1,000 Followers Celebration!

Can I get a Woot! Woot!?

has reached 1,000 followers so we are having a celebration!

For a limited time, you can get the following freebies!

AUTHOR STUDY UNIT

This author study is for upper elementary level classrooms and includes a banner heading and multiple posters depicting some of our most famous authors!  

Check it out and leave some feedback!

ART  NOTEBOOK

This art unit was created as a way to teach the basics of art to my 4th, 5th, & 6th graders.  It covers the basic elements of art and includes a student interactive notebook and a corresponding Power Point presentation.

Check it out and leave some feedback!

MUNCHING THROUGH MATH FACTS

This is a year long set of math facts - one for each day of the school year!

On each page is 25 math facts that included a mixture of addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division!  Give students a minute to finish or have them time themselves to see how long they finish the set! 

Check it out and leave some feedback!

Great Graphing Projects

We have been graphing stars this week!

This is the first time I have ever done this project with 4th graders.  In the past,I had done it with 5th and 6th graders.   So, I simplified the project just a bit and the kiddos did a super job!

We spent about a week planning our surveys, completing our surveys, and then creating graphs for our results.   

The final result is a bulletin board of Graphing Greatness!

Here are a few examples!  

They were asked to make a cover for their project.

 

They needed to create a Frequency Table with their survey results.

Then they were asked to create a bar graph...

 

a Circle graph...

 a Line graph...

and a Pictograph.

These 4th Graders are Graph Experts now! 

This weeks Friday Flash Freebie is this Graphing Unit.  

This is a printable project activity for your students to complete after they are finished studying about Graphs. It includes 11 pages:

Page 1 - Student Instructional Sheet

Page 2 - Survey

Page 3 - Frequency Table Template

Page 4 - Line Plot Template

Page 5 - Pictograph Template

Page 6 - Bar Graph Template

Page 7 - Circle (Pie) Graph Template

Page 8 - Line Graph Template

Page 9 - Stem and Leaf Plot Template

Page 10 - Histogram Template

Page 11 - Grading Rubric

I put all these pages together in this order into a packet that I handed out and explained to the students. I then displayed their final projects. Great Final Graphing Project. I also have a PowerPoint presentation that I used that covers all these graphs.

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Graphs-Power-Point

Favorite Freebie Sites and a Friday Flash Freebie

Check out these AWESOME sites that offer freebie downloads EVERY teacher can use!

Finding the best sites is hard because there are literally millions of them out there.  Here are my Favs!

Doodle Art Alley offers fun and unique free printables that students can color.  The variety is amazing and goes from the various holidays to different subjects to motivating phrases.

Here is a fun site that offers free fonts that can be used in the classroom!

We Give Books is an awesome site where you have access to thousands of books for free.  Just sign up for a free membership.  The nice thing about this site is you can project the books on your Smartboard and read them together as a class.  There are plenty of books for upper elementary as well as primary grades, so head on over there and check it out!

I am not a huge fan of showing long videos in class.  However, I do think videos can add so much to a lesson.  PBS Learning (also called Teacher's Domain) gives you free access to thousands of educational video clips.  You can search by grade level, topic, and subjects.  

Math-Aids.com is a nice site to go to when you need extra Math practice in a certain area.  I actually do not use this site a whole lot for classroom work, but I do share this with parents who are looking for extra Math practice for their children.  It's free!

I am going to be honest,  I have not been using this next site for  very long.  However, I love it and know I will continue to use it.  A teacher friend recently told me about GoNoodle which is a nice site for 5 minute brain breaks.  It gets students out of their desks and moving which, let's face it, they need!

And....saving the BEST for last is TpT!  I feel like this is an obvious one but I had to list it.  This site is my #1 go-to when I am looking for something.  There are lots and lots of FREEBIES, but there are also bazillions (that's a word, right????) of reasonably priced resources.  And you get them instantly!  Memberships are free so if you haven't been there, check it out!

  

Download this Divisibility Rules poster for FREE a FLASH!

The Busy Teacher and Mom Planner & a Friday Flash FREEBIE

I love teaching and spend every minute of the school day in "teacher mode".  But then 4:00 rolls around...and it's back to "mom mode".  That's when a new kind of craziness erupts.  It's not the craziness that can occur during a 4th grade Science experiment.  It's the craziness that occurs when you have 4 kids ranging in ages 1 to 11 packed into a mini van and  feeding them after school snacks while you are in route to the 5 year old's gymnastic class and checking the 8 year old's Math homework at the stop light.  Yep...this happens to me quite frequently.  What's my main goal during these times?  To remain calm and organized. :)

I have used many planners over the past few years...and have found something I didn't like about each and every one of them.  So, I created my own.  

I purchased this Mead notebook from Staples.  It is really more of a binder than a notebook but is not bulky like a binder.  It fits in my purse! (It's a large purse...but it does fit!)

I use the front pocket folder for important papers that need immediate attention.

Then I put in the pages of my planner.

The next pocket folder is for my kid's school papers.

Then I have a pocket folder for the kid's sports papers and a separate pocket folder for my grocery lists.

The organizational possibilities are endless, but this is what works for me at this moment.

To download my 2015 Planner FREEBIE, click on the picture below.

Enjoy!

Today's Flash Freebie is a set of Triangles and Angles Task Cards.

This is a set of Task Cards suitable for 4th, 5th, 6th Grade Math. Students measure the angles of a triangle and name the triangle as either acute, right, or obtuse. (There are equilateral triangles too!)

I printed and laminated off several sets to be used as a Math center in my room. That is one option. 

You could print off enough sets for every student, pairs of students, or even small groups of students.

You could also use as an assessment tool.

Common Core Aligned for 4th Grade.

Included is a recording sheet and an answer key!

To download this FREEBIE, click on the picture below!

Friday Flash Freebie and some Long Division Help!

Who doesn't love long division?!?!?!?
The dividing, multiplying, subtracting...we all have to agree that it is the best thing ever!!!
Well...there are some who may not agree with us. (Shocking, I know!)  And some of students may not agree with us either.   So to make division a little more fun for everyone (and easier to do) I created this exercise.

I laminated this for my classroom. 

I also made a smaller laminated version for each student to keep right on their desk as they work their division problems.

Early on in the division process, I give them sheets like this, with grid lines to really help them stay organized in dividing.

They also have a sheet like this to help them multiply to check their answer.

Ahhhh...gotta love long division!

This Monster Division Poster is my Friday Flash Freebie!  Click on any of the pictures above to download this Freebie.  But hurry, it's not free for long!

Along with my Friday Flash Freebie, I am also sharing this Freebie printable.

I found this saying at http://www.theteachertreasury.com/ and converted into a printable poster that we are using for our school's Visitor's Day.

Friday Flash Freebie and Math Journal View

We are already in our 3rd week of school (CRAZY!!!!) and I wanted to share with your our Math Diaries.  

We call them our Math Diaries because they have a theme from the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series.

This diary goes along with our Saxon Math series for 4th grade.  Each day we do some Math review and a page or two out of our Math Diary which is essentially our Math notebook.  Here are some samples from this year.

The students always respond very well to this Math Diary.  They love the Wimpy Kid theme and it gives them a resource tool to utilize throughout the year!

Here are a few upcoming pages!

I am constantly updating and making tweaks to our diaries.  This year my main focus is preparing a Power Point to go along with each page of notes.  I will have this ready to go by the summer!

This product is available for download right now at a discount.

Click on the picture below!

Now on to  Flash Freebie Friday!

For one day only, my newly listed Classroom Library Labels are free!

I use these labels in my own classroom library to organize the books by genre.  Simply get some baskets (I ordered mine years ago from a school supply catalog, but the Dollar Tree has baskets that would work for much cheaper) and attach the labels with rings.  I would suggest laminating for durability!

Enjoy!