Simple and Pretty Darn Cute!

I have received many questions about the purpose of these balloons other than the obvious- they make the classroom look really cute! Our school has a Meet the Teacher night before school starts. This is an informal hour of time that parents bring their students to school to find their spot, meet the teacher, pick up materials, and get familiar with the room before school officially begins. If you look closely at the balloons, you will see that each one has a student's name written on it. I use them so that the students can quickly locate their seat when they come in the room. They also serve as little welcome gifts that the students take with them when they leave for the night. I order the balloons from Fry's (our Kroger grocery store) the morning of Meet the Teacher Night and then pick them up a few hours before students arrive. Simple, fun, and a great way to welcome kids to second grade!!

"I need to go to the bathroom!"

How many times have you heard that phrase right in the middle of a lesson? Or worse yet, you're rockin' a lesson, the kids are into it, participation is high and they're on a roll. You call on an eager hand raiser thinking they have a great comment to add to the discussion and instead, you get the dreaded question that brings everything to a halt. "Can I go to the bathroom?"  Ugh.

In my early years of teaching I didn't have a system for letting kids use the bathroom. I just assumed that they would be honest and go when they needed to. Instead, I had kids trying to go to meet up with friends, to get out of working, and every other imaginable reason. Now, I spend a significant amount of time training my kids to go only during work times, recess, or lunch. Plus, I use the magical bathroom tokens.

These are poker chips that I spray painted to match the colors of my room. If you aren't obsessed with having everything matchy-matchy like me, you can use unpainted chips. Each child gets 4 tokens a week. They may use these tokens during working times to use the bathroom. The catch is that they only get 4 so they have to use them wisely. Kids who have 3 or 4 left on Friday get 2 punches on their punch card.  If they have 1 or 2 left, they get one punch. I encourage my kids to use the bathroom for "free" during recess and lunch so that they don't have to use their tokens. Every token has the child's number on it so that I can return them on Monday. It has been the BEST bathroom system and has eliminated unnecessary trips to the BR which means more time for learning!

Cute and Organized!

Today I finished my Daily 5 book box display. I have always wanted to use book boxes but couldn't justify the expense of magazine file boxes. The cheapest I've seen them was $2.50 each. Times that by 26 kiddos and well, you get the idea. So you can imagine my excitement when I found these cuties in the Target dollar spot. Yay!! I picked up 30 of them and ran back to school eager to put them in their chosen spots. I decided to organize them all in a pattern because it's prettier that way and I love me a pretty display! BUT, you all know what happens as soon as the kiddos get a hold of them. They will be shoved back onto the shelf in any old order. To keep them in their place I labeled the shelf with an identical name tag that's on the book box. Now all the kiddos have to do is find their name and my pretty display will stay all year long!

Busy as a Beaver!!!

I love Back to School time! It gives me a chance to start fresh and complete fun projects to cutesy up my room. I told you about the adorable crate seats that I found on Pinterest. Well here is my finished product thanks to the hard work of my mom and husband! Once we had the wood cut these seriously took us 30 minutes to put together.

My camera washed out the colors. The one on the left is pink and green striped and the one on the right is the same fabric only blue and green striped. The butterfly fabric matches my chair pockets.

I love how these turned out and they were super easy! I could see these in a playroom or a child's bedroom. They bonus is they double as storage which I was in dire need of in my classroom! Here's what you need:

• Crate- Target has cute colors right now for $3 (it must be the file folder kind with the lip)
• Foam- This can be the expensive part if you're not careful. I used a 50% off coupon at Joann's and paid $15 which was enough for 6.
• Plywood- My wood working husband already had this on hand so no cost to me.
• Fabric- About a half yard per seat.
• Ribbon- $1.97 at Walmart. One roll for 3 seats.
• Spray Glue- I think I spent 3 or 4 dollars at Walmart.

Directions: Measure the plywood and cut so that it will sit inside on the lip. Cut the foam using the same measurements (use an electric knife- so fast!). Spray the glue onto the plywood and place your foam on top. Let this sit to dry for about 30 minutes. Wrap the fabric around the foam covered board, pull tight and staple to the back with a staple gun. We wrapped the corners like we would a present. Once you have the fabric on, measure a piece of ribbon to go around the cushion and staple it into the back. Make sure the ribbon is not too loose, but loose enough to get your hand under it so that you can easily pull the cushion off of the crate when you need to. Voila! That's it!



Snack Time!!

I used to loath snack time. I tried it one year. What I saw was scary.

My idea was to have kids bring a quick, healthy snack to eat while they are working independently on writing or some other activity. What I got instead were 24 kids unwrapping Ding Dongs and Twinkies, smearing their cheesy little Doritos hands all over their papers, and a line a mile long of kiddos needing me to open something. Plus, little crumbs of chocolate cupcakes and the remains of Goldfish crackers were repeatedly ground into my carpet. Not pretty. Definitely not how I envisioned it in my head.

That was when I banned snacks in my room. It was a blessing that lasted many years. But then, I was handed a new schedule that put lunchtime at 11:45.

If you know kids at all you will understand that going from 8-11:45 without a break is almost impossible. Their little minds begin to fade away and their bodies get a case of the wiggles. So, I decided to put snack back into the day along with a 15 minute recess.

But, I've learned. Now I have a class snack. My parents donate boxes of cereal, bags of pretzels, goldfish crackers, animal cookies and any other bulk snack items that they can think of. On the way out the door I give each kid a handful. If they don't like that particular snack then they simply say no thank you. This is not a buffet; you get what you get and you don't throw a fit.

The best part is that it literally takes 2 minutes to pass out and if they drop any it falls onto the sidewalk; no more little fishy parts being ground into the carpet....yay!!!

It's a Bird, It's a Plane, It's a..... Bracelet?

These strange little bands that you see your student coming home with are actually bracelets. I like to use these cute little pieces of plastic goodness as rewards for good behavior. They are fun and cheap (which is a big plus for my pocketbook) and the students love them.

These are the go to reward that students choose when they are the "Mystery Walker" or if they save their bathroom passes for the week. If we're having a particularly "chatty" day, I keep a bunch of these in my pocket and randomly give them to the kiddos who are on task. It's amazing how fast a room can get quiet when I'm passing these babies out. I don't like to do that often because honestly, I think that kids should behave without a reward; but, it's a nice little thank you to the kids who are seldom off task and a reminder to the rest.

For my teacher friends, I purchased these "fun bands" from Oriental Trading before school started. Right now they have them for $4.99 for 50 or, $29.99 for 500. The quality is decent as long as the kids don't pull on them. I have had a few break. If you know of a place to get them that is cheaper or a higher quality, please let me know!

The Never Ending Bathroom Dilemma

It seems that every year I get a few students who abuse their bathroom privileges. These are the students that suddenly need to go "really bad" at a convenient time for them, like when they are supposed to work. Before I know it, little Suzie has spent the entire work time in the bathroom and because I was busy helping other kids, I failed to notice.

The other typical bathroom caper is the child who needs to go two or three times a day who swears he/she will have an accident if they don't go RIGHT NOW!! Not only do they have to go immediately, but this child will announce the desire to use the restroom in the middle of story time 5 minutes after returning from recess.

Now don't get me wrong, I know there are medical issues that require kiddos to need to use the restroom more often, and kids aren't adults so they don't always manage their restroom usage effectively, but on average, the typical 7 year old should not have to use the restroom at recess, lunch, and three other times during the day.

I feel like yelling out like an evil villain in that deep "I got you" laugh... because, lo and behold, I have solved the never ending bathroom dilemma.

I'm sure this is nothing new, but it is new to me. 

This year I started using bathroom passes. Each child receives 4 passes on Monday. They may use the restroom as needed during class by handing me a pass. Once they are out for the week I start deducting time off of their recess each time they need to go. If their time spent in the restroom was too long (we're talking over 5 minutes and only for kids who tend to live in the bathroom) I take another pass. Of course they can go at recess and lunch for "free". Kids with all 4 passes left get a small token at the end of the week.

It's amazing how well they manage their bathroom breaks now. This may seem trivial or "mean" to the average person outside of education, but I can assure you, no one will end up wetting their pants and more time will be spent learning, which of course is the main objective here!