Hello darlings! With school closings, I wanted my students to do something fun on their Spring Break. I created these Virtual Vacation Field Trips! You can use them for Spring Break OR as Virtual Field Trips. I have included all the links if you click on the little airplanes. Students also have a journal to fill out as well. If you don't need the journal or the spring break picture, just delete those slides from your copy before you post it to Google Classroom. These slides are NOT editable, meaning you cannot change the days of the week or change out the places I have chosen. The student journal IS EDITABLE. I created this to be ... Read More about Free Virtual Vacation Field Trips
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Meet the Teacher Open House Night Resources
Hello Darlings! Do you have a Meet the Teacher Night or Open House where students and their families come to drop off supplies? We have one each year and families can come in anytime within a two hour window to meet the teacher, tour the room, and drop off their child's supplies. It gets really hectic on this night because families are going in and out of the room, babies are crying, toddlers are running around drawing on the dry erase board with perminant markers.... LOL! Those are just a few experiences I've had! I want to be able to meet with each family, but I can't if they are asking me where everything ... Read More about Meet the Teacher Open House Night Resources
Plan Your Lessons in Google Slides
Hello darling! Do you need to plan your lessons in Google Slides? Do you have to share your plans with your admins or teammates? This free template is perfect!! It can be edited to fit your needs. You can save it as a PDF and print it or you can open it in Google Drive and save it as a Google Slide file. Lesson Plan Template If you are looking for something more substantial, go check out my Teacher Planning Toolkit. It has over 65 different templates that you need for the school year!! I LOVE using the conferring notes and small group forms! It makes planning so easy! Here is what some teachers are ... Read More about Plan Your Lessons in Google Slides
Adding Vocabulary to your ELA Block
Hello darlings! Do you teach vocabulary to your students? I think this is one thing we are missing in the upper grades and we are doing a disservice to our students. As they move up levels in reading, the thing that I notice that holds my students back the most is the challenging vocabulary they encounter. This of course affects their comprehension. I decided I had to squeeze vocabulary into my daily ELA Block. I have Reading and Writing Workshop each for an hour and I have a half hour for Word Study. I take that work study piece and break it up into three rotations- Spelling (word Study)- ... Read More about Adding Vocabulary to your ELA Block
Getting Ready for Book Clubs
Hello Darlings! I've had a lot of questions about how to start Book Club Groups. Here are a few tips to help you get started. Decide on your Book Club groups by reading level. I group them by DRA level. I also use Running Records from The Reading and Writing Project here. Ex. All my 28 M’s might be reading Magic Tree House and all my 38 P’s might be reading Tales of a 4th Grade Nothing. I would not recommend more than 6 groups. You may need to combine some levels. For example if you have 3 kids at a level 28 M and 3 at a level 30 N, put them all in the 28 level. It is ... Read More about Getting Ready for Book Clubs
Pumpkin Globes
In third grade, we are learning about continents and oceans. As a culminating project, we make duh, duh, duh, da... Pumpkin Globes! It is so fun and my past kiddos always come back and tell me how much they loved it! We send home a little note a few weeks before, asking parents to send in a medium sized pumpkin. I teach at a Title 1 school so I do have families who can not afford a pumpkin. Depending on the number, I will purchase them myself or ask for donations. Pumpkin Tips I tell the kiddos not to bring the pumpkin until the day it is needed so we don't have pumpkins ... Read More about Pumpkin Globes