Don't just do it, teach it!

Now that the newness of summer is wearing off, I am ready to jump into next school year.  Since I am still looking for a new school to call ...

As our theme week concluded, we celebrated beach day.  As a final activity, the students made a beach ball book of memories.  Each of the st...

On the final two days of our Sports and Games mini-unit, my students learned about the Olympic Games.  They were excited to learn about the ...

All year my students have been completing "think and respond" questions at the end of their weekly stories.  A while back, I start...

This is one of the activities that our team completed as a follow up to our hike.  This is an activity that one of our teachers found online...

After a couple of weeks of report cards, assessments, and packing up, I'm finally back to blogging!  I have so many new things to share,...

As we finish up the year, my first and second graders are doing a mini unit on Sports, Games, and Play.  We are talking about the different ...

My second grade math students started learning the basics of multiplication today.  We first started with with skip counting, and then moved...

We had so much fun today making bouquets of flowers for all of the kids' moms.  First the kids made 5 flowers, complete with stems and l...

As the year comes to an end, I wanted a way to count down the final days.  All year we have kept track with stars on the wall the number of ...

Spring activities are so fun, but so many of them seem to be along the same lines: flowers, insects, rain, and sun.  Since we had done sever...

Today was our first and second grade musical, and it was a huge success!  The production was excerpts from "Seussical" the musical...

My students use white boards every day.  It never fails, we always need more boards at a lit center or in the math area.  Since white boards...

Here is the latest addition to my long vowel activities.  This activity can be completed independently or with other students.  There is a s...

Here is another spelling activity that my students have been doing most of the year.  I had heard of spelling pyramid activities before, but...

So many spelling tests and so little time!  As I continue to work through the Words Their Way methods, I wanted a way for both my students a...

This is an activity I designed to help my first graders recognize and decode long vowel/silent 'e' words when reading.  The students...

Earlier this year, my first and second grade students completed a Social Studies unit on United States symbols and landmarks.  The students ...

My second grade mathematicians have been working on some tricky geometric concepts: flip, slide, and turn.  This is not an original idea, bu...

As I've become more familiar with the Words Their Way program, I've discovered the need to become more efficient.  With students wor...

I have been away from the blog for a bit, but I'm fired up and ready to get back to work!  So much has been going on in our classroom an...

Here is some of our new literacy center work (I needed a little spark to keep them working hard this time of year).  My students love "...

 In my ongoing quest to not only be organized but efficient, I came up with a new idea: erasable flashcards.  With four different reading gr...

UPDATE: Right after I posted our eagle project and information about the eagle cam, I found out that the Decorah eagles now have 2 eggs in ...

Here is the latest addition to my room and classroom management repertoire. I found the idea on The Schroeder Page , which I love (Thank y...

As part of our continuing Social Studies unit on national symbols and landmarks, we studied the bald eagle. We read books, researched eagle...

Valentine's Day is over, and most of us have moved on; however I did not want to forget these cute ideas for next year.  My daughter rec...