I though y'all would appreciate this... :)

Today two of my girls were having a little disagreement. We're working a lot on problem solving in our classroom, so I decided to just sit back and watch them work it out. I could see that they were not making any progress, so I started moving in their direction to help them. When I got there, I could see that one of the girls was getting pretty angry.

She stomped her foot on the ground, crossed her arms and shouted,


"If you keep on being mean like this, when you grow up...you...you...YOU WON'T GET IN TO A GOOD COLLEGE!"

I died.

I l.o.v.e. first grade. :) :) :)

WOO HOO!

I signed my contract for 2011-2012 today and am thrilled to report that I will be spending another year in first grade! I love this age and am SO happy to be staying. :)

On a sadder note, 8 teachers from our school did not have their contracts renewed due to budget cuts. Please keep these teachers and their families in your prayers and keep your fingers crossed for employment opportunities for each of them!

MeasuremANTS

Hey ladies,

We're about to start non-standard measurement, and I put together these little activities to help us practice. Selfishly, I put it on TPT (but still for FREE!) because I want to know how many people are downloading. :) Hope this is something you can use!

 

Download by clicking here. :)

What's better than a giveaway?

A double giveaway! Head on over to KindergartenWorks for a fantastic double giveaway co-hosted with DeeDee Willis!

...or don't go because I really want to win this one. ;)

You know you teach first grade when...

Love this linky party at

You know you teach first grade when...

1. You find more plastic coins than actual money in your pockets at the end of the day.
2. You know that the "s word" is not actually the "s word."
3. That song you can't get out of your head is probably from a Dr. Jean CD.
4. Where most might insert a four letter word, you use "bummer", even with your "grown-up" friends.
5. A Diet Coke (or coffee, if that's your drug of choice) is a necessity. And you know what a "three Diet Coke day" means. :)
6. No matter what my college Foods and Nutrition professor taught us, you know that sugar DOES affect behavior (so you may or may not scrape a little bit of the icing off of those ridiculous cupcake cakes...).
7. Every "a ha" moment makes up for that pair of Louboutins that's not in your closet.
8. You spend more time choosing a font/clip art than actually creating the activity or newsletter. 
9. You have yet to find something a first grade WON'T do for one Skittle. 
10. The best purchase you've made all year is a School Pro pencil sharpener.
11. You get compliments like this one...

Here goes nothing...!

Ok, friends. I've put together a mini-unit for spring. It has a math (money) game, a fraction center and a couple of writing templates. I have been SO inspired by the things that others are posting, I just had to head over to Scrappin Doodles and share in the creativity. Since this is my first attempt, I would love any feedback you have to give. Hope some of you can use it! Click here to download.

 PS - I'll probably be adding things to this all week. I just couldn't wait to put it up! :)

It was a sad day in room 113

One of our class pets died today. :(

We started the year with our little tadpole, Jacob, and two guinea pigs, Bella and Alice. (Yes, we named our class pets after Twilight characters. The kids actually chose Jacob and Bella on their own. I may have encouraged them to choose Alice for guinea pig #2...)

This morning, Bella died.

Thankfully, it happened before the kids got to school. And what did I do?


I lied.

I told the kids that I had a friend who was a teacher without a class pet and that her class was learning about animals just like we were. We all agreed that the pets helped us learn a lot about how to take care of an animal and that it was a good thing to let Bella join their class so that they could learn, too.

Question - Was I wrong? I know that death is a part of life, but I also know how attached they were to this little creature and how devastated they would be to know she died. Would you have told the truth? Or would you have created a happier story, too?