Spring Break!

It's amazing how quickly time flies.

Gets away from us.

Yet, we are often heard saying:

"How many days until break ?!?!?"

"I can't wait until summer break!"

"Is it Friday yet?"

And I get it - I'm right there with you! I'm often the one instigating the complaining!  Nonetheless, I woke up this morning realizing we had made it to the infamous
S P R I N G  B R E A K ! ! ! !

Where did the year go ???  I only have 2 months left with my kiddos! It's been *such* a fun year with them.  I can't believe how much fun we have had together.  And these last 2 months are going to be awesome.  Our IFL unit is on Oceans and Ocean Life.  Guess we know what I'll be up to over break . . . ;)

So, for the past few weeks, a lot has happened -

My sister was accepted into Rutgers' University Graduate School of Education! :)  So, she will have her undergraduate degree in Mathematics, then she'll continue straight for her Masters in Education. I'm so proud of her.  She has definitely come a long way, changing her major a few times.  I told her she can teach the Math and I'll teach the ELA/LAL. #twopeasinapod

                       

 Our district has us using PD360.  Our state is requiring us to do 20 hours of professional development a year, so our district helped us out with this program.  Any thoughts on it?  I've been using it here and there.  I enjoy the videos and the thoughts/ideas that are presented, whether is information from the actual videos or the classrooms in which the videos are filmed.  I just wish there were more videos on workshop models and those sorts of things that are taking over our classrooms - whole brain teaching, Daily 5, yah know. :)

I completed my first half marathon last week!  woo hoo !

Hadn't really trained for it.  Yes, I ran here and there, but nothing serious that would've really prepared me for running a continuous 13.1 miles for what felt like 5 hours. ;)

When my friend and I left on Saturday to pick up our packets, I said we would drop down to the 8k.  But then, we walked into the expo center and ... I saw my running bib.  Saw all the other people around.  Looked at where I was a year ago - standing around waiting to corral for our 8k.  And I realized, I needed to do this.  All of my stress, anxiety, grad school work, school work, cleaning - was never going to go away.  It will ALWAYS be there.  But the chance to do this for myself, doesn't come very often. .... plus, we had paid for this. -_-

Anyways, my friend came to pick me up Sunday morning for the race.  I got in the car and said, "We're doing the half.  Don't ask questions."

Off we went.

Then there I am a few hours later ... :)

 I think we had a visitor in our classroom ..... :(  How rude! Totally killed our aloe plant. </3

Oh, yes! And we won the Pennies for Patients contest!  Granted, this was a few weeks ago, if you keep up with me via Instagram. :)  Seriously, my class - I couldn't be prouder.  They are truly some of the funnest, loyalest kids a teacher could ask for.  After starting the first week of collections in fourth place, they came through and three weeks later we BEAT our class goal of $300.  We earned bragging rights, again for the year - after winning the Drug Awareness Week door contest back in October - and we also won a pizza party!! :D  One of my poor girls. :( She started crying because she can't have pizza.  </3 Of course, we will figure something out for her while we still wait for those pizza gift cards to come. Hmm...

 And last but most certainly not least ...

 NEW WHITEBOARDS!

I was fortunate enough to have 4 new whiteboards installed in my classroom.  The chalkboards are now all covered and the crummy old whiteboards that I once had were replaced with these beauties.. I couldn't wait to use all of these magnets because for whatever reason I'm obsessed with magnets!!  :D

I know - they look a little empty.  This was when I first got them and just threw some charts on the board as well as the calendar and our schedule/morning meeting stuff.  I had everything strewn about my green kidney table that it drove me bonkers and I just needed things OFF the table and my magnets needed to be utilized. :)

For now, I'm a happy little teacher on spring break for a few days.  Though spring breaks means grading, lesson planning for the rest of the year, andddd lifeguarding... 

Better Late than Never .. ;)

I know !! It's been, ugh ... 3 weeks ?!!!

It's always on my to-do- list, to blog, but I've just been putting it off.  I have told myself that it's really important to do, though, since this is my first FULL year teaching!  

So here are some things that happened in the midst of putting my classroom together, which I am still doing ... My job is never done. :)

I guess I went a little teacher happy ?? Never! :) 

You can never have enough supplies for creativity and writing. (;

My attempt at genre-ing the books I decided to keep and store in our classroom library.

I am starting to think I need more ... 

The punching out and laminating I had to do.

Thank you, Really Good Stuff !! SOO much Dr. Seuss stuff !! :D

Yah know, the tireless cutting of lamination I had already done that morning (background).

And the lamination I still had to do that night.

We had a lamination party. :)

I almost fell over when I found these in my local Lakeshore Learning Store! I couldn't believe it!

My friend's husband made 2 more shelves for our library. :)

I am ever so grateful.

The bookshelves filled in ... :D

The bookshelf pegs. :)

You always need a picture of those.

The semi-semblance of a classroom library -

still putting the rest of it together as a book nook. :)

There is just *soooo* much good stuff out there - take advantage! Just give credit where credit is due.  Seriously, because as a first year teacher - my classroom would not be as spectacular without the help of other bloggers and their TpT creations.  I love it ! I live for it ! Hahahaha, not quite yet. :)  For now, just keep the good stuff coming. 

Back to School

Whew! What a week it has been! I was finally able to get myself over to my NEW classroom, after all the anxiety I was having that nothing was going to be in done in time.  BUT with the help of my mom (*love her*), one of my sisters, my boyfriend, and a friend, we completely turned the room upside down.  I could not be more grateful for my loved ones who helped me soooo much!  We were able to take out resources that were in the classroom and were not going to be much help to me, so I pretty much just get to start from scratch with setting up my room!

I was too occupied with cleaning that I didn't take any before / after pictures the first day I visited my new assigned classroom.  But we have all been there and can imagine; we know what that's like. ;)  I thought about it today though! Here is just a little look at what went on today:

My friend was a God send! She had 2 rolls of leftover carpet from when her husband & her added an addition on their house.  She cut up the purple rug and adhered it to the floor so my new kids don't slip and slide. ;)  She also cut up 4 partner mats from her tan rug. Then, she cut up those tennis balls you see in the bottom left-hand corner for some of my chairs that needed them :)

p.s.. Her husband is making me extra shelves for my wooden book case (that's why the right side is empty - she has the "shelve template").  ;)

This table will house all of my writing supplies .. the "writing station."  Underneath the table is currently all the headphones and cassette players for the students to use during Listen to Reading.  The white file on top - that's where the students will keep their writing folders and portfolio compilations.

After going through about .. 10 various sized boxes, my mom helped me and narrowed down all the books that I should keep.  I had two classroom library's worth of books - at ALL reading levels.  Now, to classroom library them . . . . 

This is one side of the hallway outside of my door.  Some of the stuff we cleaned out of the room within the two days of working in the room - about 5 boxes are books that were of no use to my students. /=

The other side of the hallway outside of my door.  This side is primarily curriculum books.  Don't worry - some of them are math and science, which I don't teach this year since we went to team teaching ... Woo Hoo !!

This was today's garbage .. Now multiply that by 3 - THAT was how much we threw out the first day. 

Stay tuned !! I have to get back to researching some ideas for running my classroom this year and researching how to effectively run my room, especially my Reader's Notebooks and Writer's Notebooks.  

This will be my *FIRST* official year teaching.  I'm so excited to be with a group of students right from the very start! YAY! :D  I was hired in March, so I only have 17 weeks of experience under my belt.  That's okay.  I feel like a pro now - thanks to the teacher blogosphere and Pinterest, I feel as prepared as I can be, a little nervous - but confident!, in approaching this first year of teaching.