Texan Teach: Featured

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As July wraps up, most teachers are already buying or making lists of things they need for their classroom for the new year. Office supplies? Uh...YES, please :). Over the years I have ~~hoarded~~ collected many different teaching tools or supplies and feel that the ones listed below are absolutely essential.

1. Personal Laminator / Laminating Pouches

Y'all...I don't know how I lived my life before buying my own personal laminator. I guess I liked spending my time always waiting for the school's laminator to heat up...or for someone to order new lamination.

Teacher confession time: I may have 3 laminators. If you are a teacher and you don't own one of these yet, buy one! You will not be disappointed. The laminator pictured is the one I use the most. It heats up quickly and is a great size for storage. If you are interested in buying it - check it out HERE on Amazon.

Cheap Teacher Tip: The Scotch brand laminating pouches are wonderful, but they are expensive. Save yourself some money and order a large pack of off-brand pouches from Amazon. The 3 mil and 5 mil thickness are both great. I've tried and tested the following pouches and give them 5 stars. Click on the pictures to go to the Amazon link.

2. Colorful Pens

I don't know about you...but colorful pens make writing so much better. Anecdotal notes become pleasing to the eye. Tackling that calendar? Look how organized it is with your colors! ~~Doodling~~ Taking notes during a staff meeting? Perfect!

Flair pens are in most Teacher bags. I love Flair pens, but I'm going to let you in on a little secret. I found some pens that I like EVEN MORE than the glorious Flairs.

Staedtler Triplus Fineliner Pens

These pens are amazing. They don't smudge or bleed. The tip is very fine for those itty-bitty spaces. You can buy the 20 pack (it comes with the awesome case that turns into a stand) HERE or the mega 36 pack HERE.

3. Sheet Protectors

Don't have time to laminate? Throw it in a sheet protector! Let's get real people...we don't always have time to laminate, but you know better than giving your students a page without some kind of sticky hand barrier.

I love to put games in sheet protectors! I can quickly store the set of games in a binder or in a folder. Students can also use dry erase makers right on the sheet protector. If you get the glossy ones, they wipe off beautifully!

These are heavy duty and last a long time! Pick some of these up HERE.

4. Mr. Sketch Markers

Anchor charts NEED Mr. Sketch Markers. They are vibrant and bold. I also love to walk around and put a dot on papers of the ON TASK students. They sniff that little dot like they won a Grand Prize!

Pick some up HERE.

5. Staple Gun

I spent 8 years of my teaching career in a portable. This portable had wood paneling on the walls. Boring, brown, wood paneling. As a teacher who likes the room to be bright and colorful, I had to cover up most of the walls. I learned that the quickest way to get your anchor charts and cute bulletin boards up is with a staple gun. Sure your normal Swingline will work just fine...but a staple gun gets everything done in a snap!

This is the one that I've had for 10 years of teaching. It is basic, but gets the job done!

Buy that HERE. Those 5 supplies are used almost daily in my classroom. What supplies do you consider to be your Must-Haves?

Allison

January is always a time for reflecting on the previous year and dreaming of the future.
I’m beginning 2016 by reflecting on the progress my students have made this year. Even though it often seems like a slow crawl up a mountain, my firsties have made giant gains!

Most of my class entered First Grade BELOW an A (Fountas & Pinnell) reading level and the majority are now reading on or above an F! This was a true team effort. I can’t say Thank YOU enough to the wonderful staff that works with all of our struggling readers.

The 2015-2016 school year brought big changes for me. I changed grades and schools! My team is SUPER-DUPER-AWESOME!

December was packed full of fun. Our school had a Nutcracker themed month. Our students were lucky ducks and got to see the Nutcracker Ballet. One of the teachers helped to bring in a local Ballet Company to perform right at school! The amazing librarian coordinated a Nutcracker themed RIF. She worked with a few other crafty individuals and turned the library into the Land of Sweets.

I can’t wait to see what 2016 has to offer. I know my students will continue progressing. They are an inspiration!

Allison

Hello! I'm linking up with Schroeder Shenanigans and Lucky Little Learners to talk to you about Bulletin Boards! I'm sure many of you are busy working away on creating beautiful bulletin boards to welcome your students back to school.

I spent the last three years in a Dual Language Classroom. My district follows the Gomez and Gomez model for dual language which has many "classroom environment" requirements. One of those requirements was having a Student Generated Alphabet. A Student Generated Alphabet (SGA) is basically alphabet cards that the students illustrate and come up with the words.

English and Spanish Bundle

I like my bulletin boards to be interactive and easy to use. One of the ways I make the SGA easy to use is I've made alphabet template cards.

The templates are set-up to have the perfect space for a 4x6 index card! I cut out the templates, laminate them so they last years, and then make a little slit at the top. I place a paperclip in the slit and then put the cards on my bulletin board. It makes the frequent changing of cards QUICK and EASY! You just change the index card and not the template.

Cut a little slit.

Put in a paper clip.

Place your index card under the paper clip.

I'm moving schools and have not been able to enter my new classroom yet, so I don't have any finished pictures. I will add a picture as soon as I get this up at my new school.

In the past, this set up has made it possible to change our alphabet cards with different units. My students loved to see their artwork and vocabulary on the bulletin boards!

This idea by no means has to be for Dual Language classrooms only! I will not be teaching Dual Language this year but plan on putting up a Student Generated Alphabet bulletin board.

You can check out the templates in my TpT store. I have an English set, Spanish set, and a bundle of both. Click on the links to take you there!

If you would like to see other awesome bulletin board ideas, check out the #2getherwearebetter linky party at Schroeder Shenanigans or Lucky Little Learners.

Allison

It's time for a #TexasSizeLinkUp! I've linked up with The Little Ladybug Shop and Planet Happy Smiles to bring you an idea about managing your reading or math centers.

The first day of school is just around the corner and many of you are already planning and organizing. Reading and math stations are an important part of the day, but are often hard to manage. I have the perfect solution...Super Centers! It is a print-and-go management tool that works for reading or math.

With Super Centers you group your students into four ability level groups. I love that I'm able to see all of my groups during Guided Reading or during my math small groups.

Each group is easily identifiable by a colorful banner at the top of the card.

The center cards and grouping are flexible! It is easy to change a student to a different group or even a different partner. All they have to do is change cards! There are enough center cards for up to 32 students and eight students in each group.

Every day students will go to small group, two different centers, and seat work. Only two students will be at each of the eight centers at a time. Those two students are center partners. The partners are paired Low with a Med/High and then a Low/Med with a High. This is great because your lower students have a higher student during centers for support!

These two students would be center partners. They each have Card 2. They go to Teacher Table and Seat Work with their own groups, but are partners during the eight centers.

Having only two students at each center makes prepping centers a breeze! There are so many options for games in both math and literacy that are for two students. I know having limited technology is a common issue in classrooms - and only having two students at a center solves that problem.

A group/partner planning sheet is included in the download. It allows me to place students into groups and a partnership that works best!

If you have an odd number of students you can always print an extra copy of a card and have 3 students in a partnership or have a student that works by themselves (you know that ONE student who NEEDS to be by themselves). It really is a flexible system that you can manipulate to fit your classroom needs!

The file also comes with large (full page) or small (half page) heart signs to hang around your room to label your centers. I like to print and laminate the signs so I can write and wipe if I want to change the center.

Half Page Signs

My favorite way to set up these cards is to give each student a center folder (or binder) with a page protector. I just slip the card in the page protector. Students put center work in their folders. If I need to change a student's group or partner - all I have to do is switch out the card in the page protector.

Card in a binder

Alright...so that is the basic gist of Super Centers! Now you can enter the raffle to win this great management system. Just sign in with your email address or Facebook to enter!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

If you want to know more information about Super Centers or how I run them in my class, please feel free to send me an email (click the contact me tab at the top) or leave a comment! If you do not win the raffle or if the raffle is over, go to my TpT page to find Super Centers. They are currently on sale right now to help teachers prep for Back-to-School.

To see more wonderful ideas for back to school hop on over to The Little Ladybug Shop's blog.