New Year

If you follow things I write, you may have noticed that I...stopped writing on this blog.  One of the last things I posted was that first-year-teacher graph.  It seemed that I hit that slump pretty hard, and I was also met with a whirlwind of paperwork and deadlines...I know what this sounds like--excuuuuuses!  Indeed.  So.  Reboot, refresh, a new year, here we go!

What's New:

• My schedule for one!
  Instead of three block classes, I have five 57-minutes classes.  I fell into a rhythm pretty quickly, it's working so far :)  Also, instead of one awesome co-teacher, I have two!  Any other brains in the classroom is such a great way to always be professionally learning.  
• My room!

Several things are similar to last year; however, on the far left you see a map.  I'm putting pictures of what we read, and then
attaching a thread and pinning where the story takes place on the map. 

This may look like a weird picture, but these are my
class name cards.  I tried making this confidential by starring faces.
 I'm all gung-ho on being SUPER organized
this year.  I have each hour color-coded, and files, rosters,
seating charts-you name it- follows suit.

A dry-erase calendar to help, again, with that organization goal.

OMG NEW PHONE!  And this one is at my desk, so I
don't have to rely on my students to answer the phone properly.
I use this so often that I think people now roll their eyes when
they see it's me who is calling. 

New desks!  AHHH! THE CHAIRS ARE NOT ATTACHED!
Life is peachy.

Finally, what I am/was reading:

Also!  I forgot--I have this super fantastic class website that materialized last year after being inspired by a speaker at the WSRA about incorporating technology into the classroom.

Check it out!