School and the City

Whether you are looking to #treatyoself, add items to your wish list, or shop for the amazing teacher in your life, this is the list for you! Here are 5 items I truly CANNOT imagine my classroom without: 1. PAPER CUTTER This is one of those items that I didn't know what I was missing until I had this in my life. I use this ALL. THE. TIME. Seriously, at least once a day. I use it to pre-cut interactive notebook pages and cut out lamination (all the task cards)... It is truly a major #timesaver. Mine is a hand-me-down gift from a retired teacher, but it's by Swingline. You can find a similar Swingline paper cutter HERE . It's 15", self-sharpening, and has a safety lock... win, win, win! 2. CORDLESS GLUE GUN Yes, this is a thing. It actually exists. It works great, and it's so handy. It's so much more convenient than your regular glue gun that you'll actually use this one more often! Surebonder doesn't make my model anymore - ...

I receive a lot of questions about how I run my literacy block. At my school, our schedule is blocked out, but I have freedom to arrange my own blocks (if that makes sense). So my literacy block is 9:40 - 11:15, and this is what I've decided to do with it: We start right away with our minilesson. Students are fresh from recess and eat their snacks while I read and model strategies. From there, students move into their Daily 5 rotations. (Our school using CAFE & Daily 5, but I don't have time to rotate students through 5 stations daily, so I make sure some aspects of Daily 5 are integrated throughout the day!) I keep this as simple as possible. I occasionally change it up, but rarely! I have a chart in my room so students know exactly what their options are for each rotation. During this time, I pull small groups. You may notice I do not include myself as a rotation. I do this in order to provide flexibility for myself. Sometimes, I don't need to ...

I am SO thankful for you, so I thought I'd share a freebie with you that I hope will be useful in your classroom! My text features products are some of my absolute favorites. I originally created them my own classroom. I needed a way to assess my students’ understanding of text features other than by observation, and I wanted the assessment to tie in curriculum and relevant content. Thus, this product line was born. The kids have fun using different colors to identify the different text features, and it provides great work samples for me. I first made them about science and social studies topics , then biographies , then holidays ! I'd love for you to download the Thanksgiving text features passage for FREE!  Join my newsletter & I'll send it for FREE! I promise I'll never spam you or share your email address.  Send me the freebie!  We won't send you spam. Unsubscribe at any time. Powered By ConvertKit