*Cough, Cough*

It's been over a week since my last update.  I was attacked by germ monsters at school and have been resting up a lot.  In addition to being sick, I've been working very diligently on my ESOL certification class I'm taking right now.  Whoever says being a teacher is easy has no clue what they are talking about! Haha!  I have a couple things to share today and hopefully will finish doctoring up a super cool writing activity we did so I can share it soon!

First, I want to give a big shout-out to the ever fabulous VistaPrint!  I purchased the teacher contact information magnets that I gave my families at the beginning of the year from them.  They were wonderful quality and everybody was really impressed with them.  They also have a bunch of items you can get for free, you just have to pay shipping!  I go around every day initialing my students' planners to verify their behavior performance for the day and thought there had to be a better way!  There is, I got a FREE personalized stamp that fits perfectly in the designated spot in their planners.  I used a return address stamp that had a star.  Instead of putting in all 3 lines of information, I just put my name.  It automatically centers and turns out perfectly.  I know that some other teachers at my school are now looking into getting their own personalized stamps.  You should too!

So many of the ideas I find on Pinterest seem like such "Duh!" things.  I use to be a pretty creative person and I feel like Pinterest may be robbing me of my own inventing process.  I think it's making me lazy, if I want to get an idea I just type something in and *poof* hundreds of wonderful, already created ideas pop up.  This is one of those "Duh, why didn't I think of this" ideas.  Hot glue pom poms on the end of dry erase markers to make little erasers for the kids.  It's just like the big erasers I use on the board and saves on tissues or having dirty socks in the room.  I haven't used them yet, but hopefully the kids don't destroy them the first day... We all know how kids are with new things!

And, I leave you with a Transition Anchor Chart.  Hopefully I can break the kids of the "First, Next, Then, Finally" pattern of transitions!