Currently October

Whoooo-hooooo it's already October! So crazy how fast time goes by! As I have been for the last few months, I'm again participating with Farley's Currently. I am once again so happy to share and link up with fellow bloggers!

To anyone who doesn't usually read blogs - if you look on Farley's page that I've linked - you will find literally 100's of teaching blogs to read. This Currently link-up is how I have gotten the few followers that I have and how I've found great teachers to network with from all over the country! You should definitely check it out....after you read my blog and follow me! : )

Listening to Jason Aldean

I'm not sure why I love this song so much, but I *super* love it! I listen to it almost every day on the way to work (well, that may be because I only have like 12 songs on my iPhone. I can't get it to connect to wifi, so I don't have much of my music...). But anyways, this song is awesome. 

Loving teaching Words Their Way to Kinders

Yesterday and today were my first days teaching in kinder with Ms. Optie at my school. I feel so grateful that she's letting me try out this word study program with her class...Thank you, Melinda! We are starting her whole class off with the very first sort of the Alphabetic Spellers book, and we are working on the sounds /b/, /m/, /r/, and /s/. I'm planning on blogging about it more after this week, but we did vocabulary and cutting yesterday and then did our first sort today. It was so awesome to hear the..."mm, mm, mop" and "rrr, rrr, ring" echoing through the room as they constructed connections between letters and sounds.

Here's one girl's list of words that start with the /s/ sound:

Notice circles. While it makes the sound /s/, it doesn't follow the pattern for how we write it, so we called it an "oddball." Sophie was totally okay crossing it off her list because of the different pattern it followed. Great learning happening, all with Sophie's thinking as a starting place!

Thinking about all the great things going on around our building...

In addition to Words Their Way in Kinder, a second grade teacher grabbed me today to show me her Daily 5 Lesson: Three Ways to Read a Book. I went in to see the kiddos - all totally engaged with their partner, either reading words, pictures, or retelling the story. This is the kind of thing that gives me goosebumps. Is that lame?

In third grade, I've been invited to coteach the writer's workshop on a pretty regular basis. We finally moved from the rehearsal phase of the process to drafting and modeled the Receive the Piece conferences today in class. I love Writer's Workshop and love that this particular class invites me so often, because I'm totally building relationships with kids (my most fave part of teaching!)

And finally...first grade. As a middle school teacher and with technology, I took so much for granted. I could tell middle school kids, "Oh, just go to google." or, "Please email that info to me." In first grade, it's quite different....

You have to build background. Like - what a website is. They need to be taught where to type the website link (in the URL, of course!) They need to look at all the letters mixed up on the keyboard to find them to type the page they're trying to reach.

The first grade teachers on my campus are AWESOME! The management is impeccable and the kids know exactly what to do to to get logged in, and get to a website like Starfall. The first graders I saw today were patient, helpful, and so so great, and nothing marks great management like a group of kids who know exactly what to do. So, so impressed!

Seriously, so so good!

Wanting Grad School to be finished!

Wait, what? I'm only 4 or 5 weeks into a two year program?

I'll put it this way: It's really interesting what I'm learning about Supervision and the Organizational Analysis of managing a school of teachers. (No, I'm being totally serious.) But then I have to go write all these papers and remind myself how to cite sources correctly using APA format. And I never finish my work on the weekend, so then I'm working in the evenings on Mondays and Tuesdays. And allll I really wanting to be doing? Watching Netflix, writing on my blog, and thinking about what pictures I'm going to put on my Christmas card this year. (Yes, I'm already planning!) Not even sure I even want to be a principal, but I've already begun, and I'm not the kind of girl who is a quitter, so I must continue. Blahhh.

PS - Let's be real: I'm definitely not losing sleep over grad school. I love sleeping!


Needing a few more yoga mats.

Have you been to yoga? Have you been to hot yoga? Well, I love it. Like... love, Love, LOVE it. No matter how busy I am or how stressed I feel about getting work done, if I go to yoga, I always come out feeling way better, even though I may have given up an hour I could have been 'doing homework.' (I use the term doing homework very loosley...what I'm more than likely doing is reading blogs, reading facebook, shopping online...anything but doing homework.)

But, I digress.

Okay so in hot yoga, it's hot. Like super hot. Well, depending on the girl who runs the show though. The Monday night teacher has got that place on fire, but I've been on Thursday nights a few times, and I'm in there wondering when she's going to turn the heat on.

I seriously lol at the pictures I find for my blogs : P

But, I digress....again.

So I have an older yoga mat, and in hot yoga you get so sweaty that you slip on those things. Have your shins ever sweated? (Is sweated a word? omg. It's late and I'm getting loopy.) You basically just get super sweaty everywhere, including your hands and feet, so you have to buy these towels to go over your yoga mat or you'll slip right off.

I have two. They're both dirty. Now, I know some people (ahem...you know who you are!) who would probably just get the towels out of the dirty clothes and use them again, but I would hope that under these conditions she would not. I can't do it. They get so sweaty, they need a good wash.

So, I'm in need of a few more of those towels. Or, a new apartment that has a washer and dryer in the unit and I don't need to go to the creepy basement with quarters to pay to use it. 

I know, I know. First world problems. But hey - it's what I need!

So corny, and I LOVE it!

A Trick for Words Their Way:

As I mentioned above, I started Words Their Way with Kinder. Well, with six or seven kids sitting together around a table, all using the same picture sort, it's quite possible...no, probably a certainty, that their little picture cards would get mixed up. So, in order to know whose cards are whose, each child at the table has a different color. We write the child's name in color on the front, and then put stripes on the back with the same color. That way, if Jada (purple) gets her pictures mixed up with Joey (green) they can look to the back to know whose is whose!


Looking back on September...
And just to follow up...Last month I mentioned how I was going to Chicago in White in September. Well, we went and it was super fun! Some people went totally nuts creating crazy big centerpieces and whatnot, but my friends and I just brought some food and had great conversation. Here's a few pics from the night:

The ceremonious twirling of the dinner napkin to mark the beginning of dinner...

So fun to dress up! Here's Liz and I:

Our cake before....

And after:

(Red velvet....delicious!)

A picture the whole group... Liz, Anita, (me), and Diana

Anyways, September was a great month and I'm looking forward to October. Really excited for Halloween! My costume involves rainbow striped tights and my cousin said she'd be my sidekick. Can't wait to share about that next month. What are you all being for Halloween?

And....the next Currently will be on my birthday! So excited!

Happy October, blogosphere!