Sunday, August 26, 2012

The School Year Has Begun!

Welcome to a New School Year!

I don't know how all of my fellow bloggers post items every single day.  It has been almost a month since my last post.  I have been so busy and when I would think about writing on my blog, I was just toooo tired.  I am very impressed with a lot of you.  Some day I might be just as organized and not running around with my head cut off.  (At least that is what I have been feeling like getting my classroom ready for my wonderful 2nd grade students.)  When I started this blog in June, I stated that it would mainly be for my parents for the school year.  I wanted to post pictures and show my parents what we do in our classroom throughout the weeks.  So this is my first blog for Parents and Fellow Bloggers.  Enjoy Reading and, Fellow Bloggers, I hope you can use some of my ideas in your classrooms because I sure have used some of yours. :)

(Fellow Bloggers) Parents, welcome to our class blog.  If you were not able to come to Open House, here are some pictures of your child's new classroom for the school year.  Enjoy the pictures!

This view is from my classroom door looking in.

This is the view from the front of the room beside my classroom door.


 This is the back wall looking into my classroom library.

 This view is looking to the front of the room if I were seating in the classroom library area.

This is the view from my desk to the front door.

It is not a very big room but I love how cozy it is.  We become a family very quickly in my classroom and I love that.  Here are some more pictures of areas around our classroom that are important for students.

This is our Daily 5, Listen to Reading area. The students pick up a caddy that has headphones and a CD player and they pick a bag of books that are hanging on the blue rack.


This is the computer area that students will be doing the Lexia program on and they will also be taking book quizzes using the website Book Adventure.  This is one of my Daily 5 picks.

This is my CAFE board which will hold all of my Reading Strategies for my students to use. Thanks to Amy at The Resource(ful) Room for making the CAFE headings and cards.


Here is my DAILY 5 pick board. I will have the students pictures in the pocket chart and the pink and gray baskets hold the choices that they can make. I have not done it this way before so we will see how it goes when we start.

Here is our Bucket Filling area.  The students will be writing these during their Work on Writing time.  I got this idea from Corinna at Surfin' through Second.


Our comfy reading couch.  The helpers of the day get the chance to sit on the couch during our time at the Classroom Library and they also get to sit there during Read to Self.


This is the table for my focus groups and one-on-one confering.  I love my small round table.

Here is one of the three reading areas that I have in my classroom.  The students love the classroom libary.


This is my calendar area and math workstation area.

Well, that is all the pictures for now.  I hope you enjoy a little sneak peek into our classroom.  Now for an activity that we do in our classroom that the students love. :)

Some children may have started talking about Tigger.  He is our classroom mascot.  He is a stuffed tiger who gets to go home with a different student each weekend to spend some time with them.  Here is a picture of Mr. Tigger.

The students were so excited about taking him home.  Victoria was the first person picked and she reminded me each day that it was almost Friday. The students also take Tigger's Journal home with them so that they can record what they do with Tigger and share their experience with their classmates on Monday. I love listening to what they do.  Of course, Tigger had to spend the weekend with Mrs. Flickinger first and the students enjoyed listening to what Tigger did with my family.  It's a great writing idea and the students love reading each others entries.

What else can I talk about? We have been in school for 8 days now and I have 17 wonderful students.  My Daily 5 and CAFE are coming along very slowly which is what the "two sisters" say should happen.  My stamina for Read to Self is only 4 minutes but it will get better as the school year goes on AND my students are loving the classroom library that I have. :)  They are soooo excited to READ!! I am LOVING IT!

I hope everyone elses year is going as great as mine and parents if you have any questions at all or comments, you can email me, leave a comment here, or call me using the classrooms phone number I gave you on the newsletter.  I am excited to meet the rest of my parents at Conferences in two weeks.  I will be giving you a lot of information about the classroom and the expectations for the school year.

Unitl Next Time,
        Happy Blogging