Holiday Gift Ideas!

Gift giving is something I truly enjoy. I LOVE the challenge of finding the perfect gift for someone I care about. The thing I HATE, is the pressure of finding 900 perfect gifts for everyone I care about in a one month period. It stresses me out! 

To help everyone's stress levels go down this holiday season, I thought I would share some of my gift giving ideas. Some I have already used and a few are on my list for this year!

Family Gift Ideas:
I am always looking for memorable gifts my students can give to their families for the holidays. These adorable salt and flour snowman ornament were loved by all my families. I had a school volunteer come in and help the students form the noses and round faces. I took the snowman home and baked them to dry them quicker. The next day, the kids painted them and we added ribbon.

Paint Stick Snowman Ornaments:
All you need are paint sticks, google eyes, scraps of material, black and orange paint, raffia, and ribbon.

Student Gift Ideas:

Snowman Soup

And of course, use your bonus points to get a Scholastic Book for each student.

Co-Worker Gift Ideas:

Rudolph Chapsticks

Mistle "Toes"

Teacher Gift Ideas:

 A personalized gift for your child's teachers is simply awesome. Last year, I ordered these wooden pencil signs for my own children's teachers and my student teacher. They were a hit! I just placed my order for this year too!

Tallahassee Sunday Pencil Signs

Gobblin' Up Main Ideas and Details

 Today, I am sharing a fun and festive way to review main idea and details in your classroom.

 I am always teaching and reteaching main idea and details to my kiddos throughout the year. Seems like they can never get enough practice with this skill. Any way I can change it up and make it seem like a fun thing to learn, then I am "all over it!" Since Thanksgiving is just around the corner, I decided to merge turkeys and main idea together for this review lesson. 

The kids worked in partners with a short passage. Some were informational text. Some were fictional text. On their white boards, they wrote what they thought the main idea and details from the story were. Next, they shared their ideas out to the other partners at their table. Finally, they made their turkeys.

The kids wrote the main idea on the body of the turkey. Then, they chose 4 important details to write on each of the feathers and assembled their turkeys. I displayed them with the common core standards for my grade level .

If you would like a festive way to review main idea and details with your kiddos, you can grab this activity for FREE by clicking on  the link below.

Gobbling Up Main Idea and Details FREEBIE

Parent Conference Tips & Tricks

I survived! Yes, I really did. I just wrapped up two full weeks of parent‑teacher conferences. Two weeks. I know that sounds wild, but hear me out — because there’s a reason I do it this way, and why I’ve actually come to look forward to conference time.

I’ll be honest: I used to dread conferences. Not only did I have to finish every single report card (which we all know takes HOURS… sometimes DAYS), but then I’d sit down with each family and basically reread the entire report card to them. I hated that routine. It felt repetitive, stressful, and honestly not very meaningful. Something had to change.

So our school shifted the process: We meet with parents before report cards go home. That means no surprises for families and a much more productive conversation for everyone involved.

I schedule my conferences across two weeks, and each one is just 15 minutes. Yes — 15 minutes! It’s absolutely possible to keep things personal, focused, and helpful within that time frame. And spreading them out keeps me sane. Instead of cramming 10 conferences into one day and feeling rushed, I usually have 2–3 a day. Some days I have more, some days none at all, but the spacing makes a huge difference in my stress level. 

To streamline everything, I created a conference binder that holds every single thing I need. No more scrambling for forms, rewriting notes, or digging through piles on my desk. Everything is organized, accessible, and ready to go.

And this form — THIS ONE RIGHT HERE — is the best thing that ever happened to my conferences. It’s a simple checklist with space for quick notes, and it takes about five minutes to complete. Five minutes! Yet it gives a clear snapshot of what’s happening with each student both academically and behaviorally. I make a copy for parents so they can jot down notes, and I keep one for myself. This checklist is the heart of our conversation.

I also use a conference reminder form to help cut down on missed appointments. All my masters and copies live in plastic sleeves inside my binder so I can grab them instantly.

I keep a sign‑in sheet for documentation — one copy for me and one for my admin. And if a parent signs up but doesn’t show, I send home a quick “missed conference” note. I don’t need it often, but it’s nice to have ready.

Grab your editable conference binder pages HERE:

Get your conferences started off in the right direction with these forms. Click on the picture below to grab your FREE copy. 

Once everything is organized and in one place, conferences feel so much more manageable. Truly. Having a system gives me confidence walking into each meeting, and it helps parents feel supported and informed.

I hope these tips help you feel ready to tackle your own conference season head‑on. You’ve got this!

Candy Corn FREEBIE!

Super quick post tonight. I wanted to share a fun little freebie with all of you.

We are finishing up our review of singular and plural nouns this week. I wanted a quick assessment I could use to also display in our classroom. A few minutes later these little guys were born! HA!

Each student chose a noun. The noun could be regular or irregular. Then, they wrote the plural of that same noun. 

Finally, they used the plural noun in a sentence. Some students chose to write two sentences using the singular and plural form. When they were done, they cut it out and we put them up in our classroom!

Grab a copy of this freebie activity by clicking HERE! Enjoy!

Scarecrows and Pumpkins: Time for Fall

I am SO excited that October is finally here! It is my favorite season! The weather is still very warm here, but sweaters, boots, and scarves are on the horizon, my friends! As soon as it is humanly possible, I bring Fall into my classroom.

 Last week, I introduced acrostic poetry to my students. I started off by reading one of my favorite fall stories.

This got my kiddos hooked! Then I introduced how to use a thesaurus. The kids worked in pairs to come up with words that described a scarecrow. Next, we made a chart of all the words and phrases that described a scarecrow using the letters in the word. 

After we wrote our poems, it was time to build our scarecrows!

The kids took so much pride and ownership into following the directions and building the perfect scarecrow. Too darn cute! I don't have a lot of bulletin board space, so here are their scarecrow masterpieces hanging from the ceiling. You can find all the scarecrow templates and writing ideas in my Scarecrow Craftivity and Writing Prompts pack.

I also did my first directed drawing lesson of the year with my kiddos. I was looking on Pinterest and found this little gem. When I went to the website, it did not take me to the actual lesson. I hunted around, but I used the pinned picture for directions instead because I needed to make a sample before the kids came into the classroom and time was running out! 

Step 1: We used pencils to sketch the drawing step-by-step. This allowed for mistakes to be erased, since this was their first drawing of the year. Then, we used black felt tip markers to trace over our lines.

Step 2: I showed the kids how to shade using different colors of yellow and orange.

Step 3: Color the background sections using solid colors or with patterns. We used crayons this time. Oil pastels and water colors would also be great to use.

I mounted them on black paper so they would POP! Viola! I think they turned out marvelous!

I love these lessons because it forces my students to listen and follow directions. It helps them with their fine motor skills and introduces them to different types of art and art mediums. They are so proud of themselves when they are done. This will be the first piece that goes into their art portfolio for the year!