Baskets for Centers

I like to have many centers going on in my room all the time. I like for my students to freely move in the room, choosing which centers they want to practice. One thing I don't like is clutter in the room. This year, I am using these plastic baskets (found at Wal-Mart). My husband made the lids to fit so they won't slip off and they are strong enough for students and adults to sit on.

 

Everything is inside the basket that the students need to complete that station. Some students like to sit on the basket and others like to sit on the floor and use the basket and lid as a table. When they are finished, they put the supplies back in the basket, put the lid on and move on to another station. At the end of the day, my room is neat and the stations are ready for the next day!

 

Mummify the Teacher!

For the last 5 years, I have centered my room around a community/family feel. I don't use a traditional colored card or clip chart for behavior. For me, the same students were always singled out and they didn't take any ownership for their behavior/consequences. So instead, my students work on teams and encourage each other to make good choices. Those good choices are rewarded with tally marks for their team. To start off the year, I model encouragement and acceptable behavior for two weeks. At that point, each student pulls a colored piece of paper out of a bag and that determines what color team they are on. They move their desks together in a group. They stay on that team for 2-3 weeks. Since they are in teams, they definitely compete against each other. But I must say, even though they want to win, it is still amazing to me when someone will come up and tell me that someone from a different team deserves a tally mark on their paper. For example, someone helped tie their shoe, someone was nice and cheered them up, etc. At the end of 2-3 weeks, the winning team gets to do a fun activity with me. Sometimes we work together and sometimes we compete against each other. Many of the activities are "Minute to Win It" games. As the winning team plays the game with me, the rest of the class still gets to watch and enjoy the fun, but they do not get to do the activity. This week, each member of the winning team got a roll of toilet paper. In about 7 minutes, they had me completely wrapped in toilet paper and I looked like a mummy. It was SOOOO much fun!

 

Everyone picked another color out of the bag and the new teams will last for another 2-3 weeks!

Activity Board Organization

Now that we are in the month of October, my classroom is running so smoothly. Organization is key!! When using the activity boards, I display a new board each month. Each student has the bingo card in their work folder. If they want to complete a square that uses a specific paper, they go to the board, look at the number on the paper and then find the correct paper in the tray. Students then take that paper to their seats and complete it. They keep their completed paper in their "work folder" until I can check it and mark off their bingo card.

New to blogging!

Hi there! My name is Michelle. I'm a newbie when it comes to blogging. I love to read from other teachers, things that they have tried and neat ideas they share, so I thought I would give this a try! I have been teaching for 17 years and absolutely LOVE IT!! I taught kindergarten for 5 years and enjoyed it, but first grade is where I thrive! Watching students learn and absorb all the information I teach them is rewarded when that "light bulb moment" happens for each individual in my classroom!

One area I struggled with was differentiating throughout the day in all subject areas. I found myself struggling to find or create activities week after week, feeling overwhelmed and never caught up. Last year I implemented activity boards. These are boards that are displayed monthly in my room. The driving force of the activities are centered around a bingo card filled with activities that I want my students to complete. The activities range from easy to difficult to give students the opportunity to practice skills they need or to challenge and enrich those that are ready. Most of the time, my students will work on these during guided reading time, but they also can work on them if they finish their work early. I don't like "down time" for my students if I'm working with a small group or one-on-one, so this allows the students to take ownership in their learning deciding what they want to work on!

Activity Boards

If you are interested in trying these activity bingo cards in your room, hop on over to my TpT store! Thanks!