#BeTheSeason; The Golden Phrase; Proud Mom~My {3} Wows! on Wednesday!

 I hope all of you had a great Thanksgiving!  I guess my first Wow! should be that Wow, I missed two Wednesdays in a row!  I am back.  

My first real Wow! is the #BeTheSeason Hashtag that TpT put out there & my take on it...I thought about it a lot and I was thinking about all of the sights & sounds of the season & how children see it all, so I felt Be in Awe expressed all of that best; my second one is Be Aware...be aware of those around you who are struggling, grieving, or aching at this time of year, whether they are battling with health issues, financial issues, or the loss of a loved one or loved ones in the last year or two, this time can be a really difficult time so be aware, be sensitive,& reach out!...my third is straight forward...Love, we celebrate the greatest gift of love, the coming of Christ to earth, so we have the opportunity to show love, to BE love to the world around us...#BeTheSeason!

This is my 28th year teaching 3rd grade, and I wish I had started saying this YEARS ago for many reasons that I share after you read this phrase...I say this multiple times a day {really!}...my students frequently finish it for me! 

.First, it keeps me constantly reminded of why I am doing what I am doing... second, it is pretty difficult for a child {or parent} to get upset with you...
'You're picking on me'{my child}...no, I am saying what I am saying {about focusing or distracting, or being off task} BECAUSE you matter & so does your education...third, I hope and pray it gets ingrained into my students' heads...that when they are 12, 15, 18, 25, & beyond...it will echo in the back of their heads & it will encourage them! 

I am so very proud of my kids...both of them have solos in our youth choir Christmas program...part of this Wow! is~Wow! they didn't get that musical talent from their mom!  I wish I could sing like they can!

I am off to bed, hope to be back next Wednesday!

Edtech Summit~Temecula & a Holiday Meme

Edtech Summit~Temecula~Great Way to Start the Break!

I started my Thanksgiving Break by attending a Google Summit...it was WONDERFUL!!!  I was so inspired by every session & the timing couldn't have been better since when we return next Monday we will begin using the Chromebooks our school just purchased! {my class will have the cart Monday, Tuesday, & every other Wednesday}

I forgot to add the video of Be More Dog!

One of the reasons this weekend was so fantastic is this group of ladies!  I have taught or am teaching 3rd with all of them...one is now an AP for several of our elementary schools and the other two are looping 3/4, so I will have each one as a teammate every other year.  We learned from each other & enjoyed learning, laughing, & eating together!  Speaking of eating...

The first night we ate at a Thai restaurant and the bowl you see in front of me is what I couldn't finish {no fridge in the hotel room} I had wonderful, large Spring Rolls first & was shocked when the soup was brought to the table, it seriously could have fed a family of 5! On the way home we went to PFChang...wow! Shown is my fortune cookie...I have so many projects in my 'For TpT' folder, maybe with the break I will get a few 'Store Ready'

A highlight for me was getting the chance to meet and spend time with Vicky from Teaching and Much Moore!  Once I had looked through her Instagram I felt we would connect...many things in common...she was a delight & I look forward to meeting up with her again in the future!

This is my ADORABLE grandson, & Yes, I am biased!! His mom gave me permission to create & share this Meme! 

Sketchnotes; a Gift From Scholastic; Conferences & Student Goals with a Smile!

My 1st Wow! is about Sketchnotes; more specifically Sylvia Duckworth's Sketchnotes...if you don't follow her on Twitter, I would highly recommend following her!...maybe I should have called this one a WOW! because that is how I feel when I look at her collection of sketch notes!...here are just a FEW of her amazing sketchnotes:

 ~notice this collage does not have my usual TABT logo on it because all I did was put 6 of HER sketchnotes together...if you click on the image above it will take you to her Flickr photo stream...she has so many great ones that make me think, inspire me, and connect with me in a different way than other media...maybe one day I will try to sketchnote as well!...I liked what she had so much that I downloaded around 60 of them!!...I plan to use them to help me to think differently & to inspire my fellow staff members!

 I received a book order this week and I was so excited about the gift they included for me in the order!!!  I love the color, the quotes, & the finger & thumb tips that work on my gadgets!!  So nice to get a little something unexpected, thank you Scholastic!

Yesterday ALL day we had parent conferences & we had a short day today with conferences after the students left...I am pretty wiped out, they went well, but are quite draining...part of our conference is to include going over a parent/teacher/student compact...it has preprinted expectations in each column, and spots for goals for the student...in class we had brainstormed about different goals they could choose; turning in their homework, mastering the multiplication facts, take more AR quizzes, improve on test scores, etc...they were welcome to come up with one of their own if they chose to...then at the conference the parent chooses a goal & I choose a goal for the child to work on.  I was very proud of how self reflective my students were...they chose very appropriate goals for their current challenges...as I was going through them yesterday and saw the one below my mind was trying to figure out what the child could have possibly meant by 'white heater'...I was at a loss...this morning I looked at it, I guess I had my 'teacher glasses' on because I suddenly saw 'write neater'!!! Very appropriate goal!! 

Now, 1/2 day tomorrow, then school Friday, & after school I will be taking off with a few other teachers from my school for an EdTech Summit on GAFE {Google Apps For Education}...I am SUPER excited & I am sure I will be blogging about it! 

Shaved Frozen Yogurt, Super Improver Stars, & Binder Clip LOVE! :D

One of my favorite treats of the last year & a half has been getting frozen yogurt.  We have a locally owned place, EzFreeze just around the block from school {dangerous...they all know me in there!}...they opened a second location in the same small mall for shaved ice...this is pretty common to find, but Joe, the owner, decided to combine these two treats & created SHAVED YOGURT!  We all enjoyed it, the picture shows my daughter's strawberry shaved yogurt.

My second Wow is Wow I finally moved forward with my Super Improver Stars!  For the last few years I have tried to use this strategy from Whole Brain Teaching, but I was never successful with moving forward...I would just get too busy with other things, as well as not having great strategies for tracking & monitoring the students' stars.  I know that some students have earned even more super improver stars that I haven't awarded for growth on the Accelerated Reader STAR test which they took when school began & just retook. As the students move up, the backing color for their names will change.

Wow, do I love Binder Clips!  I use them all the time!  I love that I can store them on a ring & have them at my fingertips any time I need; they can be dressed up with washi/decorative tape; place hooks behind my desk & hang important papers, forms, & book orders & not loose them in a pile on my desk; they can be used to hold papers that need to be returned to students & hung on a hook attached to the cubbies, large clips were the ones I used to label those cubbies when stickers just wouldn't stick!

Be back next Wednesday!

CMC Math Conference! {Wows! on Wednesday back this Wednesday!}

I was very blessed to attend the CMC {California Mathematics Council} Southern California Conference in Palm Springs Friday & Saturday.  I have been to the conference many times in the past, but it has been at least 6 years since I have been able to go. 

The conference was WONDERFUL!!! 

I am a Kim Sutton groupie...I first heard her around 25{?} years ago at the CMC Conference.  I remember going to her session and being blown away!  There was so much great information that I couldn't absorb it all.  Her session was repeated & so I went back.  Since then I have heard her speak at conferences like this and also attended several full day conferences that she had through her company Creative Mathematics.  I ALWAYS learn something new EVERY SINGLE time I hear her speak!  If you EVER have the chance to see her present DO NOT pass it up!  One of my favorite lines of hers is, "Math is NOT like reading/language arts"  My students hear that all the time.  We talk about how the brain is a pattern seeking device & how if they ever listen to a two year old or someone learning English they might hear that person say, "I flied" or "I swinged" because they are trying to apply that pattern of adding -ed for the past tense, but we have exceptions~in math there are patterns, properties, constants~when you know it, you know it...there won't be rule breakers or exceptions.

I went to 2 of Kim's sessions and visited with her for quite a while, it was a delight!

I am now a new groupie too.  I went to Jane Felling's session on Family Math nights & I was so impressed with her, her style, her information, & materials I stayed for her next session Number Line Math for Teaching Place Value {it was not originally on my schedule}, then I attended her husband's session the next day Roll into Conducting Probability & Statistics & I was just as impressed with him!  He talked about brain research and what he shared fit beautifully with what I have learned from Chris Biffle from Whole Brain Teaching {which I have blogged about several times in the past}.  I purchased several materials from their company Box Cars and One Eyed Jacks and look forward to watching my students grow through using them.

I almost stayed with Kim for her last session, but it was for K-2 & I decided to stick with my original plan of going to Orchestrating Confident Problem Solvers in 3 Simple Steps!  I am so glad that I attended that session!  Here is my picture with all of these amazing individuals and more about the last session & these ladies after the picture...

I will talk about the content of that session first...I loved it! They talked about a way to work with students to UNDERSTAND word problems by doing 3 Reads with them.  One of the lines my students hear frequently is "Reading is for Meaning" and this fit beautifully with HOW to do that when problem solving.  Now, about these ladies, the opener they had up as I walked into the room was to discuss with a neighbor WHY you chose this session...I had three reasons, #1 it was in the same hotel as my previous session with Kim {a significant consideration because the conference has sessions in the Convention Center & SIX different hotels!}, #2 I liked the topic since problem solving is so critical for our students and can be a challenge for them to conquer successfully, #3 one presenter was from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo & the other 2 were from the San Luis Coastal School District~I am an alumni of Cal Poly.

After their session I began talking with them and I asked them if they knew Dr. Susan McBride, who had been one of my professors at Cal Poly.  I was surprised when they said they knew her because of how much time has gone by since I graduated.  Dr. McBride had a huge impact on my life.  When I was in college, Cal Poly was the only school that I knew of at the time that an individual majoring in Liberal Studies could graduate with a teaching credential.  There had been a certain GPA that was required to enter the credential program and I had that GPA, but at the beginning of my fourth year the GPA was raised and the students were not informed.  My GPA was now too low and I was being told that it needed to be raised, yet at the same time to graduate non-credential I would need 15 units of a foreign language.  So, while I was trying to raise it, very difficult to do when you have so many credits under your belt, I was also struggling with Spanish.  I have never tried so hard to be successful at something and done so poorly as when I was trying to learn Spanish.  
At this time my advisor was recommending I look at another career and I was feeling so discouraged. I enrolled in Dr. McBride's class, but I was overwhelmed and just didn't feel like I could do my best.  She allowed me to receive an incomplete and told me to return when I was ready.  When I came back to her class I was so inspired & impressed by her.  She made me want to give everything I had to every assignment.  I didn't receive a score below a 93% in her class.  At the time this was a pretty big deal for me!  She had a quiet, encouraging high expectation for her students, and I am so grateful that she believed that I could become a teacher.

I graduated non-credential, which was very challenging for me, but I earned my credential and Master's Degree from Chapman University.  I LOVE being a teacher, and the struggles I went through, I believe help me to relate to, and make me a champion for those who do struggle in school.

Part of my story that I shared with the three ladies involved another friend who was caught in the same situation I was.  We lost touch after graduation.  We would later be reunited. She had also continued with her dream of being an educator & I would soon learn about her journey in education.  Our reunion was related to a Delta Kappa Gamma event. {Delta Kappa Gamma is a professional organization of women educators that I was a part of}  The three ladies looked at each other when I mentioned Delta Kappa Gamma & then told me that was how they knew Dr. McBride and that they would be seeing her Tuesday night!

Thank you Dr. McBride for believing in me and encouraging me to be the best I could be.  You made such a positive impact on my life and I will be forever grateful!

Here are the goodies I got at the conference! :D  Some I purchased; the dice trays, big book & some of the dice.  The rest were given at the sessions or in the vendor area.  I am so excited to share what I learned with my students!

Now, mmmm, I love food! Here is a bit about the FOOD while I was in Palm Springs!

I'll be back on Wednesday with 3 Wows! on Wednesday!

Wows! on Wednesday~Proud Mom; More Goodies for the Class; & Dictionaries!

I think one 'Wow' could have been me blogging 3 weeks in a row!  I LOVE Doodle Bugs' Five for Friday, but Friday I am usually wiped out or busy with working in the snack bar at the football games, going to the movies, or just relaxing with my family & then the weekends just seem to fly by so I am not very consistent with posting.  I came up with this "{3} Wows! on Wednesday" for me...to focus on the positives and have just a few things to share...if I have even one comment expressing any interest {or hear on Social Media} I will make it a Linky next Wednesday, if not, it will just keep me going! :D

My first Wow! is a Mom Wow...last night my son was recognized at our district board meeting for having a perfect score last spring on his California High School Exit Exam...today my daughter received 2 grade level awards, one for Band & the other for Humanities, as well as awards for scoring Advanced in Math & At Standard in Language Arts...I am so proud of both of them and the choices they are making!

Yes, I have received more goodies from NAEIR, if you haven't checked them out click on the picture below to check out their site.  I wasn't sure what the upper left hand items were~I thought they were textured paper, but they are work making textures with clay...teacher twist~great for crayon rubbings!! There are 20 sheets of the Angry Bird stickers & Hello Kitty stickers, 40 smelly erasers, & 80 pink erasers...oh, this site is addicting!

My last Wow! is one that I am very grateful for...for over 9 years Rotary Club has given every third grader in our district a dictionary of his or her own!  This year they also gave all of the fifth graders a Thesaurus!  Thank you Rotary!!

Now, a bonus...today was our Costume parade...

 I could resist adding this picture of my grandson from Sunday...he has my heart!

 Thanks! Have a great rest of your week!

3 Wows!~$433 of School Goodies for $26, A Google Form for TpT Purchases, & 4 Kinds of Sentences Game

Wow! 2 Wednesday's in a row blogging! :) Right now that puts me in a super WOW mood!  If I can get consistent at this maybe I will start it up as a linky!

If you haven't seen my last post, just hit the 'older posts' button & look at my previous post about Naeir.org.  It shows my first box from them, this is my second...can you see it's value?...$433...& I paid $26!!!  You can sign up for a free account as a teacher, but beware...if you love school/office supplies & you love an amazing deal, you might just be in trouble...it is quite addicting to check out what is available each day {their inventory is constantly changing}

My second Wow is how many item I have from TpT; 142 Paid Purchases & 482 Free Downloads {since they started tracking it}...I am loving Google Forms & I created one to organize all of my items...after you input your information Google create a Sheet which you can organize & sort by field...that way I can look by the creators of the products eg. Blair Turner, Graphics from the Pond, etc. or by Title or use {I call them Classroom & TABT {The Apple Basket Teacher}  I don't have all of my purchases in yet {LOTS to go on my free downloads}...I may even tweak my Form & add in subject or holiday when applicable...we will see...hopefully if you click on this image it will take you to a copy of my form that you can modify for your needs! 

I just finished getting this 'store ready' & in my store...it is a game for practicing the 4 Kinds of Sentences~Declarative, Interrogative, Imperative, & Exclamatory...I print my games on 5 different colors of paper for my 5 table groups...it makes life MUCH easier if a piece is later found on the floor!...also I love the small manilla envelopes which I laminate & use velcro to keep closed.  Click on the image above to find it in my store!

Good night all!