Dreaded Student Loans

Who likes FREE money? ME ME ME!! So I had heard about this loan forgiveness before but never thought it was real. I finally googled it after I hit the five year mark and decided to try it expecting no results.

Well I got my letter and I am now down 5,000 dollars less in my student loans! Who would have thought it would actually work! If you can answer yes to the questions below you should apply.

Do you have student loans?
Have you taught more than 5 years?
Have you taught for five of your teaching years at a Title I school?

If you answered yes to all three, click the think to get your money! Make sure to call your loan company to make sure they get the paperwork and within a month or two you should here something! If you are a special ed teacher or a teacher of science and or math then it is 17,500!

http://studentaid.ed.gov/PORTALSWebApp/students/english/cancelstaff.jsp?tab=repaying%2F

New Plan Book Confession

My name is Elizabeth and I love new plan books! I love new things! Back to school is my favorite part of the year because I get all kinds of new things! I try to not spend money on things I don't need but new things get my gears going! :)

I have always been one to type up my lesson plan and just print it out. This worked for the past couple of years but it started to become tedious because I really don't like to type. I also don't like having to change fonts and boxes and things which annoyed me. Last year I made a generic plan based off of a friend of mine and then hand wrote things in and it seemed to work. This year I decided to use the free plan book the county has and make it pretty!
Front of the book.

Back.

After spending one night putting this all together I was happy with my end product. Then I found Pinterest.com (that is a whole different post) and I found this amazing website where this lady has made the ultimate plan book! I was in heaven except for the price! I like new, but I like cheap more. This book was $50 which is WAY over my price range. I had found one at office max for thirty and I couldn't spend that! With all the money I spend at the beginning of the year this seemed like a waste since I already have to spend around 200 on all the other things. So what does a desperate person do, post it to Facebook and beg someone to buy it! My amazing mom has adopted my classroom and with that came the purchase of this amazing plan book! I was so excited and can't wait for it to get here! I will write another post about all the amazing things I do with it!

This is a picture from her website where she tells all about the planbook. The link below the picture is her site http://www.erincondren.com ! Go to it and see how amazing this book is!

http://www.erincondren.com/teachers/inside/goodies.html

My head is swimming...

So today marks the first day of the school year! I am really excited about this school year and can't wait to see my kids. The best part about this year is that these kids are all kids I have taught before! When they were in third grade I was in third grade so I know most of them! I am excited about the team I am working with. They are all excited and motivated to be the best teachers for their students!

With all this excitement comes ideas and reflection. I have spent the past four days at school working in my classroom (pictures coming tomorrow) and in our 5th grade book room. My head is swimming because I have so much I want to do and so much I want to create and try out this year but I don't know where to put it all. I secretly wish I could have a Pinterest.com board in real life where I just pin and repin everything I want to try!

How do you handle this back to school foggy brain? How do you organize everything you need to do before school starts? I need a system and I need one that helps me keep all the ideas close by because if I put it away somewhere I will forget about it!

Tomorrow we have a meeting with our super and then time in our room. After that is the marathon of meetings we have this year because there are lots of updating and changes being made. This excites me but also adds fog to the brain. I want to be the best teacher I can be, but sometimes I feel like I am spinning my wheels and not moving anywhere.

Well I just wanted to say to you all good luck and I hope your first week back is a great one!

VistPrint Amazingness

So if you are a teacher and haven't used Vistaprint, you're missing out! Vistaprint.com is a website that is meant for businesses to make personalized products to use to promote their business. Now the reason Vistaprint.com is so amazing is because they send out so many amazing FREE deals! Yes I said FREE! Now if you are like my husband you will automatically assume there are strings attached with that free but their aren't! What is attached is that you pay shipping and if you order and don't need it right away the shipping is cheap! Here are some of the items I have made for my classroom.
This is a poster I made to show our student attitudes. As a PYP school we promote these attitudes for our students to demonstrate through their day.

This is the second poster I made and it shows our learn profile. This is what we are want our students to demonstrate after their 13 years of school. As adults we strive each day to demonstrate these profiles. Through the attitudes students are working towards these profiles.

I believe whatever behavior system you use, you need to support the students who always do the right thing. We are a PBIS school which means we use positive behavior support which means we promote good behaviors. Through this we want our students to be models for other students. Our motto is TEAM! Treat others with Empathy, Exercise Cooperation, Act with Respect, and Model Integrity. I have used money in the past to reward for doing the right thing and taking away as a consequence. Money is hard to manage so this year I am going to try these punch cards. Same idea, they get punches for the right thing and when ten punches are given they can save the card for bigger ticket items or they can turn it in for smaller prizes.

Each year before school starts I send my students a post card telling them how excited I am they are in my class. The students LOVE getting them because they never get mail just for them!

This is my business card I pass out to students and parents so they always have access to my information.

These are magnets I send home to put somewhere so our info is ready for them whenever!

I love VistaPrint because for all this I spent a little under $20 to have them shipped. They have tons of themes you can use and some really pretty prints. As you can see my theme is red, white and blue! I have ordered other things like a notepad, post its, t-shirt and hat for my classroom!

Daily 5

When did you decide to love reading? When did you decide to hate reading? I love to read, my husband hates to read! Now think about yourself as a teacher and think about the kids in your room and how many actual books do your students read? These ideas go hand in hand. Students need to read book, actual books not passages or stories on a sheet of paper, BOOKS! Man has the pendulum swung way far to the right and now we are moving it back to the middle.

We all know that the best instruction is done in small groups. We all know that the students learn best with hands on instruction that allows them to think deeply and apply what they have learned. Well Daily 5 is a system in which students are doing just that. They are reading actual books on their level and apply skills they learn in small groups. They are also making connections with words and writing which help build that foundation of reading. Here are some things that I have in my room to support the structure of Daily 5. Most of these ideas were found online and will give credit where credit is due!


This is my word collector where we add interesting words we find in our read alouds. All students have a small one in their notebooks to write down any words they find on their own.

This is my CAFE board that I use to teach my mini lessons. This partners with Daily 5 as this is the "what do I teach part" and the Daily 5 is the "what do the kids do" part. The students use the strategies listed on the board for their personal goals.

These are my book boxes for my students. This is essential as students need books that fit them. Their boxes house books they are reading and using to practice the skills. You can use anything, but these boxes cost me around 60 dollars from Steps to Literacy.

Now this is just a few pieces of what makes up Daily 5 and CAFE! I will take more pictures and post more about the other parts. I promise you though, trust your students and try this out and you will never look back!

School Law 101

School law is complex! The education world is complex! I just spent the past two days at the NC Bar Association where they held their annual LIFT Institution. LIFT stands for Law Institute for Teachers. NC lawyers present 7 different sessions on all aspects of education law. These lawyers specialize in education law and represent teachers as well as school boards.

My review of this workshop is utter shock! I walked away with a head filled of knowledge pertaining to education and law, but the shock came from the fact that I am a six year teacher and I didn't know a 1/3 of what was said. This institute opened my eyes to so many different aspects of education and how the law plays within the parameters of me being an effective teacher.

Times are changing and with all the new age technology the law is evolving to include cyberspeech and cyberbullying. I was amazed to see how the 1st amendment played within cases in which students made comments about other students or staff via the internet.

This is just a tiny scratch on the surface of what I learned. I would totally suggest all educators attend this institute as there are so many new cases that have changed the law. They hold this instituet each year and it was amazing! The website also has great resources for teachers in fifth grade, middle school and highschool!

DonorsChoose.org

I am rich! I am rich with love from my students! I rich with smiles from my students who feel good about what they are learning! I am rich with questions from my inquisitive students who want to know as much as possible! I am rich with thank you's from parents, students, and strangers who know my heart and soul is in this job!

I am not rich with money! As a teacher I make $1000 each month over minimum wage. This may sound like a lot but when you have a family and you spend about $250 each month on your classroom $1000 doesn't seem like a lot. In NC we have been frozen and money is short for schools. I am determined to not let this trickle down to my students! They struggle at home and shouldn't at school.

In order to provide the best for my students I have turned to the most amazing resource for teachers! The website is www.DonorsChoose.org. As a teach you write grants to ask for resources that you need for your classroom. Now don't let that word grant scare you. It isn't like you think, you basically tell your story. Share your ambitions and your expectations for your students. Share with donors why you want these resources and how it will impact your students! This is important because donors want to help. They want to see their money reach the children. Once your grant is funded you take some pictures and have your students write thank you notes. Send all that back and your done! The best part is you are also teaching your students to be thankful for things and how to show thanks through letters!

This website has changed me as a teacher! I am inspired to reach for the best lesson possible because I know I can get the resources. I am not a screener for DonorsChoose which means I read teacher grants and decide if they meet criteria! This has been a great experience because I get so many amazing ideas!

Setting Goals

As a teacher I feel setting goals is imperative to be successful. As a person I set goals for myself all the time. Some I reach and many that I don't. This year I set the goal to lose 20 pounds. I am half way there but it hasn't been something quick and easy and I am amazed I have stayed focused but the results make me feel good so I am sticking with it! Sorry I digressed, back to school goals! Goals are a way to keep your mind working towards something while also rewarding yourself for the success of reaching the goal. Or how to reflect on yourself in a subjective way if you don't meet the goal. I think as a teacher if I don't set goals for myself how can I expect my students to set goals for themselves.

So this year I am going to break it down for my students and really get them reflecting on individual subjects. I want them to really think about their strengths and weaknesses in order to better themselves. I feel that teaching has become so mundane and robot like. We are given a curriculum and expected to teach it and students are expected to master each part. Where is the relevance and the attachment to what they are learning. When you remember how to do something it is because it impacted you in way that changed how you did something or created a time in which you were successful or unsuccessful. Setting goals can do that for our students because it makes them have a purpose for learning the skills.

Once I find the page I found from another teacher I am going to adapt it and post what my final product will be. It will sit on their desk and be a reminder of what their are working towards. I want my students to succeed and I want them to want more for themselves and in order to do that we need to set goals!

For the Love of Teaching

I was probably 6 when I realized that I wanted to be a teacher. I know I was that young because it was before my parents divorced and we lived at our old house. We had neighbors that lived right behind us and they had a cool basement with this retro carpet that screamed 60's. We played down there all the time and it was ok if we spilled on the carpet because it was so old.

They had all kind of "school" stuff we could play with to play school. I was always the teacher/boss and my brother and the little girl that lived in the house were always the students. We had a dry erase board which made me feel so authentic. My tipping point was when I once called my dad in either fourth or fifth grade and asked him for an answer to my homework. He told me to get my social studies book out and read him the page I thought the answer was on. Then he continued to ask me questions about what I had read and if I still thought the answer was there. I was getting really frustrated that he wouldn't tell me the answer. After about thirty minutes I found the answer. He asked me how I felt and told him I was super proud of myself for finding the answer. That was the moment where I wanted to become like my dad and help kids find the answer; not give it to them.

I am entering my 6th year of teaching which is bittersweet for me. I am excited because as everyone said, it gets easier each year! I feel more and more confident as well as excited about the new school year. I told my school secretary last week that I look forward each year to the letter we get in the mail that lists all the new staff members and the schedule for the first few weeks of school! She told me I was probably the only one. :)

My fifth grade teacher helped me begin paving the way to become the person I am today. She was strict and expected almost perfection. She was a woman of few words but I always felt that she wanted the best for us. She worked hard to teach us and it showed through he comments on our papers or just the nod of her head.

As a fifth grade teacher I hope to inspire my students and encourage them to dream big. I want them to feel excited about learning and eager to explore the world around them. I want to foster their curiosity while holding them to high expectations. I want them to leave fifth grade exhausted from all the learning but fired up to become the best person they can become.

I love to read blogs and after finding Pinterest.com I have been introduced into the world of teacher blogs. Wow! I could spend hours reading peoples blogs and all the amazing ideas they have. Sharing ideas is where the best teaching comes from. I never even thought about sharing things that I have created because I didn't think of them as being ideas worth sharing. The more I read other blogs I realize that even though they may not be mindblowing ideas, people can adapt them to fit their classroom and be the best teachers possible! I hope through this blog you will be inspired to teach all students and become the best teachers possible!