It's summer and pretty much everything is ready for our move to Michigan. I'm hoping all my classroom stuff (I have an insane amount of stuff!) is nice and safe until I can rescue it in a few weeks. Until July 22nd cute little Olivias and Skippyjon . . .
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house sold . . . check!
classroom cleaned and packed (so much work!) . . . check!
house cleaned and packed (so much more work!) . . . check!
POD packed to the gills . . . check!
lease signed on a super cute Michigan house with a tree filled yard . . . check!
spending quality time with the hubby, Colorado friends and little Lil' . . . check!
walking to amazing restaurants on Pearl street daily . . . check!
living out of a suitcase . . . check!
found an amazing teaching job in Michigan for me . . . gah!!!
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It is seriously scary to have resigned from an amazing job without an equally amazing job waiting for me. I've uploaded resumes, cover letters, letters of rec and have filled out way too many online questionnaires. I know Michigan schools end later than those in Colorado, but the suspense is killing me!
However, even though I have no idea what lies in store for me on the job front I am still plan, plan, planning for next year and waiting (as patiently as humanly possible) for the phone to ring.
This week I've been thinking about all the Back to School books I need to buy since I've been using my amazing teammate's (turned literacy specialist's) massive vat of picture books for the past few years. Here's a few I'd recommend for those first weeks of school.
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After Mr. Plumbeans' house is splashed with bright orange paint, he decides to continue the color and creates a house that represents him and all his dreams. This is a great book for talking about positive individual differences and is perfect to use as inspiration for a back to school dream house art project.
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The black and white animal pictures in this book are to die for! The kids love the silly and serious animal pictures. I always show students the cover of the book and then put out copies of the pictures. Then students are asked to talk to others around the room about what they think might be the caption under their picture. It gets the kids talking and they love to see what the author actually wrote under their favorite picture (usually the cat in goggles). This is also an excellent mentor text to use when talking about using pictures to jump start ideas for writing!
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Summer Stuff #1 - The Birthday Committee
Summer Stuff #2 - The Service Station Freebie
Summer Stuff #3 - The Tooth Fairy
Summer Stuff #4 - Freebie Sanitizer Bathroom Passes
Don't forget to follow my blog through Bloglovin'. This whole Google Reader fiasco is a bummer but Bloglovin' has treated me quite well thus far.
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Follow my blog with Bloglovin
To check out more ideas for back to school books hop on over to First Grade and Fabulous. Just click on the pic below. What a great idea for a linky party!
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classroom cleaned and packed (so much work!) . . . check!
house cleaned and packed (so much more work!) . . . check!
POD packed to the gills . . . check!
lease signed on a super cute Michigan house with a tree filled yard . . . check!
spending quality time with the hubby, Colorado friends and little Lil' . . . check!
walking to amazing restaurants on Pearl street daily . . . check!
living out of a suitcase . . . check!
found an amazing teaching job in Michigan for me . . . gah!!!
However, even though I have no idea what lies in store for me on the job front I am still plan, plan, planning for next year and waiting (as patiently as humanly possible) for the phone to ring.
This week I've been thinking about all the Back to School books I need to buy since I've been using my amazing teammate's (turned literacy specialist's) massive vat of picture books for the past few years. Here's a few I'd recommend for those first weeks of school.
Love, love, love this book! It's a great one to use to talk about memories and connections with others' personal experiences. You can also use it to introduce an object guessing game - every student brings an object to class during the first weeks and tells classmates what memory or experience the object represents. It's perfect to use as a mentor text for personal narrative writing and I love the pictures as well as the story. Well done Mem Fox!
Last summer I started my Summer Stuff series and I will plan to add at least a few more easy summer "to do"s during the next two months. Here are the first four entries from last summer.
Summer Stuff #1 - The Birthday Committee
Summer Stuff #2 - The Service Station Freebie
Summer Stuff #3 - The Tooth Fairy
Summer Stuff #4 - Freebie Sanitizer Bathroom Passes
Don't forget to follow my blog through Bloglovin'. This whole Google Reader fiasco is a bummer but Bloglovin' has treated me quite well thus far.
Follow my blog with Bloglovin
To check out more ideas for back to school books hop on over to First Grade and Fabulous. Just click on the pic below. What a great idea for a linky party!
