How I Became a Genius

Hi friends!
I've missed being here! My husband's birthday and my brother-in-law's is today so we've had a week long celebration for those guys. Lucky ducks, right?? I've also had a whirlwind week at work. I don't know about all of you guys but I'm pooped! We don't get a fall break like you other lucky ducks out there so by this point, my colleagues and I are hauling through... just barely making it past the boogers, fevers, coughs and sneezes. =) Kindergarten teachers understand that one, right?
Well, let me tell you HOW I BECAME A GENIUS!

Last year, my school started using a site called SIGNUPGENIUS.COM to schedule our parent conferences. We could use it for other things as well but we were required to use it for our parent teacher conferences. All of us teachers moaned and groaned upon hearing this BUT it was the BEST decision ever! We use SignUpGenius.com for everything now! Our technology committee uses the site to check out equipment, classrooms use it to schedule volunteers, potlucks, and other things. You know all those parties and celebrations that are coming up... Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas/Hanukkah...well... all of those can be set up quickly by you and you don't have to worry about it again! The free site has a quick and easy process to getting your signups up and running and my favorite part? It automatically sends reminders to all those who have signed up!!! Seriously, that is genius. I can't tell you how many times I've had parents forget things on me (I'm sure you understand!). My second favorite part? You can see, of everyone you have sent the sign up to, who has viewed the sign up, how many times and on what day. Now you can't have any of those parents say, "Oh, I didn't get that email, did you send it to the right one?" ("YES! I send all my emails to the same one!" is the response I say in my head)  Well, those parents can't say that anymore because I can tell! Am I the only one with those parents?? lol. As long as you sign up, you can use it for anything really, not just school stuff!
So I put together a little tutorial about my favorite parts and how simple it really is... I tried my best and I hope you can use the site too! Here it is...

Look at all of those responsible families of mine looking at the sign up list. Many of them multiple times (though I still don't have everyone). Now I can keep my desk clear of unnecessary papers, etc, it's online, ready to go AND sends the reminders for me. All I have to do is keep track of who hasn't responded. On the day of my conferences, I print out the sheets and I am ready to go!
I plan on setting another one up soon for our Halloween centers celebration & parade and then our Thanksgiving Feast and then our Cultural Celebration (around the winter holidays). This site has done a great job of eliminating wasting time, energy and paper! It sets up the time frame for me, emails the parents for me, reminds them for me, reminds me for me, keep me organized and clutter free!
Has anyone else used this site?? I'd love to hear from you. I suggest everyone use it, let me know if you do!
SignUpGenius.com thanked me with a gift card for reviewing their site. The gift card was not dependent on a postive or negative review of the site, but was a compensation for spreading the word. All opinions expressed are my own and I say: GO TO THIS SITE BECAUSE IT IS AMAZING!

Have a great night everybody...

Lock those apps & candy corn...

Hi friends!
It's day 2 and I've made it to sit down and blog... yay! I have been super busy with school & birthday parties & an upcoming wedding on Friday & my sister-in-law's baby shower on Saturday & you know, life! Phew! Still, I find such comfort in reading blogs, writing my own and, especially, reading comments.
Ok, ok, that's enough of that, on to the good stuff!
I found this pin floating around, clicked on it, followed the link and it made me SOOOO excited!

The link takes you to step by step directions on how to LOCK your ipad/ipod in a specific app! REALLY!? FINALLY!!! I thought of all of the times that I say, "We're playing this game today," only to find out that someone was taking pictures, playing Draw Free, etc., etc...
You can read the step by step directions by following this link OR keep reading...
1. Update your ipods/ipads with the new software, iOS 6
2. Go to Settings > General > Accessibility
3. Under the Learning section go to Guided Access
4. Switch Guided Access to ON
5. Set a password
6. You may want to Enable Screen Sleep, I did.
Now you have the settings all ready!
What's next?
1. Open the app you want to lock
2. Triple click the home button
3. Click START
4. Do a happy dance!
5. To get out of the locked screen, triple click the home button again
6. Enter password and click END
Things to know...
*Volume control is also locked during the locked  screen
*The home button will not work unless you triple click and enter password
*If you do not Enable Screen Sleep, you cannot put the device to "sleep"
*Sorry I didn't take pictures! I meant to and forgot!
Look at these kids...learning... having fun... staying engaged... where are the rest of them? lol. There are 3 kids missing from this group... lol.

They are playing TeachMe:Toddler. In case you haven't heard of the TeachMe games, look them up! They go all the way up to 2nd grade  and they are awesome! They track all of the questions asked and give little sticker prizes to the kids for each 3 questions they answer correctly. If they answer incorrectly, the app gives a reason why it is incorrect. For instance, she'll say, "Find the letter D" If they press B, she'll say, "That is the letter B, find the letter D," and so on. I am using the Toddler version right now because it goes over Letters, Letter Sounds, Numbers, Shapes and Colors. The Kindergarten version goes over Spelling, Addition, Subtraction and Sight Words; not where my students are at this point. I have some students on the Kindergarten version and that is the beauty of having the Guided Access on... they can't resort to the "easy" one! Everyone gets what they get and gets what they need! Oh and another thing about the Teach Me apps, you can lock the players as well so the kiddos cannot create new games/characters each time AND it allows up to 30 students to have their own game...30! I love that app...

I wanted to share another Pinterest inspired activity... CANDY CORN! Candy corn means everything Fall, don't you think? So the original pin had tissue paper squares but one of my kindergarten team members said that cutting all of those tissue paper squares was just too much! (I agree! We divide and prep materials for each of the 4 kindergarten classrooms so that was just too much work!)
Instead of using the tissue paper squares, we used ripped construction paper... look at how cute they are... 

Look at how messy that is!

They will still cut them out but I think they look adorable! I am kinda cringing looking at these pictures because everything looks so messy but it was a really fun activity and they cleaned it all up! lol.

Ok friends, adios! I'm going to work on my aunt's wedding gift =)

Look at my new toy!

Hola amigos!
It's Monday, I had a long day! Really... long day... It was 110 degrees in my neck of the woods today. Well, my tip of the valley... it was so hot and since it was so hot we had to stay inside, ALL DAY! It was like a rainy day but worse! Anywho, I finally got the interactive whiteboard I've been dying for!! Wooo Hooo! I spent the ENTIRE day at school yesterday rearranging and fixing and playing and rearranging and fixing and playing. It was so exciting! My husband and my dad came to campus at 8am to help put it up (of course before the football games), I brought my own car because I knew I wanted to play all day.... Here was the process...

 My husband getting one last use of the old, non-magnetic, non-interactive whiteboard...

 There was some trouble figuring out how exactly to get it up and, more importantly, how to get it to stay on the walls. I have a portable classroom where the walls are fabric-type panels. Good thing my dad came with his toolbox and didn't rely in the screws given because they wouldn't have worked! AND, good thing the stud is centered exactly where I wanted it! Makes me and my OCD very happy!

 Notice how I had to take everything down? Well, turns out I didn't really have to...

 Alright, there it is! Isn't she a beauty? I had to also rearrange the seating arrangement so that the students aren't directly in front of the projector...

 I spent most of my day trying to figure out a way to get rid of this jumbled mess of cords and wires... I hate that!

 Goodbye old whiteboard! My dad and my husband left before this was put outside... Do you know who put it out there? ME! All by myself! And it was hot!

 Here's a full view, see the new seating arrangement?

 There is the final product... I used binder clips to clip all of the cords to the bookcase. The shelf is adjustable so I pulled it out a little to let the cords hang down from the back. Then I used the binder clips to attach the cord to the carpet. This is what it looked like yesterday, today I spent some more time fixin' it up but I didn't get any pictures of it yet. I think I might put a fabric little curtain to cover the bottom shelf. Yup, that's what I'm gonna do...

Soooo... now that I have this bad boy up, does anyone have any good tips on what to do with this thing?? lol. I've got some great ideas but I'm still at a loss on it's full capabilities... Anyone have a mimio or something like that? That's basically what this is. It's not the SmartBoard brand so I don't have the notebook software that comes with it but it's made of steel so it's magnetic and I can write on it with dry erase marker. Does anyone know if I can still use that software even without the brand whiteboard? This board has it's own software but I haven't figured out how to use it plus the software doesn't really wow me just yet...

I'll put up some more pics soon, right now I need to rest because I have a fever! Could it do with the boy who came to school today with an ice pack on his eye? Why, you ask? "Because my eye has mucus in it!" (boy rubs eye with hand and gives me a hug) Oh kindergarten!

Please let me know if you have any good tips! Be back tomorrow...

Happy Tuesday!

Hi Everybody!
I feel so out of the loop, I've been missing from the bloggy world for soooo long! Well, just since Wednesday but it seems like forever!
I had an absolutely awful day yesterday but today was a new day AND guess what came in??? Yup! You guessed it, my interactive whiteboard!  See that big box?? It has all of my excitement just waiting inside for me! lol. Now, I need to get it up, get it on and start playing!
Oh, and look around my classroom, it may look a little different after the install! I'M SO GIDDY! I can't wait.

So that awful day? Oh my!! It... was... a... doozy!!!! I was such a mess that I left my desk looking like this...

MESSY!! I think my desk will look a little different after the whiteboard install also. It is a big jumbled mess!
I had a new para professional come in to my classroom yesterday to work with my students and, remember D? Yeah, he didn't think that having someone new was such a great idea so he decided not to come into the classroom. And he decided to take off his clothes, again. And he screamed for a long time. He has the strongest lungs ever! hehe. AND it was picture day which meant that our daily schedule was out of whack because we had be on standby for pictures all morning. To sum it all up, it was awful. BUT today was definitely a new day! Our new paraprofessional didn't get scared away and she did an absolutely wonderful job with all of the students today. I left school with so many successes!
We taught Left & Right today and, as you know, this is a tough concept for these little guys. I totally forgot to take pictures, I'm really needing to work on that. The whole class went on a scavenger hunt around the school to find all of the shapes on our list... We could only go on this hunt if we knew our Left and Right! (well, everyone went but I said this anyway to keep them on their toes!) We found one shape, stood in line in front of it and then found out how to get to the next shape.
Me: "Here is the pink rectangle! We need to find the green triangle next. To find the green triangle, we need to turn left!"
Class: "Left is this way!" (1/4 of them pointing to the right)
Me:"Ok everyone, point the the LEFT... no, LEFT... your other hand... YES! LEFT! Let's go!"
I carried my Left and Right signs with me and used them to help with the directions. You can find the signs in my Math Posters Set OR leave me a comment and I'll send you them for FREE! You can kinda see them in the first picture on this post but hey, if you don't like them, at least they are free! lol.
Next thing on the list? I have a new item on TPT! During our story times, or any time I pick up a book in front of my class, I ask the students about the front cover, back cover, spine, author and illustrator... Now I have some cute posters and cards to go with that! I plan to post the posters and use the cards to pull and ask students. I may call some kids up, choose a card and tell me about that part of the book... The set is just $2!

Do you like the font I used in this picture??? Rowdy in Room 300 has some adorable fonts available on her blog... check it out!

Teaching with iPods

Hola amigos!
A wonderful blog TIPS:Teach, Inspire, and Prepare Students just got 5 iPods to use in her classroom (Woo! Hoo! Congrats Laura!) and is asking for some help with how to use them. Any one out there want to join her linky/giveaway to offer any advice??

Here is how I use my iPods...
1. Centers
We have a 4 center rotation each day and at one center, once or twice a week, when work is complete, the students get to use the iPods. I like to make the adjust work during these days so that they will all have time to get to play. It stinks when the fast finishers are the only ones who get to play.

2. Morning Meeting
Everyone has a block of time where the students are completing "morning meeting" type tasks, right? Well, after teaching the routine for quite some time, I break my students up into different groups, this time for days of the week. Each day of the week, a group of students gets to use the iPods. I call this my "Room 3 App Store" I am very strict about which games they can play because I want the time to be useful, fun and interactive. I give them a few choices about what they can play and they can ONLY play these choices. I tell them that if they aren't following directions, then they will not be able to play anymore but I haven't had any problems and good thing because I wouldn't have such a hard time taking such a fun time away from them! Each of their game choices works on something that they are struggling with. This makes it SOOOO easy for differentiation and inclusion: everyone gets what they need!
Here's a picture of how I have it set up in my classroom.

I have each iPod numbered (aww man, I don't have a picture of that, I'll put it in the Friday Photo Dump). So, I take a minute and say, "It's Monday, You are on iPod number 1 and here are your 2 choices, You are on iPod number 2 and here are your choices, You are on iPod number 3 and here are your choices, You are on iPod number 4 and here are your choices and You are on iPod number 5 and here are your choices." That was long-winded! I call the students by their names though, not by "You." hehe. After 2 or 3 weeks time, all I have to do is walk over to the App Store pocket chart and say, "It's Tuesday," there are probably students ready and waiting at the table already with their hands out urging me to stop talking so they can start.
To make the picture choices of the apps, I Googled the apps and looked for the image that matches what it looks like on the actual iPod, formatted it to size in PowerPoint and hit print! Here is a copy of the my PowerPoint if you'd like to use it or just take a look at how I did it. Please leave me comment if you download it so I know if it is any good! =) Also, it came out kinda funky in GoogleDocs so just email me if you'd like an original copy.

3. Listen to Reading time during Daily 5
I spent much time on my computer uploading all of my books on CD into my iTunes. After I uploaded them all, I spent more time Google-ing the images of the front cover for each book. It took me all summer last year! But it was well worth it, trust me! All my students have to do is grab a book, an iPod and they are reading to listen to the story. They go to music, find the image of the book and tap on it. So simple for my kindergarteners and I don't have hands tugging on me because they can't find their story. If I want them all to read the same story, I put 1 iPod out and hook it up to my Lakeshore splitter and we are good to go!
This is what it looks like in iTunes

In order to get the picture on there you'll need to:
1. Save the picture onto your computer. I made an entire folder called "Front Covers for iPods," clever, right?
2. Go into iTunes, find the story and right click (sorry guys, I'm a PC user, I don't know what right click translates to in Mac world)
3. Click on Get Info
4. Click on the Artwork tab
5. Click Add
6. Choose your picture and save!

4. As a timer
I LOVE my Kiddie Timer! There is an app called Kiddie Timer that is amazing. There is a free one (with stinkin' ads) and a paid one. I put it under my ELMO and the students help keep track of our time. I also have a helper who taps Stop and Go (mostly because I always forget). If you have an iPod, get this app for your kids and/or your students!

Ok, I have gone on long enough, this took much longer to write than expected. Check out my previous post about iPods here and here for more info (or repeated info) and for some of the apps that I use. And don't forget to link up with Laura at TIPS to help her out and everyone else with iPods/iPads.

Thanks for being here!

Almost Friday & iPod Love

What. A. Week.
For being a 4 day work week, it sure is long! Yesterday, was our Buddy Day! We had all the incoming kindergarteners come and meet our current kindergarteners, take a tour of the campus & classroom from our kindergarten tour guides. My kiddos were beyond excited about finally being a "big buddy." It was so cute, so fun and SO exhausting! Our sunny California is really letting us have it with it's 90 degree weather! Today, I began taking apart my classroom but not before snapping a few more pictures to share with all of you. Look at my Classroom Pictures page to see. Tomorrow, report cards, yay! It's all good though because next week is my birthday AND the last week of school, both of which bring me anxiety and major excitement.

I want to share some more things that I use my iPod for...

1. Keeping time...
I cannot tell you how easily I lose track of time, especially when I'm tackled by kindergarteners all day. I use an app called KiddieCountdownTimer during my centers, my free choice time, everything! I put it under my ELMO and now everyone can see how much time we have left. What I especially like about it is that it gives you a warning sound (or not, if you don't want that). I use the warning a the cue to clean up and when time is up, we are ready to switch or move on. The kids do a great job of looking up and saying, "2 more minutes!" It is really cool when they are all sitting, ready to switch counting down with the timer. Awww, I'm really going to miss this class!

 2. Playing Music
C'mon I teach Kindergarten! You know this bad boy is full of Dr.Jean, Charlotte Diamond, HeidiSongs & more. I use it to play songs during transitions, for a much needed wiggle break and as a clean up song. Just look at my iTunes! Now that I'm looking at it, I need more songs!

3. Daily 5 Listening Center
The snapshot above is a view of the stories I have for listening center. I made sure to upload all of the covers of each story that way the kids can find the story themselves. I'm all about giving them as much independence as I can. Of course, we talked explicitly about rules, safety and all that jazz before putting our grubby little hands on them. I have all of my songs & stories organized so that I can find them all as quickly as I can. I know that I've stumbled many times trying to find a song and trying to keep those kindergarteners from bouncing off the walls! Man I hate rainy days! (flashbacks, sorry)
4.Trickster
Sometimes, I sit in meetings and "look for resources" for my students. Hey, it's hard to sit through meetings that do not pertain to kindergarten at all! Looking at blogs is considered research, right? (wink, wink)

Happy Almost Friday!

I love my iPods!

Are you a lucky teacher who gets to use iPods or iPads in your classroom? I am! I wrote a grant last year to get these babies and I actually won! I never win anything! There were over 500 applicants and I was awarded with 8 iPods to use in my classroom. I LOOOOVE them. I use them for so many different things but I will share all of their uses over time... right now I have to focus!
The first way (and the easiest for me) I have used them was as a small group activity. We all have the "morning meeting" or morning routine that gets build into our daily schedules, right? I use this time as an opportunity for the kids to play some games and learn! I started the "App Store" as soon as I felt they had the morning routine down.

First, I created this schedule...

Each iPod is numbered and each student has a different day to play. You can see that William plays on iPod number 1 on Mondays and so on.

Next, I downloaded some games. I work in an inclusive classroom so I have students with varying abilities. I make sure to get games that will benefit all students and specific students. I explain to students that they get to play 1 or 2 different games that will be fun and work best for them to learn. That's when this comes in...

I have lots of different games that will work and meet each students' needs. I chose 2 games for them and they get to choose to play 1 or both of the games with the time that they have, which is generally 15-20 minutes.
Then, I place their choices on the chart next to their name. I have to do this each day but it takes just 2 minutes and makes all the difference!

Now you can see that William plays on Mondays and he has his 2 choices next to his name & number.

This is a part of our morning meeting each day and practically runs itself. My only job is to change the games each day to meet the students' needs and make sure the iPods are charged (my goodness, this a disaster when they lose battery!).

Here is a list of my favorite apps to use. If you have some that you use and love, PLEASE let me know, I am always looking for more.

What to do for next time?
I am going to delete the games that I don't want to students playing quite yet. Too many pages of apps is very confusing! If you delete an app from the iPod/iPad you can always download it again through the AppStore, just don't delete it from your iTunes... then you're in trouble!

What to do for inclusion?
This lends itself nicely for all students. I make sure that there are an equal amount of games for all students to use and since they each have their own in such a small group, each has a different game to play based on their skills and needs. All students loooooooooooooooooooove to use the technology, no matter what it is.

Don't have iPods? I imagine something like this working with computers as well. My favorite sites are starfall.com and brainpopjr.com. Check out my Computer Groups Post to see how my computer groups are organized. 

Computer Groups? NO PROBLEM!

I recently got 3 desktop computers in my classroom. And while they are a little old and dusty, they are new to me and my students and we are having so much fun with them! Once I found out I was getting the computers, I got straight to work trying to figure out how was going to incorporate daily use in my already well oiled machine of a day. hmmm...
I came up with this! I separated my daily center groups into T/Th and W/F subgroups. This way everyone gets 2 opportunities a week to play on iStation (a computer based reading program that my school just got). After I separated the subgroups, I typed them up on Powerpoint, made them cute, and saved it as a JPEG. Now I have a computer desktop background and the students know which computer to use and when! No wall spaces to take up, no paper to be printed on. The kiddos added this to the machine and VOILA! A new routine was born.

What to do for next time?

Nothing I can think of yet... I'm sure there might be something...

What to do for inclusion?
Students with special needs (actually, most students) are most successful when clear expectations & routines are set. All students know when and where computer time will be, all students are able to use them and computer games are easy-peesy to differentiate.