A little bit of this...A little bit of that

I have so much on my mind that I want to share...but I am going to try and keep it short and sweet. :)
First...Coach and I REGISTERED OUR LITTLE GIRL FOR PRE-K this month!!  Our sweet oldest baby, Emma Lou will start school next year. And on top of that...our sweet youngest baby, Ezra will be moving up to the 3 year old room next week! It is crazy how times flies (especially once you hit that 6 month mark with a baby...when we had our first child, everyone always said that the time will just FLY by...before that 6 month mark-I thought EVERYONE had gone CRAZY about how time flies by-months 1-5 DO NOT FLY BY)!!

The Sass and the Wild Man (yes-he got into his sister's play makeup and the ONLY thing I can get it off with is MY moisturizer-I guess he will have good, no wrinkle skin if he keeps that up)...

 

Watch Out World...Here They Come!

 

 

 

 

 

I am reminded at this time in our lives when Ezra throws his HUGE-I mean HUGE- fits and Emma Lou hits me with her Sass and back talk-and while they are growing up quicker than I could ever imagine- that I must boast in my weakness (and remember others who suffer MUCH greater sufferings that me). Because in my weakness, Christ's power may rest in me.

That verse goes on to say "therefore I will boast more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong."

Thank our Good Lord that I am strong in Him in my weaknesses.

 

 

Now let me tell you a little about what we have been working on in room 523! TIME (which the Coach would say I needed to work on because I'm late to almost everything)!! I got a lot of inspiration from Amy Lemons post on time as well as one of my very good friends and coworkers, Kim Patton (who has some really awesome products in her TPT store!)! We did a class timeline where everyone got a different time of the day (some were on the hour and some were telling time to five minutes). So basically, everyone got a blank clock- made by the AWESOME Workaholic NBTC (which by the way-these clocks fit 2nd grade standards PERFECTLY!!)- and a premade mini sentence strip with a time.

 

As a class, we went through and made the human time line first. We started with 6:00 am. For each time, I handed the card to the student and asked what they were doing at that time during the day. Then I would ask if it was am or pm. As each student answered, they went and found their place in the timeline. It worked beautifully! They loved it!!

 

 

 

 Once we were finished making our day time line come to life, they went back to their seats and wrote either am or pm beside their time and had to show me the time on their clock. Once they showed me the correct time on their clock, I passed out a blank face clock and they drew the time from their card onto thier blank clock.

 

I then passed out a half sheet of paper and black piece of construction paper. They drew a picture of their time on the half sheet of paper.

 

Then we hung them on my back wall to show a day in the life of a second grader! :)

 

 

 Anyway...here is a little preview of the WHOLE unit that I did with my class:

 



At the beginning of every math lesson, I would put a time on the board and sing (to the tune of "What Does the Fox Say"-which by the way my kids LOVE)-WHAT DOES THE CLOCK SAY?! Let me just tell you-it was the highlight of the entire unit! :)

Happy Teaching!!

 

Good News and Bad News (well bad news for some of us)...

Sooooo...bad news first...
Our snow days were a few weeks ago but I checked the weather last night and you would NOT believe what I saw...MORE SNOW (which I am sure by now has been changed to rain again) and REALLY cold temperatures! We live in Georgia and we just aren't used to these cold temperatures for this long! We were so excited to get snow a few weeks ago. And then a couple of weeks later...ice came. Now there is talk about MORE snow! Here is where we were enjoying our snow a few weeks ago... (Me and The Coach, Little Man Ezra, and Princess Emma Lou-who had to pretend she was Elsa in the snow)

Well if I'm being honest with you-the thought of more snow makes me...well sick. We were teased this past weekend with beautiful weather-I mean gorgeous-stay out all day in it-weather. On Saturday we went to my husband's soccer tournament-he coaches high school girls soccer. They hosted the tournament which meant he had to be there all day and it was perfect weather for all of us to stay there with him! We had a blast!

 

They both were able to get new soccer shirts and Ezra thought he was Spider Man in that shirt! :)


Then we have some sweet brother and sister lovin...which only lasted minutes seconds!

Anyway...now onto the good news! I FINALLY FINISHED MY SECOND GRADE DAILY MATH!!! I have been doing this with my students since day 1 and decided that they did so well with it and have retained so much from it...I would finish the year and put it on TPT. You can find it here (I included 4 weeks worth in the preview so be sure to check it out!)!!

I use mine for morning work. I put it up on my promethean board:

 

 and my students get out a sheet of notebook paper and fold it...

 

And complete their morning work without using any copy paper (once we get into measurement I will make copies for them)!!

 

My students have been extremely successful using this model. We are still able to review standards that were taught in the first week of school!

Happy Teaching!!



Dang-Dang

It has taken a great deal for me to post this. I couldn't decide if I wanted to just write all of this for me and my family or just put it all out there. I decided on the latter for a couple of  reasons. Number 1-I want you to really know me-not just me as a teacher-but me as a person. Number 2- my grandfather was an AMAZING man-why wouldn't I want to share him with all of you?!?! Soooooo...here goes....

A LOT has happened since the last time I blogged. At the beginning of December, I talked about Christmas being the most wonderful time of the year and how much I LOVE Christmas! While I still LOVE Christmas, there is now a connection with Christmas that will always be extremely hard for me. My wonderful grandfather, Harry Cook-who we endearingly called Dang-Dang, went to be with The Lord on Wednesday December 11, 2013. I just want to share with you a little bit of his amazing life.

1. He was one of the most incredible men I have ever met. He was a man of love, humor, and integrity.  And I'm going to tell you this-He loved Jesus. Almost every single memory I have of him is leading our family and church in worship and prayer.

2. First and foremost, he loved Jesus. But secondly, he loved his family more than anything else. This is a picture of Dang-Dang with our oldest, Emma Lou- who is named after his wife, Patty Lou (but we called her Granny-and I am here to tell you-Granny and I were so so close...but that is another story for another day). His love for his family was the most important part of his life. Every year we have our family reunion-and this could possibly be Dang-Dang's favorite time of the year! He LOVED visiting with family-especially all of his family from out of town. He loved hearing the laughter of everyone around and reminiscing of times past. One of my most favorite memories of family reunions is visiting with Dang-Dang's brothers and sisters and hearing stories of when they were younger. Dang-Dang was a twin and was extremely close to his brother-and man oh man-have I heard stories of them from their WILD teenage years! 

3. He loved to sing. One of my favorite stories that my mom has shared with me is that when she was growing up, she and her sister and their 2 brothers would all decorate the Christmas tree. As soon as they were finished, they would turn the lights in the room off and turn the lights on the tree on and they would sing Christmas carols. Once they were through singing Christmas carols, they would run outside to see what the tree looked like from the road. His favorite Christmas carol was Silent Night and they would sing it EVERY year.

These are only a few things about my grandfather that make him special....but these are my favorite things about him.

It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year…

Can I just say-I LOVE Christmas! All of the lights, trees, songs-okay not so much ALL the songs…it's okay to play SOME songs that aren't Christmas! :)

But for real-I LOVE Christmas! This past week we went to our local college for "Christmas on the Hill" and I must say-it was so fun! They had real reindeer, Santa, a blow up pool of fake snow (remember we are in Georgia and RARELY see snow!)!! I also have to tell you that this is the FIRST year that Emma Lou has wanted to see Santa. She actually walked up to him BY HERSELF and sat in his lap!

Here are pictures of Christmas Past:                                             

Here is this year's picture:

I mean look at the difference! Is it bad that I am a little sad she didn't cry this year?!?! And my little wild man Ezra wasn't so sure about Santa.

This is the pool of fake snow! I know-it looks so weird-I almost was afraid to let them in to play. But I must say-they had a BLAST and didn't want to leave!

By the way-I promise Ezra does smile!! :)

Speaking of Christmas and the LOVE I have for it-I just posted my Polar Express Unit! My sister, Kathryn Willis at The Tales of a Working Mom, and I worked together on this product and it is perfect for your holiday Polar Express Celebration! My unit is more for grades 1-2 and Katie's is more for grades 3-5.  I am going to put my unit for free until Sunday night! Merry Christmas and Enjoy!! 

There are spelling and vocabulary words, math activities and pages, literacy activity and pages, PLUS a Train Craftivity! 

I have also posted a super fun Letter to Santa and craftivity! My students have had the BEST time doing this. My sweet kiddos have a very difficult time knowing how to organize their thoughts to put them on paper. And paragraphs? Don't even get me started on that! It is so hard for them to understand!  Using the prewriting sheet in this activity is a great way to show the concept of putting a paragraph together. 

Before I sign off for the night, I need to tell you that I have just finished the first Georgia Historical Figures from my Second Grade Georgia Historical Figures Unit and my kids have LOVED it! And I need to give a HUGE shootout to Lauren Thompson and her AWESOME clip art skills!! I cannot begin to tell you how much of her clip art I use for my products-she is incredible!! 

Well that is it for tonight! Thank you for stopping by!!! 

Happy Late Thanksgiving & TPT Cyber Sale!

Happy Thanksgiving- or should I say-Happy Late Thanksgiving! We had so much fun with family over the break! Recently, my sister-in-law and her family moved to Tennessee and it was so wonderful being able to spend some time with them-We miss them so much! We also had a fantastic time with my brother and his wife who currently live in Jacksonville, Fl. We try to spend lots of time with them because they will  soon be MOVING to Haiti to start All Things New orphanage! Rusty and I will be going to see all their kids over our Christmas break and we cannot wait to meet them all!!

In case you haven't heard-TPT is having a HUGE Cyber Monday and Tuesday sale! All of my items will be on sale and you can click here to see them all!
My most recent product is Christmas Unit. I cannot wait to start using these activities with my students this week. This Christmas Unit is perfect to celebrate the Holiday season and REVIEW with all of your little elves! :) The following activities are included:

ABC Order

Cause & Effect

3 Writing Prompts (Narrative, Opinion, and Informational)

Skip Counting Task Cards or SCOOT

Addition & Subtraction Task Cards or SCOOT

Word Problem Task Cards or SCOOT OR Word Problem of the Day

3 Graphing Activities

I also have to give a HUGE shout out to my fabulous sister, Kathryn Willis! She started TPT long before I did and makes the BEST products! She is more geared towards 3rd-5th grade. Her latest and GREATEST product is 5th Grade Spelling and Vocabulary Common Core Complete Program...it is FANTASTIC!!

So excited…I have a blog!!!

I know-I am completely behind with just now starting a blog! But boy am I SUPER excited about it! What a perfect week to get it up and running-Thanksgiving! A wonderful break and great food! I will be posting the recipes that I am going to use this week for both of our Thanksgiving dinners. And yes-you read it right-BOTH of our Thanksgiving dinners! My husband and I are extremely blessed to have both of our families right here in our hometown-and they actually live just minutes from each other!

Also-since it is my first post ever-I have decided to put my Christmas Unit for FREE-only for TWO DAYS! Be sure to check it out-AND leave feedback!! Thanks y'all! Have a fantastic Thanksgiving!