Setting up my room again!!!

I went into school today to begin setting up my room again for the new year! Students start next Wednesday (1 week) and I have been busy these holidays making some new things for my classroom. It is already a great feeling being in my second year of teaching. Having the same classroom makes things a lot easier as most of my things are already set up and I know how I like things. I decided to change a few things though to make it seem a bit different and here are the new things I have done so far. If your interested you can have a look at my old setting up blog post from this time last year to see the difference

My new reading corner

I got a new bookshelf and pillows from ikea. I then made a story map- see other post, and put that on the wall with some story elements posters that I got from Mrs. Ricca's Kindergarten TPT store (free).
I also got some reading quotes from The teacher couple TPT store (free) and used the Roald Dahl, Walt Disney and Dr. Seuss quotes and suck them on the side of the reading shelf.
I also got an owl I PICK reading poster to put on the wall from cute classroom creations TPT store (free)

Story Map and Story Elements posters

Ikea bookshelf, inspirational quotes and I PICK poster

Birthday wall

I have changed my birthday wall this year- I decided to do an idea that I have seen on pinterest.

My wall isn't quite done but I will post some more pictures when I finish it next week. 

I bought some sparkly scrapbook paper from lincraft and stuck it up on the wall. I then got some cute owl month labels from schoolgirl styles TPT store. However I think I might need to reprint them a bit smaller, because I am going to take a photo of each the students whose birthdays are in each month. I am going to print their dates of birth with their names for them to hold up. I will then stick this picture underneath each month label. I don't have any October birthdays so I might be able to save some room there :-)

I have also redone my birthday pencils- see other post- this is the same as last year. 

I will post some more pictures when I finish this wall. 

Birthday pencils

 Owl door

I changed my door this year and gave it an owl theme. I got the sign from vistaprint . I bought the little owls from schoolgirl styles TPT store and just added my students names to it. I also got a cute owl welcome sign from teacherytidbits blog

Owls

Vistaprint poster

Welcome sign 

Thats it for now but I still have another week before school starts and I'm sure some more things will be happening :-) 

Story Map- Plus a Freebie

Today I have made a 'Story Map' for my classroom.

I originally got the idea from pinterest and decided to make one. I am going to put it up on the wall of my new reading corner (which I will post pics of next time I go into the classroom). It is double sided and has basically the same thing on both sides.

The purpose behind me creating both sides is that I can fill it throughout the week as a whole class in shared reading with a big book, and then small groups can use the other side in guided reading without having to take away the post-its from the whole class.

Ways I will use this: 

Whole class- After reading a story with the class (or before and during the story) as a class we will fill out the story map. I will write down student answers on post-it notes and stick them on the map. This can be done in a single session or can be done throughout the week (depending on how long we look at a book for). Depending on the focus of the lesson, we might not fill out every section, just ones that I feel at the time are important for the students to understand.

Small group- Guided reading, after a small group has read their book, an activity can be to fill out the story map to assess student understanding. Students could each fill in one section, or they could work as a group to fill in the whole map. This could also be used with a parent helper with the same concept.

Worksheet- I have also made a worksheet of the map so that students can go away and fill it in themselves. This can be done from a whole class or small group lesson.

Here are pictures of the story map

Side 1

Side 2-

Worksheet-

This is the worksheet I made. Just click on where it says worksheet or on the picture. I got the moister clipart from http://www.mycutegraphics.com/graphics/monster-images.html

It's been a while!!!!

It has been ages since I have last posted a blog post!!! I got sooo busy- I blame it being my first year teaching!

Well now that I am into my second year teaching my new years resolution is to post more regularly! We will see how that goes!!!

Well I have about 2 weeks until school begins and I have my new kids :-) It will be a bit different this year- I have 6 more students (27) and 8 more girls then last year (16 G and 11 B). 

I have slowly been getting into teacher mode and beginning to make a few new things for my classroom this year- stay tuned....