Hugs and Kissess

Happy Friday!
I am exhausted!

Whatever is going around {tummy bug}, has landed in my room, again!
This time there was no poop in the socks~ but it was a close one... and I am totally not talking about one of them!
I made three trips to the nurse's office this morning....and after three doses of medicine, I was okay~ until the heartburn kicked in around 1pm. And I ate a half a bottle of tums....

And you're thinking, why would she stay?!?!? Get a sub for goodness sakes!
Well I am going to be out with my daughter's appts, and with my dental appts, and, honestly-
it is harder to not be there than it is to be there sometimes!
Teaching- The only job in the world where we come to work sick so that we can relax on our sick days!


I had my Pre conference on Tuesday and my Eval on Wed. I think it went okay. It was a planning eval. So she more or less was looking at my plans the whole time. We dont have our post conference til the end of next week- I won't remember anything by then!
I did get a new student on the day of the eval. She came from a school where they don't take grades and there isn't a lot of pressure on them.....one day in and she is already making excuses.....Aye ye ye!

I did have time to redo the door. Not anywhere as ambitious as Little Red was, but still cute.
We use poetry often- but we are also required to have a showcase piece for their portfolio. So I used the adorable hot cocoa mugs I have seen on Pinterest

We wrote the alphabet vertically and then brainstormed in groups to fill each line with a word or phrase that has to with winter.
These words were going to then help them to create their Acrostic POems.
They were sweet- and some of them are going to grow up to be teachers. Here are a few of their choices when told to think of snow and winter weather:
a-absent
d- day off
n- no school
o-out of school
s- snow day


and one of my sweetie girls made XOXOXOXOX for x. I asked her why and she said because mommies love to snuggle and hug with their kids when they are home from school...sweet.....delusional....but sweet!

The poems are on the mugs...kind of hard to see the poems.

We are going to get lots and lots of rain over the next few days.
These things you can be assured will be happening: There will be naps. There will be comfort food. There will be blogging!

I have to get on and see how my luck is with all these giveaways I have entered!!!!! Sleep in if you can!!!

Around the Room

Alrighta-Rootie!
Thanks for sharing your ideas about type vs write!

1. So tonight, I WROTE my plans into the template- felt a little more connected- we'll see how that pans out. (I will scan them at school tomorrow)

2. I have decided that I am going to pawn off, unload, share the Decode If I Can (Dykodiphukan) with another teacher (hee hee...) I just can't keep all that stuff when I am trying so hard to condense what I have.

3. I was off today too! And I went to Appt Step # 1 for the veneers!!! whoo-hoo! With all the stuff that has gone on with the girl, I had to reschedule  a few times. :( She is doing really well BTW. Queasy in the a.m though.

Now for a quick look at a few things in my room:

This is the Center Center. Math centers are numbered. Reading Centers are lettered. 1 and A are technology and then B is listening and C is Word Work. (I am toying with converting to Red, Black and White. Dandelions and Dragonflies has a gorgeous room! And everything matches!!) We'll see....

This is our "Tired Word Wall". There are some words in each- and when we think of more synonyms, we add them! When they are writing, if they find a tired word in their writing- they have to substitute it. (Reverse Psychology- everyone wants to "get a new word", which in turn- makes them have to look at them and read  all of them......me so sneaky!)

All of my books are in LibraryThing.com and in these banker boxes. Did this three years ago- makes it very easy to find what I am looking for!

Bought the box at Really Good Stuff- made the labels on PPT.

After I taped up their desks (ha ha) I hot glued these red cups to desks. Cups are only for scissors, yellow pencils, response cards, and dry erase markers. Crayons, glue, and markers are in these caddies. 1 caddy per 2 firsties.

This is where the caddies live when they are not using them. I had my doubts about community crayons but this IS working!!!!!! (bleck! someone needs to dust that thing)

And these are our 'I CAN" statements. Saw a picture of a sign like this on Pinterest....fell in love. The font for the days of the week is Peeps- FUNNY! Green is Reading. Yellow is Math and Red is Unit.

Whew- that was like a set of vacation pictures at the neighbor's house, eh?
But they are not all "separate post" worthy.

Tomorrow is my pre conference, Wednesday is the Eval, Friday sister in law will be in town- she's a hoot! Sure there will be a story there after she leaves!!!!
Have a great week!

Evaluations and Advice

OK, first a "Self-Evaluation"
I am so tired of looking like the "Before" picture in the magazines! (that was me yelling)!
Seriously though, some of those "befores" look way better than my "after".
I know, "After what?"
Ok, Ok, I haven't gotten anywhere close to starting around to actually trying to solve this problem, but admitting I have the problem is the first step! How long am I allowed to stay on the first step???

Now for the "School Evalutation"-
I have my Planning Eval on the 18th. One of the asst pals will be in my room for  total of 15 mins- that's it- 15 mins.
The last one (the Instruction Eval) went very well-
and now I have anxiety (did I take my meds)....I'm am stressed because I'm know I will over plan and over analyze and on the other hand, what if I am too laid back about it???? ARGHHH!!!
The eval will be during Math, during our circus show centers and small group part of math. Ugh! And THEN when January ends- my 45 min UNANNOUNCED EVAL is coming.....can you say "ULCER!?!?!?!"


Ok, now for advice-
No, I am not dispensing it. Unfortunately there is not a Dear Squirrely section of the blog. (Who would ask a squirrel for advice anyway!?!?!? They're NUTS!)

I am considering going back to handwriting my plans. I found a template that I really liked on Teacher LadyBug Files. It is one day per page with large blocks to write in for main subjects and a space for the rest of the schedule. I downloaded it and tweaked it for my times.
I use my previous plans as a "springboard" each week- but I feel like I have been doing an awful lot of copying and pasting lately. It is making me feel a little disconnected. Does that make sense? We don't have a "set" format, but we are expected to include certain things. With all of our PLC and PDs and modules- I feel like I am on the pc too much (for school).  Am I crazy? Do you type or write?

One more question....a neighboring teacher gave me Decode If You Can. The whole kit and kaboodle. I have a few low ones every year and I thought- this could be helpful to use with them- and then..... GREAT BUCKETS OF WILD GEESE!!!!!!! There is SO MUCH crap that comes with it! Should I learn how to use it and incorporate it (next year) or should I just pass it on? Keeping it doesn't seem to follow along with the de-cluttering theme. What would you do? (And give it back isn't an option- she is already gone) :(

And last but not least, a shameless plug for someone else's giveaway- because I want to win, of course- My Grafico has a giveaway every month. Check out this month's here . :)

So-
Type or Write?
Keep or Pass On?
Working or Off for MLK day?

Hurry! It's not too late to send some love

"We have an opportunity to help out some fellow teachers! Here is an email that Mrs. Wills got from a teacher in Joplin, MO:

I teach in Joplin, which made worldwide news last May when our town was cut in half by an F5 tornado.  Many of our elementary schools were destroyed or damaged, and as teachers, we have had a roller coaster year.  I came from a meeting yesterday where many are struggling with the weight of all we are dealing with.  My request is this:  would you be willing to donate a created pack of your choosing to give away at a drawing at our upcoming district Kindergarten grade level meeting?  The meeting is Monday and I am sorry for the short notice but I did not realize until the meeting how down everyone is feeling. "

  

Mrs. Wills decided to take this one step further and make this into a linky party of love!

1.  Send your TpT product or Teacher's Notebook to Erica

edoennig@joplin.k12.mo.us

2. Then link up over at Mrs. Wills' Kindergarten

I just linked up a few minutes ago-

It puts things in perspective for me- my complaints seem trivial when you compare them to what these teachers must be feeling!
Send 'em your love!

Winners of My First Giveaway!

 

Congratulations  to Jeannie from Booky4First, Staci from Let's Teach Something, and Holly from Crisscross Applesauce in First Grade!

Shoot me an email and I will send you your "winnings"!

Thank you to everyone for entering~ it was fun!

Tell more people about your " Secret-Squirrel-Friend", and I will have another one as my numbers rise:)

We were out today- because of SNOW!
I would have totally been jealous (and kind of still am) about Jen R.'s trip to the beach if I had been at work today..but I wasn't there- I would still love to have been warm at the beach though:)
Instead,I was in my squirrely kajamas (the "k" was on purpose) and I got to take nap!

Then I got to babysit a 4 week old baby girl! OMG! We were enamored the whole time! She was here for around 4.5 hours and I think I held her for 4! I miss those days....sometimes. There were a  few shakey moments when we weren't sure why she was crying....but we figured it out:) By the time her mommy got here to get her, I was exhausted!!

Thank you for all the thoughts and prayers for our Dr appt yesterday. Her numbers were "up" but with the "medicine" not doing what it was initally set up to do- they changed it. Now it is 3xs as potent and she has to take it in the morning AND at night- thank goodness they gave her anti-nausea meds. They also put her on a different iron supplement.

Did you know that if you take vitamins and drink/eat dairy within two hours of each other that your vitamin isn't "working"? I had no idea! The dairy does something to keep the "blah blah blah" from "blah blah blah blahing"....She is a BIG milk drinker...so the last month while she has been doing grown up multi vitamins and iron- all the milk she is drinking (all day) is keeping them from helping her. The solution was to take the vits and iron right before bed...as far as we know, she does not drink milk in her sleep. :)

It is now time for me to engage in some provocative, risque, sexy mama, Friday night, night life action....

....who am I kidding? I am going to laminate some cards for a center, drink some coffee, do a night mask, blog stalk, and watch ID Discovery.... I know, the most exciting woman you know, right? The MR has to work tomorrow- so I get to sleep in- so I can stay up as late as I like:)

I took lots of pictures Wednesday of some things going on in my room- I will post them tomorrow!