Back to School!

I can't believe how exhausted I am at the end of the day! Those little ones sure do have lots of energy! Two days down so far, and I'm lovin' every minute of it! I definitely have a few firecrackers in my room, as well as a couple shy sweeties.

We are working on an "All About Me" theme right now and as an intro, we are doing ME bags. I first showed my bag to the class. Inside the bag are five things that are important to me. I had a book (my love of reading), special scissors (for scrapbooking), a purple crayon (my favourite colour), a picture of my two cats, and a picture of my puppy.

I tell the students that they are all getting their own me bags to bring back filled with five items that are important to them. We read the little poem on the bag. We talk about the rules (listed in the letter to parents). I tell them it has to fit in the bag, so their pet elephant will probably have to stay at home! I give the students their bags and have them write their name at the top and decorate however they wish.

Here are the poems I put on the bags. I print them out on 2x4" labels and just stick 'em on!

I send the bags home that day with the following the note. Feel free to use it if you can! Click on the picture to download.

I had a few cuties bring their bags in today to share. Lots of favourite toys, birthday cards, photos. It's a great activity to get to know your students at the beginning of the year! Well, one more day until the weekend! Happy Friday everybody!

Welcome to the Garden!

I am so in love with my new classroom. There is so much storage. There is a whole row of windows that let in tons of light. I think it is going to be a great place for my class to learn and have fun in!

This is my ADORABLE (if I do say so myself) bulletin board outside my room. Names on the bugs have been smudged for safety reasons.

Here is a view of my room from the door. I'm still missing a few student desks and my desk nameplates haven't arrived in the mail yet, but other than that the room is almost ready to go!

To the right of the door is these four big doors that hide our cubbies and jacket hooks. Love that I don't have to see all that mess! Up top is our birthday bulletin board.

Inside the doors is storage for the kids AND more storage for me. Love it!

On one of the doors is "Our 5 Bees Promise". When I saw this idea on First Grader... at Last I knew it would fit well with my classroom theme. The bees are SOOOO cute. I also love her Best "Beehaviour" Catalogue for some great rewards to go with it. I might make one of those later on this year.

On another one of the doors is our "Garden of Good Manners". This mini bulletin board was from Scholar's Choice (Canadian store... sorry!)

In the corner is my art supply closet. I am a bit of an organization freak. I love love LOVE labels. I spent a good part of my summer making labels for everything. I really like how they all turned out.

At the back of my room, I have one small bulletin board and three large ones over top of the windows. The small one has our "Spotlight Author" of the month. In September we are starting with Kevin Henkes. Can't wait to share his books with my little ones.

Next will be our Daily 5 board where I will keep our anchor charts up all year. I am so excited to fully try out the Daily 5 this year. Last year I tried some of it out, along with Reader's and Writer's Workshop, with my fourth graders. This will be a new experience for me! (Along with many others this year!)

Our first theme is going to be "All About Me". I think we are going to do some Me Gylphs to hang on the wall here. More details to come!

And the third bulletin board on that wall is the "Word Garden". I made the snails and leaves with my cricut (love that machine) and the printed out my own word wall cards. So far I put up number words, shapes and colours. We will also be putting up our names and the Grade 1 Dolch sight words as we learn them.

*Freebie Alert* If you're interested in the word wall cards (numbers, colours, shapes, Dolch words, and blank template) click here!

Underneath the windows are short shelving units which I am using to house my classroom library. I have a leveled section and a theme/series/author section. I was totally inspired by the awesome Kristen over at Ladybug's Teacher Files. I used her idea of putting a sticker on the cover of the book that matches the label on the basket. These stickers wrap around the spine of the book and on the back they have my name, grade, and the level of the book. Check out her blog to see how she sets up her library! Truly inspiring. This year she made cute round labels for her baskets!

I had these rainbow magazine holders already, so I thought they would make good book boxes. Hopefully they last the year and next year I can invest in some good plastic ones from Really Good Stuff.

Here is our math calendar wall and carpet area.

Next is our writing centre. Another idea stolen from an amazing blog. This tweet was inspired by Leslie Ann over at Life in First Grade. I found her tweet idea here.

Here is a view of the front of the room. I got a projector installed over the summer. No SMARTBoard yet, but maybe one day!

And moving right along, is the "What's the buzz?" bulletin board. This has our daily schedule posted. Loved Mrs. Carroll's schedule cards over at The First Grade Parade. This is one of my all time favourite blogs. Love her ideas! I used hers and made a few more of mine to fit my needs. Also on this board is our Daily 5 schedule and the Bug of the Day (my helper).

And lastly, right beside the door is our "How do we get home?" pocket chart and "Snail Mail" mailboxes. I also have my ring of Line Up Songs which were inspired again by First Grader... at Last.

And that concludes the tour! Thanks for stopping by. I realize this post is waaaaaaaaaay too long, but there was just too much to share! :)

New to First Grade, New to Blogging!

Welcome to my new site!

After I found out I was going to be teaching first grade next year... new grade, new school, new division... I spent my whole summer blog stalking some AMAZING teacher blogs. I hope to share some things I am doing in my classroom, as well give shout outs to all those who inspired me! I am so excited for this year to begin. I have heard great things about being a first grade teacher and I know I will love it as much as they do.

I have been in my classroom for the past two weeks getting things organized and pretty. Now I have one last long weekend to relax. Staff meeting and final touches to the room on Tuesday, Meet the Teacher on Tuesday night, and then 23 little cuties will be entering my room Wednesday morning. I could not be more excited and terrified at the same time! I'll be posting some pictures of my classroom later on this weekend. My theme this year is, of course, the First Grade Garden. We've got bugs and flowers galore! Something for the boys AND girls to love!

Well hope everyone has a fantastic long weekend!

P.S. A warm thank you over to Alicia at Dreamlike Magic Designs for my adorable blog template! I love it so much!! Click here to see her super cute designs!