Monday Made It - Reading Records, Bathroom Passes, and Organization!

The last Monday of summer.  Next Monday kicks off our school year (no students until Wednesday).  Of course, I'll be in my classroom all day today and at training for most of this week.  But, I'll pretend it's still summer.

The rapidly approaching school year has kicked my butt into productive mode though, so I've got a few Monday Made-Its to share!

First up, Bathroom Passes:

At the beginning of each month, I give each student a bathroom pass with the word "bathroom" on it.  Each letter is a pass.  When they need to go, I cross out a letter (of course, we still have the talk and expectations about when appropriate times to go are).  At the end of the month, unused letters become tickets for our raffle.  This is the system that all 4th grade has used at my school the past two years.

I like to have the name of the month on the bathroom passes.  Some of my teammates just rotate through the colored paper we have, but I could never remember which color I was on.  So I made one for each month.  I'm going to copy them all as soon as our copy machines are up and running so I am ready!

Next, Reading Records:

I gray out the days that they do not have to get their log signed (weekends, including Fridays, and days off of school).

Parent signed reading logs are expected at my school. My first year and a half, I used a half sheet of paper each week that students had to write how many minutes they read each night and have a parent sign.  I HATED collecting them each week and would often forget to make sure I had copies each Monday.  So, part way through last year, I switched to monthly logs.  It's still just minutes and parent signatures, but I only have to collect it once per month.  Most of the kids really liked the calendar aspect of it! I made the fonts match the bathroom passes and I'll copy them on the same colored paper (one of those cute, but doesn't matter things, I know).

Would you like to use these too?

Click HERE for the link to the bathroom passes and reading records.  All days are white on this reading log since I don't know your schedule :)

And last, some cute organization:

Label shape from Ladybug's Teacher Files; Font: Oh {Photo} Shoot
I used lots of Mod Podge to stick those cute papers on!
They match my turn-in boxes nicely (though I wish I had found this paper before I made those!)

I decided to do Copy, File, Laminate instead of Copy, File, Grade for a couple of reasons:

1. It's just not realistic to think that my grading will all fit in that drawer :(
2. I feel like I always have some small little thing that needs laminating but doesn't seem worth turning on the laminator, so I save it for later, when I have a bigger job.  BUT, then I forget or misplace that small thing.

Alright, I'm off to my classroom now to see if I can get it ready enough to show you all tomorrow for Teacher Week '13!

Monday Made-It ... and keys!

I love Tara's Monday Made-Its!  It's like a pat on the back for all the work on the things I've made this week!

First up, turn in boxes.  I'm so excited about these!

And matching magnets (well, they need to be laminated and then a magnet put on) to put on the whiteboard next to the assignment, so students know where to turn what in.

Thank you Kristen at Ladybug's Teacher Files for the editable templates!

I started setting up my planning binder:

The rest of the months are hiding back there!

I still need to decide on/make my planning pages and print meeting notes pages from Clutter Free Classroom (got them as a flash freebie!).  I'm going to have a separate grade book, which also needs to be put together.  I can't decide if I should have my record of parent communication in my planning binder or in my grade book.  What do you think?

I also finished covering the containers from my last Monday Made It and started a few other things, which should be ready for you next week!

Off to get my classroom keys and start on that adventure.  I know it's a disaster in the cabinets.  I'm just hoping it's not more of a disaster than I remember.

Monday (Wednesday) Made-It

I have been wanting to link up with Tara at 4th Grade Frolics for Monday Made It since before I even had this blog, but my motivation has been lacking.  Today I finished the first step of my first project (other than beginning to organize two huge boxes of papers, which is so boring that none of you want to hear about it), and I've decided it will be enough for this week's Monday Made It.  

My making was done on the computer, which means it is sharable with you!  


First, I made classroom supply labels.  I'm still not quite sure how I'm going to do community supplies.  Last year, students had supplies in their desks, and I had a limited number of supplies out for everyone to use.  I felt like some students took advantage (read: were disrespectful) of the community supplies, though.  Right now, I'm thinking that I will still have some community supplies, but they will be divided by group so that the students are more responsible for them.  


Here are the labels I made today!  There are 12 supply labels and 8 group labels.  Click on the picture if you want them!

I also made labels for my new turn-in boxes. I have two of these:

I made these labels for them: (click on the picture if you want them)

I made two boxes for each subject because between homework and classwork, they usually turn in two things from each subject each day.  I'm hoping that I can leave work in these drawers, one assignment in each, for the whole day.  I got the idea from one of the many blogs I read (sorry, don't remember who!  If it was you, let me know!) to have a classroom job be to put the papers in number order and check for missing papers at the end of the day for easy grading.  I think with the drawers and that job, my grading life will be so much easier next year!  I am also going to make a magnet version of each.  I will use the magnets on the whiteboard and write the assignments next to the box they should be turned-in in.  

I will use the same boxes for social studies and science because I alternate teaching social studies and science by unit, so I never have both subjects at the same time.  I made separate Social Studies and Science labels for you because I figured many people would want them separate.

My goal for next Monday is to have these labels printed and beautifully modge-podged with scrapbook paper onto their containers!  Maybe I'll also finish my new behavior chart that I started almost a month ago now.

I also have two made-its for my home!

First, I made this curtain (please ignore my messy desk).  I've been meaning to make it for the whole time - a year next month - that we've lived here.  It covers a frosted window, but that window is right next to the front door, and I didn't like people being able to see my computer sitting on my desk.

My second home made-it is again on the computer. Boyfriend bought a new camera for our trip and with the camera came an offer from Shutterfly for a free 8x8 20 page photo book (just pay shipping and handling - $8).  I just put the finishing touches on it.  I can't wait to get it!  If it turns out as cute as it is on the computer, I will probably have to make one for every vacation!

That's it! Good night!

Fabulous Idea!

I've loved reading about everyone's fabulous finds at Fun in Room 4B's linky, so I've decided to share one myself.


My purchases have been focused on basic organization. Nothing too fabulous.  I have found some fabulous ideas from reading blogs, so that will be my fabulous find to share.


So many bloggers have been sharing about organizational binders for students.  I had folders and notebooks last year, which worked for some, but not nearly all, students.  This organizational binder idea is one I'm thinking about trying.


I really enjoyed Lisa's post at Fourth and Ten about her S.T.A.R. binders.  If you haven't already, you should definitely check out her post.  She gave so much detail!


Here are some things I really liked about her binders that I'm going to try incorporating into my classroom:

• Zipper Pouch for classroom currency.  I don't know how many times I heard "I lost my Charger Bucks!" last year.
• Things in sheet protectors: questions students always use and when you finish early games.  This would cut down on so many copies AND really make the point to students that things carry over throughout the year.  I felt like a lot of my students didn't notice, even when I pointed it out, that we were using the same graphic organizer or set of questions as before.  If it's the same paper, they have to realize, right?
• Folders all in one place, in a specific order.  I also really liked the idea of one folder for things that don't fit with a specific subject.

Some things I think I might add:

• A folder for keeping lined and white paper in so that students can just get the paper out. This seems like it could be much quicker than having students pass out paper.
• A "ready to be turned in" folder.  I had a lot of students want to turn work in early last year.  I let them because I was so afraid they would lose it, but it made an organizational nightmare for me because the whole class set of assignments wasn't together.  I spent at least one or two hours each weekend just sorting papers so that each assignment was together.  Then, I still had to grade.

I'm still trying to figure out exactly how to get the supplies for this.  I can't ask the students to supply the binders because it isn't on our grade-level list, which already went out to students.  Many students have already ordered their school supplies for next year through our PTA, so I can't add something to the list!  I did buy half inch binders with another idea in mind.  Maybe I'll figure out a way to make those work or return them and try to get 1 inch ones.

Shopping!

As I mentioned in my first post, one thing I have done this summer is some serious classroom shopping.  I had quite a bit of classroom money to spend before the year was up that I didn't even find out about until the last few days of school! Luckily, I got a 3 day extension on my reimbursements, so I got to spend the weekend after school was out buying things for next year!


I'm linking up with Ladybug's Teacher Files Summer Shopping Linky Party to show you some of the things I bought. 

 Warning:  This is a long post.  Like I said, I had quite a bit of money to spend, so I got lots of goodies!


Much of it is at school, where I can't get to it until August 6th, and the rest is very carefully stacked, tetras-style, to fit in one of the few empty spots in my tiny apartment (we'll ignore that this stack means only three people can sit at the kitchen table).


Because I can't take pictures of the things at school and because undoing my stack to take pictures seems a daunting task, I've found the best pictures online that I could!  You'll see my actual ones as I work on personalizing them for my room.


First up....

I bought 40 of these tubs.  Most are going to be part of my classroom library.  My books started off this year not organized in any way (the teacher who had the room before me left me a ton of books, which was FANTASTIC, but I had no time to organize or look through them).  Over Holiday Break, I organized them by AR level.  This year, I want to focus more on genres than I did last year and I think organizing my books in tubs by genre will be a great way to extend studying genres beyond my mini-lessons.  Even though I won't use the lids for the classroom library, I'm glad to have found ones with lids so that I have more options if I choose to use some for something else!

More Storage ...

I bought 8 of these and would have bought more if they had more!  They are going to store as many of my math manipulatives as will fit in them.  I love that they are clear to see what is inside, but that they have a bit of purple on them. Last year, all four of us fourth grade teachers at my school color-coded all copies to help students stay organized.  Everything math was purple.  I'm hoping we keep this up next year (two new teachers on the team, so we'll see).  It really helps the kids that we all do it the same, since we rotate for math.  I'm trying to stick with purple for everything math-related in my room.

Organizing My Desk ...

I bought 6 of these, one for each day of the week (plus one since they came in packs of 3).  These will sit on my desk with files for each subject in each day's bin.  This is where I will keep copies for the week.  I'm not sure what the sixth one will be used for yet.  Maybe for if I'm super ahead and have copies for the following week made before the current week ends?  This year I used file folder racks.  I had one for each subject and each rack had a folder for each day of the week.  It worked well most of the time, but the files tipped over often and if I had a lot of copies for a particular day, they just didn't fit.

Organizing Student Work ...

I bought two of these.  Each drawer will be labeled and I will have students turn work in here.  That way things will be organized for me to grade.  I'm also planning on making matching magnets for each labeled drawer to put on the whiteboard so that students can reference what gets turned in where. 

Student Organization ...

32 half-inch binders.  I think I am going to have students use these for language arts.  I tried using notebooks last year, but too often I wanted them to put in graphic organizers or reference sheets.  They would glue them in and a few days later, our classroom floor would be littered with fallen out pages.

Reading Activity...

I'm super excited to try out these task cards from Lakeshore for reading time.  I love the idea of having so many activities/prompts that students can do with a variety of texts so that they can be used again and again.  It was so hard to decide between the fiction and non-fiction box, but since I feel more comfortable coming up with fiction reading tasks, I decided on these.  I also think some of them might work great during social studies or science by using the textbook as the nonfiction reading.

And of course, decorations ...

I bought lots of cute, colorful boarders and black fabric to cover my boards. I honestly can't remember what the boarders looked like right now and of course they're in my classroom, but I know I was excited for them when I bought them.  I can't wait to decorate my room!

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Wow that was a lot!  I'm pretty sure I'm forgetting things too.  Looking back over these has gotten me excited to get working on cute-i-fying them for my classroom and getting things ready for next year. Time to get to work ...

P.S. Does anyone know why my font changed after my first picture or how I can fix that?  I'm new to this!  Thanks!