Done!!!!!

I am all finished school!  I am so excited.  The take down of the room went pretty fast too, as the kids helped.

Each year, I have the students help me sort the word wall words back into the groups I have them in, which is in a binder with make a word lessons.  I sort the groups of words into the respective lessons, and I am ready for next years words.  I just take the word off the wall, drop it on the floor, and continue until all words are down.  Then I have a ziploc bag for each lesson, labeled with the words that go to that lesson.  The kids get a bag and search for the word.  It takes no time at all.

I create a ton of staple debris in the carpets when I remove my bulletin boards.  So, I have the kids help pick out staples from the carpet by using magnets.  They actually argue over who is going to get the next staple.  It's much safer than using their fingers and a whole lot more fun.

They wash everything with wipes, including walls.  My room never smelled so good!  They help me sort and organize our letter tiles for next year's folders full of letter tiles.  They help me clean and organize the math kit boxes.  They work on helping me take staples out of the walls(some years, depends on the crew of kids and how responsible they are).  They thoroughly clean their desks and cubbies.  This includes name tag and label removal.  I will be in the same room next year, so I don't have to lug all my stuff to another place.  Yay!  

Before school ended, my kids gave their teachers their gifts.  We took about a month collecting all the stuff for it.  It turned out very cute.  Each one got a 31 bag with their name embroidered on it and a summer survival kit inside.  Below it shows all the items.  Although, the cup has a couple movie tickets in it that are hard to see.

Well, now the summer list of to-do's gets started.
Amy

Volunteer Gift and Mud Race

In our school we have room moms that are in charge of helping the teacher organize parties and various other events.  They work hard during the year!  My room mom was extra special to me this year as she happens to be my friend too.  We have known each other for awhile and I have now taught both of her boys.  They are great kids.
I wanted to do something a bit different this year.  I scoured pinterest for hours...I know, that's easy to do.  I was looking for something cute but doable!  There are some things on there that working mamas like me, don't have the time allowance for.  Wish I did, but I don't.
So, I finally came upon just the right thing.  I totally forgot to take a picture of the one I did.
Below is a blog with the picture of the plant pot.
Little Warriors   


Yesterday, I went to The Mud Factor 5K race.  The one I was most scared about out of all the 5K's I signed up for this summer.  It was just as scary as I imagined when I arrived with my dear friend Marcia.  At least we were scared together!  There were trenches with freezing cold water anywhere from ankle deep (near the beginning) and arm pit deep (at the end) to jump into and then climb out of.  There were obstacles to climb like walls with ropes (that one was super scary and hard), giant A frame structures to climb over using webs/ladders made out of rope, and giant empty trenches to jump over....and if you don't make it you bust up an ankle.  It was the most serious 5K I've ever done, but at the same time it was silly because we were all rolling around in, and falling in the mud.  We completed it and did pretty dang well by finishing within an hour.  I was proud of us.
I am sore, but proud.
Here we are in the before and after.

Phew, not sure I will do another mud 5K but now I want to do the Chunky Monkey/Cherry Garcia run.  That one sounds great...and yummy.

Happy Sunday everyone,
Amy

Zoo 5K

Well, my dogs are tired!  Dogs meaning feet.  The girls and I did the zoo 5K today.  It was fun.  We also parked a mile away from the zoo, as it was busy.  Then we walked for hours, around the zoo.  We probably trekked about 10 miles today.  So, needless to say, we are exhausted.  Well, the girls will sleep well tonight.

After all that, I am eating a BIG piece of rich chocolate cake, ahhhhh, yummmm.  Nothing like undoing that good walking.

Here are my girls in front of the polar bears after the race.

What cuties.

Well, with the end of school coming I expect to finally get more items in my TPT store.  I am excited to get to that.

I am working on my room mom present right now.  I looked all over pinterest and found a million great ideas.  I will be posting the final product soon.  Anyone out there have great room parent/volunteer presents that you make?  

Enjoy your week,
Amy

Currently May!

Phew, well May has come and I am excited for all the possibilities that will come at the end of May.  Lots of time with my kids, lots of time to plan out my next year, lots of time to organize files, and lots of time to be a mom!  I am excited for the summer to come but at the same time there is a lot to get done before the summer break.

Well here is my currently for the month of May.  Always glad to hook up with Oh' Boy 4th Grade.

Little more detail.....

Wanting- I am hopeful that my students this year will do a bang up job when they enter 2nd grade.  I have worked very hard this year on all that I could with each little kiddo.  I have tried my best, as I do each year, and now can only hope my hard work payed off and that the kiddos will enter 2nd with a sparkle.

Needing- Tomorrow I will go to my 2nd out of 3 of the 5K's that I have signed myself up for these couple months.  This one is Run For The Zoo and my girls will be running (walking) with me.  It's a very relaxed run/walk 5K and should be loads of fun.  We do it every year and love it.  At the end of the run we walk around the zoo and get lunch there.  It's always a load of fun.

Bucket list-  We will be camping galore all summer.

We are camping our way from NM to Idaho and then to Montana to visit family.  

We also plan on spending time at the pool for swim lessons and just swimming fun.  

OH, so much fun to come!!!

Happy May Everyone,

Amy

Color Run

Well, it's been a crazy April.  I know it's not over yet, but it has been a bit too much for me.  Lots of friends going through hardships, family members having hardships, and our own immediate family had a big surprise too.

Out of the blue, our 14 year old dog died.  He was totally healthy.  He woke up one morning unable to walk and function normally.  It was the day before my birthday.  He was our first "baby" before our actual kids.  My hubby and I will be married 15 years this summer....obviously our whole marriage we have had this dog. We were very surprised by the whole thing.

On a happy note, I had been signed up for awhile, to do the Color Me Rad race with my friend Nina and her son.  The race took place the day after my birthday.  Check out the before and after.  I'm the short one.

Well, enough of personal life.  On to working life.

We completed our testing last week.  The kids were troopers!  They bubbled like nobody's business!  They listened with great focus and tried their very best.  I am very proud of their great effort.
Way to go kiddos!

We are gearing up for the end of the school year.  Having meetings about what is to come next year and so forth.  I am excited about various changes that are going on to improve upon our already great school.  It should be a productive year to come.

I will post more about some new things I will be doing within my classroom as time goes on.  I will be working on improving my reading centers, math centers, and other other areas of the classroom.  I love trying new things.  It always livens up the classroom!

Busy Week

  

My five are going to be brief and with few pics this week.  Very busy week.

Next week have testing for our cutey pie first graders (and 2-5th as well).  We are all ready.  Pencils sharpened, desks cleaned, etc.  Each year when we do testing week, we have the parents send in fun snacks for the kids to have as a special treat in the afternoon of each testing day.  They love this (so do I).  I also give the kids special surprises each day.  It helps the little people feel more interested in coming to school and taking the test, rather than feel suddenly ill for a week.  :)

My first surprise for the kids-
Fun crayons and a packet of cool mazes and coloring pages.

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We are working on a How-To writing project.  We brainstormed, webbed the ideas into 4 categories, and have completed our outline for the writing piece.  Next comes the rough draft.  The piece is about conservation.  We are writing ways (other than the obvious recycle and pick up litter) that we may help our planet.  I took pics of them wearing a big Lorax mustache during our Dr. Seuss week, with the intention of using it on our bulletin board.  The pics are up, along with the marble painted Earth crafts they have made.  As soon as the writing is up, I will take a picture of the completed board.
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We set our ladybugs free!!!!  Live well little ones.
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My birthday is next week, so I am giving the kids a little party favor and will have a special treat for them as well.

Have a great week!
Amy

Fast 5

Here are my fast 5:
I am not awesome at technology...but I have a computer geek hubby and I have learned a lot from him.  I also have learned a lot in 1st about technology, because of my awesome coworkers.  I have learned from being a blogger as well.  In learning how to post various pics and products...it has forced me to learn things I normally would have no idea how to do.  So, my wheels started turning.
I have seen so many posts about people who have ipads/tablets and/or smart boards in the class (very jealous).

Well, this made me think of my own daughters travel items...tablets.  We have all sorts of academic games on them (for my kids) but we only use them for long travel.  Otherwise, they sit gathering dust.  So, I decided to bring them to school for some fun.  I decided, I would start with the tablets in a math center.  This way they would have "teams" or partners.  They would solve problems together.

So here's how it worked....

I set up the tablets at my U shaped table where I usually have reading group or small group instruction.

I set up the game Math Attack and showed them how to navigate the game.  I set them up to use only subtraction and addition, although it can do a variety of math problems for older children.

The game had single and double digit addition and subtraction problems.  It's satisfying for them to get the answer right, because it dings at them to tell them it's right.

Each center was limited in time today- as we had just finished up a math unit test.  So, they did not have tons of time to work on the tablets....but they were crazy excited anyway.  I was glad I finally became a bit more techy-ish today!

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One of my sweet students brought me flowers- just because!!!

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Here are my new flagged pencils for April.  I gave the old ones to the students.  They like using the flags to track their reading.

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The ladybugs in our room are growing and getting ready for the pupa stage.  The kids are very excited.

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A lot of things have been going on in my personal and work life.  I have been very busy.  The whirlwind should calm down soon.  But until then, my posts will be limited.

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Have a lovely weekend everyone.
Amy