With school right around the corner, my classroom is officially ready and awaiting students! I am so excited for my students to see my first classroom and start using all of the resources that I’ve put together. In case you don’t remember, here is what my classroom looked like before: Panoramic ViewThere wasn’t a whole lot of anything in the classroom when I got there, the furniture in the middle of the room wasn’t mine. Everything that was in the classroom was pretty much focused in this one cornerbecause it held all the storage for the room. … Read More
September Currently
If you haven’t encountered a “Currently” post before, it is just a fun post at the beginning of each month that serves as a way to share what is Currently going on in your life! You can link up and share your own “Currently” post by visiting the wonderful Farley over at Oh’ Boy 4th Grade. I am so excited for it to be September as I am definitely a fall-time kind of person! September is also back-to-school for us in Canada and I can’t wait to be in my classroom with my students. As a new teacher, it seems like… Read More
Professional Growth Plan
During our New Teacher Orientation we were asked to start thinking about our Professional Growth Plans as we will be meeting with our individual principal’s this week. As part of this, we were provided with forms to help us guide our goals (both personal and divisional). As a new teacher, most of the times when I think of the school year my hopes are to simply survive through it! Student teaching is just a taste of what full-time teaching is like and I hope to just make it through the year while trying to balance lessons, differentiating instruction,… Read More
New Teacher Orientation
Yesterday was New Teacher Orientation in “T-Division”! My husband, myself, and four other new teachers met at our Division Office to get prepared for the new year and learn the ropes of the division. As you can probably tell from the fact that there are only 6 new employees, our division is quite small and our orientation was very laid back and welcoming. In general, the information was a little bland but necessary. We discussed:– Our provincial union, Manitoba Teachers’ Society (MTS)– Salaries– Life Insurance– Health Insurance– Divisional Calendar– Divisional Policies– Professional Development & Growth, etc A… Read More
Scientific Method Bulletin Board
My classroom isn’t ready for a full reveal quite yet, but I have finished up all of my bulletin boards (you know, the ones that were hiding behind the monster bookcase). My favourite one, by far, is my Scientific Method bulletin board that is going to remain permanent through the school year. I modeled it after the amazing one that Emily created over at The Science Life! *BEFORE*The bulletin board I’m showing is the one on the North wall beneath the black star. *AFTER*The Scientific Method!Starting from the red rectangle: “Ask a Question”, “Form A Hypothesis”, “Create and Conduct an Experiment”,… Read More
Resources To Start Off Your Week 76
It is here; my first week “working” as a teacher! Now, I put “working” in quotations because the teachers in our division aren’t actually back until next Tuesday, but any new teaching staff starts their orientation this week (including both me and my fiance!). While I have been in my classroom sporadically over the past two weeks, I will now be there full-time when I am not in meetings with our divisional staff. I am very excited to get the final touches complete so that I can do a big reveal and be ready for students. As of… Read More
Water Systems Resources
Here is the LAST resources post for my series of resources for the Grade 8 Science curriculum. With school starting right around the corner, I hope you can find these resources useful! If you missed my posts for the first three units of study, visit the following posts: – Cells & Systems – Optics – Fluids Water Cycle Song. (2011). Uploaded to YouTube by Mr. Parr. Available online at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o3BVa7PH_JE I really enjoyed planning out this unit for two reasons: I have a Geography minor and our province has experienced drastic flooding over the past few years.… Read More
Interactive "Connect With Us" Display
I am now spending almost every day in my classroom getting organized and prepared for the upcoming school year. As you know, I’ve created quite a strong online presence for my classroom and I want to make sure that my students utilize these resources and have easy access to them. To address this, I’ve created an interactive Connect With Us display at the entrance of my classroom! This display includes 3 laptops featuring the information for our: – Classroom Website – Classroom Blog – Classroom YouTube Channel In addition to the written URL for each site, I… Read More
Summer #EdTech To-Do List Revisited
At the beginning of the summer (oh geez, was that already 2 months ago!?) I shared my Summer #EdTech To-Do List inspired by a blog post by Anthony Vonbank. For the last five summers I have always worked two jobs to pay for the upcoming year’s school tuition, so I always considered myself very busy. This is my first summer since Grade 8 that I haven’t worked at all during the summer! I thought that this would mean that I wouldn’t be busy and was actually worried that I might be bored! HAHA! With the wedding, honeymoon, and planning for… Read More
Resources To Start Off Your Week 75
I am both excited and nervous as I write this post as it is my LAST Resources To Start Off Your Week post before I am back at school. Next week I begin my new teacher orientation although students will not return to classes until September 5th. When I first started these posts in January of 2011 I never thought that I’d still be doing them when I was preparing my first classroom! As always, I will be adding these to my ever-growing list of resources under the Fav Websites heading. 1 ) Math is Fun– This website… Read More