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June 10, 2014

Two for Tuesday - 2 Bundles are 50% Off


Last week I spent a lot of money on all the deals I found on the Two for Tuesday over at The Teaching Tribune.  I'm ready for another fun week.  This week I decided to choose 2 bundles to mark down.
  
Research and Writing BUNDLE {6 Products}

Animal Research Bundle {4 Products}

My Research and Writing Journal Bundle and my Animal Research Bundle were both a hit in my classroom this past year.  The kids were always asking to hop on the computers to learn more, and they became very comfortable looking up information by themselves.  That was my main point - I wanted my kids to start to grasp how to find specific information without having to ask an adult.  Of course I supervised them on that computer, but they got really into it.

In these bundles there are 10 easy downloads:
*When I Grow Up - Careers
*What a Small World - Countries - Perfect for the Olympics
*Famous African Americans - Perfect for February
*Arctic Animals
*Rainforest Animals
*Forest Animals
*Farm Animals
*Zoo Animals
*Ocean Animals

Each animal/person/country/career has a page with specific information to look up and a lined page with clip art for students to write about the topic.  It was a great reflective piece for my kids to explain what they learned in paragraph form.

Hope this helps you!  

June 9, 2014

Monday Made It and Meet Me


The Teaching Tribune is hosting another fun week of link ups, so today I wanted to share a little about me.  Since I wrote this a couple of days ago, I have proved to myself that I do not have patience.  I want to have patience, but I'm not there yet.  My boys are "helping" me grow in that area... Lovely how kids help us see our faults.   




This week for Monday Made It with Tara and 4th Grade Frolics, I have been updating, creating, bundling, scrubbing, and laminating!  



I bundled up 22 activities and task cards that I use to help reinforce math concepts throughout the year.  It's my biggest bundle ever!  

         


I also started working on some new projects this week - including my new Pencil Parts of Speech.  My goal this summer is to add more ELA task cards to my stash for this coming school year. 


Then I updated quite a few of my older products.  They now have clip art!  Please redownload. 
  
     Simple Machines and Sound Project, Presentation, and Gradi

California Early Explorers Facts and Writing Pack       California Native Americans Research and Writing Pack

We almost went out and bought new counters for our kitchen.  I really am sick of my 11 year old tile.  After making an appointment, getting samples, bringing them home, and then realizing that the countertops were the basically the same color as the tile we already have... and since we already love our cabinets, backsplash, and flooring (and nothing is technically wrong with our tile - even though we'd love solid surface)... and not wanting to have to deal with a reno with 3 little boys... we decided to just spruce up the kitchen a bit.  


Loves2Teach shared on Instagram about using Murphy's Wood Soap, it worked!!  It worked so well that I almost cried - maybe because my arms were aching, but also because the shine came back.  I didn't realize how many juice drips, popsicle fingers, and normal "ickeyness" had built up over the years until I started looking close.  Gross!  Onto the tile grout this next week.  We're going to try this home grout recipe from Life Hacker. 


With laminating...  It's now been 2 summers since I bought my first laminator.  Usually I keep one at school, one at home - but during summer they are both home to double up projects.  Yesterday in between scrubbing the cabinets and watching Rehab Addict, I was laminating up these things. 
      

Math Fourth Grade Common Core Mathematics Overview by Jivey.  In past years I have included it into my homework folder for the kids, however this year I also laminated a copy to keep in my Parent Helper basket.  I saved lamination pouches by double side laminating it.  More and more I hear from my Parent Helpers that they don't remember how to do the math, I want to have a ready reference in case they need a little help remembering how to do the different skills when they are working with the kids.  I still need to add a binder ring to hold these together when I get these to school.


Last Tuesday The Teaching Tribune hosted a 2 for Tuesday Linky - some sellers put up 2 items from their stores for 50% off.  I bought a lot - including these Word Work Activities for Big Kids from Chalk and Apples.  These are all laminated and ready to go!  


A Modern Teacher has a collection of the different Common Core Standards for Elementary.  I printed off just 4th grade and double side laminated again.  These sheets are going to be kept in my lesson planner or classroom organizer.
  
   
I'm kind of addicted to these colors.  I mean really addicted.  Top left is my Teacher Entrepreneur binder that I've been using since January, then recently I picked up a Classroom Organizer for specific pages (top right) - both from A Modern Teacher.  My Lesson Planner came (bottom right) from Erin Condren last weekend, and this week I also picked up a Weekly Project Life book (bottom left).  I'm about as organized as I'm going to get.  

Hope you have a great day!    

June 7, 2014

I'm Addicted to Reading



I love reading in my classroom.  I know I've talked about that before - I adore my Read Aloud time.  During this past year we read 12 books whole class, and I already bought a few more class sets for next year.  I am an official Scholastic Bonus Point/Dollar Book Addict!  In class I carve out time every day after lunch for us to settle down together and read for 15-20 minutes.  It's only enough time for a chapter or two, but enough to get the kids wanting more.  Many of them will continue on with the books during silent reading time.  
This past year I got smart.  I have always read every single page of every single book, but this year I found that website "Audible".  So many of our class read alouds were on there, read by the authors.  Having the authors read the characters the way that they imagined them to be, with different voices, etc... it was amazing!  I downloaded the books onto my iPod and then it was easy to plug into my speakers.  Many of the downloads were cheaper than getting a CD on Amazon.  During the chapters, I was able to sit back, relax, and enjoy the books with my students.  It felt really good to sit for a change...

 I am teaming up with Educents again with some instant downloads for you! It includes activities for so many of your favorite stories you will be reading this next year (and even a few downloads you can use with any book)! 


My products included will surely be loved by your students!  Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing and The Chocolate Touch are both books that I read with my kiddos.  Last summer I wanted to create critical thinking questions for my kiddos, so I made up 48 Activity Cards using Marzano's Dimensions of Thinking prompts for each book.  When we were reading the books, I put the cards into our ELA Workshop/Daily 5 rotation, and the kids responded to them in their journals.  

      

There is also a chapter summary grid included in both of them (just like my Read Aloud Mini Packs), that the kids responded on.  I LOVED those chapter summary sentence grids this past year.  It was a easy graphic organizer that kept the kids responsible and paying attention to what we read together.  I already have them copied for all my read alouds for this coming year!  

This bundle contains other great stories too!  

       









For a limited time it is $19.99 from Educents which is about 78% off!  
18 instant downloads with over 700 pages of materials perfect to accompany your reading list!


You can also take peek at some of the other products included in the bundle at any of the links below!
An InLinkz Link-up

Have a Great Day!