Management Woes

Sometimes you are spoiled with a class that immediately catches onto your expectations and routines.  The day runs so smoothly that you can't help but keep a cheesy grin on your face all day.  This is not one of those years for me.... YET.  Don't get me wrong, I love this group, but they need a lot more guidance than I'm used to.  I have a student who has never been in school before, a student who refuses to speak in English (only Spanish), and three students who aren't Spanish (which means I can't just switch to Spanish to benefit that ELL).   Twelve academic days later, we are still practicing how to walk in the hall, what to do if your pencil breaks, and how to unpack in the morning.  Although I plan to pull back a lot as the year goes on, I am presently micromanaging my class to the hundredth degree. 

One useful strategy for me is sticky labels.  It took me a few years to learn how to make my own mailing labels in Microsoft Word.  I should say, it took me a few years before I stopped calling my mom and making her print them for me and mail them from Buffalo before I finally asked someone to teach me!!  Once I asked for help, it took about 65 seconds to learn.  Seriously?  It's that easy?  Before the school year starts, I print several copies of mailing labels with the student names.  As soon as a supply or new book comes in, I peel off a label and stick it on.  No time is wasted looking for a sharpie and writing on everything!  When sweaters come off, new lunch boxes are purchased, or book orders come in, I can simply peel the student's name off the sheet of labels and am ready in an instant.  Best of all, if we have a staff developer or sub in the classroom, these can double as quick name tags.

I also have labels for every academic material I am expecting in my classroom, such as the various folders, notebooks, and portfolios.  These are all color coded and then have identical labels telling parents and any classroom visitors what they are used for.  The bins they belong in throughout my classroom have a large version of that same label so it's obvious where to return things.  

That brings me to my second strategy- color coding.  If your school didn't implement this already, it's not an easy thing to start midyear, but I do recommend it or next year!  My supply list on the first day of school asked for folders in specific colors.  I then used my labels to organize student folders by color.  Everything belongs in a bin of the same color.  For example, writing folders are green, poetry folders are red, homework folder are purple, and math folders are blue.  I then color code the labels for everything to coordinate with the color I associate with that content area.  When it's time to pack up, I don't have to worry about students bringing home the wrong folders, I tell them "pack up your purple homework folders," and can see from where I'm standing if the folder they have out is purple.  This is BIG this year, since I keep catching students bringing home the most surprising classroom materials (and never returning them). 


Here is a photo tour of some of the scaffolds I've put in place to help my teacher-dependent group.

As soon as students arrive, they are reminded of the morning routines.  Since my room has loud metal lockers that the students can easily pinch their fingers in, it is important to me that they do not need to return to their backpacks before the end of the day.  The classroom door reminds them exactly where to put anything they bring to school in the morning.  Sorry it's so difficult to read the steps, my camera isn't the greatest!

Illustrated morning routines

My Bravo Board:  Table Points are nothing new for any teacher, but I have had to become a lot more consistent and spend a major portion of the day adding points.  While before it was used for behavior, it's now used to award any table that finishes a task efficiently.  "Wow!  Everyone at your table actually took off their coats today?  You get a point!"  Every Friday the table with the most points gets to visit the treasure chest.  This is a great classroom management tool because the students hold one another accountable for their behavior, and no one wants to disappoint their friends!

This board tracks table points.

As you've seen in previous posts, my classroom has tables, which means no personal storage for the students.  Teachers have strong opinions on desks vs. tables, and I actually love the tables.  When I taught in the upper grades, I received a grant through Donor's Choose which allowed me to replace my desks with tables, and it was heaven!  Nevertheless, my students were wasting too much time digging through each section of the caddy looking for what they needed.  The caddies were a mess, and the number of personal items they began to store in the caddies became out of control.  I created illustrated labels that reminds the students where each writing tool belongs. Table leaders are encouraged to organize the supplies at the beginning and end of each day.  When I do spot checks, tables with organized caddies get a point!  Here's a bonus- in first grade they still haven't caught on to the fact that if EVERYONE get's a point, no one is any further ahead.  The class is most excited when all of the tables are winning.  I love it!

Supply Caddy Labels

You can download my caddy labels from my Teachers Pay Teachers store for free by clicking on the photo above.

Class jobs & book changing chart

Check out the gorgeous ribbon that was on sale at Hobby Lobby this August!  I was shopping with my mom and thought it was amazing, but didn't think I could use it in my classroom.  I have seen other teachers use pretty ribbon instead of borders, but that doesn't work when you don't have bulletin boards and have to tape everything.  I was so excited when I realized I could use the ribbon for my class rules and jobs charts.  Onto the next management strategy.  I usually change the class jobs every Monday, but this year the jobs will only rotate monthly.  This gives my students more time to become experts at routines such as where we stop in the hall and how to update the calendar.  To the right you can see students change their books once a week based on their table.  The picture below shows the procedure students follow when changing their books.  As students grow as readers, the number of books they will choose depends on their reading level.  Of course, children reading early chapter books do not need nine books per week.  I have also added my updated reading level chart.  This is the only cork board in my classroom, so I am able to use push pins and move the pictures as their reading level changes.

Book Shopping Procedure

Fountas and Pinnell Guided Reading Levels
"We're Mooo-ving Up Reading Levels!"

 I strongly disagree with telling a student he is not allowed to use the bathroom during a certain part of the day.  When you have to go, you have to go!  However, I began to notice students asking to go to the bathroom multiple times a day, and then "forgetting" to use the bathroom!  It's a great way to get out of the room and check out what your friends are doing in other classes.  For that reason, I have implemented a Bathroom Procedure board.  This board is magnetic.  When students use the bathroom, they slide their name to the right side of the board.  So far no one has asked to go after they have already moved to the right side, and the number of unnecessary interruptions for bathroom breaks has been minimized.

Bathroom Chart

 

During writing I provide my ELL students with personal word walls/ word banks.  I would LOVE to share these with you, but a lot of the images I use are from Google images, and many of them are for personal use only.  These word walls are each about a page long and have labeled pictures of the most commonly used words for a specific topic.  For example, if a student is writing about a trip to the doctor, she would receive a personal word wally with pictures of common things you see in a doctor's office and the names.  Once a student receives a word wall, he can keep it for the rest of the year.  I don't pass out all of the word walls at once, as this can become overwhelming and confusing.  It's also important that they don't rely too heavily on the word walls and forget how to sound things out.

Family Words

Some students are struggling with having too many materials available to them and the word walls have become more of a distraction than an aid.  For that group, I have hung large charts with commonly used words, such as the family members chart above. 


 Each student created an idea list similar to the chart below on the first day of our personal narratives "small moments" writing unit.  This chart will stay up for the entire unit so students can quickly and independently start new stories.

My Ideas List

 This final chart isn't the most visually appealing, but I wanted to keep it very basic to remind students of what we do during Writer's Workshop.  It's an attempt to avoid hearing "I'M DONE!"

Finally, this is a quick look at how I display strategies we have learned this month in reading and writing.  During the lesson the strategy of the day is displayed on the Smartboard.  Following this, the strategy is printed and added to the doors below.

Thanks for continuing to follow my year!  I am so lucky to have a group of really sweet and loving students this year.  I hope as I continue to implement more rigid routines they can also become more independent and build stamina. 

First Grade Poetry

One of my best selling products on Teacher's Pay Teachers is a word study map I created for first grade teachers.  You can download it here:  Word Study Pacing Calendar for First Grade For only $0.25, this lengthy pacing calendar helps you plan which sight words and word families to introduce each week.  It also reminds you of holidays and morning routines that are cognitively appropriate at different points in the year.  Among other helpful columns on the spreadsheet is a list of weekly poems that relate to the season or units of study.

The Poem of the Week is to be used in conjunction with Scholastic's E-Books "50 Thematic Songs" by Meish Goldish & "Perfect Poems for Teaching Sight Words" by Deborah Ellermeyer & Judith Rowell).  There are a nine poems that are not found in these Scholastic books, but can be downloaded here.  These poems are not my original work, but I published them in a more kid-friendly way.

The poems are all available for free by clicking on this link: First Grade Poetry

I use poetry all year long in my classroom.  I make two class sets of copies of the poem of the week.  Each student has a red poetry folder that he keeps at his seat.  One copy of the poem stays in there, where a collection forms throughout the year.  The second poem is sent home and used for homework.  On the day I introduce the poem, we do a shared reading on the smart board and look for the high frequency words we know.  Depending on the poem, I will do additional activities throughout the week with comprehension and rhyming.  When the students return to their seats, they practice reading the poem, circle the words they know, and add it to their poetry folder  Any time students finish work early, they practice reading their poems.  We have poetry slams where they can read the poems at different speeds and in different voices.  By the end of the year, most of the students have memorized at least 15 poems!

The homework that relates to word work stays consistent in my room.  This is because most of my students speak a language other than English at home, and I want the homework to be routine enough that they can work independently.  Below is an example of what that looks like this year.  All of the sight word/ words of the week homework is done in a word work packet that I created based on my pacing calendar.  You can find that on my Teachers Pay Teacher's site as well!  High Frequency Words Practice Set

Monday:

Write the words of the week 6 times each.

Practice reading the poem of the week to someone in the family.   

Tuesday:                                                                     

Write a sentence using each word of the week.

Find and circle words you know in the poem of the week.  

Wednesday:

Write the words of the week in alphabetical order.  

Find and circle rhyming words in the poem of the week in green.

Thursday:

Write the words of the week in four different colors (Rainbow Write).

Color the picture in the poem of the week.  

Friday:

Spelling test today!

Practice reading the poem of the week to someone in the family.

Wow! My intention with this post was to give away my poetry packet, but it became pretty promotional.  I guess that is because a lot of what I sell is connected.  To make up for my sales pitch, I'm going to launch a sale on the items posted here!  I would love to hear your comments on how you use poetry in your classroom!

MathMania

I have been collecting awesome photos of the happenings in my new class, but must wait for the photo consent forms from my class parents before I can post anything new.  Until then, I have some recommended math links and a FREE resource I have created for first grade math teachers!

I have to admit, I'm a fan of the Common Core Learning Standards. It's been a very time consuming adjustment, but I like knowing that across the country we're all on the same page. In New York City, we have a helpful resource (which is public), called the Common Core Library. Although it's created by our Department of Education, it applies to any school district implementing the Common Core Learning Standards. I encourage you to visit the Common Core Library.

 In addition to this website, I also use K-5 Math Teaching Resources. This website recommends math literature for each standard and has printable center activities for selected strands. Again, everything on both sites is absolutely FREE! Disclaimer:  I don't find the resources to be visually appealing, so I usually edit them for my own use, but they give me ideas for hands-on activities that I might not have thought of on my own.

One of the greatest challenges in my lesson planning this year has been the new "Scope and Sequence" New York City has published for each grade. They suggest the order in which we should teach each standard as well as how long we should spend on the different standards. Some of the Everyday Mathematics Units must be condensed into a week, while others must be spread over ten. I've had to revise my entire pacing calendar. If you are using Everyday Mathematics in your schools, you may have noticed it is not the most Common-Core-friendly program out there. I am currently working on a FREE academic year pacing calendar that aligns first grade Everyday Mathematics Lessons with the CCLS Scope and Sequence.  Click on the picture below to check out my progress so far!

Click Here!

Do you have any tips for aligning Everyday Math and the Common Core Learning Standards? Here's what they have to say about it: Everyday Math CCLS PDF

Wishing you a magical week with much success in your math planning!

Attention to Details

Do you ever come up with a new idea for your classroom, and wonder why it took you so many years?  Today I am going to continue the walk through of my classroom by zooming in on different details throughout the room.  Most of what I'm showing you is common sense and is most likely already in place in your own room, but visuals always spark new ideas!  

I have a fantastic Lakeshore Communication Center that is meant to house book boxes on the bottom and serve as student mailboxes on top.  I purchased it because I was eager to switch from book baggies to book boxes, and I loved that transition.  Since I don't have desks in my room, I prefer to use the mailboxes to store student books by table.  I am a labeling queen, and I struggled with how to label the mailboxes without damaging the shelves.

I started with a simple binder clip:    and printed my labels on regular mailing labels, but changed the text direction so I could use the labels vertically.  It ended up being a very easy task!

How to label shelves or mailboxes using binder clips

Each column is labeled by text book.  Each row is labeled by table name.

Below are some additional close-ups of my room.  For those of you who aren't yet addicted to Pinterest, I highly recommend you check it out!  Pinterest has given me many ideas for ways to upgrade my classroom environment. 

An updated photo of my writing center

Writing tools, accessible to students for more independence during Writer's Workshop

Ikea buckets and velcro make perfect pencil holders!

Important phone numbers posted for substitutes

Classroom Rules
(Free from mrsriccaskindergarten.blogspot.com)

I like to seat my students heterogeneously, but during writing it's easier to conference with small groups if they are seated homogeneously.  When students return to their "writing seats," the table leader grabs his group's bin from below.  Each group is named after a favorite author.  The bins hold their personal word walls, writing folders, and any other resources that group needs during writer's workshop.  The sign above the bins will have the students' names to show which group they are in.  This will change throughout the year.

Writing Groups

Another Pinterest find!

What little tricks have you learned this year that you don't know how you lived without?

Where is Everyone?

Last night was our "meet-the-teacher family orientation."  After having the same class for two years, it was great to see many of my students at their second grade tables.  I'm going to miss that group!

I had spent the last few days adding some finishing touches to my classroom and preparing a PowerPoint presentation for my new class.  I was so excited to meet them!  We started off greeting all of the families in the cafeteria and then bringing up our individual classes for a tour of the room and introduction to the grade.  I don't know if the turn out was more shocking or disappointing.  I have 24 students on my roster... only ONE parent showed up, and he didn't bring his child.  My last class had great parent participation, which is rare in the city.  Fortunately, the one parent I met last night is an active member of the PTA executive board, and as president of the School Leadership Team I know him well.  It will be great having his child in my class.

Below is a picture of one of the favors I prepared for the parents.  I also had lollipops for the students (none of which were given out).

A favor for parents who attended my Meet-the-Teacher event

As promised, here are some photos of my 2012-2013 classroom.  I had a vision of blue and green with pink accents.  It turned out to look like a lot of pink!  It's hard to believe I used the least of that roll of paper.

Note:  Our first two days after Labor Day are teacher planning days, and we will have from 12pm until the end of the day to finish setting up our rooms.  I will be using that time to put away the extra clutter that hasn't found a space yet.  You'll see some of that in these photos.

My classroom library, meeting area, and Smartboard.

The calendar wall will also have a birthday board and class jobs.  The class job chart is being laminated and the birthday board can't go up until I have student photos.

Close up view of my renovated cabinets.

Remember these ugly chunks of metal from yesterday's post?  You wouldn't believe how hard it is to find contact paper in this area.  After looking through several stores, we finally found some at Staples.  It only came in three primary colors, none of which matched the colors of my room.  After my dad and godmother completed the task with this shade of green, we took a trip to Ikea.  What do you think I found there?  The small filing cabinet isn't done, but already it's a huge improvement!

Literacy Wall

This side of the room includes my leveled library.  We use Fountas and Pinnell reading levels.  Every book in my library has a small label on the top left hand corner of the cover that matches the label on the bin it belongs in.  This helps keep my library organized all year.  Above the leveled library is my word wall, and to the far right is my writing center.  The extra bins you see in the middle hold student lunches, my listening center, and my printer.

Close up of the word wall

I found these word wall letters on another blog, and I LOVE them.  They look like they were made to go with my polka-dot border.  I do wish, however, that I would have enlarged them slightly before cutting out all of those circles.  I was so jealous of all of you Cricut and Cameo owners as I sat there cutting!   Unfortunately, the blogger who provided this freebie did not include a credits page in the PDF file, so I can't remember where it came from.  Please comment if you would like me to add a link to your blog here!

We're Mooo-ving Up Reading Levels!

Click, Clack, MOO!  When I finish my running records, I will post student names or photos here.  As students grow as readers, I will need to remove levels A and B to make room for levels M and N.  Last year one of my students was reading above a level N!  It's still crazy to me how many reading levels students jump in first grade.  Posting reading levels is a tricky thing.  I know at this age students need a visual reminder of their current reading level when changing their books, but it can also be embarrassing for students who get stuck at a low reading level.  What are your thoughts on this?

Lockers and Guided Reading Table

If I could change one thing about my room, it would be these salmon-colored lockers.  They're loud, they compartments are too small for backpacks, and they're ugly!  In the back corner I have my teacher area and guided reading table.  I decided a year ago to get rid of my teacher desk, as it was a trap for junk and took up too much room.  Behind my guided reading table you will find a small student desk with items such as my pens, stapler, and tape.  The wall above that has the class schedule and a very small bulletin board for some personal photos and pictures my students draw me.

You are the reason I am here

I had to do a little photo-shopping to fit this long board into one shot.  This narrow bulletin board is what you see above the lockers.  The message was inspired by http://theinspiredclassroom.blogspot.com/.

Math Center and back wall

These banners hang throughout my room.

Writing Log

 My dad had this miniature log from some yard work he was doing and put it to great use!  Not only is this an adorable display for writing tools, it will be a great visual when I teach the -og family- my students never know what a log is!

To conclude my "after" shots of the classroom, I have to share an "after" shot of my helpers.

All worn out from the classroom setup

The poor things were only in town for two days, and I had them hard at work the entire time!

I hope you enjoyed a tour of my room!  I will update the photos as the week progresses.  I welcome any feedback to make the room more effective.

Good Bye

My summer vacation is officially over, which means I had to say good bye to this...

Babysitting my beautiful nephews

Photos taken by KitKat Photography

and this...

Weekly beach trips with my dear boyfriend

and hello to this:

My bright, stifling classroom with no AC.

As you can imagine, this is how I felt:

(I had to include a sad pug on my blog in honor of my beloved first co-teacher)

Fortunately, I had some wonderful helpers to make the work easier, faster, and more fun!

My AMAZING godmother and father drove all the way from Buffalo to help!

Check out my next post to see the results of all of our hard work!

The Importance of CHARTS

My 2011-2012 Writing Center.  The shelves below housed a variety of paper choices.  The green folders you see are the students' writing folders, organized by writing groups. 

Reading groups- I have greater things in mind for this display next year!  My classroom doesn't have any bulletin boards.  Instead, I have wall to wall chalkboards, and they're not even magnetic!  The first, most time consuming, part of my classroom set up is taping bulletin board paper over every board.  My reading groups change quite often, so I use velcro over laminated sheets of paper.  My group names for that year were animals.  As you can see, the first letter of each animal group correlates with the F&P reading level of each student.  Students on the left side of the picture have just begun reading at this level.  Students on the left are close to reaching the next level up.

Since all of my students speak Spanish at home, they can never have too many models of proper English sentences.  An ESL support teacher suggested I add examples of sentence structure that the students could relate to by putting pictures of the class in action with sentences describing the picture.  My kids loved seeing themselves all over the windows!  This year I will use the same idea but in a time-line so it looks more organized. 

This chart was a great visual for my students to refer to when comparing numbers.  I used it with the song "Number Eating Alligator," found on youtube. 

There's nothing too exciting about this chart, but it serves a purpose.  It helps students become fluent in recognizing numbers in other forms.  When playing math games, I expected my students to know the numbers on a die without counting the dots.

I copied the idea from this chart from my colleague, Alison.

This chart comes from Pinterest!

I had several blend and digraph charts that rotated throughout the year.  The charts my students referred to the most were sh, th, wh, and ch.

I LOVE this chart, which helped me decide where to start during writing conferences.  I've seen many versions of this chart on Pinterest.  Following a writing conference, students would put their name next to the goal they were supposed to focus on until our next conference.

I believe the idea for this chart came from Cara Carroll!

Another chart idea from Cara Carroll.

An example of how I display my charts on a clothesline. 

I made this poster on snapfish, featuring a photo of each student in my fourth grade class.  Although it was not educational, I loved how it looked on my classroom door!

This quote, above my fifth grade chalkboard, comes from a speech to students that Obama gave on the first day of school. 

 

With so many beautiful charts circulating the Internet, it’s easy to get carried away!  It is important, however, to keep in mind WHY we post charts in our classrooms.  Our charts should serve as teaching partners.  They should guide, inform, and inspire our students.  If they are not used in our instruction and referred to when reviewing key ideas, they will not serve this purpose, and instead become a distraction to our students.  I have found that the most child-friendly charts are teacher made.  When children contribute to the charts, they are even more effective.  Sometimes I will spend hours on a chart, and students will never refer to it!  As hard as it can be, I try to take a classroom environment walk each month and pull down any charts I have not seen my students actively using.  Although they are not the most visually appealing charts I have created, this post includes some of the charts that ended up being used most often in my classroom.  My word wall, however, was referred to more than any chart in the room.  Unfortunately I didn’t take a picture of this before tearing down my room!  Other charts they referenced quite often listed transitional words, color words, and holidays.