Teaching Without the Internet

I've often thought "How did teachers plan before the internet existed?" I'm not creative enough to come up with all of the wonderful things I've found online. I use it for everything. I, as everyone else, am addicted to pinterest. Here are two projects I found and then made for my classroom.

This is the first time I am writing a blog using this app so the pics may not have worked. Don't worry. I will get them up soon :)

I have a question for all of my wonderful followers. What is your policy on pencils? I hate being so petty about something so simple but there HAS to be an idea out there that works. Just to give some background, I teach 4th and 5th grade. Students switch classes. I collect all students' pencils on the first day of school. I pass a pencil out on Monday morning to my homeroom so they can at least start out the week with a new pencil. I go through all of those pencils PLUS the thousand I purchase by January. I've tried different ideas like having a sharpened and unsharpened bin like others but my kids steal all of the pencils. What fabulous idea works for you?

Time Flies

When I first started this blog, I had envisioned writing weekly. Who knew school would take up all of my time...oh wait. I knew! :) At that time, I assumed I would tweak the lessons I did last year and wouldn't have to take up much time thinking of new ones. Oh how wrong was I? With all of these centers and differentiation, I come up with new lessons daily. I have grown more accustomed to it though and it no longer freaks me out. I also have wonderful teaching partners who make my job sooooo much easier!

December flew by leaving little time to blog. I haven't even read (or stalked) all of the blogs in my favorites. I decided to get a little more into the Christmas spirit this year so I decorated my door.

This says a lot because I'm usually a scrooge. I am not one to decorate my door in a christmas theme. I've actually decorated it for summer in the past instead of Christmas.

I also did a craft project with my students. YIKES! Another crazy idea for people that know me. 

All of these Christmas ideas came from my newfoundlove, PINTEREST. Who knew there were so many amazing crafty people out there. 

I am going to try to be a better blogger in 2012. Even if I just post monthly, I'll be happy! :)

It's a bird!!! It's a plane!! It's a . . .

It was definitely a crazy week at school! On Thursday, a teacher and I were standing in the hall talking while my students were at recess. Something flew down the hallway and she said "Is that a bird?" Quickly, I screamed "It's a bat!!!" and I ran in my room and shut the door! I peeked out when I knew it flew to the other end of the building. My school is shaped like an E with me being in the lower line. The bat kept flying through the "stick of the E" so I could see it going back and forth. The secretary announced for teachers to close their doors and keep students in the classroom. In the meantime, my teammates were in the hallway trying to catch the bat. NOT ME! A couple of times, it flew down my hallway and I would shut the door and avoid it! Finally, the janitor came out of hiding (also known as the break room) and took care of the bat.

Now this is not the first time a rodent has been in the old building. My first year there, I was one of the first teachers at school in the morning. A male teacher was in my room talking to me and we walked into the hallway when a bat swooped down towards our heads. He screamed more like a girl than I did! :) We slammed my classroom door shut. Then we wanted to know if it was still out there so we started going to his room when it swooped at our heads again. He ran into his classroom and slammed the door... in my face!!! Luckily no one was in the building during this time or did not watch the security cameras because I'm sure it would have been a comical scene. We eventually ran to the doors and opened them and the bat flew out.

A couple of years later, a boy came out of the bathroom in the early morning and said there were mice in there. A teacher found 4 baby mice and disposed of them in the woods. During one of my blocks, I was hanging up work in the hallway and I looked down and saw a mouse scurrying by. I was not as scared as I am with the bats! Ahhhhhh!!!

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Friday was one of the hottest days I can remember during a school year. It was in the 90s and the heat index was well into the 100s. The majority of the classrooms do not have air. Fans were on high and the lights were off. Around 1:20, the fans suddenly shut off. Several teachers went into the hallway to find parts of the school lost power. I'm sure it was due to the large number of fans being used because of the heat. We had to go the remainder of the day with NO fans. I could not wait to come home and take a shower. I felt disgusting!

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I just joined Pinterest. Through all of my stalking reading blogs, I have seen it is a popular site with bloggers and teachers. I'm still trying to understand it. It doesn't really make sense to me but I'm working on it.