First Day!

Well today was my first full day back to work and I was able to get a whole lot done!  Organized my desk and my shelf area - boy does it feel great to know exactly what's back there and where it all is! Being a perfectionist and a little OCD, that mess back there was a constant nagging in the back of my mind.  Now it all makes sense and all is well in my world.

These are the most recent pictures.  I think it's coming along quite nicely! (I can see the finished product in my mind) :o)

Started covering my walls. All the red will have all Spanish displays; for example - the red towards the bottom will be the Spanish Letter Wall.  The top red strip will be the Spanish Alphabet.

As you can see, each table of four students has this arrangement: two baskets with supplies and a magazine holder in the middle.

Each basket is shared by two students and it includes: two sets of 24 crayons in a large can (empty Infamil cans = FREE) two scissors, two pencils, and two glue sticks in a cute small cup (4 for $1 after Valentines Day!)  The magazine holder will be for their Writing Journals and later their library books (they aren't allowed to take them home).  This makes for easy access and greater independence (= less work for me!)

I wanted to share a classroom management tool that I created my first year teaching that some fellow teachers have asked for to re-create in their classrooms. I use it to present and teach the carpet/circle time routine.  It remains displayed and at the child's eye level while sitting on the carpet, all year long.  This makes it easy to refer back to and re-direct the child with a visual of what is expected.

 It's self explanatory, but you can replace the clip art icons with real photographs of the mouth, eye, and ear if you liked using your own students as models.  It makes it more interesting and it creates a more personal connection to the visual, thus making it more effective.  As you can tell I started that and have yet to finish. :) It works like a charm though.  

Well I need to get to sleep now. This is my new bedtime when I work, but stay tuned, more updates soon!

Goodnight!