How Do I get it All In?

School starts Monday and I have to get my daughter packed up for her return to college on Sunday......a wedding tomorrow morning.....birthday party tomorrow night.....have to cook birthday lunch for my sister/going away party for my daughter on Sunday... Why does the outside world expect to go on when teachers need every spare moment getting their rooms ready????

We did our home visits this afternoon. I saw most of my kiddos. They all looked a foot taller since I last saw them as second graders in May!

My room is close to being ready. I've posted a few pics to share. Many of the things you see either came from ideas or free downloads on blogs, are from pins on Pinterest, or are things I've been using and have just re-worked.

This is my bucket fillers chart. I've ordered free business cards from VistaPrint to use to fill the buckets. You can't tell by the picture, but the sign is held up by Scotch Restickable Shapes. One of the walls in my room is dry wall and we cannot use anything that makes a mark on the wall to hang materials.  These little babies are SUPER for hanging!

The other sides of my filing cabinets hold my Poetry Station. The task cards are in magnetic photo pockets. The file folder holds different response forms and bookmarks the kids need to complete the tasks. Our poetry books are in the tub on the floor. It also holds a couple of rhyming dictionaries. The blue magnetic pocket holds copies of the weekly poem for the students to glue in their poetry notebooks. The markers and glue sticks are gathered in a shower caddy held up by suction cups. Magnetic poetry tiles and different response cards are also hanging on the cabinets.

This is our Word Wall. Looks bare now, but it will be filled up soon! The pirates are sticky wall decals I ordered off Amazon. You can see a little of my classroom library to the left. The lamp (from Target) has a plain blue shade that I added more pirate wall decals to.

The last pic for tonight is my Writing Station. I replaced the cards on another writing center I purchased from Lakeshore. The plastic pockets hold some of the materials needed to complete the task cards clipped to the board. I still have to add the rubric sheets. Other materials are on the shelves under the center. There are dry erase boards, dictionaries, different kinds of paper, pictures for prompts, I Spy books, wordless picture books, and lots of other goodies to inspire writing. I shared a list of some of these books in an earlier post. The circles above the center are dry erase circles that I can write messages on. These are from Office Depot, but I've seen lots more at different stores selling supplies for dorm rooms. This is still that dry wall side that I have to be careful with.

Hope you are having fun getting your room ready!

Super Books for the Writing Station

I have just about finished setting up my Writing Station in my classroom and hope to post pictures soon. I wanted to share some of the books I place in the Station to help jumpstart the kids' writing.

The kids LOVE any of the I Spy books. They can write a story or description of any of the items in the awesome pictures. (I also use the books to teach main idea and details). These pics unlock even the toughest writer's block! So many bloggers are using pirates in their classrooms this year, that I wanted to include Can You See What I See? Treasure Ship. You'll get lots of pirate stories if you use this as a prompt.

Share Graeme Base's Animalia at the writing center to show your students how to use colorful words in their writing. Younger students can use the sentences as models for writing alliterative sentences for the beginning sound they are studying. The sentences are also great to use for picking out parts of speech.

Any of Barbara Lehman's picture books inspire even the most reluctant students to write. Students can write about the stories told in pictures in The Red Book, Rainstorm, and Museum Trip or can pick just one of the illustrations to describe. (Great for making predictions and inferences!)

istvan banyai's wordless picture books could inspire a year's worth of writing! Show the students Zoom, Re-Zoom, and The Other Side and step back and watch inspiration hit!

 A Circle of Friends, by Giora Carmi,  just begs the children to add words to the beautiful artwork. Friends are an important topic of choice, so be sure to include this one.

You own't be able to put Ooops, by Arthur Geisert, down long enough to leave it in the Writing Station! This book is great to guide students in an ongoing story or chapter book. Does the house fall? (Another predictions/inferences favorite.)

The simple text of The OK Book, by Amy Krovise Rosenthal, is a wonderful model for students to follow to write OK books about themselves. Once they have done that, use the format to write OK sentences about the topics you are studying in Science and Social Studies.

The pictures in Black and White, by David Macaulay, tell two different stories. Let students pick one story line to follow.

And last, but not least, go right now and get Meanwhile, by Jason Shiga, if you do not already own a copy. You might want to go ahead and get two while you are ordering, because your kids are going to looooove this book. You choose your own ending to each page of the book. The story lines are practically infinite!

Happy Writing!

50 Followers Giveaway -- Target Booty!

I am going to try to do a Giveaway when I reach 50 followers. I think I have figured out how to get my comments numbered, so I will use the Random Number Generator. Please leave a comment to this post that you have been following my blog or have just started. When I reach 50 followers, I will send the winner a $10.00 Target gift card!

You can also grab my button and leave another comment for a second chance to win!