What I'm Loving Wednesday and Classroom Pictures

Today is the first day of school my friends. The first day. Oy. There's always so much anticipation and build-up to the first day. I'm ready to be in a groove, in a schedule, with procedures down. Can we just fast forward already? :) 

Today is Wednesday so it's time for my weekly linky, "What I'm Loving Wednesday." 

First up is my classroom. I have to say that I love it simply because I've been spending so much time getting it ready. It feels good to finally be done. Or as done as I'm going to get before the kiddos come in.

Prepare for a photo dump!

My files for teaching for the week

My monthly read-alouds are kept in the black magazine files

Daily math papers in the crates sorted by lesson

Math wall and computers

Reading wall, cubbies, Friday Choice bins, and book boxes

Parent News bulletin board

Science and Social Studies wall and supply bins

Classroom library and small group table

Front of the room with the class rules

Front of the room

Carpet area at the front of the room

Another view of the front of the room

My desk

I'm also loving the genius idea I saw on Instagram about putting pool noodles in your boots to keep them from flopping over in the closet. 

I was shopping the other day and saw pool noodles for 97 cents so I had to try it out. I cut one up and put the pieces in my boots right away. Love it!

Last but not least I'm loving my new Substitute Binder that I printed out yesterday and am starting to fill in.

I feel like it's going to keep me super organized when it comes to substitutes, which always seem to take for.ev.er to plan for.

I'm hoping with all of this information already prepped and in a binder, the sub plans will be way easier!

 Check it out on Teachers Pay Teachers here.

Well, that's all I have for now. I have a couple more projects I need to finish up tonight for the first day tomorrow.

What are you loving this week? Make sure to link up!

An InLinkz Link-up

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The Daily Five Second Edition and Free Printables

I've been spending some time this weekend getting ready for the first week of school (T-minus four days people!) and what I want to teach and how I want to teach it. The beginning of the school year is so critical in getting procedures and routines in place. I feel like there's a small window of time to get the structure I want in my classroom so I like to be very thoughtful in how I go about implementing things. 

I'm recommitting myself to implementing The Daily Five this year and spent some time this summer reading the second edition of the book. 

I've poured over Pinterest and found a lot of great information through some book studies as well. There are so many great resources out there that so many wonderful teachers have put together. 

I finally convinced a friend of mine to join Instagram and Teachers Pay Teachers and they have some great printable posters for your Daily Five room in their store for free! 

Check them out here!

I am excited about these because once I teach the students the basics with all of my anchor charts, I run out of room to put the chart paper posters and my reading bulletin board isn't that big. These printables will be perfect for my size wall. I printed them out and laminated them and am excited about them going up on the wall after I introduce the information.

If you're an Instagramer, take a minute to follow my friend. Lots of flash freebies and giveaways happening on there.  

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Organizing the Paper Clutter To and From School

The other day I posted a picture on Instagram of my G.A.T.O.R. Binders being put together thanks to my mama's help and some people were asking what was inside. I decided to do a blog post about these babies. 

G.A.T.O.R. stands for Getting All Things Organized and Ready and the gator is our school mascot. The binders are a way to keep all of the paper clutter that goes to and from school organized. 

Each year my second graders are given their G.A.T.O.R. Binders on the first day of school after a lengthy talk about what's inside and how to take care of them.  The students and families take great care of them for the most part and I've had nothing but positive feedback from parents.

 The inside cover is where the students put their homework each week. This binder is ready for the first day of school with their only homework being a Student Information Sheet. I make a big deal out of the fact that really, this homework is for their parents. The students think it's funny that their parents have homework. 

 The first thing in the binder is this pouch. In the past I've used it for money that's brought to school for field trips, book orders, or lunches. This year I'm going to be putting a deck of cards and math games on a metal ring for their homework inside. 

Behind the pouch is a description of the different parts of the binder. This stays in all year and is a great introduction for parents and students. I can also easily refer back to this page if a little one needs a reminder to not color or tear out any pages. 

Next I have a Spelling Menu in a plastic sleeve that will be used throughout the trimester for homework. I have a couple different plastic sleeves behind this housing a monthly calendar of events, a writing calendar for homework, and directions for how to login at home to a computer program our school uses.

I bought these poly folders from Walmart for their Friday Folders. Friday Folders are where they put their weekly papers that come out of their cubbies. Parents look through the papers and clean it out each week. I initially thought I'd have trouble with families never cleaning out their binders, but the parents have been really great about keeping the binders in tip top shape. 

Behind the Friday Folder is a Room 23 News spiral notebook. We use this spiral notebook as a communication tool between the parents, students, and myself. Each morning when the students first come in the room, they copy down a letter to their parents that is written on the board. We talk a lot about the five parts of a friendly letter, handwriting, spacing, etc. at the beginning of the year. The letter usually consists of something that they did at school or an event that's coming up. In the evenings they take their binders home and their parents read the letters and sign them. As the students are writing their letters in the mornings, I walk around and stamp for parent signatures from the night before. What I love most about Room 23 News is that if a parent has a quick note to tell me, they write it underneath their student's letter and I see it first thing in the morning and we have an ongoing collection of our communication. 

After the students have written their news in the morning they put their binders on this corner shelf. Throughout the day if I have a paper that needs to be sent home to a particular student, I can easily go grab their binder and slip it inside. 

This year I'm going to have the students personalize the very back of the binder however they'd like. They can include photographs, drawings, etc. 

I let the families know at Back to School Night that if a student or family happens to lose the binder or it's damaged beyond repair, I will supply an extra one for $5.00 for materials. I've only had to replace one in the last seven years!

That's the G.A.T.O.R. Binder in a nutshell! I've seen a lot of acronyms used for these binders- B.E.E. Binders, M.O.O.S.E. Binders, etc. I'm pretty sure there's an acronym for any type of binder you want to create if you search the Internet. 

Questions or comments? Leave them below!

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Exhaustion is Setting in...

Man the first month of school is exhausting! It's hitting me this year more than evah. 

There's a whole lotta this going on:

Happy almost Wednesday! 

Hump Day! Woot woot!

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Classroom Pictures

One would think that after eight years of teaching, I would remember just how utterly exhausting the first couple of weeks are! I have been a major blog/Instagram slacker but just haven't been able to muster up the energy to do much of anything after school. 

Today I thought I'd post some pictures of my classroom that I admit, I took on the third day of school because quite frankly, I completely forgot to do it before the first day. 

For all of those starting school tomorrow and next week, I hope your first day goes well! 

Don't forget to sign up for the September SLANT Box exchange if you're interested by heading over to Lessons with Coffee's blog! 

I'm off to enjoy the rest of the Video Music Awards on MTV. Justin Timberlake performing with the rest of Nsyc kind of just made my night. 

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Back to School Blogger Exchange Linky Party

Last month some teachers participated in a Back to School Blogger Exchange hosted by Katie from Adventures of Ms. Smith and myself. 

Participants were paired up and emailed some information about their partner's favorite things, and the teachers were set loose to shop for their partners. Packages have been arriving on doorsteps all over the country and bloggers are linking up here to share their goodies! 

My partner was the fantastic Jessica from Mrs. Heeren's Happenings. She did a great job shopping for some of my sparkly favorites! My package even included glitter tissue paper- love it! 

I am so excited about all of my items! The Scentos stamps aren't in the picture above because I took them to school to use on a project and left them there before getting a picture. I used the chevron Washi tape on my name popsicle sticks and love it! A big huge ThAnK YoU to my partner!

These items definitely make the beginning of school a little brighter! I had fun getting to pick out items for my partner and checking out a bunch of new blogs in the process.

Thank you also to Katie from Adventures of Ms. Smith for co-hosting with me! 

If you participated in the Back to School Blogger Exchange and are ready to share your treasures, link up below! 

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Monday Made It- Finally!

Happy Monday! It is the last day of summer (in my mind). Tomorrow I have a training and the rest of the week I will spend in my classroom. Students start next week. Oy! 

I have spent the morning working on some projects for my classroom. My to-do list is huge aside from school stuff, so I'm trying to make this last day count in order to get a lot done and feel good going back.

I'm linking up with Tara for Monday Made It! I haven't done that in a while! 

First up, I painted a frame in polka dot fashion for the students to hold for their first day of school pictures. 

Next, I worked on some cards that I put up on the board with magnets letting the students know the order to do their morning jobs when they first walk in the room. I'm pretty happy with how they turned out. Please excuse the cat in the next couple of pictures, he REFUSED to move. 

I also put together some instruction cards to put up on the whiteboard to serve as a reminder of the order in which to complete a task. Perhaps I'm just cranky, but repeating directions over and over gets to me. 

Finally, I used scrapbook paper and Mod Podge to decorate an R for my last name. I plan to use some ribbon to hang it on the bulletin board above my desk. 

Those are my Monday Made Its! Don't forget to go check out everyone's projects at 4th Grade Frolics!

I'm off to accomplish my errands and house tasks while sneaking in some Shark Week! 

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