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Monday, July 27, 2015

#picturebookaday CHALLENGE!

I was first inspired by Literacy for Big Kids blog post and her experience with #nErDcampMI. She listened to a speaker by the name of Jillian Heise (follow Jillian on twitter). She reads a picture book a day in her middle school Language Arts classroom! How INCREDIBLE is that?!?!

I started doing my research with Jillian and her website and twitter and ended up finding her presentation that she did at #nErDcampMI (link here) and I became inspired! I am going to do the #bookaday challenge this year in my sixth grade room!

I am going to post the book each day on my markerboard and then after we have read the book, I am going to add it to the wall that will have all the books that we have read for the WHOLE YEAR! Imagine how much reading my kiddos will hear? Imagine how many literacy ideas I can teach them just through picture books! I AM SO EXCITED AND I CAN'T WAIT TO START!

I currently have 175 student days so I am going to set my board up for that!

Here are some freebies so that you don't have to create them too!! 

Picture Book a Day Hashtag
Picture Book Wall Display Dates
Picture Book Wall Display Title

Some of the books I plan on reading to my kids at the beginning of the year:
  • A Perfectly Messed-Up Story by Patrick McDonnell
  • My Teacher is a Monster! by Peter Brown
  • This is Not My Hat by Jon Klassen
  • Sam & Dave Dig a Hole by Mac Barnett
  • A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to School by Davide Cali
  • The Bear Ate Your Sandwich by Julia Sarcone-Roach
  • I Didn't Do My Homework Because... by Davide Cali
  • I Want My Hat Back by Jon Klassen
  • The Adventures of Beekle: The Unimaginary Friend by Dan Santat 
  • Bot + Bot by Ame Dyckman
  • Ninja! by Arree Chung
  • Picture Day Perfection by Deborah Diesen
  • What do you do with an Idea? by Kobi Yamada
  • Little Red Writing by Joan Holub
  • The Day the Crayons Quit by Drew Daywalt

Steps to Picture Book Success (And don't think I have all the answers--I haven't even tried it yet!)
1. Choose Picture Books you would like to read! (Jillian Heise presentation has great ideas)
2. Decorate your picture book wall!
3. Make a student version so the students can keep track of their favorites! E-mail me at snapshotsofsixthgrade@gmail.com if you would like my copy!
4. READ!!! :)

Follow my instagram at snapshotsofsixthgrade to see our #picturebookaday so you can continue to get ideas and feedback! 

ASSESS ME! Get to know ME Linky!

Don't you ever want to know more about the people behind the blog? Well here you go! Thanks to the Tattooed Teacher Blogger and her link up!
Enjoy! Link up with The Tattooed Teacher!



Saturday, April 25, 2015

Got Technology?

Happy Saturday!

I just spent the last two days LEARNING, LEARNING, and LEARNING! I was able to attend NETA, which is our HUGE technology conference in Nebraska.

It is so inspiring to hear everyones' stories about how they use technology in their classroom. I was truly amazed at all the new technology tools that I had NO IDEA about.

I have compiled a google doc for myself to use with all the new tools I learned about on. I am not an expert on any of these tools and plan to experiment with them this year. I am lucky enough to be at a school that is going 1:1 chromebooks next year so I will really enforce all of these this next school year after I have more time to work with them this summer. Feel free to use any of these ideas and try them in your classroom!

New Technology Tools Google Doc

Some of my favorite technology tools I use already in my classroom are: Kahoot, Zondle, Nearpod, Plickers, ClassDojo, and Google Classroom. Feel free to ask me any questions about those tools!

Monday, April 20, 2015

Best teacher moment in a while....





If you haven't seen this movement of "What I wish my teacher knew" go viral, you first need to watch the video below.

What I Wish My Teacher Knew CNN

If you have seen it and you haven't tried it in your classroom, do it tomorrow.

With this being my first year of teaching, my brain is already running 500 mph trying to figure out every possible thing I can do to make my students' sixth grade year the best year yet. Today about ten minutes before class, I remembered this article that I read on Facebook a couple of nights before and decided to add an impromptu lesson. I just simply printed out small sheets of paper that said, "I wish my teacher knew....", handed them out, explained what I wanted them to do, played some peaceful music, and sat back. What happened in the next moments is as amazing as this teacher from Colorado described. I wish I had done this earlier in the year. I learned so much about my students reading this notes after class from joyous moments to moments that my heart just broke for them.

We see our students on a daily basis and sympathize for them, but I think so much we think, "they are at school now, they are here to learn". In all reality, they have so much on their chest and we need to know it and they are not just going to tell us.

I am going to step into my classroom and teach with a different heart tomorrow knowing these tidbits about my students.

They have officially grabbed more of my heart......

Saturday, April 18, 2015

First post!

I am so excited to have my first blog post! This has been a dream of mine ever since I started teaching in August and now it is reality!

A little bit about myself: I graduated from a small town high school in 2010 and headed to UNL to pursue a degree in education. I knew from a young age, that I always wanted to be a teacher and I know that I was exactly right now! I always thought I would have wanted to teach sixth grade and I found that when I was student teaching that it was exactly where I wanted to be. I ended up landing my dream job in a beautiful school teaching sixth grade working with amazing colleagues!

I hope that you see some "snapshots" of what my life is like in sixth grade and what activities I do to help engage my students everyday. I teach a variety of levels of students so I have a wide variety of activities I do.

Thanks so much for following my journey! I hope you enjoy a snapshot of sixth grade :)

Also follow my journey on instagram : snapshotsofsixthgrade