Almost December!?!?!

Can you believe it is almost December? I don't know about you, but I'm shocked we got here so fast! I know this time will fly by!

One thing I know for sure is how crazy behavior gets during this month! Kiddos are so excited for the holidays and we are all in need of a break!

One thing I do in my room to encourage positive behavior is Fun Friday. I know many of you do this, so I'm not reinventing anything, but this really works for me!

Each day students earn points for positive behavior. I use Class Dojo {click to read my post about Dojo} to give my students points all day long. I can give them points when we are on the go by using the Dojo app. All I have to say to my class is "I'm looking for someone... "and they all start doing what they are supposed to!

On Friday, the students are able to do self-selected activities for the last 15 minutes of the day. The student with the most points has first choice of activities.

 I printed these out, laminated them and hot glued them to ribbon. I pin a clip with the students name to the card of the activity they are going to. They chose their activity from the top point earner to the least.

Students fill out a form to show their parents their points for the week and I check off their behavior that week. I am able to show the parents what their child needs to work on as well, by circling the behavior area they need to work on.

My Fun Friday Freebie packet, with signs for Fun Friday and parent behavior forms are available for FREE in my TpT store. I hope it works for you!

Open House!

My Curriculum Night/ Open House was last week! Yippee! Ok, not really. I love teaching, I love kiddos, but get a whole bunch of adults in the room and I get super nervous. So, I skip the whole big speech thing, and have my students show their parents around the room and I stand to the side passing out papers and answering any questions. I also like to have a power point on repeat that answers any questions they may have without having to wait to ask me.

One of the things that brought a lot of parents to my class this year was an activity I did with my students to make their parents find their desk. My students loved it and they dragged their parents into Open House just for that reason.

On the front, the students write about themselves, basically clues to help their parents find their desk. On the inside they write about what they like about the grade they are in and their parents write a note back to them.  The notes inside were so touching! The kiddos were so excited! For those that didn't have their parent attend open house, I wrote a note so they wouldn't feel left out!

I also did a scavenger hunt for students to show his or her parents around the room. This way, they showed them all the highlights!

Overall, a very calm and enjoyable evening! The parents loved it, and I  got rave reviews!

You can buy the guess who page, scavenger hunt, welcome sign, volunteer forms and sign in sheet at my TpT store. All of them are worded in several ways so hopefully your "open house" term will be there! And of course they are all polka dot!

Monday Made It

I'm excited to see another round of Monday Made It. Thank you to Tara @ Fourth Grade Frolics for hosting! For this weeks project I was inspired by Julie at 4th Grade Haps and Hacks and her project last week.

 
So I pretty much took her project and made it with what I had on hand. I, of course, made it polka dot and teal.

I used some letters I all ready had and I think they are a little small. I am waiting to laminate when I get home. You can't really tell in the pic, but the teal alternates between a flowery print and polka dot print.  I think it will look so cute hanging outside my door!!

I also made a dry erase frame that was inspired by the many pinterest pins of the same nature! If it was your idea, you rock!

This is silver glittery paper, with scraps for the corners. The clear sayings are clear stamps I took apart to keep the stickers. They say Believe to remind me of God's promise and "You are my sunshine" to remind me of my hubby.

I think it's a little something to make me smile on my desk! Plus, my desk becomes such a mess of papers by the end of the day that I usually can't find my to-do list! Problem solved!

Target Dollar Spot, how I love you!

I dragged my husband to 3 separate Targets so far these past two weeks. We have been out of town all summer for him to work, so we only have a rental car that I can't drive. He sure loves the dollar spot! Actually, I appreciate him for humoring me and my dollar spot obsession. Here's a few pics of what I picked up my first trip. I'll post the second and third trip later!

Everything I got! (notice the tiny erasers! love them!

The polka dot stuff: mechanical pencils, a dry erase to-do list, polka dot labels, outstanding student award, pencil holder, ribbon handled bucket and decorative paper clips!

The teal blue things: yes, my classroom is teal! So we have Dr. Seuss bags, accordion files, a foldable bin, and labels!

I'm hoping to use the Dr. Seuss bags to send home with students that need extra reading practice at home. The polka dot stuff is for my desk and I have no idea what to do with the teal accordion files or labels. I'm going to put one tiny eraser at each table group.

What's caught your eye lately? Any interesting Dollar Spot finds I need to look for?

Monday Made It!

One of the reasons I wanted to start my own blog was the Monday Made It linky. I loved all of your ideas and I wanted to share my interpretation of your wonderful ideas. So thank you to all of you!

My inspiration was a pin on pinterest I can't find now, so thank you to the wonderful person that inspired me.

Here is my finished creation:

I took a plain cookie sheet from the Dollar Store, modge podged on paper and glued some flower crystals on magnets and voila!

Total cost each: less than $2.00 {it's hard to estimate the cost of some drops of glue and such!:)}

I will be making 6 of them for the English Language Arts Common Core standards and Math standards. I will use the magnetic flowers to hang up the particular standard I am working on.