More New Years and Exciting News

We took the opportunity to start off the New Year with some reflective writing. I introduced the concept of resolutions and of course they all spilled the beans about their parents' resolutions to lose ten pounds or start going to the gym (I wonder if their parents REALLY know how much dirt they spill to us!). We also brainstormed a list of more appropriate resolutions for kids... keeping room clean, following directions, getting along with siblings.

*These little guys are all over pinterest and blog land, but I just added one detail. I felt it was important for the kids to recognize how much growth they have already made this year, so we made a separate paper for celebrations in the shape of a balloon. I talked myself blue in the face about this kind of celebration as opposed to birthday celebrations, but I still got some misconceptions. For the most part my kids talked about their reading and writing skills or a new athletic achievement. I very impressed with their final products!

 I hope that this will be helpful for you lucky dogs who haven't gone back to school yet :). If you would like these templates, click on the picture below!

Goodness-- I almost forgot my exciting news.  A while back I got an email from a company called Booksource. They asked if they could share a link to my blog in their newsletter that is emailed out once a month because they liked the pictures of my classroom library. Holy Cow, I was excited so of course I said they could (apparently they also tweeted it but I'm going to sound like a grandma here and say that I am not really all that sure what that means :) ). Well I got another email a few days ago asking me to write an article for their February issue! Of course I will share the link with you all, along with all my family members, when it comes out. If you haven't ever checked them out, you definitely should head over to Booksource right now.  Have a great evening and thanks for listening to me babble!