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Teacher Teacher Store is taking part in the sale for 2 days.

Use the TPT code TPT3 at checkout PLUS everything in my store is a further 20% off.

New Easter products have been added just in time for the sale.

Check out my Literacy Activity Book with 30 pages of Easter themed literacy activities.

Easter Literacy Activity Book Preview

OR my Maths Activity Book with 30 pages of Maths activities.

Easter Maths Activity Book Preview. 

OR my Printable Easter Cards both colour and black and white.

Or all three in my Easter Bundle.

Everything in the store is on sale for 2 days. Click here to visit my store.

Meet Leonardo

Leonardo

This is Leonardo. He is our class pet. We will be looking after him in the classroom AND the students will get to take Leonardo home for a night and have a sleepover. Leonardo will also come with a book that the students will write in and share what they have done with Leonardo. Hopefully it will be things like do homework, watch TV, read a story and not things like go for a swim in saltwater, get drawn on by my sister, have dinner spilled on me! The students will then share their adventure with a short presentation in the morning to help develop oral language and confidence.

Leonardo was introduced on Monday. He came in the post on our weekly barge. The kids were so excited to meet him. We decided he was a ‘he’ not a she and also picked his name through a class vote. Some of the suggestions were quite funny: Squirt (came from me to get the ball rolling and comes from Finding Nemo) and Crush (also Finding Nemo). Then there was; Milo, Fred, Leonardo and Brian! The votes were counted and Leonardo it was.

Writing with Leonardo

Culture with Leonardo

This week he has been a nice companion when sitting on the carpet for whole class lessons. Even the fidgety little ones have held him carefully and still. He has sat on our desks to help with work and has been on playground duty with me (the year 6/7 kids think I’m nuts).  Today he had culture with us and now he is preparing for next week when he will go home with the first child.

 

Leonardo helping with insect drawing

This weekend I will be making his book, his bag (waterproof – and you know why) and also a little note for parents with a wish that Leonardo returns to class each time!!

I’m looking forward to seeing how his first trip goes!

Back in the Swing

Week 2 of school for 2014 and we are back into the swing of things. We are into our reading, writing, spelling, sight words, maths, science, health, visual art and history work. Phew!

Homework started this week and I’m happy to say the kids said, “YES!” with fists pumping in the air. Wow, that was a shock. I didn’t realise they were that into it. I know there are times when I have a groan about making it, printing it and photocopying it. Last year I swapped and changed a bit with what I sent home but this year I think I’ve got it all figured out (so far).

The students in my class take home:

* 1 home reader for year 1 and 3 for year 2

* a spelling list in a homework book with instructions on how to practice the words each week

* a page of sight words to learn to read

* a page of maths work

Reading bookmark for fiction and non-fiction texts

I send home as much information as I can to parents to help them help their children. I’ve made this reading bookmark for students and parents to use at home together. It has questions for before, during and after reading and has fiction questions on one side and non-fiction questions on the other. I know many parents don’t realise that reading and comprehension starts before opening a book and continues after it has been read. I hope that this “little something extra” can assist families at home. This is not just for teachers but parents too! You can download it for free here or find it in my freebies page.

Magic 100 Super Sight Words homework pack

Super Sight Words homework page

Something else I’ve refined is my sight word homework. I have made lists for each of our Magic 100 and Magic 200 words that can be used at home, then one side is returned to class signed by the student and parent while the other is left at home for future use. I love the 'super sight word' theme. You can check out my sight words homework list for Magic 100 here and Magic 200 here and don’t forget to have a browse through the rest of my Teachers Pay Teachers store. I'm currently working on words 201-300 and 301-400 for the kids who have finished the other lists.

We’ll see how much the kids enjoy their homework after this week. Already I’ve had about 6 students bring it back after one night even though its not due til next Monday. They are so cute. I think they just enjoy bringing something to and from school.

I’d love to hear about other homework systems and thoughts. Feel free to leave a comment below.

Until next time,

First week complete and yes we had water!

Wow! Week 1 of school has flown by already and only 9 more weeks until the holidays. Not that I’m counting already. The kids in the class have certainly settled and by Friday were not shy at all. I remember starting last year as the new teacher at the school. The students were so quiet and shy that whenever we played my ‘getting to know you’ games I could almost hear crickets! Not this bunch.

Blowing our nose

This week was full of rules, routines and getting to know you activities. There were many rehearsals of walking around the class, sitting on the mat, sitting at our desks, staying in our seat, walking to the tuckshop and how to use our pencils, rubbers and glue (with only 1 glue stick fatality). Phew!

Washing our hands

Walking to the tuckshop

My favourite getting to know you activity was the silly self-portraits we made and hung in the room. We wrote things about ourselves and stuck that page on the body then attached the head, legs and arms. Mine shows such a resemblance don’t you think? I got this idea from Pinterest by Kallangur State School

The kids had messy fun with this one. Legs, arms, bodies, heads, scissors and glue everywhere! I’ve made a template to use for this activity that you can find here or in my Freebies page.

Miss Hayley's Silly Self-Portrait

The student's self-portraits

This one is missing a leg!

We made a friendship fruit salad on Friday after reading the book I’m the Best by Lucy Cousins.  I can’t claim this idea as my own either I got it from Crazy For First Grade

After reading the book we talked about how the animals were feeling and why. Then we came up with a list of what makes a good friend. I told the students each ingredient (or spoon full of fruit salad mix) was one of those things that made a great friend. After putting it all into a bowl and mixing I got out a pear that I had fun throwing around my kitchen 2 days before! It was bruised, brown and it was smelly. We talked about words to describe the pear: rotten, stinky, yucky, bad. Next we talked about the rotten pear being like a rotten friend, someone who doesn’t do the nice things that we put in our friendship fruit salad. I asked if we thought the rotten pear should be in our fruit salad and the class voted NO. So it was chucked in the bin. Of course we ate the friendship fruit salad and the kids loved it. I wish I had a camera with me at that time especially when I pulled out the rotten pear. Now when the students aren’t being ‘a good friend or class member’ we talk about being a ‘rotten pear’ and the friendship fruit salad.

I’m not sure about everyone else but Friday night I was exhausted and couldn’t move off the couch. I hope all the teachers out there had a great first week back.

Had to share this one. My Teacher Aide captured me explaining how to use the glue stick properly. Nice facial expressions :) 

Some more good news: our Internet is back on at school and I can now print! The classroom has been almost complete for a week but now I have no excuses I can finish printing my displays and proper labels. Stay tuned for photos of the finished (is it ever finished?) product.

If you would like regular updates don’t forget to subscribe.

First Day Fun

The first day of school for 2014 has come and gone and I have survived!  There were only a few set backs such as no school internet, a huge water leak in the class drowning some student books, no water at school with kids sent home at lunch time and a lingering tummy bug from yesterday but we remained positive. Who needs the internet in class anyway? The books can be replaced. A half day eased us all into the school year and I am feeling 100% better this afternoon.

With my blog finished over the weekend thanks to the amazing Rebekah Louise Designs (check out her wonderful work here) I thought there was no better time to write my first blog post than the first day of school.

This year I have Grade 1 and 2 and my goodness haven’t they grown from last year. The year 2s in my class had me last year for year 1 and are so proud to be the “big year 2 kids” and show the year 1s the ropes. The year 1 students made the transition from prep (kindergarten) and loved to get to know how things work in our class. They didn’t even seem to notice the lack of playtime!

The half day meant that not everything in my planning got done, but the rest of the week will now be even busier.

 

Success Wall

I thought I’d share some pics of one of our class data walls or as we like to call it our success wall. In our class we have four success walls where we share our achievements and use them to set individual goals. This year I decided to have:

* a beach/sea theme for our Superstars of the Sea classroom behaviour management/points system

*  a map of the islands for our Sight Words wall where each student has a little boat travelling around the islands

* a ladder for our reading levels with the students photo moving up the ladder

* a monster maths race for number goals with monster characters racing to the finish

These photos show our Success Wall with three of the four data wall displays completed. The monster maths will be added and ready for next week (yes once I get some time to finish it).

Superstars of the Sea Display Chart

The kids loved the Superstars of the Sea display and I wonder why? Rewards! Once each student gets 10 points for following the class rules and displaying appropriate behaviour their sea character moves along the wall and they get to choose a reward. I’ve decided this term to put all of my reward cards into a bag and have the students select one at random. Most of these rewards are free but some such as Prize or popcorn party obviously come with a cost. I’m hoping the random selection might save me some of the money I spent on prizes last year.

My Superstars of the Sea display and table points chart is available from my Teachers Pay Teachers store HERE.

I’m looking forward to the rest of the week and will be sure to add some updates and share what we have done (if there is water at the school!!!!)

Check out my Meet the Teacher page for more info about me and the story behind Teacher Teacher. Don't forget to leave a comment or share your first day stories.