Beginning of the year reading goals

Kristin from teaching in a nutshell gave my little blog a fresh look and I am loving it! As proud as I was to have done what I did to it initially, I am SO happy with the outcome. Super sweet, go check her out! Her Instagram in Tesching in a Nutshell. If you don't follow her already, you should!

 I have been in school with students for 13 days. I teach gifted and talented and work to give 1st graders extra support and I love it. The difference in what I do each day makes it interesting. All the kids I work with are so sweet.   We have been doing our version of #bookaday2015-16        With Stacy from literacy for big kids. Teaching multi-grades and seeing them once a week makes a little hard to do a chapter read aloud, so reading smler books is perfect for us. We started off by watching The Fantantistic Flying Books of Mr. Lessmore. We watched it on YouTube.

It gave me chills and my fifth graders clapped at the end of it! Wow, what a great way to kick off finding books that we love and setting reading goals. I modeled for the students what I was reading currently reading  (Rump) and how I wanted t read 40 books this year-that's the goal anyway. It was great seeing how the students varied in how they made their goals. One very young student wanted to read her 180 page book this year. One very young boy wanted to read 6 nonfiction books this year. We made little name plates with our goals written in white crayon. 

I can't wait to make a chart to help us keep up with all of the great books we're reading and maybe a recommendation tree? In my room. I feel some craftiness coming on. I hope you all are enjoying your first few weeks of school!

Teachers on vacation! A REFLECTION 👍

This post is not "school related", but I wanted to get back into the work of blogging and the best way to do that is to just start. 

CORRECTION-it is <somewhat> school related 😱 🎉 

A REFLECTION here at the end of summer. It's NOT too late 😜

Ok so there's this place I've wanted to go forever called....Disney World! I've never been and neither had the husband or kids. We had wanted to go few times before but it just wasn't the right time. So glad we finally had the chance to go. It was amazing!

Here are my 5 reflections from my the trip that I connected to school.

1. How at home I felt at Disney.

2. The Cast Members were so helpful and friendly. They bent over backward to accommodate.

3. The attention to detail was amazing!

4. Every attraction, ride, or show was completely engaging.

5. It amazes me how Walt Disney carried out his huge dream. It is amazing and has lasted and grown over the years because of his vision and the people he surrounded himself with. 

I could be over-thinking this, but I apply this to the upcoming school year, and it motivates me as I start a new school year. What are my big dreams? What people am I going to surround myself with? How can I make my classroom make others feel at home in my classroom? How can I give others the best experience with my teaching and classroom? How can I give more attention to detail with my lessons, communication, etc. What can I do to engage my students?

Reflection is so powerful and honestly I just gloss over it a lot. It takes time and I don't give myself time, but I'm going to keep on reminding myself that's it worth it...and this is just the start of it. 

I would love to hear what others have been reflecting on. Let me know!! How are you planning to make this year a year of some dream building?

March Currently

It's been too long since I've posted! Same song, different verse you know? I'm excited to be doing the currently thang with @farleyfarleyfarley.  So glad she is so talented and creative! I've been blog stalking as well to get some renewed energy and creativity flowing... 

I can't believe it's March!!! Make it great and make it count!