Gingerbread Week Day 1

It's Gingerbread Week in our classroom, yippee!

Unfortunately, I don't have a lot of extra time to do bunches and bunches of gingerbread lessons and cute craftivities. We aren't doing an anthology story this week, so I can use that time. For anything else, I'm trying to integrate the best I can.

For instance, we integrated gingerbread into our math lesson today. We've been working on fact families, so I figured we could make gingerbread houses with fact families written on them. I lucked out and noticed that Mrs. Hodson from Today in First Grade ... had a great fact family house freebie! One less thing to do for me. Gotta love that!

I copied her house onto brown construction paper. It was a lighter shade of brown and they looked fabulous. Next, I knew I wanted to add candies to the houses, but I hadn't made up my mind on how we would do it. So, I decided to check out Jan Brett's website because I knew it is full of great pictures and ideas.

Lo and behold, I found exactly what I wanted. Not only did she have candies for our houses, but she also had these super adorable gingerbread friends!

Click {here} to go to the Jan Brett Gingerbread Friends page.

Here's how our Gingerbread Village turned out. I had one little cutie still out sick so you'll notice a spot left for her.

The kids were so proud of themselves! {me too!}

Later in the afternoon, we read the Gingerbread Man. I asked if anyone remembered the story of the Gingerbread Man. They told me what they remembered {which was pretty good} and we went over the GIANT Anchor Chart we were going to complete as we read the different gingerbread stories this week. Got this from Deanna Jump's Gingerbread Unit. It's super cute, go get it now!

I reminded them that as I read the story they had a job to do. They needed to recall the characters, refrain, and ending of the story so we could put it on the chart. I read the story to them and they loved it, of course.

The kids gave me the answers for the anchor chart and I added them on.

Afterwards, I read Deanna Jump's Gingerbread story to the class. It is short and sweet and the kids loved the rhyming. Then, I showed them our big ole pocket chart with the same story all mixed up. We worked on ways to put the story back in order. They SO wanted to look at the book to help them figure it out. I told them we would look at the book after we tried to sequence it on our own. They didn't like that answer, ha!

Alas, they did it {without the book!}

One of my kids asked me to take a picture of it. I guess they are really used to me taking pictures of them by now. They want to document everything!

Here you go, buddy!

Can't wait for Day 2 fun tomorrow!

Week in Review

Oh, wow! Have your kids been nut-so lately or is it just me?

Everyone is either sick, getting sick, or getting over being sick. Even I got sick! There's just not enough Lysol in the world to keep these germs at bay. On Friday, I only had 13 kids in class. Five of them were still hacking and sneezing. Which makes for some pretty whiny kiddos.

Anyway, we really didn't get a lot accomplished due to testing and illness. Or, at least, as much as I wanted to do. Oh well, there's always next year...

Here's some of the activities we did get to:

Amy at Step into 2nd Grade with Mrs. Lemons posted this great lesson about Reindeers and Caribou. It was AWESOME! I learned so much about caribou. We didn't get to all of the activities but we did have fun doing the research together! Click on her link to view the lesson. She has a wonderful blog - very generous!!

She wants a cell phone! Who is she going to call??

She wants a new jacket. So sweet!

Antonio wants an elf to be his brother. Cute!

Lindsay at Teacher Bits and Bobs had these cutie-pie Santas and I fell in love! The kids loved coming up with items to put on our list for Santa. We generated the list together on chart paper and then the kids filled out their letters on their own. The next day, we made our Santas. Let me tell you, this not using tracers thing is fun. There were just two students who really couldn't figure it out. Poor guys! Their Santas were all backwards. I had to intervene! Click on the link above to view the beautiful art and letter.

That's about it for now. This coming week it's all about the Gingerbread! Yippee!

I love this week! No basal story. :) Only, too bad for me because we also have school the following week as well. BOO!

Opie, our class elf, wishes you a happy week!

Sunshine Award 2011

Once again, I'd like to thank Sara at Smiling in Second Grade, Patricia at Primary Practice, Jess at Rambling About Reading, and Haylee at Following Optimism for giving me the Sunshine Award. It is fabulous of y'all to think of my little ole blog so highly. The teacher blogging community is so welcoming and genuine. Reading your blogs and receiving positive comments from all of you has been a highlight of my year 2011!

Now on to the award responsibilities:

1. Thank the person who gave this award and write a post about it.

2. Answer the following questions below.

3. Pass the award to 10-12 fabulous bloggers, link their blogs, and let them know you awarded them.

Q and A:

1. Favorite Color?

Blue and Green {and I do have a soft spot for pink}

2. Favorite Animal?

So hard, I love most mammals. 

Let me repeat that - I love most mammals. 

NOT reptiles

NOT fish

NOT birds

 MAMMALS. 

Some that are on the top of my list are cats (all kinds), elephants, and giraffes.

3. Favorite Number?

I guess it depends on the day.

3

7

13

4. Favorite drink?

If you haven't already gathered that I am quite indecisive.

I love water, Diet Mountain Dew, orange juice, rum, and tequila!

I used to love beer until I couldn't drink it anymore. {sad}

5. Facebook or Twitter?

Twitter, I guess.

Can I say BLOGGER?

I got rid of my Facebook account this year.

It is too much work to read through the posts of people I'm not really interested in {but can't delete because I see them around town.} Also, you can totally tell which people are lying about what is going on in their life. And, of course, everyone's life on Facebook is wonderful! They have perfect husbands, children, friends, jobs, etc. GAG ME! Over it.

6. Passion?

Teaching is my number one passion.

7. Giving or Getting Presents?

Oh, I'm a giver! I am always on the look out for cool gifts for my friends and loved ones. My only problem is I have the hardest time waiting to give my gifts. I want to give them their gift RIGHT AWAY!

8. Favorite Day?

My special day, of course, my birthday! The best day of the year :)

Now, I'm passing this award on to the following blogs:

The Silver Lining

BEE the Change

Blooming Into First Grade

Booky4First

Busy Bees

Carried Away in K

ChalkTalk: A K. Blog

KinderGals

Teacher Bits and Bobs

Rambling About Reading

The Teacher's Cauldron

Thank you so much for this award!

Oh and by the way, I am so happy to say that I was a drill sergeant today and was able to get 12 of my students FAIR tested by 11:30am this morning. I've never tested that many students in such a short amount of time. I have 6 more to go. Not too bad. Of course only because I was forced to get it done this quickly. Ideally, I would have administered it much differently {Especially since about 5 or 6 of my students have the worst colds. You know that affects their fluency score!}

Well, laundry is calling... Happy a great Hump Day!

Piranha 3D

So, okay, I am going to apologize right now because this post is going to be a random hot mess! I am sorry...really...sorry! Now on with the craziness:

1. You know how there is the Land Shark that goes around eating people? He tries to fool us by disguising himself as a pizza delivery guy, candy-gram delivery person, or a repairman. Then, if you fall for his clever ploy and allow him entry into your house he will eat you where you stand. Yep, that's the LandShark. You better believe it.

The LandShark is a nuisance and can be very dangerous if you are not careful. Beware!

Well, I haven't had to deal with the LandShark, thank goodness {but don't think I'm not keeping an eye out for you LandShark!}  HOWEVER, I have been visited by the LandPiranha! He may look cute and very similar to my little sweetie Gus, but don't let his looks fool you. This guy is all teeth and is out to destroy your stuff!!!!

He has chewed through 3 sets of iPod buds, 2 computer power cords, 1 Wii power cord, 2  phone adapters and recently {and most notably} 1 computer modem.

This little darling has a fixation for skinny cords. I think I may have to wrap them all with electrical tape. I yell at him, spray him with water, put pepper/apple bitter on the cords and he still comes back for more. Arg!

Alas, this LandPiranha is my baby and I will be a good pet owner and train him to chew on his toys and not our stuff. Honestly, I'm shocked he hasn't gotten electrocuted, yet!

I have been without the internet for 5 days! What a pain in the neck, y'all. NO paying bills. NO checking e-mails. NO Christmas shopping. AND, NO blogging!

It's one thing to not post or read my blogs because of being super busy, but it is quite another to not do this because you just CAN'T!

Plus, getting a new cord was such an ordeal. Lesson learned: the people that work at our local Radio Shacks are morons. Hopefully, we won't have to go back there again or any time soon.

If any of y'all have LandPiranhas in your home, I feel for ya!

2. Now, wouldn't you believe it but my teacher workstation (MY COMPUTER) died on Friday!??! It is messed up so badly that the tech people have called for more tech people to check it out because they haven't seen anything like what I have. Great! They don't know how long it is going to be before they can fix it or replace my workstation. Nice! One long vacation please!

3. I want to give a huge THANK YOU to Sara at Smiling in Second Grade, Patricia at Primary Practice, Jess at Rambling About Reading, and Haylee at Following Optimism for giving me the Sunshine Award. I love it, love it, love it, LOVE IT!

I will post more about this award and all of the goodies that go along with it tomorrow after Scott and I's last Merengue dance class. {sad} We have had such a blast learning how to dance with each other. I always want to dance with Scott and he never wants to dance with me. Well, it turns out, he was too embarrassed to dance in front of others. Not anymore, thanks to ballroom dance lessons!  Now, wherever we go and as long as the DJ only plays Latin music, we are SET in the dancing department. If the DJ plays any other type of music, we're screwed! Haha! After Christmas Break, we will learn the West Coast {whatever that is...} and broaden our dancing spectrum.

4. If you are a Florida teacher then you are probably familiar with the FAIR test. If you are not from Florida, the FAIR test is a reading assessment that takes F-O-R-E-V-E-R to administer for K-2 teachers. It covers most components of reading and is designed to show what a student can or can't do in terms of reading ability. K-2 teachers have to administer the test individually to all students. In the past, the teachers at my school have been given the professional courtesy to administer this assessment whenever we can get to it within the testing window (which is about 6 weeks long.) Last week, my grade level was informed that we were to double up our classes and administer the test this week. I have NEVER wanted to give this assessment before Christmas. And I have never completed testing all of my class in two days. I want my kids to do well and right now they are in an elf and Santa fog. The last thing on their minds is their reading ability. I'm pretty bummed about this. I hope my results don't stink too bad! Plus, I had to come up with 14 stations for my class and my teammates class.

Having to prepare stations makes me soooooooo grateful that I decided to teach using the DAILY 5.  Color printing, cutting, laminating, cutting again, making copies, and storing these stations has been a major chore. My teammate tested her kids today while I taught 30 kids in my classroom. They were having fun and being productive, but it was so loud. Two hours later and I was exhausted. Now, I am also grateful that we have class size here in Florida. My first four years of teaching were in fourth grade and I had 30 students in my classes. It wasn't fun, but I did it. Grading all of their work was a nightmare. I never stopped grading. Then, I moved down to first grade and the Class Size bill was passed. Thank God!

Well, that's enough randomness. I hope I haven't bored y'all to death. Oh, and THANK YOU to everyone who made me feel better about my ridiculous boxtops cutting habit. While I was meticulously cutting them out, I was thinking about how anal I was being but I couldn't get myself to stop. Oh well, I guess I can't give up all of my bad habits!

It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like Christmas

I'm beginning to panic. I have this feeling that the Christmas Season is just going to fly by and I'm not going to get in all that I want to do. I don't know why I'm feeling this way. I literally know how many days I have to teach before the holiday break, but I can't help this feeling of not having enough time.

I am just going to have to start planning RIGHT NOW and prioritize exactly all of the things that I want to do before my break begins. It seems like I had all of these high hopes for the last two holidays, and I really didn't get to do all of the activities that I planned for. This time, I'm not going to plan as many activities and choose to do things that I can get done with the time I have allotted.

I know what my biggest obstacle is: FUNDATIONS. 

Losing an hour everyday to phonics lessons is killing me. However, I can't do anything about it. Gotta do it. I just need more time!

Today, I went to my classroom (my usual Sunday routine.) I combed through my room trying to find all of my Christmas lessons, books, nick-nacks, and decorations. I found a lot, but I have a feeling there is still another box somewhere. Since I am VERY limited on wall and shelf space, one of my favorite ways to decorate my classroom for the holiday season is to go up!

I DO plan on removing those Thanksgiving charts and tree soon!

It doesn't look like much from this perspective, but you really feel the change when you are in the room. It makes the room feel a bit magical and definitely Christmassy.


I love it so much, I kinda wish my house had ceiling tiles (but not really!)

This is an easy way to decorate your room for the holidays. I purchased garland, cut them up, and attached a pipe cleaner to the end of it. I chose to add silver ball ornaments at the end of the silver garland to make them stand out. 


AND they are easy to store when it isn't the holiday season!
We always need more space to store things.


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Now, on to something completely different.


I need some help. PLEASE make me feel better and tell me that I am normal!

Okay, here I go:

Our school collects Box Tops for Education to get money back into our classrooms. I send home those cute little pages provided by the company where the parents can affix the boxtops and send them back into me. Some parents are great about collecting these tops and usually send in more than the paper will hold and are enclosed in a sandwich baggie. This is awesome and really nice of them to do for our school.

Here's the crazy part: I will sit for about 8-10 minutes (each time) and cut these tops again so they are cut perfectly on the dotted lines.

I really don't consider myself a Type-A personality person OR a control freak, but I feel compelled to do this every time I get a baggie of Tops handed over to me. I even do it at home when my husband doesn't cut them perfectly!!!

This is what I need from SOMEONE out there in blog-world:

 Let me know that y'all do this, too!

Have a great night and I can't wait for tomorrow! Lots of great sales!!!!!

Taking Some Thanks Back

Alrighty folks, I try not to project my snarky side too often, but it can get bad --- REAL BAD. Think Julia Sugarbaker (You know, 'Designing Women.' The TV show from the 80's. Please tell me I'm not aging myself right now!) Okay, for those of you that were born in the later 80's/90's, I'll think of someone you may know from 'Nick at Night' reruns: Claire Huxtable. When I get fired up, y'all better watch out!

So, when I saw that Jennifer, from First Grade Blue Skies, is hosting a Not Thankful Linky Party, I felt compelled to join in.

I'll keep the list to five. Don't want to depress people (or myself.)

1. Hearing and Not Listening

I can't stand it when people (or children) will act like they are listening to me, but then they open their mouth and all of this garbage comes out! Especially, when I'm giving directions. The directions have been told, modeled, practiced, and questioned and then someone will come up to me and ask what to do. Are you kidding me??

2. Not Returning Shopping Carts 

How truly difficult is it to return a shopping cart!!!! Target usually has shopping cart homes all over their parking lots. I am not thankful to hit a cart with my car door because someone couldn't walk the 30 feet it would take them to return it to its home!

3. Not Picking Up Your Feet When You Walk

I am not thankful to hear shuffling. It is SOOOOOO lazy! It sounds like a bunch of cavemen wearing their first ever pair of flip-flops. By the second week of school, my students know to pick up their feet around me. I can't stand it!

4. Washing Your Hands After You Use the Bathroom

If you are a man, please wash your hands after you use the restroom. Do you want to know why??? Because if you don't, my husband will tell me. Every single time Scott returns from a bathroom, he'll point out the guy who didn't wash his hands. Even when we are at a restaurant. Super Gross! I'm sick and tired of hearing about these disgusting men. Wash your hands dudes!

5. Using the Passing Lane ALL OF THE TIME

It's a passing lane people! You are suppose to use it when you intend on passing someone. Not for the entire length it takes you to get somewhere. Geez! And if I'm flashing my lights at you, get out of the passing lane. I need to PASS you.

Seriously, that's all that bugs me. I am thankful for everything else!

Please join in the fun, CLICK {HERE!}

Happy Turkey Day!

Andi

Giving Thanks

Well, I certainly have broken my Pattern Blogging habit ... By not blogging at ALL! Ha! I have no one to blame but myself. Most of the awesome activities we've done in the classroom have been ideas I stole from your wonderful blogs. So, I didn't feel they were blog-worthy since you have probably seen them to death. Or, maybe, I was just lazy. OR, maybe, I'm just resentful because I have to work today, tomorrow, and Wednesday. Which I totally am, by the way. Jealous and Resentful! Not that I don't LOVE teaching and my cuties. BUT you know we're all itching for a break right about now!

And wouldn't you know I had the "Fidelity Police" come pay me a visit today??!!

In the spirit of Thanksgiving, I need to stop whining and start thinking about the true meaning of this holiday. I'm linking up with Rachelle and Natalie at What the Teacher Wants' "I'm Thankful" Linky Party.

Here we go:

1. What are you thankful for in your classroom?

I am thankful for a lot in my classroom. I'm thankful that it is large enough to fit my kiddos and them some. I thankful for a working bathroom and sink. I'm thankful for the door that connects me to my awesome teammate, Susan. I'm thankful for the bookshelves, cubbies, and other storage (because you know it is all full!) However, if I were to pick what I am MOST thankful for in my classroom, it would be without a doubt these two pieces of equipment

My document camera and my projector (they go hand and hand, of course.)

I use them both everyday, all of the time. I would cry huge, giant, crocodile tears if one of these two things was broken.

2. What person are you most thankful for?

One person??!! NO WAY! I cannot choose just one person. I won't do it, I just can't.

First, I am most thankful for my sweet husband, Scott. He is my everything. He makes me laugh, makes me cry, and I love growing and learning with him. (Even when we fail miserably. Hello, dead grass!) I want to go on adventures with him forever. He also gets mad crazy Bonus Husband Points because he is taking ballroom dancing lessons with me!!! Say what! What's even better? The dancing was his idea, not mine. Love this man!

Also, I am so thankful for my parents. They are the best. They hang out with us for dinners and visit my classroom all of the time. They support me in everything (even the silly things.) Plus, I know they will ALWAYS take care of me when I need them.

Can I add my sister, too? She's so awesome (even if she thinks I'm a huge dork!) Which she totally is, not me!

3. What 3 blogs are you most thankful for?

 The First Grade Parade was the first blog I discovered and read faithfully week after week. Cara is amazing! Her classroom is to die for, her lessons are too cute, and her love for everything is contagious!

 I wish I could be a student in Deanna's class. I bet her kiddos just love her to death. She is an inspiration and the teacher I want to be.

If you don't love Abby to pieces, then you are a crazy person! She is too funny and keeps it real! That is what I like about her the most. Her blog is full of great ideas and helpful teaching hints for every teacher young and old. Also, her TPT units are fabulous! My kids love all of the lessons I have taught that Abby has created.

4. What guilty pleasure are you most thankful for?

Easy.

Candy.

'Nuff said.

I LOVE candy!

5.What are you most thankful for?

I am most thankful for my health. Long story short, I have the potential to be very sick and I'm not. I have my family to thank for this. They have supported me and have helped to keep me well. Life is precious and short. I cherish all good, healthy days!

Now head on over to What the Teacher Wants, check out the other entries, and start one of your own!

Love to you all this Thanksgiving Week!