First Week down.

Wow my first full week of school is over and I am exhausted. So glad to have 2 days to regroup and relax. 

I just have to ask my whole two followers out there... am I the only preschool teacher who feels totally inadequate at the end of the first week? No matter how much I tell myself and intellectually understand that my class at the beginning of the year is NOTHING like my class at the end of the year I always forget how large that difference is. I did remember to take it slow, do lots of modelling, do lots of modelling again and laugh a lot but those small (feels like huge) behavior problems just knock me for a loop. I know it will all get better - it will won't it? :-)

Another reason for my exhaustion is the week prior to school we had our all school inservices. I was totally honored to be asked to give a full day inservice on Literacy and Math workstations for our preschool teachers. I worked so hard preparing all the workstations and my 6 hour session and then was so nervous I almost made myself sick. I was so relieved when it was over and all my friends/co-teachers enjoyed it and were totally excited to get a stack of workstations and my interactive big books ready to go for Monday morning. 
Also during the summer I did a book study of Debbie Diller's book: Math Stations. One of the best ideas I got from the book was using assessment cards for quick and easy assessment. Debbie uses index cards, adds the children's names to the bottom and then arranges them on a clipboard. This is a picture I got off Pinterest that shows an example:

I made some of my own and pre-programmed them with upper and lower case letters so it will be easy to mark each child's progress.

To celebrate the success of my workshop and the end of the first week of school I am offering an assessment pack with two easy and fun-to-play games for you all! It contains literacy assessment cards (cards have upper and lower case letters as well as letters to mark for sound knowledge with space for comments), math assessment cards (numbers 1-20 on each card with space for comments) PLUS 2 games that can be adapted to any objective! This pack fulfills several CCS. Click here for yours.

Hope to hear from someone...........anyone.... 

Back To School

Hi all,
I have been gone from the blog world for a long time I know but I have been so busy (just like the rest of you) decorating my room (and recovering from a ton odf dental work but that's another bloggin' story). I also gave my preschool a day long inservice with make and takes and plenty of ready to go workstations. The inservice was well received and all my fellow teachers taught me things by sharing their ideas. It was a wonderful day.
In celebration of the successful inservice I am offering Pete The Cat's Colorful Shoes Pocket Chart Game. Scroll down to see more on this fun game.

Here are some pics of my room. Our themes is Pete the Cat.

Our bulletin board which will hold their art work throughout the year. I love the buttons which I hot glued to clothespins to hold their papers.

This is my "We Know All About Numbers" chart. I have the 10 frame and tally part covered for now. We will do this part of the chart later as we learn about 10 frame and tally marks.

It doesn't show to well in this picture but I also made a Pete The Cat job helper chart. Pete says, "Helping is groovy!"

These hearts will hold all our weekly Bible verses as we learn them. Stickers are put on the front of each heart as they recite the verse at week's end.

This game was previously named Pete the Cats Colorful Shoes. Same great game- just new name

This fun game can be used with your preschool class to help them learn and review their colors. Ten colors and the repetitive poem make this a fun game for all. It is also an easy assessment tool for you! The game was meant to be played on a pocket chart but can be just as easily used on a flannel board.

Click here to get your game.

I wish you all a wonderful first day and successful year! Happy Teaching!

GOLF PANTS COLOR SCHEME

Well we officially start school next week but I went into my room today to start setting up. Of course I started with putting paper on my walls. I actually love putting up paper although I don't know why since I am level challenged and I am always having to take out a staple and readjust. That is until last year when my assistant suggested I use push pins to position the paper until it's just right, or in my skewed vision straight enough, and then go crazy with the stapler.
I went with a dark blue and yellow paper scheme. My class is the Bears so on two of my walls I used the colorful bear paws border. Then I guess I was bored with bear paws so I went digging into my large tub full of borders and found a red polka dot border that I thought would rock with the yellow paper and red polka dot letters I have (this is going to be my word wall.) I was having a great time - singing and dancing while I subconsciously congratulated myself on being a designer of the Martha Stewart kind. Oh yea - it's a good thing!
 I was very excited when I finished and was loving the bright colors. That is until I left the room to get some supplies and walked back into the disaster. What happened to my (in my mind only) awesome color scheme? And how did red polka dot border turn into hot pink polka dot border? I swear I heard a thump similar to what Martha sounds like when she faints. Yea, Martha, your job is secure.
Here is my wall. Check it out while you can because tomorrow I have an emergency appointment at the teacher supply store for some new border.
Any suggestions?

Worse than golf pants (no offense, Tiger)

I'll post more pics tomorrow. Ya know, before and after. 

Have any of you ever hated your color scheme? Please post and tell me about it.

Happy decorating!