"We Are Your Symphony"

Today was the first day of in-service and I am not sure where to begin. The day was filled with inspiring, motivational, and encouraging words from professionals who, in my opinion, are oozing with the passion of teaching and learning. There is so much to reflect on and so much to share. Education is somewhat rocky right now. Type "articles about education" in google and see what pops up.

When I look at the top articles I see words like "madness", "blast away", "scandal", "data revolution", and "failure".  As a teacher, it can be very difficult to stay positive about what you have chosen to dedicate your life to. Not ONE...I repeat.....not ONE of the titles mentions the word "STUDENT". How do we stay motivated and eager as educators?  The answer is very simple....students. It is the thank you from a student, it is the smile from a student, it is the tears from a student, it is the high-five from a student that motivates us to grow, learn, love, and share. 

I haven't seen my students since June. But today, during the first in-service of the school year, I felt motivated and inspired because of other professionals. 

Have you every seen Mr. Hollands Opus?  Gosh, I saw this movie a long time ago when it first came out in 1995. "Glenn Holland is a passionate musician who dreams of composing one truly memorable piece of music. But reality intrudes when he reluctantly accepts a "day job" as a high school music teacher to support his family. In time, however, Mr. Holland realizes that his real passion is teaching, and his legacy is the generations of young people he inspires." -Amazon.com 

At the end of the movie, Holland is cleaning out his classroom after retiring. His wife and son surprise him with a large gathering of students both past and present. They celebrate the wonderfully amazing career he has had. The clip was shown to the staff today. It solidifies how many lives a teacher may touch without truly knowing the impact he/she has in the moment. Here is the clip:

Click here to watch the YouTube clip from Mr. Hollands Opus.

WARNING: It may cause tears (I struggled to hold them back today. I didn't want to have my mascara running down my face on my very first day with the new staff).  

As we approach a new school year, challenge yourself to think what will your legacy be as a teacher? What will you do this year to build your legacy?  What do you want your students to remember about you as an educator?  

Good luck!

Stages of Teaching.....No more floating!

So another year begins. Tomorrow is the first day of in-service for the school year. As I sit here and think about the upcoming year, a storm of emotions come over me. Tomorrow begins my 9th year as a teacher. I struggle wrapping my brain around this. I don't think I am considered a "new" teacher any more. I'm now a veteran.

What makes a teacher a "veteran"?  Years of service?  Number of graduate credits? Grade level taught?  Money made? Promotions given?

This year, I will begin my 4th placement in the educational field. I have taught 1st, third, ESL and now Read 180 and System 44 for 5th and 6th grade. I have worked under 5 principals and numerous vice principals and interim principals. I have decorated and made six different classrooms in five different buildings feel like home to students. I have worked in two different districts. Every experience I have had in each of these settings has been amazing. With each experience, I gain more tools in my backpack that help me be a better teacher for my students.

With all this being said, I think back to my 8 completed years of teaching and realize I am not even close to being a veteran.  I'll explain in a moment. This is how I would describe or categorize the teaching stage I was in.

Year 1 - Floating Stage.....Basically, my backpack was empty. I went into the classroom with this ideal picture in my mind of what teaching was and what Miss Ely's classroom would look like. That picture in my mind was based on what I was taught in college and my experiences as a student teacher. The children sat and listened. They raised their hands. They were all reading on grade level. It was perfect. In reality, my first year was far from perfect. My students did none of the things I pictured. Students ran my classroom. I was exhausted. I spent many late nights in the classroom. I rearranged my room a hundred times. I called on colleagues to help me manage the room. I had bronchitis and laryngitis twice. I refused to take off because that meant I had to plan for a sub.  I was sinking quickly that first year. I did whatever I could do to stay above the water.....I was in the floating stage.

Year 2-3 - Experimental Stage - These are the two years that I walked into my classroom and refused to let my first year happen all over again. I would implement a teaching strategy, realize it didn't work, drop it, and implement something else. I continued to spend late nights in the classroom. But I wasn't floating anymore. Students were responding to what I was implementing. But I knew it wasn't enough. I had to do more. These were the two years when I became brave enough to try new things. Some failed, some didn't. But I was willing to experiment.

Years 4-8 - Evolving Stage - I have gained confidence at this point in my career. While I have had many changes in leadership, schools, and positions, I have spent and will spend many years in this stage perfecting and revising the craft I love so much. My learning does not stop here. Every year is different, therefore, I have to modify how I teach. I do not pull out my lesson plans from the year before. I create new lesson plans each year. I might do the same activities, but I may change the way I use them. I may develop a better way that challenges the students more than before.  I continue to evolve as a teacher.

What stage comes next? I have no idea. I hope that I stay in this stage for a little while. Evolving means that I am changing with the times, the new initiatives, the new students, and the new communities. I am changing as my environment changes. That's a good thing in my opinion.

As for being a "veteran" teacher?  I hope I can call myself a veteran as I sit down to retire in 30 years, and use what I have learned and know to teacher other inspiring, young teachers.

Here is a picture of my new "evolving" classroom in my new building. It will continue to change throughout the year to meet the students needs, just as I will.

The Classroom is Complete!

The classroom is complete!  As you know, there are three ESL teachers sharing two large classrooms this year. I come from the general education elementary classroom.  I have never had to share a space before and was a little unsure of how it would all work out.  After a week of working on the room, I'm really happy with how it turned out.

The first thing the three of us did was divide the room into thirds.  This way we all had our own space.  Then we used the furniture in the room as dividers.  We tried to build the "walls" as high as possible to give each of us a sense of privacy and our own room.  I didn't take pictures of the other two spaces yet. I'm just getting to know my ESL partners and didn't want to invade their space with my flashing camera.  They don't know how many pictures I take and how attached to my camera I am.......yet.

I took the middle space of the rooms.  I had to get a little creative with creating bulletin boards and spaces for student work.  In the picture above, I covered the back of the bookshelves with butcher paper.  I stuck on some border and taaah-da.......there is my alphabet wall.  The two tables in front of the alphabet wall will be used as a writing area/resource area.  The black bins are labeled with the days of the week. This is where I place all my materials that I will need for each day.  In addition, the bins serve as a resource for teaching students the days of the week.  I don't need a poster because I have my bins.  I love things that serve two or more purposes.  I'm also grateful I saved all of my wall hangings from when I taught first grade five years ago!  I'm now pulling it all back out!  If you notice the lower case letters are highlighted on the alphabet strip.  This is because students in first grade, should recognize and be reminded that they should always use lower case letters.  If they aren't doing it, they should be making the transition.

The blackboards are on a sliding system with tracks, kind of like sliding glass doors.  The blackboard is in pretty bad shape.  I'm not sure how often I will use it.  It might just become a space for me to hang posters and anchor charts.  I did add a border to make it more colorful and pretty.  The green carpet was from my third grade classroom.  I think I will do most of my teaching on the carpet.  I actually prefer to sit on the floor and teach in small groups.  I have my mini white boards and clipboards in bins next to the carpet since this is where I will use them most.

This space is where I placed my table so that I could work with small groups.  Do you see the chairs hiding underneath the table?  Gosh, I sit on them and my knees touch my chin!  I would probably be more comfortable kneeling at the table.  I have pretty long legs, so these chairs aren't great for me. I forgot how tiny K and 1 children are!  The large bookshelf on the bottom is covered with table clothes and stores all of the ESL curriculum materials.  We taped the table clothes on after the velcro wasn't really working.  Then we used thumb tacks because the tape wasn't working.  The thumb tacks did the trick.  My ESL partner purchased the table clothes at the Christmas Tree Shop for about $1.50 each.  I am thinking I might also want to cover the two tan bookshelves as well, but I am not sure with what or how. It's difficult to find a pattern and color that will work well with the pink.  The black piece of furniture is a filing cabinet with the drawers removed.  It's turned so the drawer openings are turned down.  This way both myself and my ESL partner have a magnetic board.

Finally, my desk area.  I have two bulletin boards.  They both extend outwards so that they can be larger, but I thought the square was enough.  The bulletin board to the side of my desk will be used as a space to post resources and information for myself.  The bulletin board behind my desk which currently has a few posters hanging will eventually be used to display student work.  The front of my desk has little cutouts of community helpers.  This will be important when I teach this unit.

This is my materials bin.  I will keep pencils, erasers, markers, crayons, highlighters, scissors, glue, and dry erase markers in here.  Where ever I happen to be working in the room, I can just pick up the materials bin and bring it with me.

How are your classrooms coming along?  Students are back to school on Monday.  I can't wait to meet my new, and wonderful ESL students!

The Complete Teacher Binder

Ok, so I wasn't happy with just the Teacher Binder Cover page.  I needed to add some more "organization" to it all.  Last night, I worked on adding the Divider Pages and Binder Tab Labels.  You can find it at my TPT store.  Check it out HERE.

Teacher Binder Cover Page

Teacher Binder Tab Labels

Teacher Binder Divider Pages

Teacher Binder Spine Labels

But don't worry, if you only want the Cover Page and Spine Inserts, you can still download them for free HERE.

I organize my Teacher Binder in a very easy way.  There are a few sections, and I only store the MOST important information that I will need whether I am sitting at my desk, in the teachers lounge, or working from home.

1. District Information - I keep all district calendars and dates of assessments here.  Anything I get from a professional development, I store in another folder elsewhere.  I might also keep important phone numbers within the district that I may need.
2. Schedule - I keep my classroom schedule in this section.  My students are pulled throughout the day for services, so I make a master schedule of this and place it here (You can find a picture of what this looks like below).  My Guided Reading group schedule is here.  I keep a master copy of the condensed schedule for Early Dismissal and Delays here. 
3. Medical Information - In the beginning of the year, I make a list of all students who have special medical needs.  I list their names and what their medical needs are.  
4. Class Roster - Do I need to explain this?
5. Pacing Guides - A copy of the state standards are placed in another binder. Here is where I store the pacing guides provided by the district.  This is the key for my lesson plans.
6. Lesson Plans - I store up to three weeks worth of lesson plans in the my binder.  Then I move them to a larger binder.  I don't want this binder, which I tend to take home with me every night, to become bulky.  
7. Substitute Information - In the past, teachers were responsible for securing their own subs. I kept a list of all the subs I liked to use with their phone numbers and e-mail addresses.  This year, my district is moving to an automated system.  I don't know much about it yet, but I will keep all phone numbers here.
8. Other - Anything that I may need but doesn't fit into one of the categories above, here is a space for it.

My Master Schedule - Listed are the students who are pulled out for services.

That's it!  Like I said, my binder is only 1 inch.  I keep just the essentials here.  I think it's important to weed out anything that you won't need on a daily basis or in an emergency.  

Let the Organizing Begin!

Heading back to school in two weeks means I am getting my folders, binders, and classroom organized. It's one of my favorite parts about back to school. I might have mentioned this before, but in another life, I would have been a professional organizer!

I'm moving in a few weeks, and I have already started packing. Packing up my apartment doesn't just mean placing things in boxes with bubble wrap. Oh no! It means grouping items, wrapping them neatly in newspaper, packing them tightly in a box, and (my favorite part) labeling the box where it should be placed in the new home. All the labels are color coded and placed on two specific places on the box. One label is placed on the side of the box right in the middle. The second is placed on the front of the box in the upper left hand corner. I also try to label what is in the box the best that I can. My office gets a yellow tag, living room is pink, bedroom is orange, basement is purple, attic is brown, closet is green, and kitchen gets a blue label. Then all of those boxes are stacked neatly in my living room and grouped by the colored label. I'm not kidding. Take a look (ALERT: Poor picture quality, taken with my "old school" iPhone 3GS).

As I prepare for the start of school, one item I have to get organized is my Teacher Binder. My Teacher Binder is everything to me.  Without it, I would be completely lost.  In my Teacher Binder, you will find my weekly lesson plans, a class roster, state/core standards, schedules, substitute registry information, medical information, etc.  This year I will be teaching ESL which will require me to pull groups of students from various classrooms throughout the day, so I know it will be critical for me to be organized and know exactly where I need to be and when.  I do not want to be "that" teacher who shows up ten minutes late to pick up her students.

As I work on my Teacher Binder, I will post the downloads to my TPT store. Here is the cover page for my binder this year.  You can find it HERE at my TPT store for free! I will ask that if you download the Teaching Binder Cover Page that you rate my product and leave some feedback.  It would be greatly appreciated!

Teacher Binder with a Jungle Theme

I also finished my desk today.  I really don't have much of a theme this year in my classroom.  I am just working on the classroom being extremely bright and stylish!  I hope you notice those beautiful Mod-Podge drawers in the background, and the Duct Tape project on my desk.

My Teacher Desk

I would love to hear how your organize your lesson plans and such.  Link up and leave some ideas below or on my Facebook page.  

Good luck to you as you start your school year!

And remember.........

The Back to School Unpacking

It was back to school for me today! I finally moved all of my belongings over to my new classroom in my new building. This year I will be a Cheston Elementary School Cougar. I will be teaching ESL this year. From what I understand, the building primarily uses a pull-out approach. There are three ESL teachers in the building, me being one of them.

The building is pretty old so there is no air conditioning. My nephew Donavin and I sweated it out in a 90 degree room. While I have been pretty spoiled over the past couple of years in a building that was completely gutted and renovated with A/C, I am kind of excited to get back to my "roots". My "roots" are Scott School in Harrisburg, PA. It's the kinda school with hot, humid, heat and critters that crawl around and might surprise you from time to time. It's the building where you don't bring any food into the room for fear it might be gone or nibbled on overnight.

The two other teachers and I are sharing two classrooms. The two classrooms have a divider that can be opened and closed as needed. We will keep the divider open and share these two large classrooms. We are pretty lucky to have such a large space. I have never shared a classroom before, so I am excited to see the results once we have it all set up. Here are the BEFORE photos.

Now, don't panic.  That's not all my stuff.  Remember I am sharing the room with two other teachers!  There is so much we can do with this space.  Wait for the AFTER photos!

Today, I worked on unpacking and putting things away in my desk. I wanted a desktop organizer.  When I went to Target, everything was silver, black, or tan.  Since I don't work in a business office, I wanted something with a bit more flavor.  For some reason, I am really into the bright colors this year.  It really isn't like me, but it's fun.  I've been wanting to do a project with duct tape, but I wasn't sure what.  Finally, something!  Donavin picked out the bright pink duct tape, and I picked out the lamp.  The lamp was my splurge item this year.  It wasn't a good deal, but it was on sale!

Duct Tape Project

What can you do with duct tape?