Book Hospital FREEBIE

Every library needs a hospital...a place where broken and damaged books can go to heal.  

This is our book hospital:  

 When books look like this...

 ...they go to the book hospital.  

This book hospital has saved me a lot of interruptions when my kiddos are reading my older books and they fall apart during Daily Five.  We review how to treat a book carefully, but I know some of my books are hand me downs and are not in the best of shape anymore.  When they need a little surgery they have to go to the hospital.  

This hospital saves me from being interrupted over and over again while I'm working with my reading groups...and my kids think it's funny when I say my old books need a little surgery and some stitches.  :)

Our librarian has been wonderful at helping me repair some of my books.  I'm hoping they make it to the end of the year and then I'll send them home with my kids for the summer and replace them.  If some of my books can make it to May I'll be very happy.  

Here is what the rest of my book baskets look like in my class library.  I purposefully made my book hospital a different color so that my kiddos could find it easily.  

I originally got this idea from Pinterest (where else?!) and before that it came from the 2 Sisters of Daily Five.  

Here is my book hospital freebie:

Hope your library can benefit from a book hospital! :)

Saturday Sayings and Winners

I am joining Tammy at Forever in First with a Saturday Saying today.  Go visit Tammy for all of her wonderful Saturday Sayings posts.  She has some wonderful words of wisdom!  

  

I *heart* Pinterest.  I have always kept a journal with my favorite quotes and now that Pinterest is here I have a board with some of my favorite quotes.  Today I am going to share one of them. 

Growing up my dad always told my brother and I that if he did something we could do it and if he said something we could say it.  He always led by example.  As our dad he knew that we would learn more from his actions than his words.  

I could go on about my wonderful dad, but I share this to say that I feel like it's the same with my students.  When I see one of my kiddos doing something they shouldn't do or saying something unkind, the first thing I usually ask them is if they have ever seen me do that or say that.  Of course they say no.  

I try really hard not to cut in line, stick my tongue out at my neighbor (unless I'm saying the /th/ sound of course), or tell the girl I played with at recess that I'm not her friend anymore...

I feel like kids get tired of being told what to do all the time.  I know I sometimes do!  :)  Kids are just that....kids.  They are still learning right from wrong and rather than just telling them what to do and what not to do all the time we need to show them.  

It's not always easy, but we need to help our students by setting a good example.  We need to be careful with our actions and with our words.  Our kiddos pick up on more than we think.  

I actually had a discussion about this with my kiddos yesterday.  I had a boy who had been out a couple days this week because he was sick.  Yesterday he went to the bathroom and a few minutes after he came back he raised his hand and told me in front of everyone that he had diarrhea.  I asked him if he had had an accident and he said he had.  He came to me so I could send him to the office and it was unbelievable.  He had it e-v-e-r-y-w-h-e-r-e.  

My heart broke for my sick kiddo.  My other kiddos knew immediately what had happened (you couldn't hide the smell) and I began to hear comments.  We had to leave the room while it was cleaned and aired out so we took some math games and went to the gym.  Before we played our math games we had a class meeting about how we treat our friends.  We talked about how our friend must feel and how each of them would feel if that had happened to them.  

I think I made my point.  

Kiddos learn by example.  I think we continue to learn from example even as adults.  Be cognizant of this in your classroom when you're with your kiddos.  

They're watching you....all the time because they *love* you.  Just because their ears are closed doesn't mean their eyes are closed. 

Before I go, I have 5 winners to announce of my Night Before Valentine's Day Pack.  Hope your kiddos enjoy it!  :)

Congrats to Marcy, Suzy, Kelly, Denise, and Karyn!  I'll be emailing  you soon!  

Happy Saturday!  :)

Night Before Valentine's Day Pack....Giveaway!

Valentine's Day is coming up quickly and I have created another activity pack to go with Natasha Wing's The Night Before Valentine's Day book.  

This Night Before Valentine's Day Pack is $3 in my TpT store.  Here's a quick look at it:

There is a freebie in the download preview if you want it!  :)

Since I'm feeling very overwhelmed with Common Core, assessments, report cards, behavior issues, conferences....etc. I am going to give away 5 activity packs away for *FREE* on Saturday.  Hopefully this will lighten the load for a few of you!

Leave a comment with your email address and I will randomly choose 5 winners on Saturday.  Winners have already been contacted!  :)

I will also be joining Tammy at Forever in First with Saturday Sayings so make sure to come back and visit!  

February Currently and TpT Sale!

The beginning of February means another Currently from Farley!  Go to her blog to get more details and write your own Currently.

Here is mine:

We got several inches of snow last night/this morning.  I love how we always get snow on the weekends, but never get enough during the week for a snow day!  I REALLY enjoy those snow days!  :)

That's why it's one of my pet peeves not getting a snow day.  I also included lying....from students or anyone.  It drives me crazy!  

I also get really annoyed when I'm stuck behind a slow driver in the left lane.  I don't mind if you want to drive slow, but don't do it in the left lane and make me drive slow too!!  :)

One more thing before I'm off to go shopping with my hubby....there is a big TpT sale tomorrow!  I'm having a 20% off sale at my store and TpT is giving another 10% off if you use the code Super when you check out.  

I will definitely be doing some shopping during the Big Game tomorrow!!  :)  Enjoy the big sale!  

Inside Recess Center Labels FREEBIE

We had an in-service today and it was split into 2 parts.  In the morning we had a local university professor who travels the country helping kiddos read fluently.  

His name is Dr. Tim Rasinski.  He has written many books and participated in a lot of reading research studies.  He was very inspiring.  The two biggest things I took away from his visit were I need to be singing and reading poetry with my kiddos EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. and that my kiddos need repeated readings whether it is reading with me, their parents, or listening to reading on tape/computer.  

He shared so many stories of increased reading performance in kiddos who were well below grade level through the use of poetry and repeated readings.  Of course there was more, but those were the biggies.  He was such a great speaker!  

In the afternoon we had another speaker and she talked to us about SLO's.  She came from a nearby county and gave us some much needed info.  After her visit I feel much better about creating these SLO's.  

All in all it was a gooood day!

I shared my inside recess centers with you last year, but I have now created signs to go with them.  You can see my last year's post here.  

Here is my Inside Recess Center Labels Freebie to help you with the long winter days of inside recess craziness.

Here is how it works in my room:

I have 7 inside recess centers.  Each group has 4 kiddos in it.  This is because I only have 4 computers.  I rotate the centers every day so they only get to each center every 7 days...this helps keep them from getting bored.  

I have a small pocket chart that I got at Target.  I have a picture card at the beginning of each line with four kiddos following.  The first kiddo in each group is the one who gets the recess center out of my cabinets and puts it back.  This keeps my 28 kids from gathering  at my back cabinet and not being able to move.  

Each center has a certain place in the room.  The first person gets their group's things and takes them to their group.  The rest of the group goes to their spot and waits.  I have a larger size picture card matching the one from the pocket chart in my recess cabinet so my kiddos know exactly what they are doing and where everything belongs. 

These centers cut down on the inside recess craziness.  Now they don't argue over what to do or who to play with and there is no arguing over who has to clean up and put the toys away.  

Inside recess is soooo much more tolerable with centers.  

I hope you can use this freebie and that inside recess doesn't drive you crazy anymore!  :)

Here's to a quick winter so we can get back to outside recess!!

Best Guided Reading Group Tip Ever- Finger Lights!

My mother-in-law bought the cutest little lights last year for my hubby's cousin's children.  They were red, blue, green, and white and had little elastic bands on them so you could put them on your fingers and flash them around.  

The kids loved them so I thought my first grade kiddos might enjoy them too.  

I headed out to the dollar store and bought 2 packages of 4 for $2.  I took them to school a couple months ago and they were such a hit.  I have a disco ball hanging up in the center of my classroom for my Rock 'n Roll theme and the little lights reflect off it really well around my room.  My kiddos thought that was the coolest thing ever that day.

Well, we have been getting out those little lights every once and awhile when I had a reason to.  After reading The Teacher Wife's blog post a couple days ago I saw how we should be using them!

This is how we used them today:  

Here's a close up at what the lights look like.  

Oh. my. goodness. 

I don't think guided reading groups will ever be the same.  I actually had to force my kiddos to leave the table today.  

...Can't we just read one more book?!
...Can we use these again tomorrow?  
...Can I take this home with me?   

Since my lights have elastic they were kinda snug on some of my kiddos' fingers so I told them to take them off and just hold it.  It didn't really matter as long as they could use them to point and follow along as they read.    

I can't wait to let the rest of my kiddos use them tomorrow.  My class was trying so hard to keep busy during Daily Five, but most of them kept peeking to see what the group at the table was doing with those cool lights.  

Thank you so much for sharing this great idea, Lindsey!  She also mentions who she heard this idea from on her blog so go check out their posts too!  :)

I have 8 cute little lights, but one is already out so I'm headed back to the dollar store.  I'm keeping my fingers and toes crossed that they still have these!! 

Do you have any other ideas for these lights?  I'd love to hear more ideas!! 

Fantabulous Friday Freebie- MLK Jr and Penguins

Yay for Friday!!  That means another Fantabulous Friday Freebie post.  Here are some great freebies I found this week from some great TpT sellers.  

If you use their products, make sure to show your thanks!

We're going to be using these goodies next week.  These Fantabulous Friday Freebies are Martin Luther King Jr activities and a penguin nonfiction research freebie.  

My kiddos are going to be spending the next couple of weeks researching and learning about penguins.  They are so excited!  

Check out these great freebies:

This is an adorable MLK Jr pack!  There is a writing prompt, word search, and a bubble map.  So cute!  

I am going to use this pack to hang up outside my room in the hallway.  Adorable!  

This pack is a great little book that your kiddos can put together after reading about MLK Jr.  My kiddos love making books!  :)

We are starting our penguin research next week and this little nonfiction book will be perfect!  Love it!  :)

Have a great long weekend!  I'm pretty sure you all love 3 day weekends as much as I do!!  :)