Getting to know you!

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I have been wanting to get my blog out there more and I thought this was the perfect opportunity.  My mission: Tell everyone about myself using my initials: SAG.  Here goes:

S is for summer weather.  I love my job, I love my kids, but I am sick of snow and winter.  I want to see and feel the sun, I want to relax on the beach at our cottage, I want to be outside. I want summer weather.

A is for always on the computer.  My poor husband. This is my first year officially in a classroom (though third year working with kids-post grad).  I spend a lot of time on the computer.  TpT, Blogging, reading Blogs, Pinterest.  You name it, I do it on my computer on Sundays.

G is for guacamole.  I was reading other people's blogs and someone had a for avocado and it instantly made me crave guacamole.  I love Mexican food, but Guacamole is sooooo good!

Dental Awareness

We set up an experiment with eggs representing teeth.  We put them in water, milk, and soda. We observed what the teeth looked like before and predicted what we thought would happen. We wrote down our answers as a class.  We then checked them again at the end of the week and discussed what we saw and what it meant for our teeth and what is healthy to drink.  Students helped me write down the answers.

The sub helped collect their observations afterwards and they brushed the tooth with real toothbrush and toothpaste to show our teeth can be clean and sometimes having sweets is ok, but brushing is important.

Students had the opportunity to floss the play dough out of the teeth!  Play dough was stuffed in between the pieces of a large lego.  They used yarn to floss it out.  Great practice on flossing and the purpose of flossing!

We had a dentist visit as well. Afternoon students and students that stay for extended day were able to hear some dental awareness information and learn about healthy teeth!

paper and marshmallow mouths

  Making paper and marshmallow mouth

Students made marshmallow paper mouths, apple mouths, and more this week.  they counted their 20 teeth and worked our fine motor skills putting them on.  We worked with matching a toothbrush to the teeth, and did some teeth math with some unifix cubes (white) as manipulative to help with the math problems. 

Apple, peanut butter. marshmallow
mouths

making apple mouths

It was a crazy week with my being gone two days, but things looked great when I came back.

Using unifix  cube manipulatives
to do tooth manipulatives

tooth addition with white unifix cubes

Clutter Free Classroom #7

 If you have not started yet, please check out the Clutter Free Classroom Blog (by clicking image above).  

This weeks job: Manage incoming paperwork. 

As she mentions in her blog: The paperwork just. keeps. coming.

I communicate with parents via email, my website, and my blog.  When parents do write notes, they write them in the student's folders.  As a school supply, we have parents bring folders with the metal tabs in the middle. We then whole punch some paper and put it in between.  This way, we can keep a running journal, parents always have the paper, and they can check back daily.

When I go to staff meetings for the school district, I bring my teacher binder with me.  In it, I have a three whole punch. I punch the information I need and put it in the correct tab.  I recycle what I dont need right away.

Weekly newsletters to parents and to staff comes to us via email.  I do not print unless I have to, and if I have to I immediately punch it and put it in the binder.

When I have extras that can be saved for next year, I put it in it's theme folder in my file cabinet.  I only have one drawer of this.  It is not an abundant area, but when I spend time cutting and laminating, I save it for next year in this drawer.  I keep as much digital as I can.  I have MANY files digital sorted in the same manner as these for next year printables.

I have the stacking drawers that have a shelf for scholastic (a big paper source), my sub binder, an extra's pile for those early finishers, and a file shelf (for if I dont have time to put the items in their files in the cabinet. 

When students finish their work, the put it in "the high five basket"  The high five basket is a paper catcher I got from the dollar spot at target that has hand prints on it.  Somehow, it got a name as high five basket and it stuck.

If they need do do more work on the item, the put it in the blue basket.

Anyway, I take the work from the basket and put it where it goes next: Alphabet books, home, or grade.  If it needs to be hung on the wall, I post-it note the pile and put it in the aide's baseket.

If RSVPs come for our many school sponsored events, these go in the RSVP drawer to tally later.  They are recycled after the event has finished.

If I need to make copies, it goes in the copy drawer. The drawers are removable, so I can take the whole drawer with me when I go to make my copies.