ACE Those Short Answers!

Hello everyone!

Well, we have been "sort-of" back in the swing of things! We had 5 days off last week and I caught up on a bunch of stuff around my house! We went back to school Monday and it was great to finally get going again.... only to be out Tuesday and Wednesday due to dangerously cold temperatures, like -15 with the wind chill! Poor babies can't be out at the bus stop in that! YIKES!

I did spend the last two days at SCHOOL working on a grant with some other people! So I haven't been able to work on all this jazz so much lately!

BUT, that all changed tonight! :)

In third grade, it is the first year we do KPREP, which is Kentucky's standardized state testing. Third grade is responsible for testing in only Reading and Math. They have to do multiple choice and short answer questions.

Multiple choice is not the struggle--- it's those DARN short answer questions! They have such a time trying to get them answer COMPLETELY.

So, we have been using this acronym, ACE...... however, I changed it to be ACED. You'll see why in my explanation of each letter!

So, it stands for:

A- answer the question
C- cite your evidence
E- explain your answer
D- double check your response

See why I added that D? :) So many kids finish and then move on, never checking their work which is a habit that I desperately try to break them of!

So, I decided I needed some "cutesy" posters to hang in my room to remind my students of this acronym when working on short answer questions.

TADA!!! Posters for the classroom! I made a set with owls and a set without owls! (I am aware not everyone is an owl fanatic like me lol) I love them and think they are super cute!

If you would like a set for your classroom, head over to my TPT store and download a copy here! :)

We have to go back to school tomorrow! I am actually excited and ready to teach these plans... we have been working on the same set of plans for about 3 weeks now, so I am OVER it, ready to teach, and move on to some new stuff! 

Brit :)

Group Tub Re-vamp!

Hey everybody!

Another *snow day* here! I have already called off school again for tomorrow so it looks like we're going to have only one they've school this week! I'm not really that mad about it- I mean, we got like 3 inches of snow and the temperatures are brutally cold! I'd rather have kids be home than standing at the bus stop!

However, the days off have been giving me a lot of time to work on stuff for my classroom! I had decided to move my kids out of their four desk groups and give pairs a try. My kids are heading into the "we all know each other too well and all we want to do is talk" phase of the year!

So, I bought some mini tubs at Dollar Tree- 2 for $1!

And I made these cute labels! I printed them on card stock and then laminated them! Seriously, on a side note, I got a small laminator a couple of months ago to use for part of this math grant I've been a part of. I have had to laminate a lot of stuff. BEST INVESTMENT EVER. I love it and I got mine at Walmart for like $25 dollars. It's worth it people.

So then I cut them out and attached them with Velcro to the little tubs. LOVE THEM! I can't wait to try them out with my kids hopefully on Friday but who knows! Here's the finished product:

Hopefully you will enjoy these too! If you want to pick up a set for your room, check out my TPT store Here!

Check back later- I'm putting together a "I have, Who has" game my friend created AND working on some ACE posters for my classroom!

Britt

Word Work

Good Evening everyone!

We had a *snow day* today and they have already called off school for tomorrow..... I am not even ashamed to say I am happy!

I spent the whole morning cleaning and "putting back together" my living room after the whole pipe-bursting debacle. Then I got to spend some time cleaning out my school bag and purging about 100 papers. How does it always end up in there? :)

Then I decided to start on the first of a few projects for school/my TPT store!

The first thing I decided to re-vamp was my choice board for Words Their Way. I wasn't really happy with what I had changed to after Christmas Break (shocking, just two weeks.... ughhhh), so I decided to make some changes and now I am super happy about it!

It has 9 fun activities for the kiddos to do with their sort for the week. They *MUST* complete three but there are some added incentives for completing more. I was finding that there was too much off-task time during this, so I thought maybe a few more activities to choose from would help. Also, instead of me just dictating 3 things to do, they have some choice in the matter! :)

 

Pick this up in my TPT store HERE. So I am hoping to try it out THURSDAY when we go back to school! Shew, a two day week- that will be fun! Check back later for more stuff! 

Britt

Fraction Pizza Update!

Hey y'all!

Well it's been a hot minute since I last posted! I was unfortunate enough to have a pipe burst in my townhouse when we were having all that frigid cold weather... womp womp womp.

That was 12 days of ZERO fun and a completely torn apart house!

I just wanted to share though how those Pizza Fractions turned out! And let me tell you, not only did my kids get a great review of fractions, they had a blast designing their own pizzas! Check them out:

 

I think they looked GREAT and they had such a good time planning them out! If you want to pick up a copy of the template to make the pizzas and the cards to tell you what to make, you can get them in my TPT store here: Fraction Pizzas!

If you want to check out my whole Fraction Unit, these are included in there as well as:

-Sequencing the Steps to making a Pizza

-Types of Resources (Natural, Capital, Human) need to have a pizza company

-Elapsed Time Pizza Word Problems

-Fractions Pizzas (shown above!)

You can get that unit in my TPT store here: Pizza Mini-Unit

And go ahead and follow my TPT store- you never know when new stuff will be added!

Have a great night y'all! 

Brit

 

P.S. Thanks to Kenz for my super cute tag! :) You should go check out her blog and her TPT store: Webster's Little Dictionary ! She's got great stuff too! :)

Pizza Fun!

Well, I can't thank everyone enough for their support!

I posted my first product last night and less than 24 hours later, it has been downloaded over 20 times. That's crazy! That just goes to show you that this could be great! And it motivates me to want to crank out some more stuff to add to my store! :)

We are doing a review/wrap-up of economics this week.... well the next 3 days! In the past we have gone to Cici's Pizza and they done a great little economics lesson with the kids and let them make their own pizzas. They were no longer offering this to schools, which is sad because we loved it, so we took matters into our own hands. We decided to review resources and making a pizza as an entrepreneur, as well as some fun math review with the pizza theme.

One of the things I created was the these Pizza Fraction Cards. The cards have different "recipes" for a pizza broken down into fractions and the students will have to draw the pizza correctly on the recording sheet. It seemed like a  fun idea and when looking for something, I couldn't find exactly what I wanted so I just created it! I also made a sequencing worksheet for the steps to making a pizza and some elapsed time word problems dealing with pizzas. We are going to be brainstorming types of resources needed to make a pizza and then finishing with making our own pizzas! Going to be a fun little unit if I say so myself! I may post the other activities to my TPT store later, but this was enough for one day! :)

Pick up your copy HERE:  Fraction Pizza Fun and be sure to follow me so you can see when I add new products!

I'll take some pictures of the kids finished products once we have done the activity :)

Now I must go eat, shower and get ready for school tomorrow! YIKES! 18 days of winter break and back to school at normal time tomorrow is going to be rough- but I'll be glad to see my kiddos! :)

Britt

Well, here goes nothing!

Hey y'all!

Not really sure how to start this off, so I think I will just wing it!

If you don't know me, my name is Brittney Sanderson and I am a 3rd grade teacher in Kentucky! This is my 6th year teaching and I love it. I truly feel like there are people who are meant to be teachers and I am one of them! :) I got my bachelor's degree in Elementary Education from the University of Kentucky- GO CATS! I got my master's degree from the University of the Cumberlands, as a Reading and Writing Specialist. I am *gasps* getting ready to go back to school ONCE more to get either an educational leadership degree or an administration degree (haven't quite decided yet) this summer. I have a great family, wonderful friends and a sweet little kitty named Oliver. If you stick with me, I'm sure you'll learn lots more about ALL of them!

I can't really believe that here I am starting a blog. I get told over and over again by the teachers in my school that I need to "create a TPT so I can buy all your stuff!" or "start a blog so I can see everything you're doing!". So I figured, what the heck! I stalk others TPT's, Pinterest pages, blogs, and any other thing you can think of. My thinking is, if you are doing something that is working- share it (so others can definitely "steal" it)!

Someone told me once that teachers were the greatest thieves- and yup- totally believe that. We work hard enough. And if I can get something that is working from someone else and use it, why wouldn't I? So I may as well share my stuff as well!

We had a snow day today, more so for the ridiculous cold and not the snow, so I created my first **FREE** product in the TPT store! We do 5 weekly sight words in my grade level and focus on them. We address them in our grammar sentences but I wanted to do something more with them! I created this page for my students to practice ABC order, spelling the words, and writing complete sentences. I find that ABC order is one skill that we don't have time to teach in isolation but after a few weeks of this, the students catch on quickly to the concept! And, you can never have too much practice writing complete sentences! :)

Go HERE: http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Sight-Word-Activities-1047574 so grab that for yourself for Free!

Thanks! :) Have a great week! As for me, they already called another *SNOW* day for me tomorrow! Can't say I'm too mad about it, plus -20 is too cold for kiddos to be standing at the bus stop!

Britt