05 February 2012

He Brought it Upon Himself to Visit...

Strep Throat that is. Insert frustrated, exhausted teacher here. Thursday I was exhausted all day, but I made it through the day. Friday I woke up feeling a little horrible, but I thought it's Friday, I'll make it. Plus it's so exhausting to make sub plans and get things ready, especially for a Friday. By roughly 2:00ish I was near death. I made it through math games, then while my kiddos were at their specials for the day I really went downhill. I ran outta school as soon as the kids were gone, drove straight to Walgreens Quick Care. I was convinced I'd get a ticket because traffic wasn't going fast enough for me. I told the nurse to take a strep test, because at that point I was convinced. She looked at me funny. Like, how do you know. Well I'll tell you how I know... I work with 3rd graders! That's how I know. So now here am a few days later, extremely thankful it was strep. Which you may find weird, but I find a relief, because within hours of taking my first dose of antibiotics I was already feeling like a brand new woman! Hopefully I'll be just as thankful in 10 days when I'm done taking them.

In order to keep myself awake for that last 30 minutes, I did manage to take some pictures of things I wanted to share.

{insert the fact i'm kinda crazy here!}
{i'm testing our black backgrounds with colorful, plain borders to see if i like it for next year. i may also try the opposite. bright, plain color backgrounds with black borders. we shall see. this is my sloppy attempt to try the first option}

{maybe i'll like it more once i actually have the new posters on it!}

{we're studying fractions currently, and last week we did pronouns}

{definitely needs to be redone neater, but it definitely helped the kids out}
 
{this was mainly up to help with the spelling for the fractions. they were having trouble with twelfths. i was amazed that third graders still have trouble with the idea that it's the shaded part over the whole, not the shaded part over the not shaded part - i always thought this was a first grade thing!}

{i completely meant to take pictures of the kids pizzas but it completely slipped my mind and i sent them straight home! we did it step by step and goofy me made them glue the pepperonis on wrong, so they didn't look right when i hung them. for all the trouble they were having grasping the concept, they all did a wonderful job on the pizzas!}

{we finished the rocks part of our earth unit 2 weeks ago, and we just finished the earth's layers part of the unit. so we made our books to help us remember about each layer. apparently it was taking forever for us to messily color them and only a few of my kiddos finished. here's one of the samples.

 {all the layers, and the earth is the cover/back page}

 {we are officially in ISAT mode. so every week we're doing reading and math extended responses. my kids are still struggling with them. but i think we may be making some progress. at least i'll keep telling myself that. here's the last one we did using an article about how our bodies keep us warm}

{it's a work in progress}

{i have to give a MAJOR shoutout to A Cupcake for the Teacher! in my delirious state on friday i forgot all the parts to my big football project at home. i was in desperate need of something easy and cute for my kiddos. the majority of my class is obsessed with football, as am i. they had a project to complete this weekend, so we needed something to go along with our fraction lesson as school. we made these and then used them for our math. but seriously... the project was $1 and came with everything i needed. my kiddos did fabulous. so a HUGE thank you coming from the desperate, sick teacher i was on friday! i highly recommend going on her TN or TPT and buying it. you can always use it next year!}

So that's it for now. I'm still trying to breath normally with all of my congestion! I'm not 100% yet, and I'm sure after all the junk food I'll be eating in a few hours I won't be any better tomorrow! Any opinions on the black? I had a few people say no way! I'm loving it though! Maybe some black, some colored? Maybe back to polka dots?

22 comments:

Jill said...

I really like your black backgrounds! It makes your words pop!

Last year I subbed in a 3rd grade ESL class for 3 weeks while their teacher's daughter had a baby, and we worked on extended responses. It was pretty much a nightmare, but I recently talked to the teacher who I subbed for and she said her kids did amazingly on the writing part! Whatevs! I wish I had your extended response thing to guide them back then!!

Marvelous Multiagers!

Unknown said...

Looks amazing!! (glad you are feeling better...strep is NO FUN!!)
Jennifer
First Grade Blue Skies

Chrissy said...

I hope you are feeling better today!

I like the black backgrounds! Everything just pops. This year, I covered all of my boards with a deep sky blue. I think it has helped to cut down on the visual noise, especially since every square inch of my walls is painted with a mural!

ReadWriteSing

amy.lemons said...

Love it all! Hope you feel better soon!

Erika said...

Glad you are feeling better. I love the black backgrounds. I changed mine this year. Thanks for the pronoun ideas. They are great!

2B Honey Bunch
The Best Endings

Lisa at Fourth and Ten said...

Loving all the pronoun ideas! So cute!
I love the black backgrounds, believe it our not, I don't have any bulletin boards in my room!
Lisa
Stories From Second

Unknown said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Unknown said...

LOVE the black backgrounds! It really makes your words POP. I'm glad you are feeling better. Thanks for sharing all of your great ideas! :)
Krista
stellar-students

Miss Foote said...

Everything stands out with the black background. I did black one year and loved it. My room now, I painted all the bulletin boards, so I wouldn't be constantly changing the paper, and couldn't commit to painting black:-)

Laurie
Chickadee Jubilee

Anonymous said...

can you please post a copy of the extended response? Thanks so much!

vicky1970 said...

I love your room, it's so cute! I will have to pop in more often. :o)
~ Vicky
Traditions Laughter and Happily Ever After

Unknown said...

LOVE your anchor charts!
I'm having an anchor chart linky party with a twist! All links will be included in a PDF with pictures and links to sources and offered for free via download. This way we all have access to lots of great anchor chart ideas/resources at our fingertips!
Please consider heading over to my blog and linking up! I'd love to include yours! :)
-Lacey
Wild about Teaching!

iintegratetechnology said...

Love those pronoun pizzas! Thanks for the idea!
Mindy

iintegratetechnology@blogspot.com

driving lessons Worcester said...

I love this classroom decorations. It is so creative and very colorful. I'm sure that this will become inspirations of the students.

iamjusttiff said...

I love those extended response sheets, and I was wondering if you had a copy on TPT or your blog. Thanks

enjoythegame said...

CAn I get a copy of the Extended REsponse worksheets

Tracy A. said...

Hi! I realize this is an old post, but I really like the Reading Extended Response sheet. Any chance you can tell me where you got it? I looked for it on TPT but had no luck.
Thanks!

Allison said...

I found this link on a later post...
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B1UC2wTcsbVJMzZmYmJkNmQtOGUyNC00ZWNjLTk5YWYtMzk4ZDQ5N2E2YjZh/edit

V-Force said...

I love your posts! Can you please send or post a copy of the Reading Extended Response Sheet? Thanks!!!

The Mess That Matters said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
The Mess That Matters said...

Who did your template for your blog? It is really cute!

Kim said...

Where can I find/purchase your reading extended response form?