SALE

Check out the sale on Teachers Pay Teachers starting tomorrow and ending Tuesday!

My whole store is 20% off!!! Plus additional % off if you use the code on the banner!
And who doesn't love a sale!!!

5 for... Saturday?

I totally am losing track of days... my district is amazing and I've been off since Wednesday... and all of  a sudden it's Saturday... oops!

I am going to share some of the fun stuff we did for Thanksgiving on Tuesday!

We read Twas the Night Before Thanksgiving & made retell turkey hats! I got the turkey hat pattern freebie from Hollie Griffith's TPT store!

Then we read Turkey Trouble & disguised our own turkeys... the kiddos LOVED this!

We also made these adorable thankful turkeys... and one of my kiddos made me one with all the things he thought I'd be thankful for, too cute!

I started a little Christmas decorating! Gotta love the Target $1 bin... that's where I found these adorable little ornaments.

And finally... check out my TPT store for 20% off everything Cyber Monday (&Tuesday) sale!

Have a marvelous remainder of your weekend!

Thankful Link-Up Days 5 &6

So I forgot to link up yesterday... oops! But I'm "double" linking up today with Blog Hoppin' to share my thankful thoughts!

First I'm sharing yesterday's link up... K is for Kindess!

Today I am thankful for the kindness of a few important people in my life!

• First, my husband! He is so patient & kind with the lack of patience I have on some days after school. Not to mention he is absolutely my soulmate and holds me together in times I never thought anyone would be able to!
• Second, my parents & sister. They are beyond supportive in every single way & always so kind in their willingness to help me and the hubs in any way they can.
• Third, the parents of my students are the kindest bunch this year. I adore them!
• Fourth, the kiddos... daily they have kind compliments to give me and those small compliments mean SO much!

S is for Sharing!

How could I not be thankful for sharing?! That's what teacher blogs are all about right? Sharing great ideas with each other to help us all become better teachers! And what about sharing with those awesome colleagues who SHOULD have a blog but don't have time to have a blog! I get so many amazing ideas from the teachers I used to work with at my old school and from the teachers I work with now... amazing & so thankful for it!


Well I hope you all enjoyed the week of thanks, I know that I enjoyed taking a moment to think about the little things in life that sometimes I forget about. Go link up! It's not too late :)

Thankful Link-Up Day 4

Linking up on this Thanksgiving morning with Blog Hoppin' for the 4th day of Thanks!

Today we are giving thanks for "Nifty New Things."

Happy Thanksgiving to you all! After you enjoy your family & feasting... check out my blog posts on Whole Brain Teaching Brainies. They are my "nifty new things" that have transformed my room this year! My kiddos LOVE using brainies to do "oral writing" or to "prove" their opinion or answer. Click on the braines diagram below to check out my posts!

Have a HAPPY HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

Thankful Link-Up Day 3

I'm linking up again with Bloghopin' for another day of Thanks!

Today I'm thankful for A Book or Few!

 

I am SO thankful for books... teaching kiddos to read every day instills the importance of reading every single day. I am so thankful that I enjoy reading and teaching reading. I am also thankful for the authors who write books that help me teach & the authors who help me to relax and enjoy reading!

I'm going to share 2 books that save my life as a teacher and 2 books that I love in general...

If you read my blog often you know how important Whole Brain Teaching is to me and for that reason I'd highly recommend Whole Brain Teaching for Challenging Kids. This book is fabulous not only to help you with those challenging kids but to help you implement WBT into ANY classroom!

Another set of books I LOVE and transformed my classroom is The Daily 5 & The CAFE Book. We do full-fledged Daily 5 in my room and I'm working on implementing CAFE more this year. Hopefully I can implement CAFE more and more as I get more comfortable and familiar with all the strategies! These books are great and are very fast and easy reads. I felt comfortable to implement Daily 5 in my room simply after reading!

Onto 2 personal reads that I LOVED over the summer! Unfortunately I don't have a lot of time for pleasure reading, but I try to squeeze in as many books as I can over the summer!

The dog lover in me loved every second of The Art of Racing in the Rain. If you have a dog or love dogs it's a must-read. The story is narrated by a dog but as "cheesy" as that may sound, not a second of the narration feels unnatural.

Another book I loved reading over the summer was Reconstructing Amelia. The premise is a single mom trying to figure out what truly happened to her daughter. The narration is super unique in this book as it is composed with normal narration, texts, facebook posts and more weaved together. I was absolutely hooked to this book and could barely put it down! Definitely a great book if you're looking for something a little different and unique.

 

I hope you all are having a wonderful Thanksgiving Eve. I'm lucky enough to not have school today... one of the best things my district does is give us this day off :)
Be sure to check out what books other teachers are thankful for here.

Thankful Link-Up Day 2

I'm linking up again with Blog Hoppin' for a Week of Thanks!

Today's theme is H - Home Away from Home aka school or the classroom - and how the "yucky" stuff gets overshadowed by the happy stuff that make us thankful to be a teacher!

Just as Kelley did on Bloghopin' I'm going to share 3 things that remind me how much teaching is worth it, because seriously I spend more waking hours in my classroom many days so I need the happy moments!

1.

The AMAZING Whole Brain Learning that happens when the kiddos are SO excited to use gestures to share ideas and answers. This class has really bought into the idea of using gestures to learn. They get so excited to "be the teacher" and there are always smiles & giggles and high energy. Some days when I feel a little down in the morning I get really crazy with my gestures just so that they will too because it always makes me smile!

2.

My grade level team! I work with 2 AMAZING guys on my team. We are the only grade level team that is composed of more than 1 guy (some grades don't have any men at all). My whole life I've gotten along better with guys so this team is a dream! There is no drama, we have fun and still get work done and I'm guaranteed a smile (or 20) any time one of the guys stops in my room to say hi, to grab something, no matter what the reason. I don't know how I survived my first year of teaching without them!

3.

I always gets lots of compliments about my room... how bright & fun it is. How welcoming it is for students, etc. Truth be told SO much of the bright, fun & welcoming is for ME! I LOVE having a place that makes me happy to walk into every morning.

What are you thankful for? Go check out what other teachers are thankful for & link-up!

Thankful Link-up Day 1

I'm linking up with Blog Hoppin' for their first day of the Thankful Link-up!

Today is all about Technology!

I am SO thankful for technology... my first year of teaching I had an elmo document camera that was shared between 7 different classrooms, 4 student computers & a desktop computer for myself.
Now I'm in a school where all classrooms have a promethean board & a document camera that links up to the promethean board. I also have 6 student computers. Although I'd LOVE to have a few iPads to use now & again, I'm so thankful for the technology I do have because I know what it's like to have VERY little technology.

Here are all the things I would miss from my day in the classroom if it weren't for technology...
#1 Morning Message & Number of the day interactively done on the promethean board
#2 Showing videos whether it be for Scholastic News, a Science Lesson or even just for fun during Friday Lunch (my kiddos eat in my room)
#3 Modeling the programs/websites students will use on the classroom computers or in computer lab by using the promethean board.
#4 Modeling an activity or worksheet using the document camera.
#5 My classroom website that I created through weebly which features kiddos blog posts, photos from our class & more!
#6 Blogging & reading blogs... oh the wonders that has done in my classroom!
#7 I'm sure there are SO many more ways we use technology at school that I'm not thinking of right now!

And I have to include my top 3 reasons I am so thankful for technology in my every day life...
#1 My iPhone... I hate to admit it but I don't know how I survived sometimes without a smart phone...
#2 My MacAir... I LOVE being able to create (&share) items for my classroom using my mac.
#3 Pinterest... I mean who doesn't love finding crafts, recipes, classroom ideas & more on pinterest!


How are YOU thankful for Technology in your classroom or in your every day life? Join the link up by clicking the top image in this post or the link here & linking up on Blog Hoppin'

Liebster Award #2

I am SO excited to have been nominated for the Liebster award for the second year in a row! This year I was nominated by Meg over at Tales and Teacherisms. I'm hopeful that next year I will have too many followers to be nominated for the award since nominations need to have less than 200 followers on their blog!

The Liebster is great to get traffic to newer blogs so great posts that might normally not have many views will get view and then hopefully followers!

Here's the deal with Liebster... I answer 11 questions so you can get to know me a little better, then I choose 11 bloggers to nominate whose blogs I love!

So here are the questions...
1. Why and how long ago did you start blogging?
Originally this blog was an undergrad assignment I started back in 2009. It was for a reading instruction class and we had to read books and review them, providing resources, activities, etc. The blog then kind of went to the wayside until last year when I was in my 2nd year of teaching and decided to expanded it to a lot more than just book reviews.

2. What 1 word sums up the heart of your blog and why?
SHARING because just about everything I post on my blog I share with my grade level partners and other colleagues and of course by posting I'm sharing with all my cyber-teacher-colleagues!

3. Is there something you learned late in your blog journey that you wished you knew before?
I hate to steal Meg's but I have to agree that link-ups are SUCH a huge way to spread your blog to more readers and I only started linking up in the past year or so. Some of my favs are...

4. What is your favorite past time other than blogging?
Well obviously teaching... haha! But other than that, I'm a runner (hence the blog name) I don't compete much at all anymore but I ran competitively middle school through college and running/working out remains a big part of my lifestyle. I also spend A LOT of my time on the beach (in the summer anyway) because we live a mile from the beach, so that's a big part of my life too.

5. How many hours do you dedicate a week to your blog?
This funny makes me laugh because I was nominated for this award last week and am just now finally writing the post about it. This week is not typical (conferences!) as I spent hardly any time on the blog at all. Normally (during the school year), I spend a few hours between Sunday and Monday night getting 2-3 posts ready for the week. In the summer I try to blog every other day or so.

6. What category of blog post do you enjoy the most?
Also have to steal Meg's here... FREEBIES! I especially love posts where the blogger posts about how they used the freebie in their classroom too because it helps me to envision how I'll use it! (Check out some of my freebies below... I need to update this page to include them all!)

7. Where does your blog inspiration come from?
Things that either make my kids smile in my room or are super effective in helping them learn or helping them to make smart choices in the classroom.

8. Which post have you written that you are most proud of?
I am really proud of all the Whole Brain Wednesday posts I've been writing over this school year. WBT has become an integral part of my teaching life (as in I probably couldn't survive a day without it!) and I love sharing the strategies with others.

9. Is there any post you've been planning on doing but have been postponing for a while?
Not really. Once in a while I'll start a Whole Brain post and it takes me a few weeks to get back to it because I want to try whatever the strategy is out for a little longer in my classroom, but right now I don't have anything on the back burner.

10. What is your favorite thing about blogging?
Connecting with other teachers! It's beyond awesome when a teacher likes my ideas or tells me they are going to use an idea I had in the classroom!

11. What recipe, project or idea on my blog would you most likely try yourself?
I love the Monday Made Its from Meg... like recovered pillows for example... that would be super awesome for my mix-matched & somewhat gross pillows in our classroom library!


Now that you know a little more about me & my blog, here are the nominees...

1. Emily at Munchkins Inc.
2. Sarah at Frampton's Fundamentals
3. Briana at Sun, Sand & Second Grade
4. Kandice at Time Two Teach
5. Amber at Peppy Zesty Teacherista
6. Miss B. at Butterflying Through Teaching
7. The Magic of Teaching
8. Pixie Ann at Growing Little Learners
9. Stella at My Kindergarden Blog
10. Katie at Teaching Voracious Learners
11. Alexis at Laugh Eat Learn


Here are the rules for the nominees...
1. In your post, be sure to link back to your nominator as a shout out & a thank you!
2. Answer the 11 questions given to you (the ones I answered above)
3. Nominate 11 blogs of your choice who have less than 200 followers. Provide them with 11 questions or ask them to answer the questions above.
4. Let your nominees know they've been nominated and provide them with a link to your post so that they can accept.
5. Send your nominator the link to your post, so they can learn more about you... leave it in the comments below!
 And that's it!... so excited to learn more about my nominees!