Let them speak Spanish!

I recently compiled the 35+ pages of exercises I have created for my students over the past twelve years for unit 1 of Spanish I into a digital packet.  The packet practices numbers, greetings, calendar, time and school vocabulary.  It is great for reading and writing Spanish.  Use it for tests, in-class worksheets, sub plans, homework, etc.  It is for sale on Teachers Pay Teacher for only $4.50.  Buy it now! If you would prefer to just purchase the activities on greetings or numbers there are smaller packets for $1.50.

Good Investments

Like so many Americans, I'm living in a home that is worth less than the price I paid for it several years ago.  If only I'd known at the time....  That isn't the only area of my life, though, where I've invested more in something than it's worth.  For example, I have invested time in meetings that bore no significant outcomes or new insights.  I have invested money in technology and books for school that have grown legs and walked.  Does any of this sound familiar?

Fortunately, I have made many investments that I thought were worthwhile.  Of them, I've chosen four of my top ones to share.  These are materials I use in my classroom so often, that if the school went up in smoke today, I'd start shopping to replace them tomorrow.

#1-Dry erase boards

My first year of teaching, a colleague suggested I create my own mini white boards for my students.  So, I visited Home Depot and purchased a large melamime board with a white resin coating on one side.  I asked them to cut the sheet into 12" x 12" squares.  I walked out of there with a class set of white boards (35-40) for under $25.  I still have them more than a decade later.  I use them to play games with large classes.  Students break into groups and each group gets a board to write their answers to jeopardy questions on.  I also use them with smaller groups.  I give every student a board and have them do their work for the day on the board.  They enjoy doing it and it allows me to see very quickly whether or not they understand.

#2-Post it notes

This may sound a bit mundane, but I use them all the time.  Students use them to mark up texts, to create quick dividers in their notebooks, or for quick informal assessments.  If there are five minutes left in class, I'll pass out post it notes and have students answer a few questions to check for understanding.  I also use them for word sorts (see the blog entry about movement in the classroom).


#3-Classroom library

There is rarely a day that goes by that my students are checking out books from the classroom library.  Besides technology, this is probably the most valuable thing in my classroom--collectively, of course.  I save money by going to thrift stores, library book sales, or checking out websites like BookSource and Townsend Press.  (My students especially like the Bluford series--$1 books written at the middle school level about high school students).


#4-A timer

If you have access to the internet or a phone with a timer in your room, then you don't need to invest in a separate one.  But, I am always timing my students.  I've found that time limits help them stay focused on a daily basis.  I've also used them with timed reading activities to help my students learn to read faster.

New Spring Lessons and Centers

Spring has arrived and while I am enjoying the weather I know my students are more antsy to get moving and get outside! To help your students stay focused on academics while still thinking about spring I created several spring themed lessons and centers for you to enjoy!

My Spring Literacy Centers has six literacy centers to use in your classroom for spring. Centers focus on prefixes, suffixes, synonyms, antonyms, and more! They are perfect for grades 3-6.

My Spring Math Centers packet contains 10 math centers with a fun spring theme. Math worksheets focus on skills such as multiplication, division, rounding, simple decimals, money, addition, subtraction, and place value. Also available for grades 3-6.

If you have students that finish assignments early my Spring Fast Finishers Art Packet is the right tool for the job! The packet contains 22 pages of spring themed printable art worksheets to inspire their creativity.

These three packets are each sold separately or also together at a discounted rate. Enjoy!

Giveaway Congratulations!

Congratulations to MamaHen who won her choice of two free products from our TPT stores! I will be contacting you with the details.

Fabulous Friday Freebies

Here is today's edition of Fabulous Friday Freebies! I have gathered some fun freebies you can use in a variety of classroom settings and subject areas.

First, I would like to highlight this free PowerPoint games template website. They have a great collection of PowerPoint game templates that you can adapt to any subject area! Since the templates are already made, they save a lot of time since you can just type in the information needed for your own classroom.

Next up is a fantastic Manda PowerPoint. Mandalas can be used for many subject areas such as math to teach symmetry and balance, art, and more. You can even create a science mandala by drawing the life cycle of an animal or plant in a mandala design.

Lastly, is my free Andy Warhol Style Hand Print Lesson. This lesson contains everything you need, except the art materials, for this lesson. Examples of Warhol style paintings are also included. This is a great lesson to help students learn about making patterns and printmaking.

I hope you enjoyed this edition of fabulous freebies!

Take a virtual trip to New Zealand

Wouldn't it be nice to start your summer vacation early...or even just wrap up the year with a fun, educational project?  One of the best vacations I've ever taken was a one month jaunt to New Zealand, during which I traveled from the upper most tip of the northern island to the bottom most tip of the southern island.  To share highlights of the trip, I put the best of the 1,000+ snapshots taken into a book.  I also turned them into a narrated film for students. 

So, here is a suggestion that combines some of our best tips into one idea: Use technology, give them choices, and have them work on a fun research project.  They can either research a place their family is going to visit over the summer, research a place they'd like to go someday or research places that you are studying (for example, I remember studying the 50 states in 4th grade and the whole world in 8th & 11th grade).  Then have the whole class share their videos and go on a virtual vacation around the country...or world.  Turn it into a special day where students kick back, while sharing what they learned about someplace new via a cool digital story they created.

I like to use the movie maker on Mac at home and Windows at school.  I've found they are both easy to use for an end user such as myself (someone who doesn't know much beyond what is right in front of her face when it comes to technology).  If you want a quick tutorial there are online articles. If you want to create a quick rubric, click here.  If you want an example, but don't want to create your own, go to my store and check out my New Zealand film.  I've reduced the price by 50% (only $1.50) for the next week only!

Have fun!  The summer will be here before you know it!

The Cool Classroom

Sometimes students seem to think that teachers live in the school and that all we do in our free time is grade papers and plan ways to torture our them (a.k.a. making our lesson plans). Now, while that sometimes might be true, it is nice to surprise them now and again by bringing things that they consider cool into the classroom and remind them that you know about these things as well. And, I have found that 'cool' lesson plans are one of the best ways to engage hard to reach students. Here are some of my favorite 'cool' lesson plans:

1. Anything comic related - Students love comics and comics are usually a big hit when I use that as a topic for a lesson. You can use comics for a variety of subjects. Use them in art by having students design a comic or create a Roy Lichtenstein style comic. Use them in English by having students write dialogue between characters. Teach inferences by cutting the comics into sections and having students try and figure out what order the comics go in. Create political comics in social studies or view political comics in class.

2. Tattoos, tattoos - The Maori people of New Zealand are known for their striking facial tattoos. I have had students draw a self portrait and then design facial tattoos onto their face in a Maori style. The picture above is an example I made. The project was a hit and one of my student's portraits even won an award in an art contest. Check out my lesson plan for this project. For social studies, you could check out the history of tattooing or check out how the Maori used tattoos.

3. Rapping & Music - Bringing music and raps into your lesson plans are a great way to engage auditory learners. You can find many lessons turned into song or rap or students could write a song or rap with a particular theme. One of my favorite ways of bringing music into the classroom is having students read poems by Tupac, as mentioned in this post. Tupac dedicated a poem to Vincent van Gogh which could be analyzed, compared to his artwork, or compare and contrast the lives of the two artists.

Please feel free to share a way you make it cool in your classroom.