Read Across America Week

This week we have been celebrating Dr. Seuss’s birthday (as I’m sure many of you have) along with Read Across America Week. I absolutely love this time of the year because I still remember how much I enjoyed it when I was in school. Here is a small glance at our week:

We read TONS of Dr. Seuss books, so of course we had to make some Oobleck. A second grade class came to help us out so we were a little crammed in the room, but they all had so much fun being scientists for the afternoon. I was surprised (but happy) that none of them had made it before.

We made our first glyphs as a class also. I am going to try to do more of them because my kids liked them so much. I found this activity from Cara Taylor on TpT for free! You can download it here.

I also found another fun (and free!) activity to go with The Foot Book from Allie Byrne. Unfortunately, I do not have pictures because we didn't get to finish it… BUT you can find and print it for yourself here. 

We had a little party to celebrate Dr. Seuss’s birthday Friday afternoon. We watched The Lorax and ate these adorable snacks one of my wonderful parents sent for our class. The jellybeans are “truffula seeds” and the goldfish represent One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish. So sweet!

How did your class celebrate Read Across America Week?

While I am here I will also share by February Scholastic haul. It was my biggest one yet! I was thrilled about all the books I was able to get. I ordered my first Knowledge Quest set (seasons and weather). It is a brand new product and aligns with common core. I haven't had a chance to really look at it yet, so I am not sure how I feel about it.

I also received my online copy of Teacher’s Helper from themailbox.com yesterday. I LOVE getting products from The Mailbox and spend way too much money there. I am so excited that they have aligned Teacher’s Helper with Common Core! I love this magazine. It is perfect for morning work, homework, or extra practice. Does anyone else hoard The Mailbox resources like I do?

I have linked up with teachers in my state! You should if you haven't yet. I would love to meet more Tennessee teachers!

My New Guided Reading Binder

This week, I changed up my guided reading binder and I am so happy with it! Here are some pictures of what it looked like before and what it looks like now...

Above is the first binder cover I made. I liked it at the time, but I was ready for a new look. Below is my new cover. I am obsessed with chevron.

I also changed up the way I record my guided reading information. I used to have to write every single thing I did down each day. It got SO repetitive... (annnnddd I may have started writing less and less info each time) so I finally changed up the form. Now, I can just check things off and fill in small blanks. You can see the plain form I had before and the new form I have now below.

My old form...

                                             

My new form!

(available in color and black and white)

Here is a very helpful reading level conversion chart I have in the back of my guided reading binder. I refer to it often.

You can find all of this (old and new things) and more in my Guided Reading Binder Kit here.

Valentine's Day Fun!

We started our Valentine's Day activities today! I have had them laminated and ready for a while, so I was excited to finally be able to use them. We will be using these centers all week. My kids are loving them! We have some more special activities planned for Valentine's Day (of course) and we also have two birthdays that day, so it will be a very fun and eventful week! Here are some pictures of my kiddos hard at work...

This is the "Scoop and Tally" center. I forgot my big bag of hearts (ugh!) so they didn't have too many to "scoop" today.

Here they are putting numbers in order and recording their answers.

These kiddos are playing a sight word game.

This is a candy heart pattern center.

You can get all of these centers (plus many more!) in my Valentine's Day Unit here.

How is your class celebrating Valentine's Day?

Free $5 to Spend at Scholastic

I received this in an email today and I wanted to share it with you. With the code DLD5 you get $5 free to spend on online resources from Scholastic. I love Scholastic and what is better than free stuff? Nothing!

If you don't get their emails, you should definitely sign up! They do things like this pretty often and they have $1 deals all the time. Now the hard part is deciding what to get! What did you decide on? Leave a comment with the resource you got for FREE.

Superbowl Sale on TpT

This Sunday is a great day to stock up on resources for your classroom! TeachersPayTeachers is throwing a sale this Sunday only. All you need to do is use the code "SUPER" at checkout. I will also be giving an extra 5% off for this day only. Check out my new products that you can get for 33% off! Click on the cover pages to link to my store.

January Scholastic Haul

Happy Monday! We had a field trip today. We had a great time but man, I am exhausted! It was also picture day so our day was very hectic. I wanted to show you guys my scholastic haul from last month's book order and tell you that if you have not signed up for Scholastic Book Clubs... DO IT NOW! There is seriously no downside and I have gotten so many things absolutely FREE. Here is all the stuff I got this time...

I got 14 books (one is even hardback!), two computer games (not sure how great they are yet...), three books on CD, and five card/puzzle games that are perfect for centers or an "I'm done" activity. All of this from one order... how great is that! I might get more excited than the kids do when the book box comes. It is a little ridiculous.

I plan on doing an in depth post about how to make the most of your book orders, but for now I will just tell you to sign up!! They give bonus points (that you can spend on school items) for every dollar your kids spend, plus you get $20 free to spend when your class puts in a $20 or more order, plus you get $3 to spend any time a parent orders online. (I could go on and on...) If you have a colleague that already orders from book clubs, ask them to give you their customer number when you sign up, because you will BOTH get extra bonus points on your first order! If you do not have a fellow teacher that uses book clubs, I would be more happy to give you my customer number. =) After you sign up, be on the lookout for a post with tips on how to get the most out of your book clubs book orders. 

I have finished two new themed resources for Valentine's Day and St. Patrick's Day (both aligned with Common Core). I am really loving making themed products lately. Take a look at them below!

You can find my Valentine's Day Unit here.

You can find my St. Patrick's Day Unit here.

Have a great week!

100th Day of School!!

Today was our 100th day of school! The kiddos have been looking forward to this day since the very first day of school. One of my kids said, "I thought we wouldn't do any learning on 100 day". Ha! No learning? Never! I was so excited about all of the 100 day activities that I had planned. Unfortunately, we didn't even get to half of it because we had some other school activities today also. Here are some pictures of our day...

We decorated these yesterday to have them ready  for today.

One of my students brought these for everyone today. So stinkin' cute!

I loved the way he spelled this! "Moodursiykl" (motorcycle)

You can find all of these activities and more in my 100th Day of School set here.

When was/is your 100th day of school and how did you celebrate?