Sunday, April 29, 2012

My Buckets...

I know many of you implement a Bucket Filler program in your classroom.  When I started looking for "buckets" to display last summer, I came up empty until I saw these in Michaels. 


Aren't they bright and cheery?  They are part of Duff's (Ace of Cakes) collection. At the time, I bought them for $2.49...I think.  (Sidenote:  Did you know that Michaels gives a 15% Teacher Discount?  They reinstated the discount late spring last year after a LONG hiatus.)

Ahhh, I digress!

Anyway, I was at Michaels today and saw them on SALE for $1 so I grabbed a few more!   They actually had large ones (think ice bucket size) but they were full of dents. 

Sigh. 

I'm sure I could have found a good use for them!

Saturday, April 14, 2012

Little Things Make Me Happy...

For years, my "paper shelf" in my classroom closet has been a disaster. DISASTER.  Sure, it starts off the year neat and tidy but quickly becomes an embarrassing mess.  Now looky at my 9x12 paper!  Why didn't I do this sooner?


I have two crates filled up and they're so, so, so easy to slide out so I can reach in and grab what I need.  No mess!  No flyaway papers.  Yea!  I no longer will have to cringe when a colleague opens my door to get paper. You can see the longer 11x18 paper next to this crate.  That's next! 

Thursday, April 5, 2012

Estimating Anyone?

I always have an estimation station going on in my classroom.  I've learned how helpful it is to show kids what five or ten of the object looks like so they can make a better educated guess.  For Read Across America, I decided to move the station outside near the front office and make it a school-wide affair.  What fun!  (We are only a K-1 school!)


The baggie in front showed what "100" looked like.  I usually don't have such large quantities but I figured this was a special occasion! 

To make it easy (and to save time for our kiddos and teachers,) I actually had the teachers names on the recoding sheet so kids could easily circle them..  It looked like this.  (But precut, of, course!)


The winning guess was, I believe 405 or 605...I forget.  But I do remember who won:  a cutie from my class!  She got to take home a huge bag of goldfish covered in Dr. Seuss ribbon and stickers.


It was so much fun that we're thinking of having a school-wide weekly estimation station next year.  Since it's a small school, it should be easy to implement.  Do you have an estimation station?  Do you give out prizes to the winner? I've gone back and forth as to what I should do but have finally decided on letting the kids sign the Bravo Board.  They LOVE it!  I should take a pic and post it here.  I'd love to hear how you implement yours.

Here is a fun song you can sing with your class.  Enjoy!