End of the Year Prep Ideas

The end of the school year buzz has already begun. Whether you have a week or several weeks left of school, the warm, summer sun and lazy summer days are quickly approaching! And believe me, I am counting down the days until I can enjoy it!

I always like to spend some time, at the end of the year, prepping for the new school year that awaits. I know some of you are just surviving this year, however, I tend to enjoy my time off in the summer when I know some of the prep is already complete!

The following ideas are just a few suggestions of things that work for me. I hope you can take one or two of the ideas away with you and ease your way back into the classroom in the fall.

1.

Copy School Forms 

I always take the time to copy all my Back To School forms, which I will send home the first week of school. I put them in my file cabinet and label a folder "First Week of School". This helps me find them easily and I spend less of my summer standing at the copy machine when school is headed back into session.

2.

Bind Books

I also spend some time preparing my "what do I do when I am done?" books. These B.A.T. books from Lucky To Be In First are an awesome fast finisher resource. I take time at the end of the year to copy and bind a class set of books. I use her first grade book as review skills at the beginning of the year. Then I use the second grade book for the second semester until the end of the year as review of the second grade skills I have taught. I used a Book Creator heat binding machine to quickly seal the published books...into my closet they go for the new school year!

3.

Create Labels

 I make sure to create as many of my generic labels ahead of time. I can't put the kids' names on anything just yet, but I can make my folder labels and stick them on. Here I have my unfinished work, writing folder, and warm up folder labels already printed and stuck on the front of a class set of folders. All I have to do in the fall is add their name stickers!

4.

Prep Interactive Notebooks

I LOVE using interactive notebooks in my classroom. But my little second graders need lots of help learning how to organize themselves. I make sure to prep their interactive notebooks by putting on the cover and adding standards tabs so they know where to glue the pages they are working on. Everything is color coded and labeled so there is little room for error. I also glue an envelope to the inside cover for small pieces that may not get glued if time runs out.

5.

Copy Morning Warm Up Pages

The first thing my students do in the morning, when they arrive to class, is to turn in their homework and put their personal items away. When they are done, they take out their warm up folder from their desk and complete one page in their printing/sight word packet and their daily review page. This gives me time to deal with morning business and my students are all engaged (for the most part). I like to have these pages copied and stapled ahead of time.

6.

Prepare Supply Boxes

I like my students to have individual supply boxes. I know many of you feel otherwise or have a different system. BUT I like everyone to have their own supplies and take ownership and responsibility for them. There are some supplies we share such as glue and scissors. The basic items (crayons, pencils, glue stick, erasers etc.) are kept in their own boxes. I like to reinforce the boxes with our duck tape of our school colors and mascot's paws! I personalize the boxes in the fall with each student's name.

7.

Create A Countdown Chain

This isn't really an idea to help you prep your classroom for the new school year. It is however, a really fun way to get your current students excited for the next grade. I created a paper cloud and attached color paper chains for each of the days we have left in school. I usually do this for the last 2 or 3 weeks of school. At the end of the day, one student gets to tear the bottom chain off. You can number the chains, write a memory from the year on each one and have a student read it at the end of the day....the ideas are endless. You can grab your grade level cloud HERE for FREE! 

Thanks for stopping by. I hope you can grab a few ideas to use to help you prepare ahead of time and give yourself some well deserved downtime during your summer break! 

How Do You Plan?

Jessica over at Mrs. Stanford's Class is hosting a linky about planning. I had to join this linky because planning is in my blood. I don't know any other way to do things (OK, a bit of an exaggeration). But really, I love to plan and planning is what I do well. I am always thinking ahead to the next thing. Planning during the school year is a complicated task though. There are so many variables that get into the way: assemblies, music, art, computer lab, P.E etc. I think it is important to be flexible but the most important thing is to have a solid road map to take you on the journey. Here are a few ways that I plan during the school year.

1. My Team Partner:

My team partner and I are like peas and carrots (Forrest Gump reference here!!). We bounce all our ideas off one another. Once a week we sit down and physically plan out our following week. We check in with one another to see how the kids are responding to the lessons, if we are meeting all our goals and discuss any changes we need to make. 

2. District Pacing Plans and Guidelines 

My day to day lesson plans are guided around our district pacing plan. It provides a framework to work from and helps me make sure I am teaching all the necessary standards. What is also great about it, is that I can check off the standards as I teach and assess them to make sure I have covered all of them. This summer, I created a grade level check list of all the Common Core Standards for ELA and Math. Since common core is new, I want to make sure I am teaching all of them. The pictures show how I am using the checklist in my lesson plan book and an example of one of the ELA checklist pages. I have created them for kindergarten through fifth grade. You can grab your grade level checklist HERE.

3. Lesson Plan Book

This is my go-to resource! In this binder I keep my monthly calendars, daily lesson plans and my Common Core Checklists. It is everything I need to plan, all in one place!

On my monthly calendar, I write in important assessment dates and any events that may interfere with our "regular" schedule so that I can adjust my lesson planning. 

I also have a detailed lesson plan for each day. I have completely changed how I view my lesson plans this year. Before now, I always hand wrote in my weekly plans in a planner I found at a local teacher store. Don't ask why...I just don't think I knew any better. I decided that this year I was going to make my own template and type them out. I saw so many ideas and versions on Pinterest and other blogs and this is what I came up with.

The biggest change for me, is that my daily lesson plans are on one sheet of paper, instead of all 5 days on 2 pages. I have planned out the first two weeks of school and so far I like the way it is working. I can add lots of details and still have room to write in last minute changes and ideas. 

That's it in the planning department for now. I hope all of you are having a great start to your planning and getting organized for this school year! 

Don't forget the BIG TpT Back to School Sale happening right now! There are huge discounts on lots of amazing products! Go shopping and get all those wishlist items you have been wanting. Everything is 20% off in my store!

School Calendar and Lesson Planner

I am always up for improving things and finding better ways of getting things accomplished. I am however, way behind the times with my school calendar and lesson planning technology. I have always had my yearly calendar and lesson plans in a spiral notebook that I find at a local teacher store. That means, I have been HAND writing everything! Not this new school year. What a concept to have your calendar and lesson plans typed on the computer. I have no idea why this concept did not enter my brain sooner. I am so grateful to all the blogs I follow and shops online that have helped me get ideas to make this work for me.

My first WOW moment was when I read Leslie's post at Kindergarten Works about her binders and and saw her calendar template. She has so many ideas and great advice about organization and planning. I took her idea and created something I think will work for me. I think it is all a work in progress, so I will have to see how it goes. But, I am super excited about trying it!

I couldn't stop at just having my school calendar on the computer, now I am working on tweaking and adjusting templates for my lesson planning. I have always had all 5 days of the week across two pages. However, I was searching TpT for some ideas and came across Nicole Shelby's template from Teaching With Blonde Ambition at TpT. Her lesson plans are all on one page for each day. At first I wasn't sure I could make the switch from seeing all 5 days at once, but I took the plunge and I am going to try it. I will post pictures of my final products once make all the adjustments.

What do you use for your yearly calendar and lesson planning? I would love to hear your ideas.
-Jaime