October Easy Prep Ideas

Besides Rooted in Reading, my Busy Teacher packets are always what people thank me for when I get to meet readers in person. This weekend one of my friends shared with me that she used my unit to get her Sub Tub ready and how good it made her feel to be prepared if her little one was to get sick.  I have used Busy Teachers as morning work, homework, sub plans, OR just that "one more" activity that I needed. 

I decided to give you a closer look into my October Busy Teacher Units!

Race to the Top is such a fun way to practice math fluency.  I would turn on KidzBop to drown out the sound of the dice hitting the desk and watched my kids have fun as they worked!

Cara from The First Grade Parade shared about these tiny spiders on Instagram.  I found them in the party section at Walmart and they were called "Spider Confetti."  They would be a great manipulative to children that were not secure with mentally calculating the subtraction problems on the above page. 

Oh goodness, my kiddos love a spinner game!  I felt like this is an incredibly difficult skill for 2nd graders, especially when crossing over that 100 threshold.  Obviously the stronger their number sense, the more confident they will feel with this exercise.  To differentiate, try providing whiteboards or place value blocks for struggling students.

"Expanded Form" is a term that I always circle back to over and over again.  We want to make sure that skill is strong before the end of the year!

I don't know what it is about Compound words, but I just love teaching them.  This exercise is a great way to not only reinforce the concept of a compound word, but to also see who is hearing all the way through multiple syllable words. 

My second graders were pretty secure with syllables, but there is nothing wrong with a little extra practice to make sure!  This is a relatively quick activity so it could be used for an assessment piece.  I also LOVE the check off boxes at the bottom that require students to assess their own writing. 

My Read it! Draw it! exercises are a great way to check comprehension.  I also love giving kids an opportunity to draw.

In every Busy Teacher packet, I provided writing pages for popular themes in that month.  This paper asked students to explain how to carve a pumpkin.  A little tip- have students highlight or circle the Time Order words to show their understanding of using them!

This last sheet might be one of my favorites in the pack.  I love the open-endedness of letting the students decided where the "story" is going.  I was also talking with Emmie's teacher about how important it is for second graders to work on complete, thoughtful sentences.  They also need to work on a variety of sentence structures.

If this is something you are interested in, click on any of the units before to find my October Busy Teachers. 

1

B2S Units and Pictures Galore

Welcome back to Christmas in July 2016 :) 

Today's sale focuses on all things Back to School.  You will find Rooted in Reading (August and September), my Superhero Students unit, all three of my Busy Teachers, my Helper Cards and my Ready or Not Centers (for both first and second grade) on SALE today only!

In this blog post I will try to highlight a couple of these units!

Just in case you are wanting to get a head start on your Reading plans for the school year, Amy and I have August and September ready to go!!!  The rest of the units will be on sale tomorrow in case you are wondering! And yes, that includes the bundle!

For the last three years, my students and I have loved using my Superhero Students unit.  I tried rounding up a few pictures to show you, but believe it or not they are few and far between!  Apparently when I get excited, like on the first day of school, I am really bad at taking pictures!

Here are my kids last year working on getting to know each other.  I used a Kagan structure of Stand up Hand up Pair up to help the kids move around the room and learn a little bit about their classmates!

Setting the mood for your first week back is so important and SO much more than just a packet of printable!  Here are a few decor options to help you set the tone for your first week! My families have loved my door and hallway display.  The red door was last year and the blue was two years ago.

This is the display I had up outside my classroom by our makeshift bulletin board.  I LOVED this display and it made a great spot for those paparazzi moms to take photos of their kids!

 Something else I did my last three years of teaching was have a classroom binder!  I know many of you know about binder systems.  My students took the binder back and forth from home every day.  I will have five sections: Our Classroom, Spelling, Homework, Math, and Reading.  Here is a picture of the cover for the binders.  I included this cover in a free resource that I will link below!

Here are my binders ready to go on the first day of school!!!

I also included these little half sheet notes to send home on the first day of school!

Click below to download!

Last but not least, here are my posters that I do with my kids.  I really, really don't like having a list of rules in my room that start with "do not" instead I like to focus on characteristics that I want my students to display!  These posters are the perfect way to do that!

You can snag all of this for four dollars only today! Click on the picture below!

If you head to my TPT store....you can snag this little paper below from downloading my preview!

Here is just a quick peek at the other units on sale today too!

My job chart we a HUGE help the last two years!

This next unit is my Back to School Centers (red will get you to the second grade ones and green to first grade): 

Here are some photos of these centers in action:

And last but not least, all three grade levels of Busy Teachers are on Sale for Back to School!

Just in case you are wondering what to expect the rest of the week! 

0

Book Review with Emmie: Maple

If you follow me on Instagram, then you probably know that I am slightly obsessed with taking the kids to Barnes and Noble  for a "treat."  Okay-it's a treat for Mrs. King too :) BUT every once in a while my husband will gently remind me of this thing called the public library. So last week Emmie, Smith, and I did a speed visit.  Don't know what a speed visit is? Take a newborn into any quiet place and you will quickly learn! 

One of the books I found was this precious book: Maple!

I am in a very exciting position at school where Nash and Emmie will be in 2nd grade and 1st grade which means we will all three be on the same hall.  Emmie can't even stand her excitement for being a big first grader so I though I would use her help on this blog post!  First of all I just want to brag on Nash and Emmie's kindergarten teacher (they had the same one because we adored her so much!).  Never once did either of them feel the pressure that our school systems are putting on our young kindergartners.  Their teacher kept learning FUN and EXCITING and they both adore learning.  I am so impressed by the language they use when talking about books.  They make connections and predictions. They even critique the writing and illustrations! ha!

I am going to first tell you how I am going to be using this book in my classroom and then I am going to let Emmie take over. As a writing workshop teacher, every time I read a book I think about how I can use a book to show my students how to be authors. I will be using this book very early on in the year during our Narratives unit.  My favorite way to "use" a book for Writers Workshop is to read my students the book say at the end of the day and then refer back to it during my mini lesson the next day (actually throughout the rest of the year we will learn from it). My focus for my mini lesson with this book would be the actual structure of the story.  

 Maple starts out with a wonderful life...just her and her tree!

Then like all narratives, there is some kind of problem/struggle/conflict. 

Maple's struggle is one that many first and second graders can relate to- a new baby!

Then Maple learns to share something she loves with her new baby sister.  The sharing just happens to lead to a solution in her problem! 

I think the bare bones structure of the story will allow my second graders to analyze and implement the structure in their own writing!

Now- what Emmie has to say!!!

"I give this book 5 out of 5 apples, because Maple has a baby just like I do!  I think Maple and her sister will grow up to be good friends. I think the tree is pretty too!"

"This is my favorite part!"

I wasn't allowed to share the picture with you...seems I have a bit of a perfectionist on my hands!  

Hopefully Emmie and I will find some more great books to share with you soon.  This one is definitely finding a place on my classroom shelf. 

This printable can be found in my Busy Teacher Back to School Pack! 

7