At Last My Lesson Planner has come ALong!

How many years have I been waiting for this? MANY How many other things have I tried? MANY How many times have I tried to create something neat and cute like this and failed? MANY. I have used paper planners. I have created Word templates that had to be continually revamped. I have eduplanner, school circuit and many other online planners. I have tried excel to no avail and the shagrin of my mother whom is a Controller and Business IT guy husband. I so dislike excel don't understand why the business mind loves it. I even meet Alice Keeler once at CUE and she tried to convert me to her ways of a SEXY SPREADSHEETS. Okay Dokie Alice, I am not buying it. But, now I see the light I see it I see it soo close I am almost there. POW! I opened my Bloglovin feed and I see this planner by Traci Clausen. I have just started to download and prep to use this tool. I waited and debated because I am not in the classroom this year I am a teacher on assignment I debated how will this work when planning consists of, meeting with teachers, modeling lessons, attending grade level meetings.So I waited but then I debated, I am really going to be able to walk around school sites with my phone or ipad and input into my planner all the things we need to do and hall way questions teachers ask, hall way requests and modifications to the schedule. I analyzed what I had in place. I have been using a combo pack of sorts to get by but with a combo sometimes things fall through the cracks. I use my phone to hold onto hall way questions requests. I use Microsoft Outlook Calendar to book and schedule modeling lessons, planning time release time. I also use my phone to write lists of ideas and things I need to do then at the end of each week I open up Microsoft Outlook and my phone and I try to remember and piece together my week for my Weekly report to my supervisor. Sometimes when I am on it I am able to piece it together daily. Oh I forgot on top of that I make a teacher friendly schedule to print and send out to teachers and admin because the outlook schedule is not great to look at when printed. Is it possible that I may be able to condense my combo pack of planning tools. I THINK YES. YES It is. Here it is :::::::::)

I am still working out the kinks of how this will work for me I am hoping next week will be an AHHHHH Yeah week for me with my new planner when I pull it all together but I will wait no more. I can just imagine walking around with my ipad and knowing where I am going, what I need to work on, what supplies I need etc. I also will simply need to print a copy for my teachers and admin. and it looks professional and teacher friendly. So, I begin my new journey with Numbers guided by the amazing work of Trace Clausen at Dragon Flies in First, Check out her blog and her TPT store. This lesson planner is ideal for the classroom teacher.

Happy Teaching!

EUREKA! CGI book!

This three day weekend I decided to clean out a piece of my garage. I said a piece because it is big and because three years ago I moved my house And classrooms at work, yeah the same summer days apart. Two years ago I moved schools and grade levels. I had been a primary teacher forever and moved up to the big leagues to work under an awesome principal. Then this year I am a teacher on assignment, no classroom. Whew! So I have been adding and adding boxes with no time to really go through and organize it. I had two goals one, go through every box on three shelfs and throw away and begin to group and organize. 2nd I have been looking for my Close Reading book by Sundae Cummins that I just skimmed last year and my Extending Children's Mathematics, fractions and decimals book by Epsom and Levi. 

Well, I have not found the books yet! But I did find some amazing work my second graders had done with CGI and problem solving. So, I ordered the book with my amazon prime account💜💜💜. Never thought I would love paying 79 dollars but I do 💜Amazon Prime. The book arrived the next day. What! Who is, How is Amazing I love it. I worked on the garage and hung out with my kids. Then Hunkered down with my long lost book. Um, I thought I would re read a few chapters I needed to help some teachers with coaching questions from last week. No, read it cover to cover taking notes and sticky notes. This is amazing. It really brings back the idea that we need to invest in training teachers not to learn how to deliver instruction based on another's curriculum but to learn content and curriculum in deep rich way like modeling the CCSS. I relearned so much and made powerful connections to Liping Ma' s work. 

I was trying to share the idea that I learned from her to some kindergarten teachers that we cannot just learn place value we need to learn it and understand that the teaching of conceptual place value leads to deep understanding of fractions and decimals, it is part of a package we are teaching and to teach only in the context of the k/1 standards does not address the package. Here is a peek at a math package.

  I now have examples and quotes to support this thought. I highly recommend this book for both primary and upper grade teachers. It is awesome  and has inspired some new thinking more post will follow with all the ideas that have bubbled up from this night of reading, the best part of this reading was me and my third graders trying to solve the problems together, she loved it and was thrilled that she was working with fractions in advanced ways. Great read. Have a happy 3 day!

Scholastic Instructor Me No way!

I don't know how many of you subscribe to Scholastic Instructor magazine. I have for a year or so and it is chuck full of tips and resources for teachers. I have learned so much from this magazine so when the opportunity to be a member of the advisory board came along I jumped at it. I jumped through the process and I amazingly I was accepted. It is a surprise and honor to be a part of anything Scholastic this company has a long standing great relationship with educators.  Here is the link to the magazine. I highly recommend subscribing. http://www.scholastic.com/teachers/instructor

The magazine also has a companion website.

Thank you Scholastic for this opportunity I am hoping to learn and share a great deal from this collaboration.

And here is my mug published ....

That's me on the bottom row. A tiny bit odd seeing myself in a magazine.

Happy Teaching!