog Award

Happy Friday the 13th to me! Imagine my surprise when I received this nomination for new bloggers! Heidi from Raki's Rad Resources bestowed the Liebster Blog Award to me. Thank you, Heidi!

Here’s an explanation of what the award is all about:

Liebster means “dearest” in German, and the award is intended to help up-and-coming blogs get the attention they deserve.

In order to accept the award, the blog owner must do the following:

1. Copy and paste the award on our blog.
2. Link back to the blogger who gave us the award.
3. Pick out five favorite blogs with less than 200 followers, and leave a comment on their blog to let them know they have been nominated.
4. Hope that the five blogs chosen will keep spreading the love and pass it on to five more blogs.

I am pleased to accept this award and would like to pass it along to the following great blogs:

1. The Mysterious Gifted Society
2. Nyla's Crafty Teaching
3. Discovery Kidzone
4. The Helping Bridge
5. Joy of Teaching


Check out these great new blogs! Thanks for supporting new blogs :)

They're Baaack!

After 15 blissful kid-free days, my students are most definitely back from winter vacation, albeit three decided to extend their holiday by just one more day. Although part of our morning was spent helping our friends tie shoelaces, reminding our friends to put away jackets, and re-learning lunch numbers, the other part was filled with sharing animated stories about cool Christmas gifts and New Year's celebrations.

After watching a cute video on Discovery Education about New Year's traditions, we discussed making goals for the new year. We used an idea I found on TpT by the Glyph Girls that helped my students reflect on last year. Here are some student examples (you just gotta love first graders)...

my little friend Austin, who has learned to cook and is proud of himself for washing his dad's car

my friend Brooklyn, whose best and proudest moment was getting a computer and learning how to work it 

and my friend Crystal, whose "good teacher" was the best thing that happened to her :) Awww...

I was quite impressed with the quality of work on their reflections, especially because it was my students first day back and probably the first time in 15 days that they actually wrote something down.

My students gleeful return aside, my favorite moment of the day was when our school's Instructional Facilitator (and grandmother to two of my former students) delivered a bag of about 20 assorted Fancy Nancy books to add to our classroom library. My students ooohhed and aaahhed over each and every one of them. It was awesome!

What is your favorite activity to do with your students after a long break or extended weekend? Do you jump right back in with their normal schedule, or do you give them a day to ease back into classroom routines? I think I do a little bit of both. There is so much academic content to cover that each instructional day counts for so much, but you also want to make school and learning fun for the students and take the time to enjoy the holidays throughout the year.

Thanks for visiting!

Back from Winter Break

This is my full last day of winter vacation. Most of it has been spent on tweaking the new blog and not on my resolutions of organizing and cleaning my house. But, those can wait, right?

We have a teacher prep day tomorrow, and I will be spending the day preparing activities that will help my students ease back into the rigorous schedule daily routines. I planned on using ideas that I found on Pinterest (another new addiction that I discovered full-time over the break) for writing about New Year's resolutions. It is always humorous a joy to hear what 6- and 7-year-olds have to say about their goals (besides reaching the next level in their DS or PSP).

Another gem that has saved me a lot of time as I've been finding ideas on TpT over the break is Dropbox. Once you install Dropbox on your computers, you can upload pictures and files and then view and retrieve them from another computer. In the past, I spent hours sending links via email or using a flash drive, which clogs up my school email and fills my flash drive with long-ago-forgotten-files. I hope this helps someone.

Thanks for stopping by!

Welcome!

Thank you for stopping by to visit my new blog! I am so excited to be starting this new adventure with you. Please feel free to leave comments, suggestions, or blog love below :)