Professional Development

My career has officially begun! This past week I participated in two district-wide professional developments. I know this is just the excitement and the newness of it all, but I throughly enjoyed both PDs (nerdy of me, I know).

On Wednesday, our district had a PD on DRA (Direct Reading Assessment). We were trained on how to properly assess our students reading levels. As a reading teacher I was absolutely thrilled to receive this training.

This program that we will be using, DRA2, not only helps determine what grade level the student is reading at but it also helps to narrow down which component of literacy the student is struggling with most. This really helps with planning instruction and making lessons more individualized. This will be great for me and helping with the implementation of CAFE which you can read more about here.

Thursday's PD was held at out district's high school. Other area districts were also invited to attend. 900 teachers, K-12 were in attendance! We were able to choose 4 sessions, put on by various educators in the area. I chose a session on Marie Carbo, one titled "My student has the ability but not the desire. Why?", and two on RTI.

They all were excellent and I am thrilled to be a part of such a growing school district. In other exciting news this week, I got my school keys! The teacher whose room I will be taking over, said she should be moved out soon and that I can go ahead and start putting things in the room! :) I can't wait to get in there!

I also started selling some of the things I have created for my room on Teachers Pay Teachers. A link to my store is on the left hand side of this page. Please check it out and leave feedback! There will be more to come :)

Book Leveling and Organization!

Phew! Life has been busy lately. I just recently finished up student teaching and graduated from Western Kentucky University! (WOOOHOOO!!!!)

Okay, so here's what I've been working on lately. I have been on the hunt for books for my classroom library. I had a small collection of chapter books that I purchased when the local Borders went out of business. Each book was only a dollar! I also bought some picture books. I've been shopping for lot sales of books on Ebay as well. Today I went Goodwill and purchased 22 books for 10 dollars! So far I'd say I've been pretty successful but I'm done book shopping for a while, it's starting to add up! If anyone has any suggestions on places to purchase cheap books, please let me know. :) I spent the afternoon using Book Wizard to determine the Lexile Level and DRA level for the books.  I used address labels to mark all the books as "Property of Ms. Clarke" and placed that label in the front inside cover.

[James and the Giant Peach]

Next I made a label for each book marking the Lexile Level and the DRA level. I placed this label in the back of the book, because it's more for my reference than the students but eventually I would like them to be aware of their DRA or Lexile level and use that to double check themselves after using the I PICK strategy from The Daily 5.

[James and the Giant Peach]

My next project was from Pinterest! I decided to make some pencil pails because I can't stand the sound of pencils being sharpened and disrupting hard working students. So I've decided that pencils will be sharpened at the end of the day and that can be one of the classroom jobs. I found this adorable label on Pinterest courtesy of Donna and her blog. You can find the labels on her blog. She has adorable pails with pencils on them, but I had no such luck finding any. So I went with yellow. 

I thought they turned out pretty cute! I also used my labels to create labels for my binder clips. Another idea I got off of Pinterest! :) I labeled mine for the days of the week and also Copy, File, Grade, Pass Out, To Do, Graded.

This week I'm meeting with the rest of my team for next year and I get to see my classroom! I'm thrilled to finally get in the building and get busy. I'm hoping to accomplish a lot this summer on organization for my room but it's slow moving. Until next time! :)

My first blog post!

After discovering that I would have a teaching position for the 2012-2013 school year, I knew I wanted to create this blog to share my experiences and to learn from others during my first year teaching. I'm currently finishing up my student teaching in a third grade reading classroom. This has been an excellent experience for me and has really prepared for the upcoming school year, where I'll be teaching third grade reading at another school in Owensboro. 

I've been addicted to TpT and Pinterest lately (which I know most of us are)! I've found so many interesting and great ideas for my future classroom and I can't wait to get in there and start setting it up. I know I'll be implementing CAFE and the Daily 5. If you haven't had a chance to get familiar with these than I highly recommend you do :)

I'm still not 100% sure on all of the things that I may implement classroom management wise, but I do know that I will be using the Brownie Points rewards. The amazing teacher I taught under for student teaching, has given me so many great ideas to use in my own classroom. Here are some of the things I know I'll be using: 

The Brownie Points are awarded each time the whole class is given a compliment for their behavior in the hallway, special classes, the cafeteria, field trips, etc. Also, our district uses a Star Chart Behavior System where the students begin the day on white. They have an opportunity to move their stars up for good behavior or good work through out the day to green, blue, and purple. They even have the opportunity to be above purple. For bad behavior or poor work, stars can be moved down to yellow, orange, or red.  Students have an opportunity to move up and down the star chart through out the day and each day the students begin on the neutral color, white. At the end of the day, depending on where the students are, different rewards are given. 

ABOVE PURPLE = Sticker, Candy, Note Home

PURPLE= Sticker, Note Home

BLUE=Sticker

GREEN=Verbal Praise

WHITE= Neutral

YELLOW= Walk two laps at Recess

ORANGE= Walk four laps at Recess

RED= Note Home, Principal Visit, No Recess

Brownie Points can also be given if the whole class ends the day on green or above. This helps the students encourage each other to get their stars up. Once the students fill up the tray with brownies, then they'll get some sort of treat! I love this system and can't wait to see how it works in my classroom! 

I'm hoping to check out my classroom sometime next week to see how much room I'll have. I'm so anxious to get in there and get going. :)