March Currently!

Have you shopped the TpT Sale this past Thursday/Friday?! I Shopped twice and during the last 15 minutes I was frantically trying to fill my cart up for a THIRD time!! I sure spent a lot but felt that everything I bought was totally worth it ;) Hope your shopping trips were equally amazing! 

My TPT store will continue to be on sale {20%} throughout the weekend for anyone who would like to do some last minute shopping, OR didn't have time. We all know how valuable time (especially weeknight time) is and if I hadn't planned ahead I probably wouldn't have had time to shop the sale. 

Today I'm linking up with Farley for her MARCH Currently. I can't believe how quickly the year is going and how quick my WEDDING is coming up! Yikes!

LISTENING: To the sound of rain falling-that's it. I love when it rains here In Hawaii because it barely happens. I love it even more when I can be at home, all comfy and cozy, with a  cup of coffee spending time on my computer ;) 

LOVING: That Spring Break is right around the corner!!! That pretty much explains itself right?! 

THINKING: I really need to decide what's on my menu and head to the store. My BFF and her man are coming over for dinner tonight and we're trying out some new recipes! 

WANTING: Another cup of coffee. Is it bad?? One cup is no longer good enough :/ 

NEEDING: Yup-my office looks like an explosion went off :( I keep putting it off because it is that bad! 

MY ANSWER IS: Sushi and noodles….Can you guess my question?! Go for it in the comment section below ;) 

Valentine's Day Compliment Poster Projects!

I survived Valentine's Day 2014!!!

Luckily, we actually had a VERy mellow day thanks to my sweet friend and blogging buddy Tonya from Tonya's Treats for Teachers . She shared an amazing idea with me about a project that she has been doing with her kiddos for the past 4 years on Valentine's Day. You can check her original blog post out {here}. 

Once I heard about this super cute and awesome idea I just knew I HAD to do it in my classroom!! 

I gave my kids about 3 weeks to work on 'Part 1' of their V-day Project at home for homework. Part 1 required them to write a sweet and meaningful compliment to each of their classmates. We really spent the time talking about what a meaningful compliment was and talked about how totally lame it would be to get 24 cards that said 'You are nice'. 

Part 2 of this project was a mystery and I told my students they would learn more about it on Valentine's Day…BUT they needed to finish Part 1 to hear about Part 2!

They were sooooo excited about this project and really worked hard on it. I shared with Tonya how adorable some of my kids were because they would ask if they could stay in during recess to work on writing their cards. I even had a handful of boys who wanted to stay in (and they NEVER want to stay in) during recess- I was totally shocked when I saw one of them carefully coloring and decorating each card he wrote! 

This year, I went out and bought all of our supplies to complete Part 2 of our project. I wanted to kick myself as I was cleaning up (at then end of the day) because I forgot about an entire bag full of stickers I had bought to us- but forgot to put out. Oh well, I will just use them next year :) 

Once I got in all of my students Compliment Cards I separated them by student and put them all into baggies. 

The students then randomly chose a bag out of my basket and created a Compliment Poster (with all the sweet notes from classmates) for whichever student they chose. So if Bryanna chose Kelly- she made a poster for Kelly with the notes from all of our classmates (and me!). 

I wish I could have captured a photo to show you all when I told them about Part 2. Because it was a 'mystery' up until V-day, they had no idea what they were doing. They were completely stoked to be getting a FULL SIZE poster board to decorate and that they could go crazy with their supplies and the supplies I had purchased. 

They were required to arrange their cards (index cards) to ensure enough space before gluing. They also had to find room to decorate the persons name onto the poster… 

Once everyone was done, they each had a chance to come up in front of the class to present their posters to their classmates. It was really fun and everyone (including myself) was super excited to find out who made their poster!! 

 They all came out sooo cute!! 

I especially loved the sweet notes I got from the students!! Some of them literally made me laugh out loud!! :D 

'I hope you find a good man' 

This was another really sweet note. Thank you for the compliment sweet child, but really?! Never Retire?! You must be kidding! lol 

I hope you also had a great Valentine's Day!! 

February Currently!

I can't believe it's already February!! Things are so busy for me I just can't' keep up! 

Linking up with Farley today for her February Currently! 

Listening-to one of my favorite sounds…my dog running around playing with all of her toys. She has lots of 'jingles' on her collar because her mommy wants her to have a blinged out dog tag and her daddy wants her to sport a Red Sox dog tag (in pink, of course)…plus her city and county tag= a jingly puppy collar! I can't imagine life without her….

Loving- the COLD weather we've been having. Cold for us is probably warm for anyone who lives in the mainland….but we've been enjoying temperatures in the 70's..sometimes even dropping to the mid 60's. I haven't had to run the AC in our room for about 2 weeks..we've just been opening up all the windows, enjoying the cool breeze. 

Thinking-uhm. Yah-it's about time to order my bridesmaid dresses! Here is the dress I've picked out…

I also need to check up on the status of my wedding dress! It should be in soon since I ordered it in August…

Wanting a tan. I am so pale it's sad. I haven't been to the beach in way too long. School + wedding planning + blogging/tpt + rainy weather= no time for the beach/sun. 

Needing- to get back to eating healthy and exercising regularly. Since the holidays have come I have really slacked on the way I've been eating. I was being really good for about 5 months straight and actually had no desire for 'unhealthy' foods……I was also starting to run/walk daily. That stopped and I need to get back into shape!! 

2 truths and a lie-

1. This is my fib. I AM full Japanese. Most people often mistake me for being 'hapa' which is a mix of nationalities 

2. I'm getting married in June-duh (I kinda blabbed that earlier) lol

3. I danced in a luau show for about 5 years of my life and entertained at private weddings/parties professionally for about 7 years….

Here's a waaaay super old photo of me (on the left) back when I was skinny and tan :P 

Last but not least…I will be throwing a 20% off sale in my TPT store today and tomorrow in honor of the Super Bowl.

Thanks to Corinna from Surfin' Through Second for this super cute button ;) 

Thanks for stopping by! Head on over to link up with Farley!! You know you want to…. :)

Five for Friday and Happy Chinese New Year!

Happy Aloha Friday and Chinese New Year!!

I'm linking up with Doodle Bugs Teaching to share what I've been up to this past week. 

I had a fun and relaxing girls night out with some of my favorite Hawaii Blogger friends!! Unfortunately, there was too much catching up going on that we forgot to take a picture :(  We were all so excited though because Nicole from Teaching With Style came to Oahu for a PD course. It's always a treat when we get to see her since she lives on a different island from us all. 

All this week our entire wireless network was being upgraded which meant people walking in and out of our rooms drilling, measuring, talking, etc. The drilling was a HUGE distraction and it was SO LOUD I couldn't even hear myself talking. SO we took class outside onto our porch, did a lesson on summarizing and here the kids are working on their summaries. :) 

We've been having a ton of PD on our Wednesday meeting days and are expected to create 'quality' entrance and exit exams to turn into the complex. They are then going to turn it over to the team of 'professionals' to rate and provide feedback on our assessments. I've been busy this week trying to get a head start on my assessment making since they're due before spring break. 

 

Here the kids are waiting patiently in the theater on our very first field trip of the year. We went to go and watch a play this week- Aunty Martha and the Nene Goose.

Today is Chinese New Year and we are lucky enough to get a team of performers to make it out to school each year to perform the traditional Lion Dances. The kids are always so entertained by this and look forward to it each  year :)

What have you been up to this week?! Head on over and link up! :)

Multi-Step Word Problems, Math Skits, and a FREEBIE

This past week, we started working on multi-step word problems using the 4 operations. My students always have a hard time with this concept because they get overwhelmed having to incorporate and figure out which of the 4 operations they need to solve for as well as having to perform two different operations in one problem. 

Too often I see them just guessing rather than really thinking each problem through about what is actually happening in the problem. 

This week, we did some math skits. The students were broken up into different groups and were assigned to either addition, subtraction, multiplication or division. In these groups, students were to discuss what it means to add, subtract, multiply or divide and come up with example situations. They were then to choose an example which clearly shows what the operation means (what we are doing) and perform it for the class. 

Here is a group of students planning out their skit.

After each performance, the audience was to decide which operation they were performing and they had to explain how they knew. As a class, we then went and wrote a description of what each operation means and then listed some key words to look out for in our word problems. 

Another group actually practicing

Our multiplication group performing..

Can you guess which operation this group was acting out? 

Have a great week!

$1.50 Task Card Sale!

I'm having a $1.50 Task Card Sale in my TPT Store until 8 PM Tonight-Hawaii Time. 

Pick up these task cards to review Rounding numbers, Multiplication and Division Word Problems, or Elapsed Time. 

3NBT3 Multiplication Freebie for Teaching in Paradise Facebook Fans!

I decided to whip up this freebie early this morning while planning what I will do as a 'time filler' in case my students were done early with testing. 

3NBT3-Multiplying by multiples of 10 was a skill that we covered right before Christmas Break. You never quite know how much actually sticks with them in those last few days before break...so I wanted to give them a fun little activity to review this skill.

I came up with this-which I whipped up in about 10 minutes.

 I didn't realize how stinking adorable it'd turn out once it was all colored in and complete.  Once I saw the finished product, I just knew I had to have more of these (great practice of this skill) and I knew I had to whip up more for my wonderful followers!!

SO-if you'd like to pick up a few of these cute practice sheets head to my Facebook Fan Page, {Make sure you 'Like' the page} and click the tab for "Facebook Fan Freebies". Click the image and it will let you download the product from Google Docs.

*I'm in the process of making more pages-so be sure to check back (I'll make a note of it on my Facebook Page for followers)..but until then-you can pick this one up today! 

If you aren't 'Liking' the page, it will just show a picture and you will not be able to get to the direct download link. 

Hope you have a great rest of the week!

Courtney