School and the City

As an instructional coach, I try to find fun but simple ways to add a little more literacy to students’ lives. I’ve created a few literacy-related bulletin boards in common spaces around the school. This new board is one of my favorites… Let me tell you all about it!  I had an idea for a new board concept, but like any good idea, I needed a strong foundation.  I learned the hard way last year that regular butcher paper just doesn’t cut it when it comes to bulletin boards in busy hallways. These bulletin boards are exposed to direct sunlight and hundreds of hands every single day. By the end of the year, they were barely hanging on.  This time around, I knew better. What could I use instead to create a beautiful bulletin board that would look just as beautiful by the time May rolls around? Enter: Fadeless Paper !  Fadeless paper is high-quality, fade-resistant paper. It won’t fade after a month or so of sunlight exposure like typical butcher p...

This year, I'm working as a reading coach and interventionist. I love teaching phonics all day long and getting to work with different grade levels. Throughout the years, I've developed favorite phonics supplies, of course. I've also changed my practice a lot due to recent professional learning. If I had to pick my top must-have supplies for teaching phonics, these would be them. You can find all of these on Amazon for easy shopping! Sound Boxes and Chips Chips, or some sort of manipulative, are a must for orthographic mapping. I've used cubes, mini erasers, game pieces... Bingo chips are my favorite because of their size and how easily they slide. I make my own sound boxes, but I love this set that I found on Amazon. It's affordable and serves as a great scaffold for your young students. Letters, Letters, Letters! This seems obvious, but yes, you need a LOT of letters to give students the opportunity to have hands-on experiences man...

Teaching is hard. Your professors did their best to prepare you, but there's so much to learn that comes with experience. ⁣ ⁣ Are you ready for this? ⁣ The answer is YES! Yes, you are ready for your first year of teaching. However, confidence and preparation are key.⁣ ⁣ Join me for a summer learning series to build your confidence as you prepare for your first year of teaching. Based on your input, I have chosen 8 important topics to cover, which will be hitting your inbox on Sundays this summer. (We'll officially begin June 6, but you can start the series whenever!) ⁣ I'm so excited about this... ! ⁣ Think of it as a crash course of everything I wish I knew. I'm sharing my best advice when it comes to...⁣ ⁣ ✔️ behavior management⁣ ✔️ time management ⁣ ✔️ parent communication⁣ ✔️ knowing your content ⁣ ✔️ lesson planning and pacing⁣ ✔️ preparing for open house ⁣ ✔️ organization and Data⁣ ✔️ planning for the first week of school⁣ ⁣ The beauty of an email series is ...

Line plots can be tricky! Here are some suggestions to teach line plots and bring them to life for your students:⁣ Hide data around the room. Put sticky notes on the bottoms of chairs. Get kids excited and moving right away! ⁣ Once every student has a data point, let them decide what to do - “What should we do to organize our data?” ⁣ Use sticky notes. Ask students a question, and have them write their response on a sticky note. They can then come to the board (or floor) to plot their own data point. How many siblings do you have? How many pets do you have? What is your shoe size? How many states have you lived in? How many schools have you been to? Supersize it. Everything is more fun when it's larger than life! Sometimes I use my whiteboard for line plots, but the floor is fun too. When it's time to teach line plots, make a giant number line with tape, but make sure you have something to use for the title and label. ⁣Mi...

Did you know that February is Dental Health month?! It's so hard to find time to fit in those health standards, but it makes is easier when you have a reminder, like a whole themed month! I like to try and cover my health standards be integrating health content with other subject areas. It's easy to mix health standards in with RELA standards, but math can be a little trickier. Here are some ideas for you to use in your classroom during Dental Health Month - or whenever - to help you cover those dental health standards. Read all the dental health books. Some of my favorite books to read about teeth / dental health are: The Tooth Book Why Do I Drool? Just Going to the Dentist (because I LOVE Little Critter!) Let's Meet a Dentist Check out this collection of dental health books that I created on Epic! How-To Writing I've always loved to use "how to brush your teeth" as a how-to writing topic when introducing informa...

I'm still shocked and in disbelief, but here we are planning for the first week of virtual school. We will be starting the school year virtually this year. In the past, I've shared with you my day-by-day plans for the first week of school . These plans won't exactly work this year, but many elements will. While I don't know exactly what "school" is going to look like this year, I do know that the first week of virtual school will need to include the same kinds of activities that we usually do in order to set expectations for the year and build relationships with students . Setting Expectations Use Picture Books My favorite way to discuss behavior expectations is through the use of picture books . If you have hard copies of these books, you can record yourself reading them to your students. If you don't have them or can't access them, try finding read alouds on YouTube or eBooks on platforms like Epic and...