Still Alive.. and Sharpening!

For those of you who are interested, I managed to make it through the rest of this week with no other injuries! Phew!

This week has gone so well. Like, unbelievably well. Of course, students are testing the behavior waters, but my friend & I have already hit our stride with team teaching. We are so confidant and totally up for the challenge that we've been given this year! Excited to see where the rest of the year takes us.

So, the day we came back as a staff, we found out that our school switched from Reading Counts to AR. I know what AR is and everything, but does anyone have any secrets or tricks that I should know about? I'd love to know these things up front instead of learning the hard way, if at all possible! =)

Can't wait to get back into the swing of things and post about what we've been up to. Hopefully, I'll remember my camera. If not, you'll get some lovely cellphone pictures!

In other news, this came into my life last week...

Let me start out by saying, pencil sharpeners [of all varieties] are the bane of my existence. I went through three electric ones last year. The boys shoved who knows what into them, and they were never treated gently. And the handheld, personal ones? Don't get me started. They mysterious fell out of desks 12 times a day, and those same boys decided to try to sharpen their mini carrots. Yeah, that happened. So I banned those.

See? I hate pencil sharpeners. When I saw this product from Classroom Friendly Supplies floating around blog land, I knew I had to give it a shot. The worst that could happen would be another deceased or banned pencil sharpener.

Here's my honest assessment.

I opened the box, and it was already put together. I just had to attach it to a surface. I ended up just leaving it free though so it can travel with me around the room. At the moment, it has only been used by teachers!

Now, it does make noise, but it only makes about a tenth of the noise an electric sharpener does. Awesome! I don't let students sharpen pencils during instruction anyway [they trade their dull one for a sharp one], but it will definitely help to cut down on noise during morning work when they are allowed to sharpen.

This puppy is fast! I was really surprised how quick it sharpened a new pencil. I feel like an electric sharpener takes forever now! Less wasted time. Love it. And don't get me started with the perfect point. It sharpens a pencil to PERFECTION! It drives me nuts when my electric sharpener makes a point that you can't write with. Ya with me? With this sharpener, you get a perfect point every time.

The verdict? I'm sold. Totally worth it. And, like I've heard others say, I love that it is made for classrooms by a classroom teacher.

I'm going to introduce it to the kids next week, now that we are getting settled in. I will have to show them, step by step, how to use it. I might even show the video from the website. I'm sure that it'll survive. I'm hoping it'll last the whole school year! Here's the button to Troy's site if you're interested in learning more. I suggest at least checking it out!

First Day Battle Wounds

I have battle wounds!

I wish I had the energy to post about my first day back with my kids.

I really do.

But right now, all I've got for you is the fact that is looks like I've been beaten up. Hot mess status at the end of the day, people!

Here's the run down.

HUGE paper/cardboard cut on my finger. No clue how it got there.

Toe nail issue. One of my chick-a-dees came charging up to me at recess and kicked my foot in an awkward way. Ouch.

WAAY Frizzy hair. Because I'm team teaching, I have a "duty" in the morning. This week, I'm lucky enough to I have outside morning duty. It was so muggy! We also changed dismissal, so we have to wait outside with our kids until they get picked up. I looked disgusting by 3:40!

And my cute nail polish has mysteriously chipped off of one finger. Wah.

So hopefully, I can stay in one piece the rest of the week, and I'll post something of substance over my four day weekend!

How was your first day of school?

Giveaway Winners

Went into my classroom today. We got SO much done! I didn't take pictures though.

Shocker.

But I plan on getting pictures when it is all done! My friend & I are so excited to be teaching together. We've had to make a few decisions about some procedures that we do differently, but we are both pretty flexible. We go back officially on Monday! Yikes.

On a side note, it was SO hard to wake up early today. Ugh.

Here are the winners of my giveaway!

I am emailing you now to confirm your email addresses. Once I hear back from you, you'll receive your prizes from me & I will pass along your email addresses to the ladies who helped in my giveaway!

Congratulations, and thank you to everyone who entered! I will be posting more freebies in the near future as a thank you to ALL of my followers!

Subject Poster Freebie

I wanted to let you know that I uploaded a new freebie to my TPT store! 

I'm toying around with ways that I'd like to display my essential questions in my classroom. Last year, I dedicated a whole bulletin board to them. I would write the EQs on sentence strips and change them out by stapling them. It was in the front of the classroom, and the sentence strips were large, so they were easily viewed by everyone. 

This year, I'm not sure I want to use that bulletin board for that purpose. So I'm trying to think of ways to display this mandatory element in my classroom so that everyone can see it, and also in a way that is easy to maintain.

I made these pages as an option. I was thinking I could maybe enlarge them a bit and laminate so I can erase/rewrite?

[What I reaaaaally wanted to do was get them made on Vistaprint as large car magnets, but that would be a little waaay more than I want to spend. Especially since I've spent so much already!]

So anyway, click the image to see and download the freebie! The PDF includes a sign for Reading, Writing, Math, Science, and Social Studies. If you need something else, shoot me and email, and I'll whip it up for ya!

How do you display essential questions/standards/objectives so that they are easily seen and maintained?

/////////Reminder that my giveaway will end tomorrow at midnight! If I have 250 followers by then [only need 7 more], I will pick a third winner from the comments! Please spread the word if you have a second!/////////

Also-- I'm currently watching E! Investigates: Bullying: Celebs Speak Out. Wow, what a powerful program. If I were already a school counselor in a middle to high school setting, I would use this special as a tool.

I've Got the B2S Blues.

Hey, everyone!

One week until teachers officially report back. Yikes!

And I just heard we don't have a reading specialist anymore. 

She's been moved back into a classroom teacher position.

It's crazy. Teachers work SO hard, and every time we make progress or get ahead, something is taken away from us! The fact that teachers are expected to do more and more with less and less is baffling to me. I'm sure most of you can relate to this in some way!

Hopefully, we have a high enough unit count so that someone can be hired after Sept. 30th. Not banking on it though, as my class list is sitting steady at nineteen.

Anyway, I've been crafting and organizing a lot of the stuff I've purchased over the summer! I would post a picture, but the pile in my living room is straight up embarrassing! Teachers are allowed back in the building [unpaid] this week, so my friend & I are going to go in Thursday for the day to get a little head start. 

I wish I was ambitious enough to go in every day this week, but I'm truly not in the mood. So much nonsense going on in my life right now. I actually can't wait until school and grad classes start so that I have something to focus on.

I'll be back Thursday with the winner[s] of my giveaway and "before" pictures of the classroom!

If you haven't entered, click here and get to it! I'm at 239 followers, and I said that if I get to 250 by the time I announce the winner [Thursday night], I'd pick a third winner!

Good luck to everyone who has started back!