A day in my Shoes

The Adventures of a Sixth Grade Teacher is having an awesome linky party so I'm linking up!

I loved a teacher's treasure's directions so I copied them!
Here is how it works...

1. Right click and save the button above to put in your post. 
Hyperlink the picture with the original party post from Katie's Blog so others can easily find the linky party.

2. Tell us about a typical day in your classroom. You can share as little or as much as you would like.

3. Go to Katie's blog to link up.

4. Visit the other links to see what a day is like in their class!

This is what my Friday looked like yesterday:

5:50 alarm goes off and I hit the snooze button.

6:00 I get up and shower, get ready (in jeans because Friday is spirit day at our school YAY!)

7:00 my husband and I leave for McDonald's the breakfast of champions.

7:30 we get to school and I survey my room with my nonfat late in hand. As I do so I realize that I totally forgot that I have to take my fifth graders to our kinder reading buddies! Which is totally not what I had planned for Friday... So scrap the plans and start fresh. Hmmmmm..... As I stew over what to change in my schedule I am tuning on the Elmo and projector (don't be jealous that's all I have, no smartboard to play with *sigh).

7:55 the kids start filtering in. They have a science prompt on the board from Uncovering Student Ideas in Science as part of our push to bring up our science scores. They do the prompts in their morning work journal then pick their centers for the day and read silently. I like it quiet what can I say...

8:30 After announcements homeroom is over and we switch for first period. Our fifth grade is departmentalized with 1 teacher teaching all fifth grade math (my hubby!)for an hour each, 1 teacher teaching all fifth grade science for an hour each, and two reading/language arts/social studies for two hours each.

8:35 I do my mini lesson about nonfiction text structure on the carpet (yes really, they LOVE it) and decide that this is the perfect opportunity for group work!

8:50 I have them break into their new literature groups (that they haven't met with yet) and give each group 4 old time for kids magazines, a piece of sticky note chart paper, scissors, glue sticks, and markers. Their mission was to find an example of each nonfiction text feature and text structure. Then paste and label each on their sticky chart paper. I know, pretty good for an improve right? During this time I had them practice THINK before you speak which I got from pintrest.

9:50 Leave for Kinder Reading Buddies. They are pros at this by now. They go right to their assigned spots and get to work. Kinder buddies read their books and then fifth buddies read a book the kinders pick out until its time to go.

10:30 We leave and I pass out run/walk club cards (exercise program we do on Fridays for resource) along the way.

10:35 By now the kids are dropped off and I can go get more coffee and use the restroom YAY! Then by the time I hang up their stickies, do attendance, and send lunch count over the computer I have to leave to pick up the kids.

11:05 Collect the cold children and take them to the restroom. Then it's back to the room to warm up with some quality read to self time.

11:24 Leave for lunch. Drop them off. Shove food into my mouth.

11:52 Pick the kids up and take them back for the switch to second period.

12:00 I get my homeroom back and we go over the morning work and do a KWL for the rock cycle which I thought was what the national geographic kids magazine we were going to read was about....but it's ok we didn't actually have time to read it either....

12:30 Reading class starts and we repeat what I did with first period.

2:25 They pack up and are out the door.

2:30 I have the joy of doing parent pick up which doesn't end until 3:30 because of drama and it's Friday the thirteenth....

Then hubby and I are done! We go home and relax!

Clutter Free Classroom Project: week 2 challenge plans

I know that I haven't done the week one challenge yet of posting my pictures. I am having technical difficulties at the moment, but I WILL be catching up soon. I really do plan on decluttering my truly appalling looking teacher closet. I can barely walk in there now, it's scary! I sometimes think that the reason I can't upload the pictures I took is because even the Internet is afraid of my teacher closet...

What do I plan on doing with my "stuff?"

There are several new teachers and many hoarders at my school so I plan on donating my unwanted "stuff" to them.

What are my rules for Purging?

If I do not use it I will not keep it. If it hasn't been used in the last year it will be purged!

There will be NO boxes in my closet. I have clear bins that I plan on using for the stuff I do keep. That way I know what I have and where I have it. No more oh wait it would be cool if I can find this...where is it... I also will have supplies in baskets for easy access.

Everything will be labeled or visible (open baskets).

If I have it saved on my computer or Internet it will be purged.

What items have I gathered to make the purging easier?

I have gathered clear bins and baskets. I will use any leftover bins or baskets at my home for storage there. Thus avoiding the temptation to keep just because I have extra bins. Plus I only bought two small hanging file bins to keep that down.

Want to join in on the decluttering fun? Just go to the Clutter Free classroom!

Plans for the planning days :)

Today as I entered my grades into the computer I thought about changing my classroom around. Because of course knowing that I have to get my grades into the computer today due to an inservice tomorrow only makes it easier to get sidetracked. So I am currently in the process of revamping my classroom and schedule. Partly because I want to move towards the next step of independence for the daily 5, and also because I have been inspired by the clutter free classroom project. If you haven't checked out the clutter free classroom blog then you totally should!



I love having everything in my classroom organized. If only I could get my closet to be that way... I don't know about you but I tend to shove a ton of stuff into the closet in my classroom. Stuff I don't know what to do with, stuff I don't want to see for a while, and excess stuff all gets piled into the closet. So the classroom closet (dun, dun dunnnnnn) is what I am going to tackle with the clutter free classroom project! But not all in one day! I am actually going to follow along with the clutter free classroom project (mostly because I probably won't have time to tomorrow with the inservice and rearranging that I am planning on doing...)!

So, tomorrow I am going to rearrange my room and schedule. This time I am going to take some bloggable pictures and then join in on the project fun!

Current state of affairs ~ the Daily 4

Right now my lovely group of fifth graders has worked up to a modified Daily 4. If you haven't heard about e Daily 5 please go to either the Daily 5 website or this swap n share. The swap n share site has some AWESOME resources for the daily 5 and cafe as well as helpful getting started stuff. There is a ton of stuff for the upper grades version of the daily 5 and cafe which is hard to find usually.



Anyway...my day looks like this right now. I call the kids to the floor for a read aloud for 15 minutes, then a 15 minute skill lesson. Then the kiddos break into their groups of either the word work, read with someone, or computer centers. We do three 15 minute rotations so my kids get to do each center each day. Then we go back to the floor for a refresher of the skill and reminder of the journal entry. Finally, they break into a read to self with journal response for 25 minutes.



My kids sign up for their centers on a long piece of construction paper that I have written each of the center elements on it along with blanks for their names. Then I expertly covered the piece of construction paper with CLEAR CONTACT PAPER while it was on the wall! And bam, instant laminated daily 5 check in poster.


I took a picture and was all hyped about uploading it but apparently the blog hates my iPad pictures.... I will attempt to upload pictures later.


Until then feel free to post what you're doing with your kids or questions about what I'm doing with mine!

Crazy New World

Well it's a new year and I'm off on this crazy new adventure of...blogging! I've gotten all of these great ideas and inspiration from other blogs out there so I feel the need to give back! So here it is, my contrabution to the teaching world. I'm going to share my teaching adventure with the blogging world out there!

I teach 5th grade reading in Florida. My philosophy is that if you walk into my reading classroom you should find the students....READING. Or learning about reading. NOT regurgitating information. Ok, (stepping down from soap box) I have found that a combination of literature groups, the Daily 5, and Readers Workshop works the best for me and my students. I will post more about this later :) but for this very first post I just wanted to put myself out there!