Activities and Tips for the First Day of School

Where in the world has summer gone?! I swear- this was the fastest summer EVER. Due to the wedding planning, I feel like I literally had about 2 weeks. 

Here in Hawaii, we are officially back in session! The students started on Friday and we've been spending lots of time getting to know one another, building positive relationships, and of course, reviewing those procedures! 

Today I'd like to share some tips and favorite activities of mine to start off the school year.

The first day of school is always a little hectic with parents dropping off their child with bags and bags of supplies and then wanting time to talk with you. It's difficult when there are 10 parents, one teacher, and 28 little ones inside waiting for you to tell them what to do! 

Because of this, I always have a simple assignment waiting on each child's desk. 

I like to have them work on these All About Me Posters so that later in the day, the students who are a little shy have something to go off when sharing information about themselves. 

You can pick this printable up for FREE in my TpT Store. 

Sometimes your supply pile can get out of control and you may have a difficult time knowing what supplies belong to which student if they aren't labeled. A simple fix for this is to use Avery Address Labels.

Prior to students coming, I go ahead and type up 3 labels per student. That way when the parents come and hand you their bags of supplies, just stick a label on the bag. Once everything has calmed down you can sort supplies while students work on their All About Me Posters or at the end of the day. 

One thing that I have definitely learned over the years is that you can't stand in front of the class and talk about all of your routines and procedures all at once. These are kids…they will get distracted. Plus, they've been on summer break for a few months and aren't used to having to sit down nicely and listen to someone else talk. 

I like to break things up by going over one procedure and then moving on to a game or getting to know you activity.  Sometimes the activities are so simple- like the number pop-up game. I use numbers in my class so I randomly call out numbers and the students need to pop up out of their seats. So simple, yet the kids love it! 

Another fun Getting to know you activity I do in my classroom is with a beach ball. I write simple questions in each colored section. 

Questions I use are:

1. Where were you born? 

2. Tell us about all of the people and pets that you live with.

3. What is your favorite meal?

4. Who is your favorite person and why.

5. What do you like to do on the weekend. 

We gather in a circle and students toss the beach ball to someone across from them. When the person catches the ball, they choose the question that their thumbs land on. 

The next activity that I am about to share is about building a kind and caring classroom community. Students are given time to create a doll that represents themselves. 

Once they're all done students get into groups of about 4-5 students. I have them each pass their dolls around the circle while saying one mean thing to the doll. Each time they pass and say a cruel thing they are directed to tear the doll, crumple the doll, smash it, etc. We go around the circle once. I then have them go around 2-3 times saying kind things to the doll while taping it back up, or smoothing the doll back out. The students are sad as to what their dolls look like. 

We talk about how words are hurtful and once said, you can't take back the way you made someone feel. Even though nice things were said and apologies were given, the doll could never go back to being the same as it was when we started. Each tiny rip or crumple in the doll is like a hurt feeling that is held onto. This activity is usually a very meaningful lesson for the students. They are much more thoughtful about the things they say and do in and out of the classroom. 

That's it for today. I will be back later this week with more back-to-school tips and ideas! 

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Back to School Recap...

Phew. These past two weeks have been a whirlwind for me. I can't even keep up with days nonetheless, all the work that has been piling up...Here's a quick peek at what we've been up to these past two weeks. 

Students came in on the first day and began working on these adorable About Me Posters. I believe these were from Target, last summer. I'm hoping I can snag more of these this year..but I haven't seen any yet. 

I also put them right to work with some writing. I always like to see how they are as writers so they were asked to tell me about what a Perfect First Day of School would be like....

The kids have been doing a ton of team building activities, getting to know you, working together type stuff these past few weeks. My goal in the beginning of the year is to really reinforce to them that we are all a family, and that you must look out for one another. 

At the ending of last week, I also got to do some getting to know you. I was so excited to meet these fabulous ladies...we had a fun night out and had lots to gab about!! If you don't know who they are you better go check em out. On the far left is Tonya from Tonya's Treats for Teachers, Me, Angelia from Extra Special Teaching, and Sara from Smiling in Second Grade

The kids spent a lot of time creating these adorable mini me's of themselves. We did a lesson on feelings and saying hurtful things. We passed their Mini Me around a circle and said something mean, laughed at it, teased it, didn't want to play with it, etc and tore it or crumpled it along the way. Every so often a nice friend would come by and make them feel better or someone would apologize. We tried to smooth it out and tape it back together. Of course, it didn't look how it did at the start and the students admitted they were no longer as proud of it as they once were. We talked about how this is what happens to peoples feelings when hurtful things are said, or even when things are not said and how these feelings will be remembered forever. This was a deep and powerful lesson for the students and the good thing is that they have all been so nice, kind, and caring to one another. 

I picked up a beach ball earlier this summer from Target's dollar section. In each section of the ball I wrote some questions. Students tossed the ball around on the first day of school, whichever section their thumbs landed in was the question they had to answer aloud to the rest of the class.

This was a fun activity, and was new for me! I like that each student was required to share different things about them. 

This year I'm really trying to keep my students organized (and their parents). All of their folders are labeled and pre-packed with things that must be returned to school and kept at home. I also attached a checklist for all of the back to school forms to make keeping track of them a bit easier. 

Last year, I was looking at all of the papers I sent home at the beginning of the year and was like Woah!!! This is kind of information overload...and a TON of different loose pieces of paper. I told myself that this year, I would attempt to make a foldable brochure where parents can easily access all the important information. When I decided to make this I kept thinking to myself...how in the world am I going to format it?? Good thing for TPT because I decided to check it out. I was so happy to find this already made template by Ashely Reed. Check it out here if you're interested. 

I've also been giving my students tons of assessments. I want to find out where they are academically so that I can spend the first few weeks brushing up on anything they need reviewing on before we really jump into grade 3 curriculum. 

I wrote a post awhile back that you can read here about a Grade 3 Math Assessment I created that was aligned to Grade 2 CCSS. I use this each year to see what my kids need review on before jumping into grade 3 math. This past year we were so lucky that the second grade teachers at my school agreed to administer this at the ending of last school year. We gave it again at the beginning of the school year to compare how accurate the data was in their abilities. It was so helpful to be able to look at how they performed last year as opposed to the beginning of this year. You can find this assessment in my TPT store. 

For any second grade teachers interested, I've also created a Grade 2 Math Pre Assessment. 

And a Grade 4 Assessment for 4th Grade Teachers.

You can pick that up in my TPT Store as well.

I apologize for any major typos and grammar errors, which I'm sure there are many but this girl is 

T-I-R-E-D!! 

I envy those of you who are still on summer break. I see pictures on instagram of people going into set up their classrooms...I wish that was me right now! At least tomorrow is a day off, hopefully I can catch up with some of my to-do list. 

I'm off to bed :)

Christmas in June?! Nope, it's my Popsugar Must Have June Box!!!

I am so excited and feel like a little kid at Christmas time! I've been waiting patiently and checking the mail daily for this:

This is a Popsugar Must Have box! 

For those of you who have never heard of this, this is similar to a Birchbox. except WAY better (in my humble opinion!) 

This is a compete lifestyle box where you get goodies each month that will vary from fitness/health products, beauty, fashion, and home decor. The boxes are $35.00 a month but you will definitely make up for it and then some. The value of the box each month usually exceeds what you pay by 3-4 times. 

I'm not super knowledgeable about  beauty products but I am wanting to try new things out...I just don't know what to get! SO I've been watching youtube videos about the Birchbox and I have been wanting to order it. Birchboxes cost $10/month and you get a bunch of beauty samples. 

I like Popsugar much better because you get full sized products...and they aren't only beauty products. I like the idea of trying new things that I wouldn't normally know about or even try because it's probably way to expensive and I wouldn't want to buy something if I don't know what it's like. 

Here is what I got in this month's box. I'll list everything under it's designated category...

Fashion:

The fashion item for this month is a Gorjana & Griffin Zuma Scarf. 

I love the colors and the pop of that bright coral. 

This scarf's retail value is $62.00

Beauty:

The beauty item is a Juice Beauty moisturizer that is made with all organic ingredient. It is proven to reduce fine lines and fights signs of aging. It smells very clean and lemony. 

The retail value for this is:$65.00

Along with beauty I also got two samples of the Juice Beauty CC Cream...This is like a BB cream but is supposed to be a 12 in 1 product?! We'll see...

Fitness:

Fitness this month was a workout video. 

This retails at $9.99

Entertainment:

For entertainment, I got a hard cover book of Revenge Wears Prada. This seems like a pretty good read. It's supposed to be the sequel to The Devil Wears Prada. I absolutely LOVED that movie so am pretty excited to read this book.

The retail value for this is $25.99

Food:

This was interesting!! It is a by an amazing company called Project 7. They give back to a variety of different charities. In this month's box i got some wintergreen mints. For each tray or mints that are purchased (there are 12 tubes in a tray), a person in need will receive one years worth of clean water.

Also got some fit popcorn. Apparently this is supposed to be a guilt free snack. I'm holding out to try this since I want to be hungry for my turkey burger dinner that the hubby is grilling tonight! :D 

SO...I didn't calculate what the food items costed since I don't really know that...but the other products totaled about $163.00. I say that's totally worth it!! 

I'm excited to see what I get next month because I've watched some youtube unboxing videos and they get some pretty neat stuff. I've seen an exercise ball, glass coffee mugs, wide brimmed hats, beach bags, and all other kinds of neat stuff. 

If you're interested in signing up for a subscription (you can do this monthly or sign up for several months at a time) you can get more information at the Popsugar Website

Also, use the code: REFER5 to get $5 off of your first delivery. 

I know this post is totally non-teacher related...but if you're interested in seeing what I get in these boxes each month, let me know in the comments!!

Now I'm off to walk my pup who has been waiting so patiently!