Five For Friday-Hitting the Ground Running!

Well folks its that time of the week again. This week definitely flew by! There was lots of incredible learning that took place and I can't wait to share it with you!

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First I'll start on a personal note. Not sure if I've mentioned this previously, but the Hubs and I are die hard Green Bay Packer fans.

He is from Wisconsin, so naturally its in his blood. I didn't really care about sports until I met him, but I have to say football has grown on me and now I am a packer fan through and through. 

We were SO excited on Sunday when the Packers beat the Jets!

    GO PACK GO!!!

This was us at Lambeau a few years ago! Needless to say, our love for them is a little more than a hobby-It's more like a lifestyle. 

Okay on to the school stuff:

Have You Filled a Bucket Today?

 Okay, so I know I have already posted this picture, but come on, how cute are this little buckets???

I taught this lesson on Tuesday for our Elementary chapel 
(1st-5th grade students) and man was it a HIT!
It is always a great lesson to teach at the beginning of the year. I like to establish an atmosphere of kindness and sharing so everyone feels safe and happy to come to school.

Get your copy HERE

 All I have to say is THANK GOD for pinterest and the teacher resources that can be found on it!
I realized Tuesday morning that I was in charge of teaching the lesson for chapel to 35 little ones and I had to come up with something in a quick minute!

A big thanks to: Stephanie at 3rd grade thoughts for her amazing bucket filling inspiration. She got her idea from Cara Carroll at The First Grade Parade another one of my favorite bloggers who created a Peacemakers/Peacebreakers anchor chart. I loved their ideas so much, I decided to use both!

You can download the bucket filler labels for free right Here
And the peacemakers/breakers labels from First Grade Fanatics Here

We wrapped up our lesson by cheering this chant which I downloaded courtesy of Gradeonederful

Our Solar System Schema is Out of This World!

Check out these AMAZING solar system drawings my kiddos completed in art. I found the free project on TPT thanks to Lesson Fantastic

  This gem is an excerpt from an AMAZING solar system unit I picked up on TPT that is helping me teach my kids all the important facts. Check it out

 Solar System Interactive Notebook Unit

Okay so I know these notes are a bit sloppy, but I just had to share the amazing acronym we learned about to help us learn the order of the planets: My Very Energetic Mother Just Served Us Noodles

      Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune

We obtained all our initial info from this book! I would highly recommend it, not to much information and wonderful pictures!

Get yourself a copy HERE

Thank Heavens For Laminated Labels!!

So, I think I mentioned my husband is also a teacher and this year his job description shifted from high school Spanish/Algebra teacher to Lead teacher of our (ENTIRE) middle school department (6th-8th grades).

Needless to say, its been a big learning curve. The teacher who retired at the end of last year (after 20 years of service) was an amazing master teacher. She was so inspiring and myself and my coworkers aspire to be like her someday (she had her lesson plans finished 6 weeks ahead of time). 

One classroom procedure that was in place from last year was the assignments board. But after three weeks of students complaining about not being able to keep track of all their assignments, we thought maybe we needed a fresh approach.

I'm not gonna lie, this board looks kinda like a hot mess :( sorry babe.

Check out our new masterpiece!

I can't help but thinking laminated labels always make things better. Deep breath, ahhh! Feels good to get organized!

Gotta Love Effective Communication!

A unique part of my schedule this year is that I teach kindergarten/first grade in the morning and then I teach 1st-3rd grade in the afternoon. 

My kinders get picked up after lunch and since I am already teaching my new group, I haven't been able to touch base/communicate with parents. 

I wanted to make sure they had an effective way to pass info along to me as well as drop off forms and check if they had any outstanding items that still needed to be turned in.

The clipboard has a checklist with each child's name and a list of all the things that need to be come back to school.

The bin is designed for forms and other important things parents want passed along to me. 

I know this drawing is a little rough, but after I drew it for my kiddos, I realized I loved the idea of having a picture clue next to each day to help us remember what's coming up.

As you can see next week is gonna be JAM PACKED!!!!

So to sum it all up- We are happy, healthy and a whole lot of tired over here and I think my hubby and I will be celebrating the end of a long school week with a big glass of vino! :)

Have a fabulous weekend everyone!

~Abbie~

Terrible Tuesday/Wonderful Wednesday

Well, what can I say? I guess it has been one of those weeks. Yesterday was especially hard…. Some days are better than others :/
I knew I would need a little extra energy (and patience) this morning, so I decided to take the plunge and try out a new juicing recipe.
Friends have recommended juicing for the past 2 years but I was never brave enough to move from solid food to liquid.
What can I say?? I get hungry a lot, I mean A LOT! And I LOVE food, so its not something I have been willing to part with easily. But for now, I finally decided to break down and try this whole juicing thing purely because it is supposed to give me "more energy".

The Concensus: Not bad actually! AND I did have more energy! HA! Who knew all those crazy health nuts were right?? I will be trying more recipes.

I'll let you know how it goes :)

On a happier note, I have to say I've got some AMAZING co-workers! They knew that yesterday was a challenge and when I came into my classroom this morning (after getting coffee from the staff room) look what was waiting for me:

So the coffee cup is mine, but how sweet was it for my fellow teaching buddies to bless me with liquid love???? I was completely overwhelmed and of course it automatically turned today into an AMAZING DAY!

Gotta love it! That is usually how things work, very hard day followed by great day where friends are awesome and the students are angels! I think that's what makes the job worth it. Thank God for the balance of stress with calm. It would be much harder if every day was a struggle. I'm so thankful those days are rare. 

And just to add a little educational plug into this post, my favorite find of the day: Abby Mullens over at The Inspired Apple just posted the most AMAZING freebie.

For a Christian school teacher, this was a Godsend!

Say hello to our September memory verse! And it totally fits into our apple theme! Woohoo and Thank ya Jesus!

Well that's a wrap folks.

I hope you had a wonderful Wednesday! 

Be sure to check back in for my Five for Friday.

Toodaloo! 

Five for Friday TGIF!!

Five For Friday with Doodle Bugs Teaching

I hope you all had an amazing week. We were very busy, but we got so much accomplished and I can't believe how much I've seen my kindergarteners grow in just TWO WEEKS!!
They are already learning how to be kind, considerate, patient and loving. I am thoroughly loving all the learning and growth that is taking place.

So to kick things off this Friday here's my first highlight of the week!

 

I don't know if any of you are as OBSESSED with pumpkins as I am, but let me tell ya- I might have a problem! I start thinking about fall and pumpkins in March and April and it gets me excited and gives me the little UMPH I need to push through to the end of the school year- a little crazy but it works for me :)

I got a flyer in the mail for NOAH's pumpkin bagels and I almost had a conniption fit! I NEED TO GET SOME!

I also celebrated our first chilly morning (its starting to feel like fall) we've had by picking up a pumpkin spice latte- Can I say Bliss???

 I saw this super cute idea on Pinterest, and thought it would be an awesome way to get my kiddos excited about learning. We are filling it in halfway- each day we are reading and adding on an extra minute. They have been doing SO well! I'm very pleased!

  

Since my group of kinders is pretty young this year, I thought it might be better to ease them into partner reading. This week we got to wear reading "glasses" and pick a "partner" (stuffed animal) who we can read the pictures with.

        We are quite the typing experts! 5 years ago I discovered the joy that is bbc typing and ever since I have taught my kindergarteners to use it. By the end of the school year they are able to type independently and feel so proud of themselves!

Check it out here:

Dance Mat Typing for kids!

 This week in science we talked all about germs. How they spread and how we can prevent them from spreading. We started our conversation by testing out what will happen when bread is touched by dirty hands. The bag labeled "dirty hands" has bread that was touched by every student. The "clean hands" bag has bread only touched by a few students with clean hands. The "control" bag has bread that was not touched. We are still waiting to see what will happen.

I found some amazing videos which helped make our learning more meaningful. The students especially enjoyed this treasure:

Don't Infect! Protect!

 

By the way, I am LOVING these Interactive Social Studies Journals (K-2) by Primary Graffiti

Interactive Journals K-2

I have enough material to cover all the units we will be studying this year! HALLELUJAH!!!

We kicked off our solar system unit yesterday. Take a look at this AMAZING mobile a student asked if they could bring in and share! I think it will make our study so engaging and exciting!

HAVE A FABULOUS WEEKEND!!!!

Thank God Its Friday!!

Five for Friday (a little late) oops!

I'm gonna try something new that's pretty popular in the blogging world. Here is my Five for Friday. 

I meant to post it yesterday, but let's be honest- at the end of the first week of school I (ridiculously) thought it would be a good idea to go home and make lasagna (from scratch) and after slaving away for 2 hours I promptly ate dinner with the hubs and then passed out on the couch at about 7:30pm. NO JOKE! 

That's a teacher's life for ya folks. After the school week ends, its pretty near impossible to stay awake like normal people.

So excuse my tardiness, and let's just pretend it's Friday and I'm posting this yesterday :)

#1  Fun New Clips This Year.

I absolutely love how my students clips turned out this year. I found these stickers at walmart and think they add a little something special. 

#2  I can't get enough of these new nails!

A friend of mine gave me a sample sheet of Jamberry Nail Designs and can you see how cute the chevron pattern is??? I couldn't possibly paint that in a million years and now all I have to do is stick a pre made pattern on my nails. So easy and so cute!!

#3 What Do Scientists Do?

This week we talked about the scientific method. We discussed what scientists look like and what they do.

Aren't these cards so cute! A big thank you to Deanna Jump for sharing these! You can download them for free right HERE

I read the book Meet Einstein and my students absolutely LOVED it!

I also had the kids draw themselves as crazy scientists. Look at how cute their pictures are!

 

#4 Selfies Galore!!
My coworker (she teaches 4th/5th grade) found the cutest template for student selfies!
She picked it up on TPT  HERE

#5  A Fun First Day Gift!

After what had to be the longest first day of school for both me and my hubby, he did the sweetest thing! He brought home flowers for me! He always brings me flowers on the first day (its a tradition).

I'm so grateful for this man and his incredible support!

And on that note I hope you all have a fabulous weekend!!

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