Flexible Seating Update No.1

FINALLY!   As September is coming to a close, I am able to take some time and jot down some thoughts about our venture in trying out flexible seating in the classroom.  First off, big hit from students AND parents alike.  I was actually quite surprised at the overwhelming response we received from parents.  For some reason, I thought for sure we'd be getting some complaints, but we received nothing but compliments.  The only grunts came from siblings that we jealous because they didn't have these options in their classrooms; go figure! 

As both experienced teachers, we knew kids and things that might need to be in order at first.  We knew that we needed rules set in place from the start.  We discussed this with our students day one.  We wanted to stress that this was a privilege; therefore, rules needed to be in place and stress particulars about certain seating options.  For example, stability balls are not to be bounced on or kicked around the classroom.  We also wanted students to know that we had the option to remove them from seating if they are not using it responsibility. We of course felt that students can learn best when they felt comfortable and with some movement; but others may need the structure of a desk so we left a few in our classroom! We offered a variety of options for the students to use, such as ottomans, yoga mats, a lounger, foldable seats, stability balls, and husbands. To ensure more flexibility with places to work , we provided a standing table (a table with bed risers) and a table with no legs, so that students can sit on the carpet! Clipboards also needed to be provided so that students not at tables can still write or complete activities.

As with anything new; this is a learning experience for myself and my co-teacher.  These are the things we learned.

1. Certain seating options need to be located in a certain area of the classroom.  For example, certain chairs like our chairs with wheels, need to stay in their location.  We found that certain students loved certain chairs yet wanted to move them around the room after EVERY subject, and too much time was used to get them settled are start of a new lesson! 

2. Often times as we were teaching, kids would be all over the classroom and we realized!they simply could not focus! We decided that for whole group instruction, they needed to be in certain spots in the classroom. Likewise, certain spots were off limits too during this instruction too! As an inclusion classroom, some students needed modifications that were more challenging for me to provide when they were all over the classroom. This allows me to work smarter, not harder. Therefore, larger tables needed to be used during testing. 

3. We realized that we needed more desks! Some students actually prefer an actual desk to call their own. This would have been me as a child! Quote simply, some had to have their own working spot, especially to help with the organization of their supplies. Even though we had certain spots in our classroom allocated for certain supplies, and students were given their own bin; this still posed to be a problem. Some also could not handle sitting with friends, but if they were moved to a desk, they clearly understood it was for their benefit! 

4. We realized that the variety of choices could be considered as a negative too! Some students became overstimulated and overly concerned if they were able to get certain seating, and it became a problem with bickering and the like. We tried to combat this problem, by allowing only our two helpers of the week to be allowed in sit in certain options like our lounger! Additionally, there was a need to clarify a need to switch seating after a certain lesson.

5.  We also had to clarify the need to respect our seating options. These cost of these options, came out of our pockets and there was a need to reiterate to respect any and all "furniture".  No placing feet on desks, chairs. No laying on options that were meant to sit on! No kicking ottomans! No tilting in chairs with four legs (we actually lost a couple of stools due to bent legs.)

6. Some students were using multiple seating options at a time; that too needed to be addressed! This proved to destroy some of our options and kept other students from using these options! 

7. Finally, some seating needed to be taken away to later be reintroduced back into our classroom. For example, students were not using the stability balls correctly. Since being a hot commodity, we felt the need to remove them from our classroom. This again, goes back to respecting our items! As students can demonstrate their respect for other seating options, we will slowly reintroduce the stability balls! 

As for now, with having worked out a few speed bumps, we are all smiles (for now).... More to come in the future! 

Grade 3 Math Interactive Notebook

Holy cow!  I think I need to go out into the world, because I have been glued to my computer ALL of Labor Day WEEKEND!  I have been working on my third grade math interactive notebook for what seems like forever.  Ok, not forever, but a really, really, really long time.  I had created notes and interactives for my students last school year because I felt it would be something they could go back to and use as a reference and even enjoy doing the activities.  Even though, I had it all saved I didn't have it all together organized.

It wasn't until recently that I had a parent of one of my students ask if I was going to sell my notes and foldables on Teachers Pay Teacher.  She happens to be a third grade teacher in another district.  Not only was I excited; I was flattered!  And this is where the last two weekends of my life have been.....in front of this computer. I'm even shocked I'm sitting here now, writing this post!  I just can't contain my excitement!  Who knows what I'm talking about?  


Literally, when this was officially uploaded (like 10 minutes ago); I SCREAMED!!!!!  What a relief! Picture me doing all of those happy dances from the 90's.  Seriously, I did that!

Check it out here: https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Grade-3-Mathematics-CCCS-Interactive-Notebook-2770146

Now, onto start my fourth grade interactive notebook!

O-Emoji?! Back to school already?

O-Emoji! I mean, OMG!  Back to School is upon us....Whomp, whomp!  New school year means a fresh start; although not if you follow your kids up to the next grade level.  I will be doing just that; moving from third to fourth grade.  I am NOT looping with my kids, but I will have some of the same students I had last year (I hope they aren't too disappointed.....some of them might be, as I know the tricks some of them like to pull).

Anyways, being that I will have some of the same students, I needed to up my Back to School activities game.  With being on trend, I wanted to do something fun with emojis.  Something simple, but would still include how they are feeling about their first day of school.  Will they be nervous, surprised, excited about etc?!  (P.S - Writing tasks using emojis will be coming at a later date.)

One of my favorite back to school activities that I love, Stump your Teacher!  It is similar to Two Truths and a Lie; I just have students list three truths.   This is such a fun activity to get to know your students.  Some of them can get very creative and I love trying to figure out what they are fibbing about.  It always gets a lot of laughs.  

Since back to school activities are often about the teachers getting to know the students, I find that the students also like to know a little about us too.  Due to that reason, I have created a teacher true and false.  I have kept it fairly generic; however, you can recreate it to make it more specific to you :) Again, this is another classroom favorite that tends to get a few laughs.  

These are just a few of the activities that I have in my Back to School bundle.  Other activities include #MySelfie, classmate scavenger hunt, classmate interview, goals for the school year, and math about me.  To see more details about each activity check out my link to the bundle here.  Or simply head on over to my store on TpT.  

Welcome back my friends!  

 

My Yearly Eye Opener

For the past nine summers, I have been fortunate enough to teach during our Extended School Year program.  Extended School Year (ESY) is offered to special education students that need to continue to work on their IEP goals during the summer because they could digress.  It is often offered to students that are in self-contained classroom settings during the school year, or for students that could continue to use services (Occupational Therapy, Speech and Language, and Physical Therapy).  Out of the nine years, I have been teaching ESY, I have only taught what I was teaching during the school year once.  Yes, ONLY ONE TIME.  During ESY, I have taught in the following programs; Preschool Disabilities, Autistic Classroom, Learning and Language Disabilities, and Multiply Disabled.   

These experiences have made me a BETTER teacher, no doubt.  Why do I say this?    I do because, you are challenged to a new degree. You learn more from others, such as assistants that are in these type of programs throughout the school year.  You become experienced in working with varying abilities (notice I did not say disabilities!); different age levels; different obstacles. 

In my twelve year career as a teacher, I have primarily taught inclusion at the upper elementary level.   So when you are in an entire new setting, you tend to appreciate what you have throughout the school year and have respect for those that do it day in and day out.  For example, I LOVED teaching the autistic classroom during the summer, but it is another thing to be a teacher in  that classroom during a FULL day during the school year.  You learn to respect the challenge that these teachers face daily.  

A benefit I would add, is that it is a nice way to REFRESH yourself as a teacher.  Let me explain.....When I experienced my most challenging year as a teacher in sixth grade, I seriously wanted to walk out on my job twice, no lie.  I literally did cartwheels on the front lawn of building as the buses drove away on the last day of school.  That summer I was given the job of teaching a Preschool Disabilities classroom for ESY.  Can I just say, working with those kids was the breath of fresh air that I NEEDED.  Working with those 3 and 4 year old during those four short weeks reaffirmed why I got into teaching in the first place.  

Change is GOOD sometimes (at least during the summer months).  Don't get me wrong, I cannot stand moving from different grades or even different classrooms from year to year because it IS A LOT OF WORK.  But, sometimes teachers need change.  This is the small dose of change that is good for me.  Too often, I have seen teachers become complacent and set in their ways.  In MY opinion, if you have been in the same grade level for 20 years, it's quite easy to say that teaching one grade over another is easier.  But if you have had a change every so often, you tend to appreciate how hard others have to work too!  I can tell you firsthand, that teaching preschoolers how to identify letters and count seems easy enough, but it IS NOT!  Preschool teachers are teaching these students the fundamentals of subject areas, but they also how to teach students how to stand in a line, walk in the hallway, proper ways of going to the bathroom, how to raise their hand, how to take turns, how to be respectful, how to be a good friend; silly things that teachers in upper elementary can take for granted.  

I will never say one grade is easier than another.  Teaching ANY grade is challenging; but for different reasons.  Unfortunately, it feels that if you teach a TESTED grade, you are under more pressure.  So I can see where there is a divide; but just be open-minded and know that everyone's job may be a bit different; but they are all still difficult.  I'm thankful that I have this reminder every summer!  

Do you Kahoot?

Talk about a Hoot?! This game was introduced to me by my good friend, Jill! It is a great way to review a skill or check students' understanding that gives immediate feedback.

My students love games and even more so when technology is incorporated! As a teacher I can sign up for FREE; create my own account; create a Kahoot game or check a ton of other Kahoots that fellow teachers have created and use with my class. 

I can easily create questions and provide four different responses. I check off which one is the correct answer. Instead of ABCD choices; shape/colors are the  responses. Each question can be given a time limit as well! I can create as many or as few questions as possible. It is extremely easy to do and very user friendly. 

Here's how it works.... Once I found a game or created one; I start the game. I project my game onto my class overhead projector. Students have to enter the game pin on their own device to get the exact game! This allows for connectivity and interaction! Students are asked to put in a nickname and once they join. As a class, we can see the names of those that have joined, as well as the number of participants that is displayed for all to see on the overhead. My classroom has ten iPads; so I either have students pair up or  borrow iPads from another class! Personally, I prefer the latter so that all students are engaged! 

What I love about the game is that the question and answer choices are only on the teachers version which is displayed for all students to see. The student devices only show the shape/color of the answer choices! 

As students answer, the number of participant responses pop up on the teacher version; therefore, I know how many answered quickly by either knowing it just trying to rush. I know this because after the time for each question is up; a bar graph shows up displaying the number of students that got the correct answer and the number of students that answered each of the other responses. If I am in the back of the room, I can easily see who got answers incorrect because their screen is red and will remain that way until I move into the next question. This provides me with quick feedback, and I know which students that I need to continue working in the particular skill with during guided reading/math groups or for intervention purposes. Since each child provided a nickname, each student is awarded points for how quickly they answered the correct response. On the screen, it will show the leaderboard after each question based on their point value. It even tells each student what place they are in on their individual devices. 

The students proclaimed this as their favorite classroom game all school year. I can understand why.... It is a must try classroom tool. It motivates and gets all students engaged especially as we wind down the year! I would love to hear your experiences with the game too, so please be sure to comment!!!

Motivation for Testing

I don't know about you, but my third graders start PARCC testing on Monday.  This is the first time that they are taking a state assessment; so their anxiety is at an all time high!  It's this time of year that I use my Motivational labels along with a small treat to let them know that they can do this and ROCK that assessment.  You can find them here at my store for FREE!  My students have loved the little motivators in years past; yours might too.  Check them out!

How to get your students pumped about reading!!

Today has to be a favorite day for my students; not only is it Friday but, it's Flashlight Friday! 🔦 Wahoooo!

Rewind back to August 2015, I had recently read The Book Whisperer by Donalyn Miller. (BTW, if you have not read this book, you are missing out!!!). The book introduces the 40 Book Challenge; where you challenge students to read 40 books during the school year from different genres (future post in that later). 

As a special education teacher, I often have very reluctant readers because it is often a challenging task for most of my students.  I was determined this school year to get my students to love reading! But how?! 

At first, my class of third graders were not happy to hear of this challenge and thought one book was a lot to read during the school year. So... I did some brainstorming for activities we could do to get the kids excited about reading. Well, the number one activity on the list that we do is Flashlight Friday.

There is just something special about getting cozy in your classroom, turn out the lights and reading with a flashlight! The students love to go under their desks, go in dark corners, and just READ... Ahhhhh! I found some good quality mini- flashlights at Marshall's and a pack of four finger lights at the Dollar Tree that students love just as much! 

My co-teacher and I do other activities too. We do a snack and chat where the students share the book they're reading and provide a synopsis for their small group of classmates.  This is for other students to explore different books that they might not normally pick out on their own! If their peers recommend a book, then it becomes a must read! The teachers provide the snack and allow time for the kids to chat about their books! Students also provide book commercials for their books; another way to get other students intrigued about a story! This "sells" the book to the students without giving the entire storyline away! My students even love reading to me; which totally makes this heart smile. I love what this challenge has done for my students. students that struggle, I have created a template for students to follow which you can find here! 

Even the simplest of ideas, can get students EXCITED to read! For younger kids, you could have students bring in a stuffed animal, doll, or action figure to read to aloud. You can also pair up varying grade levels for Buddy Reading. Contests are always fun too! Students certainly love a bit of competition.

Back in January, my co-teacher and I decided to ask the students how they now feel about the 40 book challenge; and we were so happy and surprised how their feelings towards reading has changed! 

I hope this post inspired you to try some new things in your classroom to get your students excited to read. Do you have other ideas that you would love to share?! Please comment below! 

Happy Reading!

Flash Freebie

Hope everyone's weekend is off to a great start (and snow free...)  I am in the sharing mood; so I have a flash freebie for today!  I am sharing my Multiplication Word Problem: Winter Edition.  The word problems all relate to the winter theme; hot chocolate, ice skating, snowball fights, etc....  I truly made this for my students to use and practice their multiplication skills, but also working on their reading skills.  Numbers in the word problem are not always in standard form, but also word form and they must truly understand the question.

You can use this product for centers, practice with the skill, an early finisher, etc.... Let me know your thoughts!  I would love your FEEDBACK on the product on Teachers Pay Teachers too!  Below is the exact link to the product on Teachers Pay Teachers!

https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Multiplication-Word-Problem-Task-Cards-Winter-Edition-2275681


Have a great weekend!

Inside Snowball fights????

With the upcoming snow tomorrow, I figured it would be the perfect time to play one of my favorite review games! It's a favorite of the kids too! I have adapted it for all subject areas; so you can too. It's a SNOWBALL fight!!!! A perfect review game for the kids to get up and moving around the room; especially since we have had quite a few inside recess days lately! It has F-U-N written all over it!

Today's skill was math.... Adding and subtracting three digit numbers with regrouping! All you need is scrap paper (who doesn't have a ton of that around?!). For this Math review, I had students solve different regrouping problems. After they solve it on paper they rolled it up into a ball. They can do any number of problems you would like. The more problems solved; the higher the number of "snowballs". I have kids spread out to the corners of the room and start their "snowball fight". They love getting each other. They love "hiding" behind desks, sneaking up on people, and then some... After a few minutes of fun, students have to get the same number of snowballs they through in the snowball fight! Chances are; they will get different problems!

 Students will have to check one another's work and explain how they are correct or how to fix it and explain what they did wrong. The students don't know who it is from but it is a learning experience; since we review those problems as a class! They explain it to the class under our document camera. A lot of my students love playing teacher and this is the perfect opportunity for that!

There are so many ways to adapt this game... Vocabulary review, spelling practice, writer's notebook activity such as adding on to sentences to create a group story, etc.... Be creative! 

I would love to know what you do for review that your students love?! I know grudge ball is another favorite of ours. Please share what works for you or other indoor activities that are perfect for the dreaded cold weather inside recess. 

Just did my first Periscope.......AHHHHHH!

For those of you that have no idea what Periscope is, it is a social media site that provides live broadcasts.  If you can't join in on the live broadcast, the site will save it up to 24 hours.  People can join in on the broadcast and ask questions, make comments, and so on.  You can follow certain people and get notifications about their broadcasts.  I didn't hear of this site until I started selling Rodan and Fields.  My team started to use this app/ site as an online networking tool.  It wasn't until I started to dig further that other Teacher Pay Teacher authors were getting in on the hype too.

So today, I made my very first Periscope.  You can go back and view it and follow me on Periscope and just type in Katie@Motivational Ms Mac and then my mug will show up....LOL!  Much like my blog, I don't want it to just be about teaching.  I would also like for it to be scopes on some of my interests outside of teaching, such as working out, recipes, skincare, health, family, etc....  My first scope was stating just that; my ultimate goal for using the site.  I was a tad nervous, so please don't judge.  (I did say I was an overachiever and someone commented that I obviously wasn't "modest huh?!")  If you know anything about me, you know that I often take on too much, but I truly feel that is when I work best.  C'mon, what teachers do you know that aren't overachievers and total Type A personalities?!  It can be looked at as either a positive or negative....sometimes I look at it as both.  It was more of a dig at myself, not trying to boast!  I guess that is a caveat of live broadcasts......"haters gonna hate."  I'm ready., I got this...BRING IT!  HAHAHAHA!

Although, this was my first scope and was semi-nervous; I am seriously looking forwards to sharing quite a bit.  Watching your own video is a little funny too...I asked myself, "Do I ready sound like that?" or "Huhhhhhh, did I just make that face?!"  Time to reflect......

Anyways..... would love for you to check it out and join me on yet another adventure.
Periscope..... Katie @Motivational Ms Mac

If you are scoping too; leave a comment!  I would love to follow you!

What Is Scoot?!

As a teacher author on Teachers Pay Teachers, I often see my fellow Teacherpreneurs sell things that they call scoot! I felt a little silly asking my TpT seller friends so that I didn't sound crazy; so I asked my third grade unit at work. All they did was rave about it!

So I decided to give it a try! My students were struggling with rounding to the nearest 10 and 100.

This was a great activity to get the students up and moving. Our curriculum is so fast paced... Yet I decided to slow it down a bit as this is a skill they will be using in math in future grades and even in life! 

The students loved it!  This is how I played.... Students were to get up out of their seats.  When I yelled to begin, they are to flip over the task card at their desk and write down their answer on the provided answer sheet.  After they have written their answer, they are to flip cards back over.  Once I yell "SCOOT" ( about every 30 seconds), they are move onto the next desk, flip over that card and solve.  I tried to make this as uniform as possible in my classroom, by having students go to all of the student desks' at their group and then as a group move onto the next set of desks.  But that is totally up to you.  I have even spread out the cards around the classroom for the students to find.  I love that the students have to think quickly, but I would adapt the time depending on the skill they are working on.  Since this skill was rounding, I only gave about 30 seconds for the students to complete each card; making it roughly about a 10 minute game for my students.   The pictured cards are ones I found on Super Teacher Worksheets; but I have since created my own scoot cards.....VALENTINE'S STYLE!  

You can find my version here: 

https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Rounding-to-the-Nearest-Hundred-Valentines-Scoot-2390772

FREEBIE ALERT: Printing on Sticky Notes

After seeing posts about printing on sticky notes over the years, I finally decided to try it out for myself. I was planning for an observation and was trying to think of ways for students to review the plot of a story they were familiar with. As I knew I was being observed, I wanted to spruce it up a little. So I thought.... This was just the thing I needed to do! For me it was super easy, all I did was set up a template in Power Point. With the template, I typed up information about a story to complete a story map I made with my class.  The students loved reading the sticky notes and allowing them to get them out of their seats and placing the notes on the story map.  It was actually great because the students had discussion about the story and even gave valid points when they disagreed on sections of the plot.

I printed out all of the templates first.  As it was my first time doing this, I wanted to make sure that everything lined up correctly.  From the printed page, I placed sticky notes over each box, and printed again.  That is it! Voila!  A total time saver!

For independent work, I had students continue to work on reading passages and highlighting the literary elements in different colors.  I was able to print these out on color and send with the students to their seats, so I could easily move onto working with my other guided reading group here!  

Find my FREE template here!  

https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Printing-on-Sticky-Notes-Editable-Template-FREEBIE-2381657

Please let me know how you have used this in your own classroom!

Sun, Moon and Stars Unit: NO PREP

Science is one of my favorite subjects to teach! Without fail, every year, my students get so excited about Science; not sure if it's the subject matter or the fact that it is less pressure than Math and ELA.  Either way, this unit always makes my students want to learn more! They will read all of the space related books we have in our library, share any information they learned with excitement and

even research more at home! This just makes my heart smile! 

This 100+ page NO-PREP unit is FILLED with all of the information needed to teach students about parts of the solar system.  As the teacher, you are given lesson plans for 15 DAYS!  You can use the presentation to teach information regarding the sun, moon and stars with matching cloze-style notes.  Included are three quizzes and one unit test. Your students are going to love the activities and the ease of taking notes.  These notes can be used as study guides too!

This unit includes:

~Lesson Plans – 15 days of written plans!  Objectives, procedures, and materials needed are provided for each day.

~Presentation – All of the information needed to teach students this unit.  I teach the presentation and review it the next day.  Words in red font are the answers to the notes provided. NOTE: Not editable.

~Notes: Cloze-style notes for students to highlight important information that goes along with the presentation.  “Answers” to cloze-style notes also provided.

~Activities- Moon Calendar with moon phase pictures, Cardinal Direction Posters, Posters of the Moon Phases, Cut and paste activity, (2) different observation recording sheets, chalk drawings, and planet coloring pages.

~Review game- “Jeepardy” game to review information for the unit test.  Editable for your use!!

~Assessments – (3) Quizzes for the Sun, Moon and Stars.  (2) Modified Quizzes for the Sun and the Moon, (1) unit test.

Check it out here: 

https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/NO-PREP-Sun-Moon-and-Stars-Unit-and-Planet-Facts-too-2067119

Here is my direct link to my Teachers Pay Teachers store:   https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Motivational-Ms-Mac