My first week of summer started with a lot of time by the pool reading some great books.  The first book I read was Teach Like Your Hair's on Fire by Rafe Esquith.  This book left me with so much to think about as I start the next school year. To begin the book Esquith introduces the six levels of learners students can chose to be.  He discusses how many students are Level 1 thinkers who come to school and behave in order to avoid getting into trouble.  He wants his students to reach Level 6 which is when they want to learn and do right for themselve ..read more

Friday was my last teacher workday so Summer has officially begun for me!  The end of the year was so much busier than I thought it was going to be.  The last week was a lot of fun for my kids.  My favorite day was a beach theme day.  We started our morning by laying on beach towels in the room and reading our favorite books to each other. We then made some different beach themed crafts.  My students loved making a flip flop craft I found on Pinterest and they also enjoyed painting sea shells. On Thursday we had our class party.  We started with a pizz ..read more

LSpring break is this week for me and many of my NC teacher friends.  I am looking forward to many things about this week, but mostly for getting time to recharge my teacher batteries.  I started the day with some time in the gym and lunch with friends. Later in the day I spent some time in the sun with a book.  I love days like these!  On Wednesday I will be heading to the beach with a couple of teacher friends.  Of course when I go to the beach I have to have plenty of great books to read.  I have three different piles of books.  1)  Guided Reading Bo ..read more

Hello everyone! I am so excited to start back blogging again.  I took some time off as I was getting settled in my new job.  When I previously had this blog I was teaching sixth grade and going to college for special education.  I then taught special ed for two years and just returned into the regular education classroom this year.  I am now teaching second grade and so far it is my favorite grade I have taught. I can't wait to share with you all what I am doing in my classroom and collaborate with some other elementary teachers out there.   As a fun freebie for start ..read more

I'm moving!  Please visit and follow my new blog at http://thebehaviorroom.blogspot.com.  You can read more about my move on my first post there. I am hoping to broaden my PLN there and with my new twitter account @thebehaviorroom ..read more

We all know that summer doesn't just mean time to play around, but also time to learn some new things for a better school year.  This summer I have so much I want to read and learn about.  This week I've been in a conference learning about MTSS which is a layered system of support for identifying struggling students and helping meet the needs of all learners. It has been an eye opening conference and I am looking forward to the changes that will be taking place at our school.  Other than conferences I also have my own list of books I want to read this summer. I've already almos ..read more

Last week was the last week of school for students.  We celebrated in my room with a different theme for each day.  Monday was math games, Tuesday was fun with reading, Wednesday was science, Thursday was reflection of the year and Friday was summer activities.   My students enjoyed these theme days and overall were able to keep their focus the last week while enjoying themselves.  Reading in the dark on reading day Getting to learn from a therapy dog on science day Rain in a jar on science day Started off our week growing grass.  It sp ..read more

     I have had a lot of fun lately, with spring break and going to the Bahamas.  I'm very happy to say the hardest part of this school year for me is behind me.  I've got most of my IEP meetings done for the year and I finally feel like I have a good handle on my new job.  I have grown a lot over the course of the school year as an EC teacher and it is nice to know feel like I know what I am doing.   I'm especially happy that now all my students current IEP's are ones that I have written so I know exactly what I need to be working on. &nb ..read more

   This post is the story of one of my students who I've worked with a lot this year, let's call him Tommy. He has really changed my thinking about my job and I am very thankful for that.  Tommy is a young elementary student who I serve in my classroom for 75% of the school day.  He does get to go to enrichment, recess, lunch and science with his regular class but the rest of the day he is with me.  Often, it is just Tommy and I working together in my classroom.  You would think Tommy would progress immensely with so much time working one on one with me.  Thi ..read more

    It has been a long but fun St. Patrick's Day for this Carolina girl.  I had a little too many activities planned today for my kiddos and some we didn't get to, but lots of learning went on in the CBS room today.  Next time I will try to do better at taking pictures. 1.  We started our day by learning why we celebrate St. Patrick's Day.  We used getepic.com to read a nonfiction book called St. Patrick's Day.  This book was great because it had mini chapters that each explained why we do certain things on St. Patrick's Day.  We then wrote a summary of ..read more