Only One Week Left

   I kept believe there is only one week left of my first year as a teacher. These last few months have just flew by. You can tell that because I didn't post anything on here during the months of March and April. 

   I am both sad and glad that the end of the year is almost here. For the past month the students have been making me a little stir crazy. They have not been listening as well and I think that is mostly from having indoor recess for almost three weeks in a row. 

   I also worry about if I taught my students all that I possibly could before they go to First grade. I don't want their teachers next year wondering why they don't know something when they should. 

   Teachers last day is on the 17th It is going to be strange not having the students walk through the door that day like they have been since September.

Easy, Simple, and Cheap Literacy Centers

 

   I don't know about other teachers, but as a first year teacher I am trying not to spend a lot of money, though this can be difficult. While doing reading groups it's important to keep the other students engaged and learning independently. 

   Since becoming a teacher, I am constantly searching for new activities and ways to do this while not becoming bankrupt at the same time. I only keep a game or activity out for two weeks at a time or else students become bored with it. 

   I have found some really great and cheap games that I wanted to share with teachers, especially new teachers. 

Typing

For this activity you will need some computer keyboards. I had some extras lying around in my house, but you can always go to the thrift store and get them cheap. All students do is practice typing their sight words. 

Play doh

There are so many things you can use play doh for, so spending a little bit of money will go a long way. Students can use it to make letters and words, but can also be used for math. You can find free mats for making sight words and letters(click on the links for the ones I use). 

Game Boards

There are a ton of game boards for students that you can find for free to build students skills. Here are some ones that I have; magic e, cvc words, sight words, and beginning sounds. 

Clip Cards

Again just like game boards, there are lots of clip cards and all you need is clothes pins that you can get a big bag of them at Walmart for a low price. I have rhyming, vowels  and beginning sounds. 

Sensory Bottles/Shakers

For this you need empty bottles, some type of sensory, and printed words. Students search for words in the bottles/shakers, read and write them. I made a recording sheet that you can get for free here.  

Write/Read Room

Reading and writing the room. Students walk around the classroom looking for words that start with a certain letter or they can look for words they know how to read. You can make this more fun by giving students pointers, wands, or even fly swatters to help them search. 

Popcorn Words

You can get popcorn containers from the dollar store and I just took construction paper to write the words on. Then just crumple up the words and place in the container. Students then take one out, read the word, and write it down. Click here for free recording sheet. 

Go Fish

I found this fish cut outs at the dollar store and knew right away what I would do with them; sight word go fish. Though they can also be used for other skills too like word families and the alphabet. 

Telephone

I found this idea from Kidscount1234. Students pretend to call their partner and give them a sight word to write down. There is a free recording sheet from the website. 

Winter Sensory Table Activity

   I don't just want the sensory to be something to play in, but also a learning tool for my students. I actually use it as one of my centers that the students go to through out the week. During this month of January in my sensory table I have placed snowballs. My students absolutely loved them. 

   I was searching on Pinterest different and fun activities that I can do with word families when I stumbled across this great idea. Though I don't have the students toss them. Instead they have to just search for one, read the word, and then place it into the correct bucket. I did 11 words for each word family. I did some four letters words for my more advanced students.     It was so simple and cheap and something I could use until the end of the month and just add the different word family when I taught it with the others. I bought the same ping pong balls that the website suggested and there was a lot, so I didn't use them all. I am sure down the road I will think of different activities that I can use them for. 

   I got the buckets really cheap at Walmart from the after Christmas sales, but even so they were only 97 cents to begin with. Also on the buckets I wrote on duct tape and placed on the bucket so I can reuse the buckets for other things and activities. 

First Snow Day

   So it is official! We have had our first snow day, though to be fair it should have been a normal day. We already had Monday and Tuesday off before the storm, but Tuesday was a teacher work day. That day is now Thursday, so no students and that uses two of our days, which I find really unnecessary.

   I feel like we are wasting snow days for nothing. I mean, I am sure that lots of teachers have been working and doing things from home, so we don't really need that work day. Or couldn't they picked a different day for it or even turn one of the PD days into a work day instead because we have plenty of those.

   Though, I think this is happening is because teachers need a day to complete report cards and they can only do that at school. Lucky for me, we don't have to give out report cards this semester.

   Hopefully, we do go in tomorrow for our teacher work day and the comes come in on Friday or else we have then missed a whole week of school. 

Anyways.... I thought I would share some pictures from the blizzard. 

My car got completely covered and can barely tell that it is blue not white. 

Just to give you an idea how much I got. 

Can you spot the road? The snow is so tall that you can't tell it was been plowed. 

   One really great thing about all these snow days is that I am very ahead with making products for my TPT store. I have products made all the way into April, though I am only uploading one product a week. For right now that is all I can manage, but I feel very proud of myself and one less thing to worry about. 

My Very First Conferences

The Night Before:
I can't even begin to express how nervous I am about having my first conferences. This will really be the first time that I meet the parents expect for my one parent helper. I am mostly nervous because I don't really know what to expect or what the parents will ask. I have talked by email or phone with some parents about students already and those went well. 

For the most part I am just worried about two parents based on the emails I have had with them so far. Those students are about behavior and no parent wants to worry about behavior. 

Most of my students are either on grade level or above, so I don't have to have those awkward conversations about the student not progressing. I have been told by my team that some of the parents won't even show, though I did get all my conference papers back saying they could all make it. 

The Day After:
Well I did it. My first conferences are over and they didn't go to bad. I only had two parents that didn't show up. Though I did have a few parents that were late. 

Most of my parents were fine and happy to hear what I had to and show them. I only had one helicopter parent, but I think I calmed her and told there was nothing to worry. Her child is one of my high students. 

I only had one problem with one parent and I just really felt at a lost for words because I didn't know what to tell her. On the report I basically put on that he needs to develop his language skills. This child barely talks to me or participates in class. He really only shakes or nods his head at me. She apparently has been told by people that he is very articulate, has really good grammar, and vocabulary. So now she is going to be "volunteering" in the classroom. What bothers me that she is so caught up on that when he still doesn't know his letters, letter sounds, and can't identify numbers. 

I am not going to let her bother me and my holiday. Besides another teacher was telling me the mom is strange when she had the older child and told me not to worry about her. 

Planning, TPT, and Other Teachery Things

I have just been so busy, which I am sure many of you know how busy being a teacher can be let alone a first year teacher starting after the school year. I feel like no matter how much I try to plan ahead for the upcoming week over the weekend, that I always fall behind, though my team feels the same way since we have a new curriculum this year. 

Overall things have been slightly overwhelming with things at work. Like keeping up with county assessments, planning, meetings, emails, and events going on at school. It's all just a lot and I never know who to talk to about all of this. I kind of have a mentor, who has been really great, but there are just some things that she doesn't know or I find out that she told me wrong. I just worry about missing deadlines for all of the county assessments and getting in trouble. 

I have one assessment that needs to be done by the beginning of November and all I have been doing for the past two weeks is assessing students. I feel like I am not teaching them anything, especially during math because that is the time that I spend the most assessing students. It has gotten so bad that I don't even know exactly where I am even at in math. After school this Monday, we are going to plan for math and I am just so thankful because I feel just lost at this point. 

Then I have started my own store on TPT which has been an interesting and new process, so far I have only free items, but plan to add paid items soon. I know that it will take time for my store to grow and when I add my paid items that it could take time for it to sell. I post twice a week and thankfully I spent my summer creating items, so I just had to add it to my store and I do not have to worry about creating activities. 

I know my store comes second compared to my students, but I do want to take my store seriously and hopefully it will become a little something. I plan to move sometime the beginning of next year. My commute is about 50 mins to 1 hr. drive and it is starting to take it's toll on me. I will soon be driving in the dark to work and then back home in the dark. 

Anyways I better get back to planning for this week. Luckily we have a half day on Thursday and then no work on Friday. I could really use a three day weekend. Also I am not sure about a schedule for my blog, but hopefully I get everything settled with work soon and can atleast post once a week. 

Kindergarten Teacher!!

I know just last week I said that I was working as a long term sub for a teacher's assistant, but know I officially have my own classroom starting on Friday!!!

This went really fast because the new school year has already begun and they needed a teacher fast. I get an email asking about doing the interview on Monday. Then Tuesday I had my interview and then today I was offered the position! 

I just still can't believe this. I am just SOOO excited. I know this next week is going to be crazy and I am ready for it. 

Application Woes and Anxiety

Trying to obtain a teaching position is not going how I thought it would be. I honestly thought I would have been on interviews by now and have been offered a position. I would be spending by weekends going to yard sales....but that's not happening like I wished. 

I had only applied to two counties. One of those counties is the biggest in my state, but I got so worried about not getting a position before the school year that I applied to another county. I haven't heard any as of today that I am uploading this and I applied a little over a week ago.

The day I applied to the other county and I got thinking about something and I emailed the other county, the big county, human resources department because I felt like something was wrong with my application. I already had the pre-screen interview, but was thinking the lady did not attach that to my application since it was a while ago. I tried emailing her and it would not go through, so I emailed HR. 

A few days later I got any email from the county saying I need to schedule a phone conference for the pre-screen interview. Though the email also said to ignore the email if you have already done it. I emailed back right away asking if I still needed to do it or not because I thought the teacher fair interviews counted. 

I got an email back the next day saying that the person I interviewed with doesn't work there any more, but the lady checked and said that my interview was there. I then got emails from recruitment saying that basically my profile can be seen by principals and they will call if they are interested. 

I felt so relieved when I got this all fixed because I was worrying that maybe my mentors really didn't like me like they had said and I had bad reflections. But everything is fixed now. I just wish I had done it sooner because now I feel like the principals would have completed their interviews and have finished their hiring. 

It has now been a week since I have gotten everything situated with my application and I have not heard from any principals. I got an emailed from my university supervisor last Friday or Thursday asking about how everything was going and I told her about everything. She told me that she doesn't think it's too late and that she got an email asking about her reflection and she said that usually means a principal is interested. 

I am just starting to lose a little faith and losing confidence in myself. 

Problems with Mentor

Let me begin by saying that I did not have any problems with either of my mentors. 

This is about the other girl that was with my pre-primary mentor that had problems. 

So at the very beginning of the of the second rotation I was getting ready to leave the school when I was walking past the copy room and the girl stopped me to talk. She asked me if I ever wore jeans when I was with the mentor and I said yes. I know what you are thinking, you should not wear jeans, but my mentor, supervisor, and principal said that it was ok. I only ever wore jeans once a week and only on the day that we were told that we could. 

Anyways, she begins to tell me that the mentor went off on her, yelled at her she said, about wearing jeans. I was confused and said she really yelled at her to the point that she wanted to cry. She said that the mentor said that she had to force me to wear jeans and another intern ,now teacher there, never wore jeans when she student taught. 

I was kind of taken aback when she said I was forced because she didn't force. She just said that it was ok. I talked to her on a Friday I believe and late Saturday I got an email from that mentor asking for the supervisors email, which I give to her. I ended up texting the girl to give her a heads up.

The intern talked to the supervisor and everything seemed fine I thought. Then during the second to last week in the semester I talked to the other intern and she said things between the girl and mentor was tense. I was surprised to hear that since when I would see the girl and ask her how things were going and she would say fine. 

The other intern told me about how the girl was lying about things to the mentor and that it was so bad that the mentor threatens her about her evaluation. I was shocked to hear about the evaluation and how bad things seem to how gotten. Though the girl was keeping in touch with the supervisor who was supposedly on her side. 

My mentor was making the girl do things that I did not have to do. Like she made her turn in her plans every Friday for the following week. I got to turn mine in the night before. She was having the girl stay until 6 or later almost all the time. I only stayed till 6 one time and the rest of the time I left around 5. When the girl went to pick up her cap and gown which is about an hour drive away, she went there and had to come back to the school to still help the mentor. 

At first with everything that I was hearing about what was happening was such a surprise because the girl is really nice and very charismatic. But then I found out she was lying and not getting things done like she was told and then I understood why the mentor would have been frustrated. I always felt there was something off about the girl when I first met her. 

I would have thought with after the jeans incident she would do everything right. I can tell you that she never jeans again. I began to feel awkward wearing jeans, but my mentor stilled said it was fine and the other intern was wearing them. I felt bad for the girl, but it seems that she dug her self into that hole. 

If I was the girl I would be very worried about the recommendations the mentor will write about her to the counties she is applying for. Eek!

Mentor Gifts

This post is going to be about what I gave to my mentors at the end of each rotation. I gave both my mentors bracelets from Macys and a $10 gift card. The bracelets value at about $55, but I think I got them on sale for $25. 

For my pre-primary mentor I gave her a bracelet about the beach and a gift card to dunkin doughnuts. She really loves the beach and dunkin doughnuts coffee. 

For my primary mentor I gave her a baseball bracelet and a gift card to kohls. Her family is obsessed with baseball and I wasn't sure about the gift card. Last time I gave her a target gift card and wanted to get her something different, so I picked kohls. 

To be honest I was not sure how much to spend. The other girls in my cohort all had varying prices on how much they were spending. One girl just made her mentor a scarf and gave her some chocolate. Then another girl was spending $50. 

I recommend doing what you think is best, though keep in mind you will need them to write recommendations to the different counties you apply to. Just a reminder. 

Student Gifts

This is going to be a quick post about what I gave the students in both my pre-primary internship and primary internship. Below is a pictures of what the gift looked liked all packaged up. Sorry the quality of the picture is not very good. 

I got most of the gifts from oriental trading and just bought in bulk because it was cheaper. In total for both classrooms, I spent about $50 or $25 for each classroom and about $1 on each kid. 

Inside the bag there was:

                                             bubbles                                                                   erasers 

                                               pencils                                                       mini beach ball

2 freeze pops

personalized bookmarks

Then I also typed a small thank you note to the students on a green piece of paper and tied up the bag with red and blue ribbon (school colors). And that was my gift...nothing super fancy. 

Semester 8 Reflection

Earning my bachelor's degree is finally over. Gosh, It only feels like yesterday when I was beginning my first internship and I decided to make this blog to document my journey. 

College has gone by so fast especially my senior semester. I still remember being so nervous to apply to this college and worried about getting rejected and having to apply to another college. 

Anyways this is suppose to be about this semester. This semester was really great and I grew so much into myself as a teacher. Both my mentors taught me so much when I was with them and I know that I can always email them if I have questions. 

Both mentors told me to keep in touch with them, which I fully intend to do. I will truly miss having their guidance. I will miss working with them and their students. I will also really miss just being a part of that school. 

The principal never talked to me about a job there and that is more then fine with me. I was going to say no anyways. I think it is very early and some undecided things going on at the school about plans for the next year. 

I only had one goal this semester and that was to graduate, which I have proudly done. Now my goal before the next school year to get a teaching position at a school. 

Student Teaching: Primary: Week 8

Today was my last day as a student teacher and this week went by so fast. 

During the week I still taught reading groups, but that was all. On Tuesday and Wednesday morning, I went and so the morning routine of two of the second grade teachers. Both teachers had their students come into the classroom quietly. It was surprising to have students come in and barely say a word. 

Thursday was a surprise. I walked in and the principal said hello and said that he had a question for me. He went off to do something and I went down to another intern. After searching for the principal I found him and he asked me if I wouldn't mind taking over my mentor's classroom for the day because they needed her to go into another first grade classroom and the sub that was suppose to be there to go to Kindergarten because that sub had canceled. 

I agreed, but I felt like I really couldn't say no. Then it was a rush to have my mentor explain everything that was planned for the morning. Also during lunch discussing what to do during math. At the beginning of my lunch, my supervisor from college came in to say her goodbye and how much she enjoyed working with us. My mentor kind of told her what was happening about the day, but I don't think my supervisor fully understood that I was teaching in the classroom by myself. 

It was all good though. Everything went well and no major problems accrued. 

Walking in on Friday knowing it was going to be my last day didn't feel real. It still doesn't feel real. My mentor was checking the students reading levels and had a sub in the classroom. I got to watch her doing the running records. Then before specials at the end of the day my mentor gave me her gift and we ate popsciles outside. 

I gave the student their gifts while they were packing up. The students were so sweet when they saw that I gave them something. One student immediately said "aww" and gave me a big hug. Another student told me that he was going to miss me so much and was going to think about me in his dreams and memories. 

Oh! Also, on Friday we provided a small breakfast to all the staff in the school. We got a breakfast tray from Sam's Club and made a fruit bowl. Nothing super special. Later in the day I went down to use the restroom and everything was gone. During the day, many teachers said thank you for providing them breakfast. One of the intern's teacher said that none of the other student teachers have ever given the staff something before. 

And... that was what my last week of student teaching was like and now I will be graduating on Thursday. I will tell you all about that next Friday. 

Student Teaching: Primary: Week 1

So I am back in my primary internship place. It feels weird to be back and I really miss my old kids in my pre-primary classroom, but I know that I will still get to see them around the school. 

On Monday and Wednesday my pre-primary class walked past my classroom outside and they all start calling my name. I turn around and they have big smiles on their faces and are waving at me like crazy. It was really great to see them and to know that they miss me. 

I can't remember which day this week, but I started doing opening. The first day I did it the Smart Board was still not working, but then on the following day it got fixed. I am so happy that it is fixed now, so that I can use it for my lessons. 

Student Teaching: Pre-Primary: Week 8

I finished my last week in my pre-primary classroom. I was so sad to say goodbye to the students. I really enjoyed working in Kindergarten and I feel like it is a potential grade that I would like to teach. 

During this week i got to go around to the other kindergarten classrooms to see what they are like. I also went and saw a second grade classroom. I was in there during their math time and it was the highest level math kids. It was very different and I thought I used to want to teach that grade and now I am thinking not so much. 

On my last day i gave the students their gifts and my mentor her gift. The students also made me a little something. I also got to leave early on this day. My mentor wished me luck on my interviews since they were the next day. 

Student Teaching: Pre-Primary: Week 7

This was my teach week, so I taught and did everything. It was a good week because it was a normal everyday week. We did not have delays or closing or drama performances. So I really got a authentic full week of teaching kindergarten. 

There was one incident where one of the students said no to me and would not listen which is something the student has done in the past. My mentor took him out of the class room and later he came back and apologized. 

I got to the school early everyday and stayed late every night. I always took paper how to grade and put into the gradebook also. 

I only have one week left before I go back to first grade. I don't know if I have ever said this, but a year ago I did not want to teach kindergarten and now after spending so much time, I feel that is a grade that I would really enjoy teaching. 

Student Teaching: Pre-Primary: Week 6

On Monday we were closed and I spent this time preparing for my COL because I was beginning on Wednesday and my supervisor was going to come on that day. I wanted to start typing up my lessons plans since this COL has to go in my portfolio. 

Tuesday we celebrated Dr. Seuss Day and we had a blast. I made green eggs for the kids to try and most of them enjoyed eating the eggs. While making the eggs the burner stopped working for a few minutes, but my mentor got it working again and all was well. We read lots of Dr. Seuss books and activities that went along with each book. 

Wednesday was a normal somewhat normal school day. We had missed our counselor day last week, so we had this day. It was during out reading group time, so we did not have reading groups on this day. Also my Supervisor came in and observed me during my math lesson. 

Thursday and Friday were both snow days. I spent Thursday mostly relaxing and wondering if schools were going to be open or closed tomorrow. On Friday I did some shopping later in the day when it was safe to drive on the roads. I also did a lot of planning for the upcoming week since this upcoming week is going to be my teach week. 

Lastly, this weekend I decided on what I wanted to give the students and my mentor because believe or not this next week is going to be my second to last week with the students before I go back to my primary class. 

Observations and Assignments

I have only had two observations from my supervisor thus from in my pre-primary internship. I was thinking that she was just going to show up one time unexpected during the last two weeks, but that didn't happen. 

My first observation was back during the second week I believe. She is suppose to get in four observations for pre-primary and another four for primary. One has to be during our COL and one needs be during out Teach Week. 

Make second one was during this week. She observed my first lesson for my COL. She made that comment that I need to smile and relax more. It's hard for me to be out of my comfort zone and do silly things in front of other adults. My Supervisor said that she wants to see that from me the next time she comes which is sometime next week. 

My Supervisor is in a rush to try and fit everybody's observations in with all of the snow days and delays. She is also going to be gone for about a week, so that is less chances for her to come and see us. 

There are still assignments that I need to complete during this rotation before I move on to the next one. I need to videotape one of my lessons which I plan to do sometime next week during one of my math lessons because we need to turn in a lesson with it and I already have to type up all of my COL lessons. So I thought I would kill two birds with one stone. 

I also need to type up all of my COL lessons and everything else that goes with that. I need to type up whatever I need to for my Teach Week. Both my COL and Videotaped lesson is due on April 1 and I am not sure when the Teach Week stuff is due. 

There is also my action research project that I need to complete in my second rotation because I got too busy during this rotation and with all the snow days it would have been a mess anyways. And that is not due until sometime in May. 

Student Teaching: Pre-Primary: Week 5

This semester is going by so fast and this week was just as crazy as last week. We had a two hour delay on Monday and on Friday. We also had no school on Thursday. 

Monday was crazy and my first day doing whole group. On Tuesday whole group was better since school was on time and I was able to fit everything in on time. I continued that on Wednesday. 

On Friday, I did nothing but give the math test because we had a drama performance that took up the rest of the time at school.

Nothing really interesting happened besides that. I have to be honest that I can't wait for these last 3 weeks to be over because I am late everyday there. The thing is that the other team teachers come in and always have to talk to her or she has the special ED teachers that need to talk to her about one of her students, so what we need to discuss is after all of that. 

I know in my primary weeks that won't happen and so we will have more time to plan during the day and not so much after school. Also my mentor has kids and has to leave at a certain to get things done. 

Student Teaching: Pre-Primary: Week 4

On Monday we were closed for President's day and then on Tuesday we were closed because of the weather. Then on Wednesday and Thursday we had two hour delays. ON both of those days we celebrated the 100th day of school. It was suppose to be on Tuesday, but it got pushed to Wednesday and Thursday since we did not get to do everything we wanted on Wednesday. 

On Friday we had another 2 hour delay, so I got to teach math and it went really well. I had the students go "fishing" for addition and they really loved it. I even had one of the students ask me if we could go fishing again. 

I stayed after school for a good while, to plan some things out for the next week.