Currently in June

I know I'm a bit late to this link up but I'm fashionable late because my summer just started and I did not have time before. So here is my current happenings in June.

Listening: I just bought the Arctic Monkey's new CD. Do you still call them CD's when you download them? I'm probably aging myself here..? Hmm anyways I've been listening to all their songs and I love them! I think they have a great sound to their  music and a great lead singer. It's funny how I have time to catch up on things I enjoy when I'm not so wrapped up in the school year.

Loving: SUMMER BREAK! I just had my last week of school and I'm so pumped for summer. I am worry free, my house is clean, errands are done, and I've been to the pool. Life is great! 

Thinking: I want to turn on Netflix and watch Orange is the New Black. The second season just came out yesterday and I've been wanted to watch it all day. I'm just waiting patiently for my hubby to get home so we can start binge watching.

Wanting: I have been wanting to decorate our master bedroom for some time. We have a discount and gift cards from Pottery Barn so I think now would be the perfect time to revamp our room. I want to do blues but haven't decided if I want cool blues or deep navy blues. I will wait and see what catches my eye. I also have been eyeing new summer dresses and keep finding reasons why I need them. I have a wedding I'm going to next weekend so naturally I need a new dress for the rehearsal dinner...right?!

Needing: I need to pick up my bridesmaid dress for the wedding I'm in next weekend. I just got it taken up and need to go pick it up from the tailor. I was supposed to do that today but all day at the pool seemed like a better option. Also I can pick it up on Monday because I don't have school! 

Summer Bucket List: Travel travel travel! I want to travel as much as possible this summer and each month I will be going somewhere. This month I'm going to Savannah, Amelia Island, and Jupiter. In July I'm going to Washington D.C. and in August I'm going to the Poconos Mountains in Pennsylvania. We will be visiting family and friends on these trips as well as celebrating our one year anniversary. I also want to take day trips in between all that to the beach and other interesting places around the area.

Link up-it's not too late! Join in the fun! 

Last Day of School

My last day of school with the kids was on Wednesday. We did a "Frozen" party day and watched the movie, had popsicles, played fun games, and said our bittersweet goodbyes for the summer. 

Yesterday I went into work to wrap up everything. I cleaned my room and made sure everything was off of the tile because that will be cleaned first. I also always try to put as many things on shelves as possible so they can better clean the floor.

Now I'm ready for summer! 

Top Ten Things I Want To Do This Summer

Summer is right around the corner. 2 more weeks, 7 days with the kids and 2 teacher workdays. June 6th can't come fast enough!

I have some trips planned out for this summer already but here are 10 things I want to do this summer!

1. Read lots of book! I have a wish list on Amazon that I created so when I finish one book I can see what I'd like to read next and then instantly download that book.

2. Go to the beach! While reading all these fabulous novels I should be sitting on the beach. The beach is about 45 minutes to an hour away from where I live. I just need to hop in the car and go for the day. It seems far for me since I've always lived about 10 minutes away from the beach. I vow this summer to take more advantage of living in driving distance and go.

3. Take day trips with teacher friends. I have a few teacher friends and it would be so fun if we took day trips to cool places around where we live. St. Augustine and Mount Dora are a couple places that would make a great day trip.

4. Exercise every day. I'm serious about this one. I'm not working over the summer so I don't have any excuses. I want to work out at least one hour every day. I plan to take classes during the day, workout at the gym, and do hot yoga. I think it I wake up and do it first thing in the morning I will be successful.
5. Watch some of my favorite TV shows. True Blood, Orange is the New Black, and So You Think You Can Dance all come back on this summer.

6. Go on lunch dates with friends and the hubby. All year long I hear about people taking fabulous one to two hour lunch breaks at nice places around work. I want to go and enjoy that time to sit down with and chat during their work week. It will be great to get out of the house and have some social time during the day.

7.  Plan for next year. Yes, I can't help but include some teacher related. I want to combine our science and literacy standards together to make better science plans. I also want to get things ready for the next school year. This includes set up for the classroom, Meet the Teacher, and creating new activities. 

Isn't this bulletin board adorable?! I would love to use this and have the words say "Dive into first grade!" 

8. Blog! I would like to read more blogs and write more myself. I have taken a very long break from it and I miss it. I want to get back into the blogging community.

9. Clean and organize my closet. I am actually going to do this one because I really need to do it. It looks like a hot mess and it is hard to find things. My friend and I are going to do this one together to decide what to keep and what to donate. If I have a ton of things this might lead to a garage sale...which should probably happen anyway. Disclaimer: My closet it not even half of this size but this would be very nice to have. I need to organize my closet even more since it is smaller.

10. Landscaping and painting our house. Our house is super cute but it also really old and needs a refresher.  We have already started some part of the landscaping but I want to take it even further to continue making our home look the best it can. I also really want to paint a fresh coat on our house. It needs it bad so hopefully these are some projects that can get done while I'm at home this summer.

 

What do you want to do this summer? Link up or comment below!

That's a Wrap! End of the Year Party

I can't believe it is almost the end of the year! But who I am kidding...I'm counting down the days! I have 8 more days of school and this is my last full week of school!

So this is how I'm going to wrap up with my first graders this year on the last week of school.

Our last day of school we only have 3 days. We are having a Hollywood theme first grade center rotation! Our first grade classes will switch and go to other teacher rooms to play games.

The games are:

Hollywood Squares-kid movie trivia

Red Carpet Relay-kids dress up as a movie star and walk down the red carpet then have to switch with a partner and walk back down the red carpet

Oscar hot potato-kids will play hot potato with a fake Oscar trophy

Karaoke-kids will all sing along to songs

Dance party-kids will dance and play freeze dance

Then the kids will have their "movie premiere" of our year together. I make a slideshow with music for the kids to take home as a gift. We will all watch the movie together and remember our year.

This is the gift I gave my kids last year and this year the gift will be very similar. 

A picture frame from Oriental Trading and a Scholastic dollar book. This year it is a Junie B. Jones book.

Popcorn 

Swedish fish

Thanks for a picture picture year with our class DVD. I got these tags from The First Grade Parade.

Buckets with their names on them. A parent used a circuit for all the names.

All the goodies in the bucket and our memory books bounded with the covers.

The boys had blue and the girls had red last year. 

We will also have our awards ceremony. I'm rolling out the red carpet (or just butcher paper) for the kids! They will all walk down and receive their award for the year.

On the last day we are having a "Frozen" day. We are going to watch the movie Frozen and sing every word I'm sure. We will also have popsicles and other "Frozen" activities.

What are you up to the last week of school?

Red Ribbion Week & Random

Hey blog friends! 

I've been slacking on my blog a bit! I want to share with you some of our Red Ribbon Week doors from this past week. These are all of my first grade teammates doors.

Be Drug Free Anything Less is Despicable! 

This is my door. :) I got the idea via Pinterest! The kids made the iPods and wrote on them iPledge to be drug free! and signed their names.

On the left side she posted all of her kids putting fake bugs in their mouth. Super silly and fun!

We promise to "leaf" drugs alone! 

We don't fall for drugs! She had the kids all sign a leaf.

The small sign on the tree says "Drugs make you batty!" All her kids made bats and sign their names in white crayon. 

I think they are all pretty awesome, cute, and creative! We had a contest where admin voted on doors. I won for my grade level. I was kinda floored because I never win anything. My class got some rocking guitars keychains and Twizzlers as a prize. FUN! 

I just discovered this great site...check out this awesome FREE math resource: 

There are several math games for K-7 using interactive boards. I will be using this for warming up their brains for sure! My kids love anything to do with our Smart Board!

In other news, I have parent-teacher conferences this week! I had 17 out of 18 parents sign up! So I have many meetings before and after school. I have also started AAA tutoring to help 3-5 graders build their reading comprehension and raise their test scores for the FCAT (our state standardized test). It is an hour each morning. I tutor one group for thirty minutes and then they go on the computer for Reading Plus and I tutor another group that was just on the computer. 

I'm enjoying this "chilly" front on the east coast and looking forward to Halloween this week! I'll post back here on Friday with all the fun that happens during our week.

Have a wonderful week! 

I heart school shopping!

Our school district gave us a debit card to use for classroom supplies this year. We just got it a few weeks ago and I've been looking for deals before I purchase anything. I got a 50% of coupon for Lakeshore tonight so I decided to go ahead and spend the card!

I love Lakeshore Learning materials because the stand the test of time and last.

Here are a few things I got: 

Word Building Blocks: I thought these would be super for word work. The kids will use these to make their spelling and sight words.

Wipe and write number strips: These are perfect for math centers! My kids use their number lines on their desk all the time so this will be great for them to use on the floor or even at the computer.

Lowercase magnetic letters: I have a mix of letters I've collected over the years but I don't have enough vowels and I'm missing some. This will be a good addition to the collection of letters. The kids use these during word work to make their spelling and sight words. 

I also picked up some new exemplar text for Common Core and easy readers. Some of the titles include books with the titles: How People Learned to Fly, Frog and Toad, Zin! Zin! Zin! a Violin, and  Hi! Fly Guy. I picked read aloud stories, poetry books, and informational text for a healthy balance. 

I also stopped by Joann's this afternoon for these awesome Native American headbands. Our first grade is doing a Thanksgiving program in November. Half of our kids will be Native Americans and half will be Pilgrims. We can't wait to tell the true story of Thanksgiving. Our program is based off the alphabet book "T is for Turkey." 

Have a wonderful evening! 

1st week of October {Five for Friday}

I can't believe it is already October! This school year is just flying by! Time to link up for another Friday to show you all about my week!

ONE

We have a furry friend in our classroom! I just adopted a guinea pig from a teacher who could no longer have two. Our principal made a rule that teachers could only have one pet per classroom so this teacher had to split her guinea pigs up. I took over the little guy. My kids could not be happier! 

I  LOVE having a classroom pet. He is an inspiration for writing, keeps them quiet when he is napping, teaches them about healthy fruits and veggies, and taking responsibility. A special thanks goes out to the Critters in the Classroom blog! It helped me to get things going with our guinea pig.

My kids named him Shadow. We love our little friend!

TWO

We have been learning our doubles facts this week. My kids love this doubles video.

They also love to use these Halloween erasers as counters.

THREE

Fall is all around our classroom now. I put up fall decorations this week and the kids wrote about the season.

FOUR

We had our Boosterthon Fun Run this week. This is a great fundraiser that promotes health and raising money for a good cause. The kids had so much fun running their laps! (think 5k kid style)  I think the program helps character building and is a positive way to raise money.You can read more the Fun Run here: Boosterthon Fun Run  Our school has used this fundraiser for the past three years to raise money for technology. Now every classroom has a SmartBoard! 

FIVE

Not the greatest picture but this is our brag box! Let me explain...our staff morale has been low and we need a way to pump it up! Our old principal used to write us sweet, encouraging e-mails or leave notes in our mailboxes. We thought we could continue doing that with each other by writing positive things on a little note and putting in this brag box. At the end of our team meetings our team leader will read the notes. Hopefully everyone will feel more encourage, uplifted, and ready to take on anything! At least that is my thought. I'll let you know next week how it goes! We want to stay positive and continue to lift each other up through changes that are happening. I hope this helps foster our love for each other even more!

Hope you all have a beautiful and restful weekend!