A Look Back at Our Beginning

Wow!!!!

Who else forgets how bad the 1st week of school is????

I spent most nights last week feeling like a train wreck.

But, now that the first week is done, I'm hoping we can start settling into some of our routines.

In case you missed the news, I had to change rooms again this year.

Although I LOVE my new room, it was a nightmare to move.

My plan was to change my theme this year.

I had already started pinning some of the CUTEST things.

But, the move got in the way.

So right back to SPORTY PIRATES we went.

Here are a few pictures in case you missed them.

Our kids started back to school last Wednesday. 

So even though it was a short week, it felt like a month.

We spent a lot of our time going over classroom procedures, 

starting our STAR Reading Assessments 

and some fun "getting to know our teammates" activities.

I found the GREATEST packet at TpT by 

Jamie Sears from Diary of a Not So Wimpy Teacher.

It's Called.....Welcome to the Team,

sports themed first week of school activities.

It was FULL of super sports ideas for meeting our new classmates.

If you are doing a sports theme this year, it is a MUST have.

Go give her some love.

Be sure to head over to 

Chalk One Up for the Teacher 

to check out some other looking back posts.

Teacher Appreciation FLASH FREEBIE

I'm posting over here in hopes that those of you who use my 

Memory Verse Monday packets will head over to my Facebook page.

In honor of Teacher Appreciation Week,

I'm giving away one of my units instead of doing a new

Memory Verse Packet.

BUT, it will only be FREE for a limited time.

Hurry over to my Facebook page and click the link to grab it

before it's too late.

Hope you all have a great week!

Thank you for all you do!!!!

Go Pirates! part 3

Have you heard?

The TpT Back 2 School sale is this weekend!!

My wish list is full & I'm ready to shop.

My store will be 28% off so be sure to head over & take a look around.
(Click on my picture for the link.)

And now.....
I think this is the end of my back to school classroom pictures.

This bulletin board is in the hallway leading into my class.

(Someone on my Facebook page asked me what the numbers represented.)

The truth is...the numbers were supposed to be their class numbers (1-18) 

but we had already cut all of them out on our die cut machine when we realized that they were too big:(  Just too lazy to cut them all over again, so we used what we had.

This is a great piece of clip art from 

and I added the pirate emblem (from My Cute Graphics),

and blew it up on our ELMO.

I had to have a Pirate player somewhere in the room.

Here he is in his place guarding our math board.

This was our first full week back at school 

so we started on a few basic skills like reviewing odd and even numbers.

We called these 2 "The Fair Pair." 

They are ALWAYS fair, always equal, always even.

I filled paper footballs with skittles (Pinterest idea) and they

ripped them open and sorted them.

They liked sorting, but you know their favorite part was eating them when we were finished.

Another fun activity we did this week was writing a 1 sentence goal for the year.

Finally, if you are doing the daily 5 and want a few sporty items to go with it,
here are a couple of things I made for my room.

This file is an "unofficial adaptation of the Daily 5 by Gail Boushey& Joan Moser". 

It is not endorsed by the 2 Sisters. To access official resources, check out http://www.thedailycafe.com/

Just click on them to pick up your free copies.

Don't forget about the sale!!!

Go Pirates! part 2

We are officially back to work!

We have 5 days of pre-planning before our students come on August 8th.

5 days or 10 days, it never seems to be enough,

and I usually head into panic mode thinking there is no way it will all get done.
I'm sure you know the feeling.

Well here is part 2 of what I've been working on.

I posted these already (they are going to be my book buckets for the Daily 5),

but I added baseball name labels to them.

I added magnets to our daily schedule and posted it in on our white board.

(I forgot to make a writing card arrrg!)

This is going to be our class wide compliment system.

They will earn one letter at a time until they spell out the word

"PIRATES."

(sorry about the flash)

I

This is on the front door of our classroom.
It is for my wish list,
all those things that we need but are not allowed to require.
I laminated the poster and will add post-its for the parents to take with them.

Classroom rules....

and a very small welcome board with all the kid's names on it.

The last thing I have is a freebie if you want it.
I love this quote with our sports theme.
I plan to print and frame it.

The artwork is by......

and

Thanks for stopping by!

What?! Another FREEBIE?!

Oh my word! Have y'all been participating in our blog hop and giveaway?!

And have you been over to check out our new collaborative blog?!

Some super ladies have been hard at work for weeks getting

this all up and running and I think it looks FABULOUS!

I've also hopped around and picked up some great freebies.

If you haven't started, what are you waiting for?

Click the pic to start the hop.

Next up is Memory Verse Monday.

Your packet this week is Revelation 21:23 and

it includes word cards, unscramble the verse, blank writing sheet and a

page to illustrate the verse.

Click on it to get your free copy.

In my neck of the woods we are heading back to school on August 1.
Yep, it's time already!
So here is a view of one of my projects last week.
I inherited an ANCIENT room with ANCIENT shelving and furniture.
So the way it has been spruced up over the years is paint and contact paper:)

How many layers of paint and contact paper can you put on a single shelf?
I finally got all of the contact paper out and the painting began.
I'm working on a sports theme in my room this year
& I'm doing everything in green, blue, black and white.

These 2 shelves are stuck right in the middle of my kids cubbies &

I usually keep baskets of themed books on them.

This year, I am kicking off the Daily 5,

so I am going to house their individual book baskets here.

Since it's a sports theme, I couldn't resist these super cute buckets from the Dollar Tree.

They are big enough to hold a folder and their books.
I am soooo excited about these!

And this is what it looks like.
When I get the whole wall of shelves looking acceptable, I'll post this again.
For now, I'm happy with it:)

Enjoy your Monday and don't forget about the hop!

Going Out of Business!

Ok, I do hate it that some person is having to close their shop, 

but I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE getting the deals when they do. 

I've been working on a new theme for next year and I wasn't going to announce it yet,

 but.........

the One-Stop Party place is closing down and they have everything 75% off.

I got such a great deal on some things that I wanted for my room,

that I can't wait to show them. So, here they are....
We are going SPORTY!!!! 

48 CUT-OUTS FOR $4

3 LANTERNS FOR $1.25
(Love theses!!)

And then off to the Dollar Tree where I found these bases
 and cool football games.
Can't wait to work these into some literacy and math games.

I didn't want to stray too far away from our Pirates this year,
but I felt like we needed something fresh added to it.
That's why we are going with Sports.

Our small town (once inhabited by pirates) is all about pirates.
So, almost all of our sports teams are Pirates.
I thought this would be an easy way to combine both.

I'm working on some new items to match my new theme and will share them as I get them made.
In the meantime, here are some templates that I've been working on.
If you want them, just click on any of pics to pick up the PDF copies.

(This is one of my new FAVORITE borders!!

It's from Wendy at Teacher's Toolkit.

Be sure to check out her great stuff.

She is having a sale this week.)

Would love to hear your sports ideas or about what theme you are thinking about for next year.