a lil shopping trip... a lil update..

Thanks for all of the sweet words yesterday, they made me feel lots better!! :)

Today we had an amazing last day of January, we made shaving cream/glue snowmen, I will take some pics tomorrow!  We will be starting our February centers tomorrow!  I feel like January just flew by!

I went shopping at Staples and the Dollar Tree this weekend and got lots of great goodies!!!  I was at Staples in hopes of finding some good organizational tools, here is what I came up with: (sorry for the pictures in my parking garage, I knew if I took everything upstairs, I would forget it).

some plastic envelope-y things to store centers in.

those are containers.  they are about the size of three decks of cards for more storage.  the picture is on top of my apparently, very dirty car.  

I have a pretty small Dollar Tree and seem to do better at the out of town ones, but this most recent trip was pretty good!

heart containers to be used for math centers!

glitter heart stickers!

foam stickers!

blurry pic of mardi gras coins, when I bought them I was thinking St. Patricks Day gold, but Im sure Ill think of something else too! ideas?

and this K workbook that I will use for morning work for a few of my kiddos.

I thought it was a pretty productive trip!  I have a serious issue with buying things! eek!

in other news...

I NEED ADVICE!  Today, after we finished math groups, I told a group of my kiddos to put  their math center back together.  This entailed, putting small cards in a small ziplock (easy), stacking a set of cards (easy) but LASTLY, they had to paper clip it all together.  omygoodness.  We couldn't do it!  not one of the 4 kiddos in the group, and this was my high achievers! They could not paperclip.  could not. at all.

So I modeled it, and with some serious assistance they did it.  I did not realize we couldn't paperclip people, didn't even know it was a skill I needed to address. and it is.  lifeskills are our thing, but paperclipping skills? ideas? anyone?  

Tomorrow Im having a center be paperclipping skills, but I need more!  If you have an idea, please share! I would love you forever!!!!!!

Also, if you haven't entered my giveaway, please do, click HERE!

Have you entered?????

Oh boy, Im exhausted.  I took an ambulance ride today, spend time at the hospital and had an overall, very stressful day.  Also, I gained when I went to Weight Watcher meeting, ugh, up .4 pounds, not much but annoying all the same.

and so my friends, I am too tired and feeling VERY not creative, so I will just remind you to enter in my super fabulous giveaway and tell your friends to do the same thing!  It ends this FRIDAY, Feb. 3rd!

enter by clicking HERE...

have a good night friends!

Sunday Hodge Podge!!!!

I always feel like I have so much to write about on Sundays!  Let's start with the fun stuff!  I've been tagged three times by Amy at The Resource(ful) Room, Kelley at Buggy for Second Grade and Rebecca at Teaching First!! Thanks ladies!

So here are the rules:

1. You must post the rules.
2. Post 12 fun facts about yourself on the blog post.
3. Answer the questions the tagger set for you in their post, and then create 12 new questions for the people you tagged.
4. Tag 12 people and link them on your post.
5. Let them know you've tagged them!


okay folks, this is going to be kinda long, but you will know so much about me when you're done reading!!!


Twelve Fun Facts about Me!

Now I'll start with the questions...

Amy from The Resource(ful) Room asked..

1 - What's your favorite season?  fall, i love the comfy temperatures and beautiful colors.
2 - What's your favorite book?   This is hard, book I've read lately is City of Bones.
3 - What's your favorite TV show?   oh gosh, i LOVE tv - Grey's Anatomy, Private Practice, Biggest Loser, The Bachelor, Modern Family, Locked Up (ever watched it?), All Real Housewives, Big Brother, Amazing Race, Toddlers and Tiaras.  Yes, I know, lots of reality tv.  I don't even feel ashamed to admit it!
4 - How do you celebrate March is reading month?  We visit our library and other fun activities!
5 - Do you live close to your school (work)?  Its 7 miles!
6 - What's your favorite thing to teach?  Life skills like cooking and grocery shopping!
7 - How do you track student progress?  I have my students in four groups, I track IEP goals, each group has a clipboard with documentation sheets on it.  
8 - How do you use technology in the classroom?  I barely do, I only have 1 student computer and it's currently not working.  
9 - Do you use Accelerated Reader? How do you reward kids for points if you do?  I do not.
10 - Do you play sports? what?  I play ice hockey!
11 - How much time do you spend doing your hair each morning?   about 1 minute.  seriously, pony tail, everyday!
12 - Whats your favorite memory from high school?  all of the great friends I made!  weekends with my girlfriends, etc!

Kelley from Buggy for Second Grade asked...

1. What is your favorite T.V show? oh gosh, i LOVE tv - Grey's Anatomy, Private Practice, Biggest Loser, The Bachelor, Modern Family, Locked Up (ever watched it?), All Real Housewives, Big Brother, Amazing Race, Toddlers and Tiaras.  Yes, I know, lots of reality tv.  I don't even feel ashamed to admit it! (yes this is copy and pasted)
2. Do you have any hobbies?  I love to read and am working on being a crafter.  I also like to spend my time being a blogstalker.
3. What was your New Years Resolution?  my resolution was to work out more, so far, so good!
4. Are you a dog or cat person?  I love them both, but I will never have either!  lots of work!
5. What is one color that describes you?  I think purple describes me, it can be be calm and thoughtful (lol) but also can be bright and fun! does that make sense?

6. What type of music is playing in your car right now?  Country
7. Favorite subject or unit to teach? lifeskills!
8. How many siblings do you have?  2 younger brothers!  
9. How did you husband propose to you?  my husband and I went to his grandparents' orchard to pick peaches and he told me "you have to see this one", I was like in a tree trying to get a peach and was kind of ignoring him, but when I finally went over to him, he said, "rach, you've got to see this one, you'll love it", he got down on 1 knee and proposed!
10. What is your favorite drink?  diet coke
11. What is your go-to blog or website for teaching?  pinterest - everything in one place!
12. What is your favorite guilty pleasure?  ooh, good question.  probably pedicures!

Lastly.... (are you sick of learning about me yet?) Rebecca from Teaching First asked...

1. What is your favorite t.v. show? oh gosh, i LOVE tv - Grey's Anatomy, Private Practice, Biggest Loser, The Bachelor, Modern Family, Locked Up (ever watched it?), All Real Housewives, Big Brother, Amazing Race, Toddlers and Tiaras.  Yes, I know, lots of reality tv.  I don't even feel ashamed to admit it! (yes this is copy and pasted, again)
2. What was your favorite food as a child? I used to LOVE strawberries, or so Im told.
3. What is one of your favorite quotes? 

4. What is your favorite season of the year?Fall.5. If you could have any technology in your classroom, what would you ask for? a smartboard, and ipads!
6. If you could ask a person from history about a past event who would it be and what event would it be? I would want to talk to Anne Frank, her story is amazing to me.
7. What is your favorite dessert? My MinL makes an amazing cake called Tang cake.  Its angel food cake with Tang in it and its delicious and orangey and has this yummy Tang glaze.  so good.
8. What is your best quality as a teacher? patience 
9. If you had one piece of advice you could have give a new blogger what would it be? enjoy it! do it for you! 
10. What time do you usually get up for work? I get up around 7:30ish.
11. Where would your dream vacation be? Right now I really want to go to Bora Bora.  it looks so beautiful.
12. What is the last book you read? City of Bones.

Now I have to tag 12 people:

1. Courtney @ Swimming into Second.
2. Amy @ Step into Second with Mrs. Lemons
3. Kara @ Sped-ventures
4. Mandy @ A Special Kind of Class
5. Christina @ Mrs's Bainbridge's Class
6. Jen @ The Teachers' Cauldron
7. Erika @ The Honey Bunch
8. We are ALL special
9. Kristen @ a Teeny Tiny Teacher
10. Alysia @Miss B, Busy Bee
11. Laura @ Kinder Kraziness
12. PreK and Sharing

Now my 12 questions...

1. What was the name of your first pet?
2. What was your best moment as a teacher?
3. Where is your favorite place to buy clipart?
4. What is your biggest pet peeve?
5. What kind of car do you drive?
6. What is your favorite food?
7. What food do you HATE?
8. What is your favorite winter activity?
9. Have you ever completed a 1,00 piece puzzle?
10. Where is your favorite place to buy clothes?
11. E-reader or real books?
12. Mac or PC?

Okay, friends, answer those questions! I tried to tag people who hadn't been tagged yet, but if you have, sorry!!

Did you know I reached 200+ followers?? To thank you all, I'm having a giveaway!  Click here! to enter!

Are you a Michigan blogger???? We're planning a meet up!!

Amy from The Resource(ful) Room is organizing this!  If you want to join up, email her!by clicking here!!  We'd love to have you!!!

So, I had another whole thing to write about, I went shopping! but this is already the LONGEST BLOG POST ever.  So I'll save it for another day this week!

THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU! .. a giveaway

I love blogging!  I love teacher blogging even more.  I love all the cool, awesome, creative and amazing ideas I find. I love the new bloggy friends I have made, that I hope someday to meet in real life! (Michigan ladies, we must organize this).

That being said, I can't believe I have reached 200+ followers! I truly appreciate all of the sweet comments people leave, all of the positive support and the community we have here!

To thank all of you WONDERFUL followers, lurkers, readers, commenters, and other bloggers, I am hosting a GREAT giveaway!

clipart from Dreamlike Magic and KPM doodles

There are two FABULOUS ladies that are giving away THREE WONDERFUL ITEMS!!!

I will have two giveaway winners!

One person will win:

this adorable keychain from Lorelei Rose!  It will be great for your school keys, which I ALWAYS get confused with my house keys, not for long!

Another person will win 2 lovely prizes from The Jemzy Boutique.

this super sweet customizable frame! I loved the turquoise example but there are about a MILLION color combos!

as well as...

a customized hand sanitizer!  We all use it, why not have the cutest bottle ever??!?!

Fabuloso prizes right??  Well, you might be wondering, Rachel, these are great, but how do I win? I will give you lots of options!

1.  Follow my blog, and leave a comment telling me you do!

2.  Add Lorelei Rose to your favorite Etsy shops and leave a comment telling me!

3.  Add The Jemzy Boutique as a favorite shop AND like The Jemzy Boutique on Facebook, leave a comment telling me you do!

4.  Blog about this giveaway! Use the picture I made up above and link back here.  Leave a comment with the link!

5.  Follow my TPT Store! Leave a comment telling me you do!

6.  If you have a teacher Facebook page, post about this with a link back!  Leave a comment with the link!

That's 6 possible ways to enter!  

This giveaway will end on Friday February 3rd, 2012.

In addition to all that, Lorelei Rose is also offering a 10% discount to EVERYONE who reads this and orders something from her, just write the word "TEACHER" in the message to seller! 

Friday! Winter Fun Day!

Hi friends...

Im writing to you from my cozy hotel room! I have grad class this weekend and its an hour and a half from home, so Im staying in a hotel! Class was from 5:30 til 8:20 tonight and is from 9am til 5 tomorrow, longer than my school day!! Im going to catch up with my bloggy friends and tell you all about my fabulous day, without pictures, too many kiddos in them!

Today was our much anticipated "WINTER FUN DAY"! I scheduled this in December, assuming since I live in MI the end of January would have tons of snow!  Well, as it started melting this week, I got nervous, but we did it! This morning we all got dressed in out winter gear (great life skill practice!) and headed out behind our school, sleds in tow.  Every single one of my students who was in school today participated.  It was SO FUN!  We slid down the smallish hill in the back of the school but the kids were loving it!  I have a student with autism who I rarely see animation from and he was grinning from ear to ear, melted my heart!  The greatest part of today was that since our weather has been so bizarre we weren't freezing out butts off outside!  It was sunshiney and nice out, but we could still sled!  I was actually sweating from pushing kids down the hill! We were going to make a snowman but everyone was so into sledding we didn't even get to it!

After lunch, an equally anticipated even, PIZZA LUNCH!! I ordered in pizza to the school and boy, we were living the life!  The kids had an amazing day.  I love doing things like this with my students because often times, they do not get to experience some of these types of opportunities.  It's amazing how few kiddos had been sledding before I started doing this!

Since Im in a hotel room, what else to do but plan a March activity! My kiddos LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE arts and crafts.  While this doesn't have seem "academic" for many, I find it a good way to teach many other skills.  I use arts and crafts to teach all kinds of things.  Some examples from the top of my head:  fine motor skills, turn taking skills, following directions, listening, sharing, etc.!  I am posting a cute leprechaun activity to my TPT store, we made these last year my kiddos really enjoyed them.  It includes several different writing prompts as well.  Check it out!

You can grab it at my TPT store HERE

Well, I'm off to blogstalk and sleep! Early and long day tomorrow! gah.

All of our hard work...Picture Overload :)

I finally got around to snapping some pictures of some things we have done lately, about time!  We finished our hot chocolate addition today...

I decided they should go somewhere where everyone could see them, by the bathrooms! LOL.

A closeup... 

This activity was easy to differentiate, when I was passing out marshmallows to the kiddos, I would just give them the amount that I knew they could complete! This kiddo got three 'mallows!

and this kiddo had more!

Keeping with the addition theme, we completed this ADORABLE penguin addition activity!  I got it for free from the lovely Erica Bohrer's TPT store!  

hangin' in our hallway

they turned out so cute!

Again, this activity was very easy to differentiate for my students!

We also made some adorable snowman that Ive seen floating around blogland and pinterest!

I know, my border and paper totally dont match but when we finished these, I had a few students ask if I could hang them out in the hallway RIGHT NOW.  They were super proud of them!

Too cute, right?

Hope you enjoyed all the pics!  Happy Wednesday!

Hot Chocolate Addition

I've seen this idea floating around Pinterest for awhile now:

I've seen it done a few different ways!  Some with real marshmallows, some with paper, etc.  That was just the one I pinned, but on a blog somewhere (I got it at school so I couldn't pin it) there was a printable available that I grabbed. (Please tell me if it's you).

We started the project today.  We had just a few minute before lunch so we did not finish it, but we will tomorrow.  We are going to use real marshmallows, we love using real food!  For my students, some of them had to cut every piece out, some only had to cut a few things, some had hand over hand assitance, but everyone did it!

gluing the "cocoa" on

working hard!

one more cocoa to go!

Tomorrow we will finish these up and I'm going to hand them up in our hallway with this sign!

I'll post our finished product tomorrow!

You can grab it from Google Docs: HERE

Clipart from KPM Doodles and Dreamlike Magic

Another Snow Day... Freebie!

Well I had another snow day today, I mean it was nice but I had stuff to do! I have an IEP tomorrow and I had all kinds of great lessons planned!  Since I had lots of free time I made a few things today...

The first thing I finished I think will be great for my special education friends as well as my ESL and foreign language friends!  It is a Food Photo Bingo!  I plan on using it in my classroom as a fun activity to work on our life skills.  Knowing foods and being able to name them comes very easily to many of us, but for my students it can be a struggle.  Playing this Bingo game will help learn the names, I also plan on using the calling cards for sorting purposes, sorting fruits and veggies, etc.   For foreign language folks this can be used to practice food vocabulary just in another language!  I just put it on my TPT store for $3.00.  It had 20 bingo cards and all of the calling cards for each item!  The pictures are all real life pictures, no clipart.

Head to my TPT Store to grab it!

I did mention a freebie, I made a cute lil Valentine's word search that I will probably use for morning work when February gets here!

You can grab this at my TPT Store as well!  Do me a fave and leave some feedback if you like it!

Well the weather is not looking so good outside right now, I wonder if Ill have school tomorrow, I might start going stir crazy if we do! I'm sure my students are!

Pizza Giveaway Winner!!!! a sale! and more..

Mandy and I are super excited to announce the winners of our Pizza Giveaway!  I ended up with 79 comments!  If you didn't win here, don't forget to check Mandy's blog: A Special Kind of Class.

I went to random.org and entered in 1-79! The winner of THREE pizza packs is:

Mary will be taking home the lovely prizes of:

My Pizza Unit

Mandy's Pizza Math

Mandy's Interactive Reader

If you didn't win, don't fret!!! Mandy and I will both by reducing our Pizza Items by 20% today and tomorrow!!

You can head to my TPT store to  grab it : HERE

or to Mandy's TPT store: HERE.

Congrats Mary! Keep on eye on your email, you should be receiving two! 

Also today I posted Valentine's Roll and Color, here.

It's free! Go grab it!

Also, I've seen some tutorials about adding numbers to comments, I can't figure it out, any recommendations??