resources for teachers
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Cyber Monday Sale on TPT
Don’t you love my fourth grade school picture (1996)?! the worst part is, other than the bangs and much better sense of style, I don’t look all that different 🙂 I’m sharing this beautiful picture to let you know that Teachers Pay Teachers is hosting their annual Cyber Monday (and Tuesday) sale! I love to take a minute to share what’s on my TPT wish list with you, so here are the products that I can’t wait to add to my cart: I have been a huge fan of Erin Bradley designs for as long as I’ve been creating things for my classroom (long before I started me TPT store!)…
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Explaining Classroom Centers
As preschool teachers we spend a lot of time defending the importance of play. We know exactly how much learning is taking place in our activity centers during “free play” because we designed them specifically to encourage learning, social interaction, and inquiry. Parents and family members don’t always understand that. I designed these labels to identify the different types of learning that takes place in each center. Display them in a photo frame or attach them right to your shelf and parents can rad the brief description while waiting for their children to finish up their work. I wanted to share them with you, so I designed them in two…
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Evaluating your Environment
Every so often it’s a good idea to take an objective look at your classroom environment. Do you have everything in your room that you should have in your room? Are the children actually able to access the materials? Does the room feel warm and inviting, or is it a bit too cluttered and chaotic? It can be really difficult to be objective about your space, and that’s why I’m a fan of the Early Childhood Environment Rating Scale (ECERS-R). These have become a pretty popular tool in my state because programs are required to have a copy for our Quality Rating and Improvement System, but until recently I hadn’t actually…
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Friday Freebie: Evidence Checklist
Happy Friday! It’s that time of year when the weather is perfect and the last thing I want to do on the weekend is stay inside, so my goal is to be super productive today so that I can enjoy my weekend! Yesterday I shared some thoughts on informal assessment, and I mention using those observations as evidence for your formal assessments. Here is a freebie checklist to help you keep track of all of the evidence you need to collect – it’s pretty basic, but you can white out the fields if you want to personalize it to your own assessments. Download your copy here and enjoy your weekend…
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Preschool lesson plan webs
I use webs ALL OF THE TIME. Seriously, I’m a very visual person so it always helps when I can organize my ideas on a piece of paper. Once I can see it all in writing it seems to make more sense, and I am more likely to remember my ideas and thoughts. There are so many different ways to use brainstorming webs in the classroom; planning for themes or projects brainstorming activities that meet early learning standards planning for IEP or IFSP goals for specific children organizing ideas for classroom centers brainstorming ideas for special events and family activities The best thing about a web is that it can…
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Great autumn activities for centers
Autumn is a great season to explore in the classroom because there are so many natural materials the you can bring into your environment. This also means that it is really important to have other materials in your centers that are related to those natural materials. Here are some of my favorite autumn centers; Autumn vocabulary cards– These are great for reinforcing the new vocabulary words that students are learning. This set includes the words acorn, apple, leaf, corn, leaves, pumpkin, tree, orchard, squirrel, and turkey and are wonderful for a writing center. Acorn matching set – This set includes letter matching, number matching, and color matching, making it easy for…
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Systems for tracking anecdotal notes
Anecdotal notes are incredibly helpful, they provide evidence that shows which skills children have mastered, and which skills need additional practice. They also give teachers the opportunity to write down direct quotes from children, which can be insightful, hilarious, and adorable. Being able to access all of this information when it comes times for conferences is invaluable, and parents love to hear what their children have been up to. The main issues with anecdotal notes are; storing and organizing all of those random little notes remembering to write them in the first place When it comes to remembering to write them down, I’ve found that it works best if you…
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When Educators believe in each other
Have you seen the TED talk by the amazing Ms. Rita Pierson. It is powerful. She puts into words every single reason that most of us became teachers in the first place. This quote from her talk hits me to the core every single time that I read it; I fully believe that every child needs a person in their corner. A person who tells them they’re worth it, they can be great, and do amazing things. A self-fulfilling prophecy can be a powerful thing, when you tell someone that they are incredible enough times, they start to believe you. I will give that to any child in a heartbeat.…
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Sharing Positive Messages with Families
Kids do great things during the day - they share, they tell funny stories, they help without being asked, they melt our hearts with their sweet comments. In an effort to share these great moment with parents I created Happy Notes, which you can download for free! I really need to be better about sharing great stories with parents, so the idea behind Happy Notes is that you can write down something great right when it happens, then share the note with the child, and they can take it home and share it with mom and dad. These are a great way to reinforce positive behavior, and a perfect way to let…
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Back to School Products for the Preschool Classroom
It’s the end of July, I know, how did that happen?! I swear summer gets shorter every year! Many of you are preparing to head back to school (and if you haven’t started prepping, you’ve probably started thinking about it) so I thought I would share some of the things that I’ve created that might help you out this year – make sure to read the entire post because there are freebies throughout! Inspire Emergent Curriculum: This standards-based curriculum is perfect for programs that implement the Reggio Philosophy or the Project Approach. Circle Time Mega Pack: Start the year off right by implementing successful, developmentally appropriate circle time from…
