TpT Credits...A Must Read Reminder for Teachers!

Ummm...do you teachers know that when you purchase items from Teachers Pay Teachers site that you EARN credit???  Yup, earn credits.  These credits can be used towards your future purchases.  Twenty credits count as one dollar and can be used as if it were a coupon/coupon code. For every dollar you spend, you earn a credit.  For example, if you were to purchase my task cards for introducing multiplication and division for $3; then you would earn 3 credits.

If you didn't know this, you MUST do it NOW!  (Don't forget that #CYBERMONDAY deals are going on now and tomorrow!!)  All you have to do is go to your My Purchases tab under My TpT drop down, when you are logged in on TpT.  Under the title of each purchase, is a yellow star for you to provide feedback.  Click on that link, rate the product and leave a comment!  That's it.  You just earned credits to be used towards future purchases!

Leaving feedback not only earns you credits which equates to dollars, but you are also helping out the teacher seller.  The more feedback a seller receives, the better it looks for a buyer.  Believe it or not, sellers only get 10% of their buyers leaving feedback.  When you see the number of ratings of a product (Ex: 7 ratings), that is the number of feedback the seller received, not how many people actually bought the product.  So your feedback really does help!   It even helps if you provide feedback on free products that you downloaded.  Teacher sellers thank you!

Study skill strategy.

I always try to make review fun and easy. Not only that, but something that the students can do independently! I've done this activity for sometime, and for all subject areas. It's so easy to do too!

First, all you need are strips of paper, index cards, or anything you can write on and cut up. If I am creating the review. I write a question on one side of the index card or strip of paper and the answer on the other side. After doing that, I cut zig zags, wavy lines,  a combo of both and so on separating the question and answer! I do this for all of the cards, but vary my cut for each. This way it creates a puzzle piece and the two fit together! If students are doubts this with me, I shuffle up cards and place questions on one side and answers of the other. Students read the questions first and try to find the answer! If it doesn't fit together like a puzzle piece , then the answer is incorrect and students will try again!

I particularly like this as a center activity. Students are able to check their answers and answer questions they struggle with. If you want to go the extra mile, you can even use the same color marker for the question and answers that match that will help students that struggle even more. 

Not only is it great for review, it's a great way for students to make and practice their fact families, study new vocabulary, and easy enough for them to create in their own at home!

My students loved it! They even wanted to create their own questions for their book review. I know it may not be anything new, but simple ideas work too! I am now on a mission to create templates of these puzzle strips for my TpT store...... Stay tuned! 

Sweet Potato & Quinoa Patties

Just made a new recipe on my last Sunday Meal Prep day, and I'm completely obsessed so I have to share. I love when I find receipes that I enjoy since I'm such a picky eater.  It's also super easy to make too! 

Ingredients you need:

~2 sweet potatoes

~1 medium onion

~thyme (fresh or dried)

~2 cups of COOKED quinoa

~3 teaspoons of garlic

~ salt (I use PinkHimalayan)

~ ground pepper

~coconut oil (couple of spoonfuls)

~EVOO

Procedure:

1. Cook quinoa.  (I usually make this ahead of time, especially if using in other recipes... It freezes well!) Boil water and place 1 cup of quinoa... Quinoa will double in size once done. I've made the mistake before of boiling two cups and getting 4 cups of cooked quinoa. 

2. Rinse 2 sweet potatoes and dry off with a paper towel. Use a fork to punch holes throughout the potato (very important!!!) place in the microwave and cook on baked potato setting (usually about 8 minutes for 2)

3. Dice medium onion and sauté with a little bit of EVOO over medium heat. Add a pinch of salt to help the onions sweat. Cook until the onions become translucent; then add the garlic (only for a bit so it doesn't burn) and a big (palm size) helping of thyme. I only had dry thyme at home so I put a palm size full of thyme and rubbed my hands together to bring out its flavor. Mix ingredients together and take off heat.

 

4. In a large mixing bowl, place cooked quinoa, the onion mixture and cooked sweet potato without the skin. 

5. Wait until sweet potato has cooled and mix together. Add salt and pepper for flavor. 

6. Form mixture into balls and flatten into small patties. 

7. In the same sauté pan as you cooked the onions, add a spoonful of coconut oil to melt in the pan over medium heat. Cook patties on each side till they brown. They may not completely stay together... But no worries they still taste great. 

Voila! Simple, easy and healthy too!

Sorry I didn't take pictures of the finished product... Smelled too good that I had to eat, and totally forgot about the leftovers! I will definitely add them once I make this awesome recipe again!