I spent a little more time in my classroom today, and things are starting to look up a little!  I thought I’d share a few of my latest “to do list checkmarks”!  I thought I’d link up with Doodle Bugs Teaching for her “Five for Friday”!

1.  If you followed me last year, you might have noticed that I like to use my read aloud novels to track our thinking.  From “Wonder Board” to “Fluttermobiles”, I’m always looking for new ways to interact with text.  We start the year by reading Shredderman, so I have cleared an area to do SOMETHING with . . . to be continued!

2.  This is my label maker cartridge running out of label tape.  With. 5. Names. Left. To. Make.  Grrrr.  Guess who has to go to Target this weekend now.  Bummer.

2 1/2.  Why did I need them?  Here is my plan for storing Words Their Way sorts  I figure zip loc bags, envelopes, folders, and the like will get buried and lost in their desks.  These were inexpensive and I thought students would be able to find them easily!  Names are on the inside in case they get left out.  I hope it works!

3.  I redid some of my bulletin board background papers/fabrics and decided to pitch my old faded alphabet and got a new one.  I stretched it out across the floor and it took up almost my entire room!  It was HUGE!  I decided to cut the letters apart and arrange them on the board and saved myself 4 feet of space.

4.  Student letters went out, so it’s time to send post cards to my students!  I try to keep them pretty simple, but I know the students like to get them.  I also found out I’m going to have some extra teacher help in my room for a good chunk of the day.  Yay!

5.  The custodians took down my lanterns to clean this year (although secretly I’m afraid they are going to make me take them back down due to our fire policies).  They have been up for 6 years and some were a little faded so I replaced a few.  I love them.  I need them.  How flammable can they be anyway?  I mean–won’t they just go “poof”?  Shouldn’t I be more worried about the prolonged burn of my classroom library?  Just sayin’… I hope all of you have a wonderful weekend!