The countdown is on.

August is a time of craziness for teachers.  Throw parenthood into the mix and you enter a new level of craziness.  Aside from getting your classroom ready you have to get your own kiddo ready - school supplies, new shoes, haircut, etc.  (I have to cut Erik's hair.  He has a lot of anxiety with scissors and trimmers around his head and screams and wiggles around - it's SO FUN.  Oh boy... ha) 

Anyway, gone are the lazy days of summer.  Because starting last week, I've been kicking it into high gear.  I remember my ex-husband saying that he didn't see much of me in September.  I tend to keep long hours at school and on the home computer, putting together visual aides, behavior modification tools/contracts, picture schedules, etc. to help my students get through their school day.  That's the thing about teaching a special needs class.  All of my kiddos will need that extra something to help them get through their day.  The tricky part is figuring out WHAT that something is.  But before you can start on that, you have to get to know them.  REALLY know them.  You have to get past that honeymoon period of perfect behavior - which can last as long as early October.

I have 12 students on my roster so far.  (Currently I can have up to 13.)  Of those 12, I'll have 3 students returning.  I'm well aware of their strengths and weaknesses.  However, I'll have 9 brand new students - which is a lot for me since my kiddos stay with me for three years.  So I'm anxious to meet them and get our year rolling.

For now, I've been in and out of my classroom decorating, getting bulletin boards papered and the classroom library together - you know - the fun stuff.  It's always so funny walking into that empty shell of a room in early August and thinking that same thought of "Holy crap.  How on earth will I get this all done?"  But it always comes together.  And for that first week of school, your room is GORGEOUS and shiny and organized and so clean...  But that doesn't last long.  ha ha 

Since this is my 3rd year in this room, working with K-2, I am starting to get the hang of what I need to do in order to keep my room more organized.  For example, I have my classroom library organized by topic.  But some books fall in that murky territory of "either/or."  And the kiddos would just throw the books anywhere so they could get to the next center.  So I've made new picture labels for the book bins and coordinating book labels - - which need to be put on all of the books.  Pretty labor intensive.  It took me about three hours just to create and print all the labels.  However, it's going to pay off in the long run when the kiddos can simply match the label to the bin picture and get going on their way.  They're happy and I'm happy.  Phew!

Here are some "before" pictures of the room.  (You'll see my son, Erik, in some of the shots.  He liked going to my room and playing with his train which he could run all over the hardwood floors with. He actually let me work for a whole hour and a half that day!)

"After pictures" coming soon!

Also, I've only got about 7 more chapters to read in Fred Jones and I'll be posting those "cliff notes" as soon as I'm finished.  I'm trying to cram in as much reading time as a I can so I can get started reading Debbie Diller's Math Work Stations book!

Learning How to Use this New Toy

Finally got a chance to sit down and use my new Wacom Bamboo graphics tablet tonight!  It was super easy to set up.  Just installed the driver using the CD that came with it and then plugged it in via USB port to my PC and it was ready to go!

It's going to take some time to get used to drawing on a tablet but seeing the image on the monitor.  Anyway, to practice I made the crude self-portrait below.  It took me about 20 minutes to get the hang of things.  I suspect it'll get much quicker the more I practice.

Hmm.  Guess I made myself pretty thin in this self portrait.  =)

Creating my own digital art work - or - WHAT I'VE BEEN DOING WITH MY SUMMER.

If you've been following along, you'll know that Teachers Pay Teachers (TpT) is what got me to thinking, "Hey wait.  I CAN DO THIS."  But then I wondered HOW I could make all that cool stuff I was seeing from teachers like Krista Wallden,  Miss Kindergarten, and the amazing Deanna Jump (who has made over one million dollars on TpT).

I already had Adobe Photoshop on my home PC and new some basics via my "Photoshop for Dummies"  book.  I scoured teacher forums like AtoZ to find out how teachers were creating the materials they were selling and learned about digital artwork.  I still wasn't sure that was the way to go so I decided I needed to try out some freebies before paying for it.  Enter Krista Wallden who offered dozens of free digital artwork packages (and still might) - PERFECT for the beginner like me to try out.  I downloaded free colored stars, borders, fonts, hands - all kinds of goodies and started this blog.  I created the background of this blog on photoshop and the header using PicMonkey.  Then I started creating my center signs on photoshop but started running into stumbling blocks.

For one thing, you can't sell materials on TpT that use copyrighted images.  Big no-no.  And while I was using some of Krista's images and others I'd purchased from KPM Doodles, you still have to give these folks the credit for the images you're using - which is only fair - even though they were free or your purchased them.  Now, my center signs actually have google images on them which may or may not be copyrighted.  But since I'm not selling them, it's okay.  The name plate owl images were purchased from KPM.  So I have to give her credit for the clip art.

So I started to think.... wait a sec.  If I'm every going to sell anything on TpT, then it would be beneficial to create my own digital clip art and stop using everyone else's.  So I started with my Puzzle Center sign, got on photoshop and started messing around.  First I thought I would free hand puzzle images, scan them, and then color them in photoshop.

But when I zoomed in, I could see sketch marks, eraser marks - everything shows up.  So then I decided to "draw" them in Photoshop.  But all I knew to "draw" with online was a mouse.  Try making a non-shaky free hand line with a mouse.  Yeesh.  After MUCH fixing, the new piece looked like this:

And it STILL looked like crap to me.  I'd seen all of these GORGEOUS hand-drawn images in Photoshop from other people and wondered how they did it so smoothly with a mouse.  So I got on YouTube and started watching video tutorials and finally learned what you all probably already knew.  I guess I've been living under a rock.

They're not using a mouse at all.

I know.  I was shocked to learn that I'd been making this as hard as possible on myself.  If only I'd known more about technology, I would have realized that they were using a GRAPHICS TABLET.  Hallelujah!  

The next step was to google graphics tablets and read up on what they do, how they work, which is the best for what I'm trying to create, etc.  If you aren't familiar with graphics tablets, they're basically a tablet that connects to your computer via USB port or wireless technology and you use a stylus to create images on your computer screen via the tablet.  From there you can manipulate the images and create your own digital artwork!

SO, after reading what seemed like a million reviews on Amazon about these tablets, I decided to purchase the Wacom Bamboo Create Pen and Touch Tablet.  It should arrive in a few days and I'll give it a try.

More on this later!

Who Doesn't love a free 100 Grid?

Sorry, I've been a little MIA lately.  This week I celebrated *cough* my 45th birthday.  My boyfriend and family went WAY above and beyond so I've been a little busy!  But I DID manage to create a few 100 grids.  What I've found with my kiddos is that they don't understand where the numbers "pick up" at on the grid.  So I tried color coding the last and first digits of each row the same color so they could "match" them.  We'll see if it works.  I also made the more traditional rainbow grid and thought they could choose their own this year.  Giving choices gives them total ownership!  It's a win-win.

If you are using any of my stuff, I would appreciate it if you could become a follower.  Thanks!  :)

Still reading good old Fred Jones, by the way.  Just starting Chapter 11 which looks promising; "Succeeding from Day One."  I think what I'm going to do is offer up one giant post when I'm done of all of his KEY POINTS.  Like a cliffs notes version.  So keep an eye out!

Name Plates and more Fred Jones

Decided to create some color-coded owl name plates for the kiddos this year.  The stoplight colors are red (Kinder), yellow (1st grade), and green (2nd Grade).  This will help my classroom aide distinguish learner levels early on.  I'll also use them to split the kiddos up into three teams for review games on Friday. 

Last year I discovered the best way for me to put name plates on my kiddos' desks - VELCRO.  I laminate and velcro them to the desk.  This way the kiddos can rip them off and take them to small group math activities and centers with them.  Last year they used their number lines a LOT.

Back to Fred Jones.  First of all, has anyone read this book before?  What's up with making it oblong and heavy as hell so it's near impossible to read unless it's on a table?  I hate that!  I'm trying to read this sucker in bed - very tricky - and then today to make it even harder on myself, I tried to read it balanced on a floatie in the pool.  So yeah, I should get props for that one.  (Gee Fred, you couldn't make the book triangular and weigh as much as an anvil?  Phew!  We lucked out there!)

So last time I talked about Fred, it was chapter 3 or whatever and he was talking about WORK ETHIC and said this can be installed by actually checking the student's work as they did it and giving them atta boys.  HOWEVER, as I progress, I'm finding out that you can OVER DO IT and create learned helplessness.  So he mentions to "praise, prompt, and leave" to avoid helpless handraisers and to use VIPs (visual instruction plans) for everything you teach.  So if you're teaching addition with carrying, you would make a VIP that shows each step and each new part is a different color - and they're numbered.  So instead of "tutoring" helpless handraisers, you can simply walk up, see where they're at, point to the VIP and say, "Next, do step #4," and move on.

I remember making VIPs when I taught middle school.  They really do work.  A little time consuming to make but definitely worth it.  And they actually ACCELERATE learning!  Give it a try.  If you don't know what I'm talking about, the (gigantic, heavy, pain-in-the-butt-to-hold) book is called "Fred Jones Tools for Teaching."  Check it out.  Good stuff.

Reading Center and a little tip from Fred Jones

Here's the Reading Center sign which is similar to the Listening Center.  Next up, Puzzle Center.

Just in case you're wondering, no, this is not the final product.  I'll take them to our laminating center, paste them on one piece of poster board (probably blue because that's my literacy color - green is math, orange is science, etc.) and laminate the whole thing so that it'll be an approx 16" x 22" poster.  Easy peasy.

Now, as for Fred Jones.  I've been re-reading Fred because I can never brush up on classroom management enough.  I've been trying to read a little bit before bed each night.  Last night's snipit that stuck out the most was how to get kiddos to have a good work ethic at such a young age.  The answer is so obvious but also not easy to accomplish.  It's simply to check their work as they're doing it.  Makes sense, right?  You put a kiddo on a center when they're independently able to do it, but then do small group at your table and don't keep an eye on them.  They know you're not watching.  So they start to goof off and then eventually get in trouble.  This happened a LOT last year - especially after Christmas break.

This might sound like an easy fix but it's going to be tricky.  First of all, I do centers in order to do my necessary small group work.  It's hard to be in two places at once.  I'm going to have to figure out how to utilize my classroom aide at this time a little more efficiently so that I can get out there and check on the kiddos.  All they need is to get back on track, a few atta-boys and TA-DA - work ethic is born.

Phew.

More from my Listening Center.

As I mentioned in my previous post, it's crucial to include as many images in your signs as you can when you teach kiddos with special needs.  Some of them will be non-readers and the images will help them out!  So here's the Listening Center Expectations that I'll be laminating underneath the other sign.  Feel free to print these out.  I did use some clip art from Google but nothing was copyrighted and I'm not making any money off of these, so here ya go: