Lessons and Ideas

Letter and Number Bottle Caps

As a teacher, I am fairly certain I can find use in almost any object. I have collected water bottle caps forever envisioning some sort of creative student project with them. However, I recently came across this brilliant idea and put my own spin on it! I found packets of number and letter stickers in the One-Spot at Target.

I bought every.single.package.

 I mean, the lady at the checkout must have thought I had lost it. I brought them home and to my excitement, they fit PERFECTLY on top of the bottle caps. I pulled out my Mod-Podge and got straight to work.

I create a bunch of these. I plan to use them to practice spelling words, key vocabulary, or even to talk about letter sounds. For the number caps, the possibilities are endless. I pictured just a few of them below. Share your ideas and comment below!

Boggle

This week I decided to take a new spin on bellwork. I downloaded this wonderful file from TPT. I absolutely love this boggle game and so do my students!

 I decided to laminate the letters and put magnets on the back of the letters. This makes for easy acess to the game and helps in case you need to fill time in a pinch.

For bellwork, I asked them to make a list of as many words as they could from the Boggle board. In case you dont know, the rules of Boggle are........

• You must make words from letters that touch in consecutive order.
• You may go digagonally, horizontally, or vertically and any combination thereof. 
• You cannont use a letter twice unless it appears that way on the board (for example you could use the word "MOM" if the letters O and M appeared next to each other because you could go back and forth.)
• The most important rule of all: DON'T GIVE UP! Trust me, just when you think you have a huge list, more words start appearing. The more you stare, the more words appear.

 My students hovered around the board and tried and tried to make words from the letters. What impressed me the most was their perseverence with this game! The longest word list was 86 words! 

Quiz Erasers

So today on my way home from setting up the classroom, I made a quick trip to Target. "The Dollar Spot", located right near the entrance, is one of my greatest weaknesses. I absolutely LOVE it at this time of year because it usually features some sort of classroom goody! I could go crazy in this store buying organizing bins, pencil cups, and other adorable school-themed items. Today I came across these very unique erasers.

 The erasers came in a four pack. Each package features four different erasers, each a different color. Each eraser also has a letter on it; A, B, C, or D. As soon as I saw these beauties, my mind began searching for a way I could incorporate these into instruction. 

I plan on using these as a way to quickly access students' understanding. We do a lot of activities in the classroom where students are in small groups for instruction. I plan on giving each student a bag with the four erasers in it. I will ask a question and ask the student to move that eraser up to the front of their desk. I imagine making this into a more active learning experience. For example, "Hold your answer about your head!" or, "Show your answer to your neighbor." I feel that doing this mixes up the constant use of the whiteboards as a method of assessment. Don't get me wrong, I love the whiteboards for some activities. However, a little differentiation goes a long way!

Progress Tracking Bulletin Board
I created this board as a way for students to monitor their progress though out the unit. I made hot air balloons, and assigned each student a number. The students were told confidentially what their number was and I did not assign them in alphabetical order. I moved the balloons twice, once after they completed their pre-test, and again at the end of the unit to show their post-test score. They were able to see their wonderful growth and everyone moved up! Some notes about this board; I labeled the side of the board 1-100% however I did not allow the board to end at 100%. This was purposeful to show that their is unlimited potential in learning and growing! Also, I marked the sides of the board in increments to show a more exact measure. I love this board and I think it does a wonderful job of making students responsible for their learning!

How cute are the birds! (eeeeeek!)

Before:

Pre-Test:

Post-Test:

Media Center Bulletin Board
I created this board for the Media Center. The students were asked to create a project representing themselves for digital citizenship week. I decided to turn the board into a giant  Mac computer screen. This is a bulletin board that can be reused over and over again! It was a big hit with the students!

School News Station Bulletin Board
I created this bulliten board as a backdrop for our school announcements. Our announcements are filmed on a school network and completely student run. I created this board as a backdrop to be seen on the news. The poster in front of the podium was created in Word and then made into a poster at Kinkos.

Student Council News Bulletin Board

I created yet another bulletin board this week! I decided this space would be a great way to keep parents  and students informed about the happening of student council. It is located right next to the double door entrance to our school. It's high traffic area allows for a great means of communication to the school population.

Hallway Bulletin Board

I created a display in the hallway next to the office.

 It can be challenging to think of something to put on this board because the entire school shares it! I decided to create a board where teachers can share their student's work to show what they are learning. This board also doubles as a place to post flyers and posters announcing school-wide events. It turned out great and I can't wait to see it in use.

Spelling Group Display

One of the most unorganized things last year in our classroom was the way in which we organized our spelling groups. Every time it was time to give a test, I found myself running around the classroom triying to find the list and who belonged in that group. I thought long and hard about a way to make this easier. I came up with this simple and affordable solution!

For this project you will need: 

Pizza tins from the dollar store (make sure they are magnetic!)

Popsicle sticks

Magnets

Alphabet Stickers

Ribbon

Command Hooks

I simply glued ribbon to the back of the pizza tins, placed a few command hooks on the wall, and viola! You have yourself a cute spelling group display.

On the tin that says "This Weeks Activities", I plan on displaying which activities they are responsible for completing. We use a variety of activities to go with our spelling curriculum so for us, this varies week to week. 

I wrote each student's name on an individual stick and glued magnets to the back of it. I will place the students' on a tin depending on which group they are in. When it is time to give a test to that group I will grab the tin off the wall and head out to the hallway. HOW SIMPLE IS THAT! This also makes things simple when students move up or down in spelling group levels. All you have to do is move their stick!

I plan on using the larger magnets on the front to pin the spelling list to the tin as well.