February SLANT

I loved getting to know my match this month for Lessons with Coffee's SLANTBox Exchange. (You can read about my October post here.) 

Laura from over at Teaching From Beyond the Desk is a 6th grade, first-year science teacher in northern California. We had some great conversations about how to get kids thinking scientifically and bonded over our mutual love of colored pens and common spirit animal (Monica Gellar). She sent me an AMAZING box this month with some great goodies:

Check out the art on this box, huh? It's all in shades of purple because it's my favorite color.

I can't wait to take this notepad to school. (The top says " The list that keeps going and going and going and going and going..." totally true for us teachers. The lists NEVER.STOP.) And I'm totally taking that journal and my new pens (below) with me to Spain next week.

She also sent me a lot of Valentine goodies (some not pictured) like some window clings I plan to use next year and some pencils and mini pens that I'm planning to use in my classroom becuase my preschoolers are really getting into writing right now.

And this gorgeous cup is all mine, with one of my favorite phrases on it: "It takes a big heart to shape little minds." I do believe I have a big heart. But the best part is what was inside:

KIT KATS!!!! Om nom nom nom. My favorite.

I'm sitting March out because I'll be in Spain for half of it, but I can't wait until April's exchange! If you've never done a SLANT exchange, you should. They're so fun!!

A Place for Everything...

I love to be organized. No joke, in my undergrad, each class had its own notebook, folder, and highlighter in the same color. For example, my Reading Methods color might have been orange so it had an orange folder and notebook, and any assignments I had due would be highlighted in my planner in orange. And so on and so forth.

Hello, my name is Jessica and I may have a smidge of OCD.

However, I think it's incredibly important as a teacher to be organized. Whatever your system is, you have to find what works best for you otherwise you'll lose your mind. So, here's part 1 of my organization.

Monthly Boxes
Because my themes mostly stay the same from year to year (I'm not gonna do a fall theme in February, for example), I'm able to keep most of my materials and manipulatives in a box. These boxes rotate out each month so that I have everything I need at my fingertips. Some things I might put in there:

• Bulletin board letters
• Manipulatives (I'm always on the lookout for erasers and other small things I can use)
• Worksheets (I slip these in dry-erase sleeves to use during center rotations)

The is the second year I've used this system and I.LOVE.IT. Unfortunately, I keep finding more stuff so some months are in overflow Sterilite shoeboxes as well (December and October, mostly; I have a lot of Halloween/holiday stuff in there).

I keep each theme's paperwork in manila folders and then chuck my teacher created cards and activities in there too. Some months are almost impossibl to close. I don't know what system I'll end up using if/when I teach in an elementary school, but I have no doubt it will be some kind of spin on this one.

Valentine's Day

I'm going to start by saying: I hate parties. What teacher doesn't? I don't like how crazy it makes the kids and I don't like how hopped up on sugar they tend to get. So I do it differently in my room. Instead of "wasting" a day with a party, I incorporate the holiday into my day. For example, I didn't do an entire week of Valentine's Day activities, as my coworkers did (frankly, that would bore me to pieces... we did a week on feelings and emotions instead). I did make a day of it, though. Heart themed art, conversation heart math and science, name activities... Plus our "party."

We sorted and graphed how many candy hearts we had (I forgot to take a photo with all the candy hearts still ON the graph!). We've sorted things before and placed them on graphs, but we've not taken the results and colored in graphs. The kids I expected to "get it" quickly did, but there was one or two surprises. One of  my girls who really just takes things at her own pace actually did MUCH better than I expected -- probably because she knew she'd be getting candy at the end. Ha!

My favorite activity, though, was this freebie I picked up from Teachers Pay Teachers.

We had 3 cups of liquid and hypothesized what would happen if we dropped some candy hearts in each. They then drew the results. I got some AMAZING drawings, considering my kids are only 4!

All in all, my Valentine's Day was a lot of fun! Hope yours was too!

January Currently

My first post of 2015 is a link up with Farley over at Oh Boy 4th Grade. It's my January currently:

Listening: Friends is on Netflix now, don't ya know?

Loving: I got a Fitbit for Christmas, basically, and I'm kind of obsessed with tracking my steps and calories. I think it's exactly what I need to stay on track this time!!

Thinking: I am going to SPAIN in 60 days!!! I can't wait!!!

Wanting: The box I store all of our Christmas stuff in is in the storage closet on the patio and it's currently 14 degrees. I have no desire to go out there and dig it out.

Needing: I shaved my head in June for St. Baldrick's and while I'm keeping it shorter until after Spain, I hate when it gets too scruffy.

Yes: Getting fit. I lost 40 pounds 4 years ago and have been telling myself I was just trying to maintain my weight because I literally went to the gym three times last year. Whoops. So I gained about half of that back. I don't look as flabby as I used to because while I wasn't going to the gym, I was still trying to keep eating responsibly. My goal is 40 more pounds this year and then actually maintain it (for real this time, I swear!).

Maybe: We're discussing going to California for my birthday next year (I'm turning 30). Hubs has family out there who live near Disneyland so I thought it would be a fun opportunity to cross off the other Disney park and celebrate entering a new decade of my life.

I Wish: We currently live in a condo and I'm tired of renting and tired of not having a basement (esp. when the Midwest tornado season hits). Plus, hubs wants a dog and I refuse to get one until we have a yard in which it can run. I recognize that my maybe AND my wish can't happen at the same time. Damn money...

Hope your new year has gotten off to a great start!!