School and the City

Back to School News is creative writing task that I've used during the first week of school for many years. Students love it! As a teacher, you'll love this back to school writing activity too. Why? Read on, teacher friend! It's such a fun way to get to know your new students! Through this writing activity, you'll learn a bit about each students' summer, home life, and feelings towards school. You'll also be able to see how they treat creative writing assignments, drawing/artistic abilities, handwriting, creativity, and humor. Also, it's a pretty time-consuming task, but it's meaningful and engaging . It will keep your new students busy while you greet your new students, work on those urgent first day tasks, or pull students one-on-one for assessments or conversations. Once they finish, these back to school newspapers make a pretty stellar bulletin board display that students and staff alike will love looking through. La...

New year, new interactive bulletin board!  I’m sooo excited about this one - My students are going to love it, and yours will too!  Choose quality materials.  For this board, I decided to use Fadeless Paper in White Shiplap. For the border, I used black and metallic gold Bordette. (Find all the materials here .) Fadeless Paper is the way to go! It is high-quality, fade-resistant paper. It won’t fade after a month or so of sunlight exposure like typical butcher paper will. It’s also so thick and strong that it doesn’t rip nearly as easily, either, which was super important to keep in mind when it came to this particular project! I’m confident that this bulletin board, lovingly decorated with Pacon’s Fadeless paper and Bordette, will hold strong alllll year, so I know my time and energy creating it is all worth it!  Build the board.  Fadeless paper is quick and easy to hang. I like to roll it out on the floor to match ...

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...

Classroom organization can be overwhelming. I get it. A new school year is coming - Let's do our best to organize that classroom for efficiency. Organization is a tough topic because it's different for everyone. What works for me might not work for you, and that's totally okay. You'll have to experiment in order to create systems that work for you. Here's what works for me: Use all the bins! I'm a big fan of plastic drawers ! The drawers pictured above are used for storing my copies (and other materials) for the week. I put copies and such for next week in the bottom drawer as I work on plans throughout the week. I also use plastic drawers to store small group materials, papers that need to be graded or sorted, etc. They are cheap and effective! I like using 12 x 12 scrapbooking bins to store my units: books, games, task cards, posters, etc. These are the Iris brand. I got mine on sale at Michael's for $2.50 each, an...

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...

Here are 5 of my favorite, tried and true ways that I use to get to know my new students. Teachers and students alike will love this back to school community building activities! 1. Survey Your Students I think it's so important to survey your students during the first week of school! I typically use surveys as morning work and keep them to refer to all year long. There are tons of free and paid surveys on TPT and elsewhere, but after a few years, I made some tailored to my needs. The first survey I use is one that asks students about their learning styles and preferences. This helps me make environmental decisions about dimming lights, playing music, and so on. Another survey that I find to be important is about what holidays students celebrate. I have an amazingly diverse student population, and it is imperative that I am inclusive to all students. For example, I don't want to do any Halloween activities in my classroom if I have any students ...

On a recent Instagram story, I mentioned that we earned a new unit for our 3rd grade team. I'm not sure how common this is, but you all had lots of questions for me! I had 25 students in my class, which is the state maximum for first, second, and third grades. However, we had to wait for the ten day attendance count and allotment funding to come through before hiring a new teacher. We were so lucky to find someone amazing, but at this point, we were 4+ weeks into the school year, so the transition was tough for everyone! How many students did you lose? Five. Five sweet, clever children that I had spent 5 weeks bonding with. How were students selected to move? There were so many details that went into this decision, which was made by the administration team: reading levels and math levels - We have leveled classes, so this is important! demographics - The new class needed to be just as balanced as ours, as far as ethnicity and gender.  exceptionalities - The n...

Every year, my school does a Curriculum Night. You might call this Open House, Parent Night, or something along those lines. Basically, parents are invited into the classroom (without their students) to learn about: grade level curriculum content resources standardized testing schoolwide expectations  PBIS important policies like transportation changes classroom expectations schedule behavior homework communication It can be super intimidating, but it's a chance to show your parents that you LOVE THEIR KIDS and that together, WE'VE GOT THIS.  First, the parents trickle in. This year, I had them each sign in because I had confidential paperwork that I handed out to them and they had to sign for it! (In the past, I haven't asked them to sign in.) Also on my table I had my volunteer sign up form, which is provided by my PTA, and sometimes I put my wish list there, too. Then parents go find and sit at their child's desk. On the d...

Last year, I blogged about my first week of third grade . That's still a good resource for you if you're looking for ideas, but I did change things up just a little this year, so I thought I'd provide some more details for you. MONDAY Students come in with the option to read a book or draw a picture.  Read aloud Lilly's Purple Plastic Purse and complete activity to make inferences about the teacher, then inferences about other students.  Discuss class mantra (Be kind. Work Hard. Have Fun.) What does it mean to you? Discuss team jobs  (blog) - How do we take care of our classroom? Teach call and response.  Team building activity: cup towers.  Read aloud The Crayon Box that Talked . Make chart for "Accountable Talk" to discuss how our words and tones matter.  Another team building activity: tangrams  (free). Afterwards, discuss. Did your team work together better this time? Were you more successful? Wh...