My Room is (almost) Done, and I have some cute freebies!!

I feel like every year I say this, but I think this is the best my room has ever looked! There are still some additions I would like to make and eye-sores that I'm working to phase out and/or cover, but overall I'm very proud of how it's turning out for this year!

This is how I came back to it last Thursday. For once, I didn't come in ahead of time. But I always cover my shelves and keep all of my big furniture in place. The only thing I had to move was my desk/table which is pretty light. I also kept my "boards" up from last year.

Since I don't actually have bulletin boards, I bought one cheap plastic table cover (like the $1 ones in the party section at Walmart) and cut it to the sizes I wanted. Then I found this adorable chevron duct tape on Amazon to use as my border.

It's perfect! No fading, and the cloth is thin enough that my magnetic posters can go over and stay up.

Click links to find CAFE, Daily 5 Posters, Decoding Strategies, and Comprehension Strategies posters!

Yes. I have magnetic walls, which is a HUGE time saver. All the posters you see in this picture have been laminated and have those little magnet circles on the back. It makes set-up and tear-down SUPER easy, which is one of the main reasons I could wait until the day I had to report back to work on my room!

Under my CAFE board, I want to find two or three little black bookshelves. Then I can also display some great books on the top for students to have recommendations, etc. I've been checking Craigslist and may go to Salvation Army, Goodwill, and the Habitat Restore this weekend to see what I can find!

Click links to find VOICES and Pencil posters!

This picture shows more of my "eye-sores" - the rug and filing cabinet being at the top of the list. I need to get some scissors and just cut off some of those fly-aways, but I honestly don't even want to waste my cute tap on bordering that rug. It's not so bad with everything else, so I'm just dealing with it now. The cabinet just is what it is. I also want to get up to IKEA sometime to buy black stools for my table. Then I can get rid of those chairs!

I think my word wall is going to go above my desk area this year. It's not ideal, but it's really the only place big enough to put anything. Plus it desperately needs something. I may go buy another tablecloth to frame out another "board" for it! Then I may add a cute border (like a real one) to my Promethean board. I think I have a few from when I actually had bulletin boards...

I am SO proud of my new signs!! I actually made these on my own. And there *might* be a fourth sign on my desk with a certain Paramore song quoted...let's just say it kind of goes with my favorite "Life's tough. Get a helmet!" quote from Boy Meets World!

I had a cute pencil sign with this same quote that I got from Farley about 3 years ago, but I wanted a bigger one to put in these frames (Btw, thanks for the frames, Mrs. O!!)

If you want to download the signs I made, I'm attaching the links to my google drive. They're already in GIF, but I would recommend printing with a black border if you can because it was hard to cut them out to the right size.

Use Your Brain

May Your Grades Be Ever in Your Favor!

Pinky Pencils

Bonus: Paramore quote

And finallly, I have a tiny bulletin board outside my classroom. It used to have a little "Where are we" sign for my aide and I, but we always forgot to change it. This year I decided to try something new.

Did you scan it? Just in case you don't have your phone nearby or can't scan it, the QR code takes you to Reading Rocket's Parent Page. Farley posted a picture of hers on Instagram, and I instantly knew I wanted to do this! Mine definitely pales in comparison. I may change the letters to look a little better before Back-to-School Night!

I can't believe that we'll have students here on Tuesday! Good thing there's a long weekend to get some more summer in before hitting the ground running. I'm excited to start!

Teacher Week '13: Taming the Wild!

This will be a shorter post, but today is about classroom management. Since I'm not a regular classroom teacher, this has become VERY simple for me. I use Class Dojo, which I HIGHLY recommend if you don't already use it.

I can set up separate classes for my groups (which are easy to edit since my kids are in and out). Then I can also set up positive and negative rewards. I give these from my phone and/or computer (whichever is closest at the time), and I don't have to worry about interrupting instruction.

There are two different sounds: one for positive and one negative. Students are quickly redirected by either sound. At the end of each group, students get as many Skittles or M&M's as they have positive points (negative cancels them out though). Simple, but they love it! And I love that I don't have to break the bank to keep them excited about coming to my room (even when we may not be playing games).

Okay, I promised pictures of my classroom, and I am delivering today! There's a LOT to be done, but I'm getting things ready. Then I can make it pretty next week.

I will be putting my CAFE board on that back wall along with some other posters. The white cabinet is in need of repainting (thinking a nice blue), and I will be getting rid of that filing cabinet, although I may move my other one back there. I also want to get stools for my table and send those chairs somewhere else.

This is my desk area. I added my para's chair to the other side so we both have work space. I'm also going to probably move this filing cabinet, like I mentioned above. I haven't pulled out any of the personalization (except for my Chick-fil-A calendar that never moved), so it's looking pretty sad right now.

Not sure why this picture is so fuzzy. I have NO idea what to do with that rolling white board thing. It's so big and awkward, but it was purchased with Title I money, so I can't just give it away. I use it some, but I mostly use the Promethean. I may just lend it to someone permanently. Any of my coworkers reading this, we can talk!

This blue bookshelf came with the room, and I realized last week that I could turn it on it's side like I pinned two years ago and make it a bench! It's also in need of a paint job and some cute bins to hold books. I will be taking this and the white rolling shelf home at the beginning of next week to paint. Can't wait to see how they turn out. Oh, and this adorable rug is from Walmart.com. Don't you love it? I bought it last summer!

That's my tour so far. I made more of a mess today than anything, but we have SEVEN workdays before the kids come back. I usually come back earlier, but our principal is giving us two of those days (the two we don't usually work) completely for us, so I decided to enjoy as much of my summer as possible. The only reason I went in today is because we had to meet and discuss our plan for an in-service about CAFE. This will be our second official year with CAFE and Daily 5 as a school plan, so we're working out kinks from last year.

Classroom pics

Alright, I feel like my classroom is finally getting to a point where I'm really excited about it! If you're following me over from The Dalton Gang, you may remember my last classroom pics from about a month ago here. I was waiting on a rug that I got last weekend and added to the decor. Then I also made a few other changes. This doesn't quite show everything, but I wanted to share anyway. I'm so proud of how it looks so far! Sorry some of the pictures are poor quality. The lighting in our building is kind of pitiful.

 My rug (Walmart) and CAFE board (Ladybug's Teacher Files). I want to add some of those adorable poms that Schoolgirl Style has, but I haven't made them yet. I had to wait for the fire marshal to come through first.

My door isn't finished, but I needed something there. The letters were free on TpT. Sorry I don't remember where exactly, but I'll search for them again and post. Any ideas for what to put on the right side? I wanted something related to reading. Someone recommended an acrostic with the letters, also. I'm open to any and all suggestions.

This board came from an idea I found on Pinterest from Miss Kindergarten here:

I kept planning on getting the ribbon, modge podge, and scrapbook paper, but it didn't happen. Then I realized I had a small corkboard to do something with, so I figured it would be easier to just use it. Now I have enough space to show where myself AND my parapro are. This was at the end of the day Friday. I snapped the pictures as I was walking out of the building.

Alright, I have a niece ready to see me, so I need to get Keagan and myself ready for the day! Have a great weekend!