First Day!

Our first day of school was today and I have a great group of kids.  It was only a half day, but I am exhausted.  Another half day tomorrow then a full day on Wed.  Whew!  Time to get back in the swing of things (and to Sonic for their $1 large Diet Cokes! Mmmm caffeine!)  Here are a few pics of my classroom.  For the coconut tree, I have some great friends who own a printing shop.  They gave me the end rolls of the vinyl they use.  Then I cut the leaves and had my WONDERFUL (6'5") husband hang them from the ceiling.

Take Home Folders

Every day the children in my class have take home folders.  I use frogs for my classroom theme, so our folders are F.R.O.G.S. (Fully Responsible and Growing Students).  This is not original, buy I'm not sure where I got the idea.  Here are the labels I use (2"x4").  This year I have poly folders, so I'm not sure how well the labels will stick.  I will report back.

froglabels[1]

Back to School Ideas

My mind is starting to think about crayons, folders, games, letters, numbers ... it must be back to school time.  Here is one of my favorite links for back to school ideas.
Mrs. Nelson's Class
She has some great ideas for the first day of school.  I use her survival kit during our open house.  I include a laminated picture of me on a little business sized card that says "This is my teacher Mrs. Long."  It helps the kids on the first day remember that I'm that nice lady they met a few days ago.

I also use her classroom management system.  It is similar to the green, yellow, red system except it uses frogs staying on a lily pad.  The kids love it and they work very hard to keep their frog on the lily pad.  At the end of the year I send the magnet home and parents have told me they use it on their refrigerator for behavior management.  Here's a picture from her site.


 Here is the link for her classroom management page. Mrs. Nelson Classroom management