Circle Up! Why I prefer this to assigned squares

If you are like me, you probably have a carpet in your classroom that looks a little bit like this...

Perfect for giving kids their own carpet square.  A place to sit every time you meet as a class on the carpet. It's their spot and nobody elses.  Plus- you can separate those talkative ones, right?!

My first & second year- my whole group time looked a lot like that.  Students had their own carpet square and that was where I expected them to sit when I asked them to meet me on the carpet.  I sat the kids who had trouble staying focused up near me, separated the talkative ones, and the ones who tended to get into mischief if they sat together.

It was fine...except...

-My "Good" students got the shaft.  They got stuck between kids who struggled to pay attention, who were talkative...They sat in the back- and sometimes, some of them would drift off... It kinda looked like this- only probably with one child laying down, another talking to a neighbor, and another up walking around.  Yup...don't deny it...you know it happens.

So this year I decided to try Circling up instead of squares. Now, with 18 "Squares" on the outside of the carpet and 23 students + me AND my easel- this is a little bit of a challenge but we figure it out.

Here are the benefits I've noticed so far:

-Not only can I see every student, but they can also see each other- Keeping them accountable for their engagement and behavior (Yes this can also be a distraction- especially if you have a class clown - I had to ask students who were being a distraction to sit outside of our circle for a few weeks before they finally understood that their behavior wouldn't be tolerated)

-When someone has something to say- students can easily turn their heads to the person who is speaking to be an active listener rather than turning their whole body.. 

-It has more of a "family" feel.  Everyone feels and knows they are a part of our room and that they matter.

-It's harder for students to drift off because they know there are 23 pairs of eyes that can see them.

-It's easier to have group conversations.

All in all- I've enjoyed our whole group "Circle up" time and think it has had a positive impact on our class community!

Educents FRENZY!

$15 Frenzy is BACK at Educents!

From Monday, September 21 - Sunday, September 28, 2014, Educents is bringing back the ever-popular $15 Frenzy! Here's your chance to get 15 different curriculum bundles for less than $15 each! Some incredibly talented teachers have come together to bring you Science, Reading, Language Arts, Interactive Notebooks, Planners, Math Centers, Social Studies Units, Reading Comprehension Units, Clip-art & more! You're sure to find something during this amazing sale! Here's just a sample of the awesome curriculum and activity packs that are on the site!

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Science, Weather and Geology Lessons for 2nd/3rd Grade - 40% OFF

 

Reading & Language Arts Interactive Notebooks - 40% OFF

Business/Personal Planner with Editable Pages - 50% OFF

 

2nd Grade Math Centers - 61% OFF

 

America's Past & Present Social Studies Unit - 75% OFF

 

Greek Myths, Fables & Fairy Tales Curriculum - 57% OFF

 

Guided Reading Curriculum Bundle - 56% OFF

Kindergarten Literacy & Math Curriculum - 58% OFF

 

Alphabet Madness Activities - 46% OFF

 

Primary Social Studies Activities & Curriculum - 47% OFF

 

Early Childhood Clipart- 43% OFF

 

1st & 2nd Grade Arts Integration Curriculum - 57% OFF

Happy Shopping!!

September Bright Ideas: Smile Moments

Welcome to the September Bright Ideas link-up! A link-up bringing you nothing but fantabulous ideas to bring to your classroom!

Today I'm stopping by to bring a little smile and laughter to your room with...

SMILE MOMENTS!

Smile Moments happen every Friday morning in my classroom.  This is a time when I share a video or picture I've found that will make us SMILE and laugh! :)

Here are a few we've watched that my kids have adored this year...

My students absolutely love, and I mean REALLY LOVE our smile moments.  It's the first thing I hear on Friday morning when they walk in, "What's our smile moment today?" :) 

Thanks for stopping by!  For more bright ideas more than 100 different bloggers, please browse through the link-up below and choose a topic/grade level that interests you. Thanks for visiting! 

An InLinkz Link-up

4 Engaging Ways to Practice Math without Worksheets

Put away those worksheets people! Save the trees....here are 4 ways we've done Math in our 2nd grade classroom this year that are more fun, engaging, and provide great practice for all of our most important math skills.

Sidenote : 2 years ago, my kids did a worksheet every day for math.  I was a newbie and was just trying to survive!  Did they learn? yes - but they were not thriving in my math classroom.  They just did it because they had to.  They were not enjoying math and I knew I had to make a change for my future students.

1. Manipulatives - Yes, I know everyone uses them - but we use them in so many ways.  Sometimes, I just simply pull out manipulatives and ask my kids to show me their knowledge of something.  In this task, my students were asked to create a picture out of base 10 blocks & tell me their number.  Then, students went around to see other students creations and count to figure out the number.

Creativity and Learning? Score!

2. Math Journals - Why copy a worksheet when I can save a ton of time & paper.  Just simply write a problem on the board and students solve in their journal.  It's a bonus that I don't have to be prepared with this ahead of time. Oh Yeah, I forgot to mention that checking 1 problem for 23 kids is easier than checking 10 each for 23 kids=better feedback from me! And for the kiddos? It's so fun to bust out their journals. (Probably the most fun for them comes from the fact that they can show it however they choose- as long as I can make sense of it!)

3. White Boards - SO simple!  Pull out white boards, dry erase markers, and erasers (Or old socks!) and do some problems together.  Then, ask them to solve 1 or 2 on their own.  They can't leave the meeting area until they've solved problems correctly.  This means- I get to the kids who didn't get it right away!  The rest head off to group stations.

4. Shaving Cream. or Sand, or Play doh - I pulled out the shaving cream today to review comparing numbers, place value, and even/odd.  They were beyond excited and so enjoying their work.  After, the buzz around the classroom was, "I want to do that AGAIN! That was so much fun!" 

There was/is absolutely no shortage of learning in any of these ways to get kiddos engaged in math.  Actually- they don't even realize they are learning - but can explain exactly what they are doing!  

So today I want to challenge you - if you use worksheets in math often (and I used to people, every day!!) - Try to switch out 1 each week.  Once you see the change in your students and their excitement for math, you'll wonder why you ever used those darn worksheets before!

Combating Internal Self Doubts

Lets face it, we all have them (especially educators).  Those internal voices in our head saying "That could have gone better" or "You didn't do your best" or "That kid didn't learn anything that you tried to teach them today".  In the words of a sweet little child who lost her life to the Sandy Hook Tragedy, we can't let these self-doubts "Suck our fun circuits dry" 

R.I.P Sweet Ana Grace

I was recently chatting with a fellow educator (Greg Curran - @innov8reduc8r) for his podcasts on Thriving and he asked me how I deal with these internal voices - the self-doubts, and the negativity. (Something that has been VERY difficult for me in the past!)

To combat my internal self doubts - I started something this year that has been absolutely wonderful for not only myself, but my students as well.

Each afternoon we meet together in a circle for Afternoon Meeting.  Our meeting is a time for us to do 3 things:

-Recognize people that we wrote compliments for throughout the day.  We write a compliment and put it on our compliment board when we see friends working very hard, or helping someone out.  We share these at the end of the day

-Reflect on how the day went.  Each student shares something that they think went really well or something they learned.  

-Relax together for a nice "See you later" at the end of the long, exhausting, learning filled day instead of the chaotic pack up, craziness routine we've had in the past.

Hearing students share what they've learned throughout the day or what they think really well - has helped me stay more positive about what we are doing in our room - and celebrate even the smallest successes!

Math Workshop that Works!

SMILE & Bare with me.. this is a long post...

Energy y'all. Let me just start by saying my kiddos have A LOT of it plus some to spare! This is why I've really thought long and hard about the way I am doing math this year (& have already tried multiple ways to structure it).  

(Props to Teaching My Friends for this adorable sign - The Oracle helped me find it!)

Many of my multiple structure attempts are due to this years pull out schedule and making sure kids don't miss anything (& failing semi-miserably) but also some due to other problems... Here are a few I've tried..

-Whole Group- We meet on carpet for lesson, dismiss for worktime & stations - Nope - slow workers, fast workers, kids who don't get it, kids who already do...& pull out kids miss all of work time

-half & half - 11 kids in 1 group, 12 in the other - while half work at stations I meet with other half on the carpet.  This worked pretty well - but with all of the energy and personalities in my room this year - I'm often needed to solve disagreements/problems.  We are working on this, but with it being so early on, they need me (Isn't is so nice to be needed).

PLUS Others!

Soooo.... Finally, I really sat down and thought about it...

How can I harness their energy & use it to my advantage?

What can I do to keep them moving and learning?

How can I reach all of my kids - my strugglers and my "I already got it"-ers.... 

I thought and thought and thought until I finally figured it out.... Here is my Math Workshop that Works!

We start by getting our brains warmed up with a math sprint! This week we are doing a Skip Counting by 5's sprint.  Students have 1 minute to solve as many problems as they can.  They do the same sprint each day - trying to beat their score from the following day (We switch the sprint each week).  When the 1 minute is up - they grab their hi-lighters, mark off where they ended, and check as I read out the answers.  After each problem, students who completed that problem whisper a "yes".  This way, I know when nobody got past a problem and I don't have to read any more answers.

After our sprint, I give them about 2 minutes to work on the rest of it (GREAT Practice!) while I ask my students of the day to get everything for our lesson set up.  This might be white boards, it might be manipulatives, or math journals.  

When we are all ready- it's on to a movement, skill break.  Counting by 1's, skip counting, addition or subtraction partners.  Whatever skill we are working on or need practice in.  Sometimes they practice with partners playing a "Patty Cake" -ish type of game, sometimes we do the back stroke, jumping jacks, shoulder rolls.  Pretty much anything!

They we get settled into our lesson.  I teach a skill, I let students practice 1 or 2 times, I ask them to solve 1 problem on their own and show it to me before heading off to stations, games, or other activities.  Kids who "get it" are off quickly and kids who need a little more help hang with me for some more 1-on-1 time.  (Side note - I RARELY give my kids worksheets to practice any 1 skill.  If I give them a task - it is typically multi-skilled task cards or real work problem solving tasks, rather than doing 15 problems telling me whether the number is even or odd)   This is all around 15-20 minutes

This is a time when we did a whole group activity for worktime.  Students were practicing reading numbers from expanded to standard form.  They looked at the expanded form and colored the standard form on a 120's chart and it made a picture.  I got this from The Primary Techie on TPT! 

Then it's LUNCHTIME!! Yes Peeps, lunch time.  I've found that a little break in the middle of math helps them - otherwise they lose focus and start goofing off.  

When we come back from lunch- this is a time for them to do 1 of a few things:

1- My Pull-out kids meet with me for a small group lesson (This works perfectly because they need it anyway)

2- Everyone meets with me to teach them a game or do a whole group activity using our skills.

3- They continue work they started before lunch

Here my students are playing an "Even & Odd" sort it out game.  See video below :)

Above is our ULTIMATE HOP SCOTCH!  What better way to get kids MOVING and COUNTING to 1,000 than with the biggest hopscotch they will probably ever make? Movement & skill practice?  I call that #winning.  

Then, at the very end- sometimes we will meet to review the skill, reflect on how we did as a class, or to clear up any misconceptions.  When all is said and done, we've spent 60 minutes on Math (Yep- all this in 60 minutes!)

It's a whole lot of movement and transition but it's what I've found to work with my kids this year.  They really cannot remain focused on 1 activity for more than 15-20 minutes without starting to get themselves into a bit of trouble- so I'm using their energy to my advantage- although I will admit that I am a very tired teacher at the end of the day!

Bright Ideas: Easy Notebook Identification

Hey Hoppers! Welcome to the Bright Ideas Link-up.  A monthly link up bringing you nothing but great, practical ideas for your classroom!

Today, I'm dropping by to give you a quick and easy way to keep your kiddos notebooks organized (For those of you that don't have desks) and easily identified.  

I simply "label" each notebook with a different design/color duck tape on the spine!

Why, you ask?  I'm glad you asked!  This way, if a child is missing their Science Journal (And it's not in the science bin) I can tell them to go check the other bins and they can easily recognize the "odd man out".

Do you see it? It's a little easier when they are "right there" :) It took a little bit to do, but I think it's been totally worth it!  Happy taping!

For more bright ideas more than 100 different bloggers, please browse through the link-up below and choose a topic/grade level that interests you. Thanks for visiting!