Behavior Management Linky

Hello friends! I hope you had a great Monday! I spent my Monday in SIOP training and that's all I have to say about that.

 I'm linking up with the gals at What the Teacher Wants for the

I'm currently using a combination of things in my room. I am using the ever popular clip chart. Surprisingly, I had a couple of parents say they didn't like the color chart because their child just didn't feel good about himself if he got below green.........Uh......  Should I mention that her son is THE behavior issue in my room? No? Well, then I won't.

So, I am using the cip chart and I'm also using the now, ever popular "Golden Tickets" that Kristin at A Teeny Tiny Teacher posted about.

The students get golden tickets (yellow construction paper strips) if they do good things throughout the day and at the end of the day, if they are on green, they get one golden ticket. The next color up is pink, so they get two tickets if they're on that and so on up the chart. If they are below green, they have to pay me a golden ticket, which no one ever wants to do. At the end of the week, whoever has the most golden tickets gets to go to a "Free Station" and they get to choose first. I start the timer for about 15 mins and the kids with the most tickets get to go to their station they choose first. And I collect all their tickets. By the time I get to the last few students, sadly, most of our free station time is up AND they just have to take whatever station is left open. They do not appreciate this but hopefully they'll work harder to earn the tickets in the next week. I've only had this going for a couple of weeks and I'm anxious to see if it motivates those challenging kiddos. I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

Thanks for stopping by. On a sad note, I just want to say to my friend Sally who lost her sweet Mom today that I love you and I know Miss Mary is having a ball up in heaven, but it's so hard to see her go. 

Shhhhh...be vewy vewy quiet...

Howdy y'all! Sorry I haven't been posting as often as I'd like but you know it's still really the first of the year so...Yes! It is still the first of the year. I'm choosing to deny the fact that progress reports go out a week from Tuesday. That's just crazy talk! Anyhoo...I hope you are having a great weekend. We have had rain all day and my team, the Razorbacks lost today. I'm still upset, but I'm loyal. We got killed by Alabama today but that's ok. We'll get me someday! I am so excited though! I am posting today on my brand new iPad!!!!!!! I just got it Friday and it's wonderful. I wrote a grant and got it and now have this wonderful new blogging tool technology for my students to use in the classroom!!! I mean, of course I've gotta test it out and make sure it works, right! Ha! I'm kidding of course just don't tell anyone! I am seriously looking for some great apps to download. The free-er the better! I would love to hear of any suggestions you may have. I did just download Bugs and Buttons and it's good. My 5 year old really likes it. It seems to have a lot of counting and abc activities but I need to explore it some more. Any other great App ideas? Please share and maybe we could all get some new ideas! Thanks! And I hope if you have a team, they won!

September Currently

Hey y'all!!! I hope this post shows my September Currently. I've had blogger issues lately so I don't know if it'll work. I so want a mac laptop. I'm convinced that will fix all my computer problems actually would probably cause more! Let's give her a try...Check out Farley's site and link up!
Not only a great resource, but Farley's a hoot!

Sorry, it's little...not sure why it's doing that...maybe when I'm saving it?! Who knows?

Just a rant and a Funny!

Soooooo....how's your year going?! We are in the middle of our third week and we are up and running in my class. It's.....different than last year. Last year I had around 19 kids most of the year. I had one child who had behavior issues, but pretty much everyone else was great. This year is......different. I do have great kids! 23 this year. I know many of you have way more than that and I'm sorry and I think that's crazy! But those 4 more in my room are making a big difference! They are just quite a bit more chatty than last year's group. I'm doing the Clip Chart AND they are earning Golden Tickets thanks to Kristin's idea at A Teeny Tiny Teacher. Thanks, Kristin! But we are still struggling. You know the years when you have 4 or 5 talkers that just won't be quiet? Well, I've got about 13 of those! One afternoon, I dismissed the kids who were not talking and let them go ahead and get in the car rider and bus rider lines. The other more than half my class had. no. clue. I finally just had to turn out the lights and yell, "Bus Riders! You're going to need to go get on your bus now!" They looked around, oblivious to the fact that the other kids were gone. Uhh..... We will work it out, though! These are good kids, just noisy. I do have a few kids who I've had to remind that there is one teacher in the room and they need to take care of themselves (I know you've never experienced anything like this before!) Anyhoo, I had to laugh this morning when I heard a student at the table. He said to another student, "You know, I'm not the teacher, but if I were, I'd tell you to STOP IT!!!!" ha! That was a moment I had to turn around and look the other way so they couldn't see me laughing!!! So funny! I'm still introducing the Daily 5 and although we are struggling with our stamina in Read to Self, I'm going to stick with it because I think they'll get it and I think they'll love it once I get every part up and running. I'm staying optimistic! I hope your year is off to a good start and if you have any ideas for me to try, please share!!!! Talk to you soon!!

An Alphabet Guessing Game!

So as we're getting school underway and with that Common Core, we are beginning the first unit Alphabet Books and the Children Who Read Them. I like this unit at the beginning of the year as a review of kindergarten for those students who need it.
Every year I read one of my faves, Q is for Duck. Are you familiar with this story?

I always read it after I've read several traditional ABC books such as Chicka Chicka Boom Boom and Annie Bea and Chi Chi Dolores and all those other great ones that there are now. I save Q is for Duck for last and the kids LOVE it! Most of the letters they can guess the answer but there are a few that usually stump them. Then, after we've heard the story and discussed it, I let the students come up with their own idea. I tell the students they can use an idea from the story or they can come up with an idea of their own. I make a big deal about how great it is to come up with your own idea. But I like that it's safe for those kids who aren't really sure or aren't confident and challenges those kids who can come up with their own ideas. My students this year really impressed me! They came up with some great ideas! You could make this into a class book or put it on the wall or bulletin board. We have open house next week so I put them up in the hall. Because of that and because it's the beginning of the year, I went ahead and typed out the correct sentence and let the students glue it on to their paper AFTER they had written the story the "best that they could." I just told them I did that so everyone could see exactly how it should look. They were all okay with that. They turned out great! Here is how it looks on the wall and a couple of great ideas!

Aren't these great?! I loved their creativity! Yay!