Wednesday, February 26, 2014

Check Out My TpT Wishlist


I'm sure by now you've seen this button everywhere and you know that TpT and TpT'ers are having a big sale the next two days.....so need I say more! Hopefully I'm in your wishlists somewhere! hee hee!

But the true reason for this post is not to market my store, but to link up and share things with you on my wishlist that may inspire you as well! So I'm happy to link up with "Speech Room News" for her WHAT'S IN YOUR CART LINKY!

Slide3-001

To be honest, because my class consists of 6 different grade levels and so many unique students, I do have to create most of my own resources in order to meet their needs....therefore the largest majority of my wishlist is clipart! 

But here are a few academic and fun resources on my wishlist that I plan on purchasing and you may like them too!! 








Each picture is linked, so just click on each picture to read more on each of these fabulous looking products from some super fabulous creators!!!

Happy Shopping and a Woo Hoo to TpT for becoming 3 million teachers STRONG!! :)

 photo 262537ca-e39d-4585-9d7c-a9633c31f18e_zps73236c33.jpg

Monday, February 24, 2014

Sharing Kindness with a Kindness Wall!

I'm very excited about my new kindness wall! My students have been so horrible lately with picking on one another and singling others out in the classroom! Yep, even special needs kiddos can do this once they get to know one another! I know there are so many great ideas out there about how to share kindness in the classroom that work well for general Ed classrooms like writing notes of kindness, compliment chains, and so on....but these don't work so well with special needs students. So I've been brainstorming ways I can get my students to spread kindness in my classroom and how I can make it meaningful for my students! 

And the "KINDNESS WALL" was born!



Most of my students don't know how to interact appropriately. They don't know how to give compliments or how to initiate play! I knew I needed to give them a jump start by providing them clues and something with pictures to help them understand! 

Here's how it works. 

I have 12 students, so as you can see I have paired two students in each of the 6 boxes. These two students will be buddies for the week, getting a new buddy each week. Every morning they will post something nice to their buddy's wall by choosing from the picture bank below the names. Those that can't read, have the picture to help them. The choices allow those that have difficulty expressing their feelings the chance to participate. The pictures choices include nice things like below and are duplicated 3 times so that one student is not limited to one, as others may want to choose the same. 

Let's play at recess
Let's have lunch
I like you
You look nice today
You're awesome
I have a gift for you
You make me smile
 Let's be friends


The students love it and it's providing them with that jumpstart that they needed! I also love that my non-verbal students have access as well!  

How do you inspire kindness in your classroom?




 photo 262537ca-e39d-4585-9d7c-a9633c31f18e_zps73236c33.jpg

Sunday, February 23, 2014

Do Any Worksheet on the ipad With "NOTABILITY"


Do you use ipads in your classroom? Even if you have just 1-2 classroom ipads, I am going to show you an incredible app that will allow you to upload and edit any pdf document, activity or worksheet on the ipad. With this app, you can not only save paper and time copying, but you will increase student engagement by allowing your students to complete their worksheets on the ipad. If you're into increasing student engagement through technology, you will definitely want to read on!

This app is "Notability." And it is only $2.99. So the first thing you will need to do is get the app. 




Tip: If you're having trouble viewing the small print, hold down your ctrl button on your keyboard and press the + button until it is enlarged to your viewing preference.



















I am so excited about this app! 
My students are much more engaged and are wanting to complete worksheet after worksheet. They are actually begging me for more....IMAGINE THAT! 


 photo 262537ca-e39d-4585-9d7c-a9633c31f18e_zps73236c33.jpg

Sunday, February 16, 2014

Great Finds Sunday!


Time for another "Great Finds Sunday!" Here are my great finds for the week!


I've been working hard with the speech pathologist at my school to help some of my students that have unintelligible speech with their articulation, as well as working with students on "WH" questions! After some searching, I found these two awesome sites! 


Therasimplicity requires a subscription fee, but is so worth it! You can choose from their thousands of pre-made activities or Therasimplicity gives you the ability to create and customize your activities! You can create worksheets, communication boards, game boards, flashcards, and much much more! This video will give you an overview of some of the neat features!


While a yearly subscription is listed as $189, I was able to get it at a discounted rate of only $49. I signed up for the 14-day free trial and the next day a rep emailed me and informed me that they were offering a discount for teachers in CCSD of only $49! SOLD! 

Sign up for your free trial today{here}! If you like it, I would suggest contacting them to see if you can get a teacher discount too!

Here is another AWESOME site I discovered and it's FREE!! This site has a plethora of materials for practicing articulation skills with your students! Even if you're not focusing on articulation, but focusing on specific sounds, you'll love this site! You can print flashcards specific to the sounds you are working on! Check out the articulation materials {here}


My class has been doing a lot of hands-on science! My students just love it and can't wait for Science Time every day! But I'm beginning to run out of experiments.........at least until I found..........



Steve Spangler has some really awesome science projects just for kids! I think I have my science covered now at least through March, thanks to Steve! Check out some of his cool science experiments and videos {here}.



Erin Condren is offering 30% off of her teacher planners, plus a free set of pens with order! Enter teacherlove at checkout! But hurry....deal ends tonight at midnight!





Get 26 free St. Patrick's Day printables from "Teaching Blog Addict" {here}!

If you're not following "Right Road Kids" on Facebook, you'll want to! This lady LOVES giving things away to teachers and classrooms! Giveaways almost every week! She calls them "Simple Acts of Kindness for Teachers." Today you can win a $50 Barnes & Noble giftcard! This giveaway ends in a few hours, but even if you missed it, follow her {here} for the next "Simple Act of Kindness." This lady is just amazingly generous!


Really Good Stuff is having an "I Spy Sunday Giveaway" on their blog!
Just guess this item to be entered!

Enter {here}! This giveaway doesn't end until the 19th, so you have plenty of time if you missed the giveaways above!

Do you have some great finds to share? Grab my linky button, add it to your post, and link them up below!





 photo 262537ca-e39d-4585-9d7c-a9633c31f18e_zps73236c33.jpg

Friday, February 14, 2014

Gobstopppers Experiment & Valentine Fun!

I'm going to try and make this short as I have to be in Vegas in the morning for a training (Vegas is a 1 1/2 hour drive for me). It's staff development day, so no school for the students! But yay.....still a 3-day weekend with President's Day! So needless to say, we had to have our Valentine Exchange Party today! 

I'm pretty excited about my training though, as I am piloting and getting a free subscription to ULS (Unique Learning System) and FIVE classroom ipads!!! At the training I'll be learning how to best use ULS in my classroom! 

Our Valentine Exchange Party was a blast today! Here's a look!

Right before the party, was our Science block! We did this awesome Science experiment with Gobstoppers! 


We got so excited with the results that I forgot to take any further pictures! But you can kinda see from the picture what happens. The colors all disperse to the center of the plate and do not mix!! It's really cool. {Here} is a picture from Pinterest that shows the final result! The kids loved it! Then, they all got to eat a Gobstopper!

Then, we decorated our boxes for our Valentine's! I actually bought these over the summer from "Really Good Stuff" to use as pencil boxes for my students, and misplaced them! I did not find them until about a month ago! They were stuck down in my beginning of year seasonal bin....go figure! Where they should be!! :) So I thought since I no longer need them as pencil boxes, they would make great Valentine Exchange boxes. You will see their boxes throughout the pictures below.

We played a couple of "Minute to Win it" games!

The first being "How many candy hearts can you toss in a cup in 1 minute?"


Then, we played "Valentine Stack." Students had to stack as many Valentine candies as they could without them falling over. The student with the highest tower in a minute wins!



Then, our PARTY! 





Getting ready to head to the bus dressed as special Valentines for our parents! Get this cute idea and poem from "Crayons and Whimsy." These turned out adorable and got us many compliments on the way to the bus!




And to end the day...........
the most beautiful gift from one of my students made my day!
SO SWEET!



HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!!!!!

 photo 262537ca-e39d-4585-9d7c-a9633c31f18e_zps73236c33.jpg