Oh, Snap! It's Five for Friday!

It's FRIDAY! Wooo-whoo! Who would have thought I'd be so excited for a Friday over the summer? However, this just happens to be the Friday before vacation. I haven't been on a vacation longer than a weekend in a very, very long time. I'm so excited to be get away for a week to eat yummy foods, relax with the boyfriend, and hopefully take in some touristy sites! But before then, I thought I'd get back to blogging and link up with Doodle Bugs Teaching for her amazing Five for Friday linky!

So here's what I've been up to this week...

Okay, so the awesome collaborators over at Blog Hoppin' have set up "Oh, Snap!" an Instagram scavenger hunt with some amazing prizes! I love a good scavenger hunt and seeing everyone else's photos via Instagram. You should definitely check out the contest, rules, and, of course, the fabulous prizes! The contest runs until August 6th... so there is still PLENTY of time!

I'm working on training my crazy Italian Greyhound to ride in the back seat for vacation. He is very accustomed to riding up front but I can't ride in the back of the car for 6+ without an unlimited supply out Dramamine. He's been not so pleased about his new seating arrangement. We bought a pet hammock and it does seem to help when he's not trying to crawl under it to get up front... Suggestions?

Took some time out this week to check out the new African  Painted Dog exhibit at the Cincinnati Zoo. Pretty amazing! The ostriches get sooo close! The painted dog himself was rather shy but the rest of the African Velt was out and about! If you live in the area follow @CincinnatiZoo on Instagram and check out #cincyzoopic for some awesome Kodak Moments.

Back to school shopping already? I've hit Target twice already for some teacher back to school necessities. I just need a few packs of colored pencils and a fun new binder and I'm ready {supply wise} for this new school year. However, I'm looking hard at investing in a laptop. I haven't had an actual laptop since college {9 years ago} and I had a netbook in between but it's just so slow. I really want something small and portable but I also want to be able to use it for Teachers Pay Teacher or blogging... Not looking to blow the budget either. Decisions, decisions!

Okay, so I've been working on my Kizzy Ann Stamps novel study & more general historical fiction novel study. I have a letter to the parents, about the author, and common core standards done. Now, it's time for the calendar, teaching points, and student handouts. Many of them are made but I just need to make them look much, much cuter to put them on TPT. What would you want to see in a novel study? I've never created anything quite like this before so suggestions are welcome! My store is a hot mess.... Wish me luck!

Hope everyone has a wonderful Friday!
Please follow me on Instagram so we can scavenger hunt together!

Farewell Summer, Hello Back to School!

This short summer is a killer. I haven't even been the pool once yet! With summer school and then starting back at the beginning of the August. I'm not quite sure where my summer has gone. I've already been shopping Target for back to school supplies. Really Target, was putting everything out this early necessary?

But, with the start of school about a month away for me, I decided to link up with I {Heart} Recess to share my 2014 - 2015 Teaching Goals. I can't be in denial about school starting any longer so setting some goals should help me get ready for a new year and new kiddos.

Here's last year's goals...

So, my personal goal failed miserably. I never left by 3:45 (totally unrealistic) and made it to the gym on the week days only a hand full of times. It's my own fault but I really do need to be better about saving some time for me. However, everything else I met with optimism and success! I had a lot of fun reading some new novels and trying out new activities like our Lemonade Day!

And this year...

My biggie this year to to get myself organized. We're collecting all this data and I have be at a million meetings. Last year, I had a huge binder with all my data, graphs, student tests, etc. It was great for me but a total pain to take to meetings. It was just way, way, way too much to bring to a student meeting. This year, I'm hoping to split my data binder into my evidence, forms, tests, benchmarks, etc. and then have a smaller binder or notebook for my gradebook and current student/classroom data. Then, I can bring evidence as needed to meetings and not an entire 3'' binder! How do you keep yourself organized in the age of RTI, MAP, State Testing, and Guided Reading Levels?

I also hope to really hone in all my vocabulary practice this year. Our district is making vocabulary in the content areas the prime focus and I'm ready to jump on board. I've read several of the "gurus" and they make some great points. This means redoing some of my "morning work warm-up" activities and creating new root and prefix based spelling lists. But I'm ready! {Okay, almost ready!}

What is one goal you have for next school year?

Star Spangled Currently!

This is the first breath I've been able to catch this summer! Whew! I've had only about a full week of "real" summer since I've been teaching summer school through the end of June. I've seriously been an absentee blogger. But since I have a few free minutes (and everyone is sleeping), I thought I'd link up with Farley at Oh' Boy 4th Grade for July's Currently.

I love the Fourth of July! I love the summer foods and fireworks. Although, this year, I think we are going to try and see if we can see our local fireworks from our porch instead of fighting the crowds. However, we may cave in and join 100,000 of our neighbors...

Loving!

To get into the Independence Spirit, I've been labeling my planner with  my new awesome Frixion Markers! They are erasable! And the colors are beautiful. Love them! If you have a marker or pen addiction (like yours truly) then you need to add these to your Amazon cart.

Thinking!

I have so much work to do in my TPT store. It's really a sorry sight! I've been working on several novel/genre studies but I'm still in the early stages. My goal is to really buckle down next week and get some new products up in my store! Here's a little peek at one project I'm working on...

Whew! I have a lot of work ahead of me! I hope everyone has a safe and fun Fourth of July! I'm ready to make some breakfast before checking out the movie times for today. Nothing says, "I love this country!" like watching a Channing Tatum movie, right?

Don't forget to checkout Oh' Boy 4th Grade to see everyone's plans for the fourth!

Happy Independence Day!

Tried it Tuesday: The Lemonade War & Scholastic Summer Reading Challenge

I've been absent far too long. These past few months have flown by and I've been trying to tackle all my end of the year projects for both school and home. I've really neglected my blog and I'm going to try and be more diligent.

 With that being said, I have two Tried it Tuesdays to share with everyone today! Thanks again to the always fabulous Holly over at Fourth Grade Flipper for hosting and sharing! Even though I've been MIA, I always read and favorite the great ideas everyone shares.

 

My first share this week is for the book The Lemonade War by Jacqueline Davis. Although the book is a little too easy for many of my fifth graders, it does such a great job at teaching so many underlying concepts of economics! This is a must read if you teach economics in 4th or 5th grade! My students preferred the novel over a textbook any day! Plus, reading the novel, means Lemonade Day! This was my first year participating in "Lemonade Day" as dubbed by several coworkers who started this great project a few years back.

While reading, The Lemonade War, students created their own drinks for others to sample. They need to use some of the advertising techniques discussed in the book as well as in class. As as well create a drink, people would want to try! As fifth grade teachers, we also added in a portion of the project based on interdependence and globalization. Students had to state somewhere in their advertising why it'd be beneficial to trade with other states/countries/etc. in the creation of their drink. 

Requirements:
- Creative name
- Slogan for drink
- Advertising technique
- Statement about interdependence
- Price of drink

Here are some snapshots of our Lemonade Day:

Our Lemonade Day was a huge success! We have many young entrepreneurs and marketing execs. on our team. Hats off to a great book and fun end of the year "project."

Since we've read so many great books in class this year, I decided to try out the Scholastic Reading Challenge to keep my students motivated and reading over the summer. Thanks to my teaching partner for hearing about this easy to manage summer "reading log."

Scholastic allows you to enter your class roster into their reading website. Simply go the Scholastic Reading Challenge page and choose "Educator." Students will be assigned a user name and password. I just cut out the strips after printing but you could also give students the cute user name cards that Scholastic has on their website. Then students can go on each week and "log" their minutes read. We offered a prize to any students who reads 1,000 minutes over the summer.

Students can also see how their school's minutes compare to other areas of the country. There are also lots of great videos and facts centered around this year's theme of space.

The best part, you can check up on your readers! You log on like placing a book order and can see the minutes read by each student in your class. Super easy to check on their progress or verify their "winnings" next year. It's easy and very  motivating to several of my students. It's great too because I can see how many winners, I'll have before next school year to plan my "prizes" accordingly. If you're still in school, definitely share the challenge with your students.

What have you tried this week?

Gone too long... Back for Five for Friday!

It's been quite a whirlwind around here with both my school life and personal life but things seem to be getting back on track so I figured, why not link up to share some of the great things happening in these last few weeks of 5th grade!

So I'm linking up once again with the wonderful Doodle Bugs Teaching for her Five for Friday linky party!

We finished our College and Career Unit this week! Students had to research a career of their choice and report on the skills, experience, and education needed to be successful in that career. Thanks to Nicole Shelby and her fabulous College and Career Research Project - my teaching job was a breeze! We watched some videos on United Streaming and then had the iPads for several days to do our research. We ended the unit this week with some musical chair reviews!

  

 

I love my new Staples M discbound notebook for grades and data! 

Tomorrow I'm running in the Color Me Rad 5K... Well, walking in the race with family. I'm excited because I've never done a "color run" before! Plus, the shirt is cute... Too bad I can't wear the adorable sunglasses because they aren't prescription!

Have you heard of Our World Boutique? If not, you need to check them out. They have great sales on super cute jewelry especially statement necklaces. Five new necklaces for only $21 dollars and free shipping! Love all my new accessories!

We're getting ready for our "Lemonade Day" in the coming weeks. I love ending the year with Economics! Today, read The Lemonade War and we went over different advertising techniques that companies use to hook us into their products. Then students had to decide the best strategy for marketing their drinks! I'll be blogging more about this book this Wednesday for Workshop Wednesday!

What's one of your favorite unit(s) to end the year with?
Happy Friday,