Whew- my classroom is done and ready for that first day back. I really like some changes that I made this year. I have been doing a camping theme the last 4 years. I really like it because it fits in with our study of animals and habitats that we start at the beginning of the year. I have seen so many other classroom blogs with camping themes this year. I want to incorporate a lot of the ideas I've seen. This whole blogging thing is great - getting to share ideas!!!

 

 

 

 

 

My hallway display.

 I love how it turned out this year and I plan on using it as a photo backdrop for my students pictures.

 

My reading corner

My kiddos absolutely love to read in the tent. I choose two students each day for partner reading.

 

My Cafe wall.

 I saw that someone on Pinterest had turned cafe to face so I thought I would take their pictures and use them for students to put them on the skill they were working on.

 

My Daily Five Wall

I will add anchor charts  and photos for each component as we talk about them . There are graphs to keep track of their daily progress on their stamina.

 

My Retelling Corner

I have a little puppet stage where students take turns retelling their storie using props.

 

Students have big books that they read and then practice retelling at the puppet stage area.

 

 

This is my corner and reading table.

I was putting together my classroom for the year.  I thought I would share my discipline board. Each one of my students has a pair of blue jeans with their name on it. Every day they have had excellent behavior ( at our school we still pull cards ),  they get a pin (stud) in their jeans. When they have five, they are allowed to go to the prize box. Then we start again. They really love it !!! If I forget to do this, my name is "mud".

This summer I was cleaning my craft/sewing room and found a project I had started last year for my first grade kiddos so ..........................I got crackin' and got them finished for this year. I feel so accomplished. They are called Schultuete cones.  In Germany, they are given to children at the beginning of the school year filled with trinkets and candy. This might become a new tradition of mine because you could change the material and fabric to suit your theme.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I just took a piece of card stock and cut it into a cone shape. Then folded it together and glued it with my hot glue gun. I had some foam sticky letters that I stuck on the side. Then I went into my material scraps and cut out 4 " pieces and glued them on the inside of the cone, filled them with candy, special erasers, playdoh and fancy pencils and tied them with ribbon. I put them on the kiddos desks on the first day of school. They loved them!!!!  You could do this at Christmas time too!!

 

 

Vocabulary

                                                         Daily Cafe- Vocabulary


I have a Word Jar in my classroom to help my kiddos new vocab and to learn the meanings of new words. When I am teaching the Daily Cafe and we are going over the vocabulary part of the menu, I read them "Donovan's Word Jar" It's about a little boy that collects words and by a happy accident the senior citizens at his grandmothers nursing home get into and steal the words because they need that word.

This year I had the high kiddos for reading and I had some awesome word collectors. They would bring in words every day for the jar. I had one little guy who brought in hypoallergenic, psycho and

elegant in one day!!  That was a good discussion.  We went over the meanings of the words each day and then we put them into our jar.  

This summer I found three new books on being a word collector. Love, love, love that two out of the three characters are boys.

Can hardly wait to read these and develop new lessons around them !!!

Why this name for a blog?

This is my very first post on my very first blog. SO.............excited to get started. I have been truly inspired by so many teachers this year reading their blogs.  So I wanted to join in the fun.The wealth of creativitiy and the things you are all doing in your classroom makes me truly proud of the teaching profession. I'm hoping I have a few things that I can share too.

MOOSE TRACKS??????   Why this name for a blog??????

My hubbie works for the U.S. Forest Service and part of his job is to fight forest fires. He usually gets called out to a fire out west somewhere every year. If he ends up in Colorado or Montana, I know that I am going to end up with a gift that has something to do with a moose. He is in love with moose stuff.

Moose Drool Beer

Moose Brown Ale BBQ Sauce

Picture Frames

Moose Socks

Moose Yard Art

And several pairs of moose pajamas!!!! ( which I didn't want to model).My own children have joined in the fun so we are also getting moose ornaments for Christmas.  So a couple of years ago I started a camping theme at the beginning of the year in my classroom and since our students travel to different rooms for reading my room became the moose room. My reading kiddos loved being the called the " MOOSE" kids. They also learned quickly that moose is singular and plural.

Tracks?????

I teach my students that when we read, problem solve and write we leave tracks of our thinking. This blog is my way of leaving tracks of my thinking. What's happening every day in my life, what's happening in class and seeing that progrss that is made throughout the year with my kiddos. Also, when you follow train tracks you start at one place and get to another. By beginning this blog , it will hopefully take me on a new journey to create a little more, reflect a little more and learn a little more. ( especially this computer technology part)