Vacation thoughts...

Being 900 miles away from my classroom can be a chance to really realize that I need to relax. School will begin on August 4th for me. It has given me an opportunity to stay away. But it also gives me too much time to follow the blogs of teachers who are creating wonderful and fantastic and as Abby would say--12 kinds of excitement.

I have gotten some documents that are ready to print and laminate. I broke down and bought the Scott laminator right before we left. I purposedly didn't open it. Now I just need to make sure I pick up printer cartridges because I am going to have an assembly line going. I wonder if I can persuade my husband to cut laminating???No way!!!

Before I left I began replacing my solid blue border around a few bulletin boards. This is the before:

Michaels is now carrying a few teacher supplies. I am going to get as many packs of the green polka dotted border as I will need for some of the boards. (Now you do realize that I can't post any after pictures yet!)

I have saved many documents--thanks to Teaching in Flip Flops.  She has been so 12 kinds of nice to create many classroom documents in polka dot, leopard, and now cowboy themes. I am going with the polka dots. I now have Daily 5 information, calendar, alphabet, writing, etc. (I still can't post any pictures.)


With that being in my mind and actually settled--juuuuusssssttttt need to accomplish it--I was getting more inspired by The Inspired Apple. Abby is going with a "rocking first grade". She is so creative! I looooovvve her bulletin board area with her what to do when first coming to school and her behavior guitar.

I am not going with the "rocking" theme but I love her banner. That I can use. Now I need some creative juices to flow to use a clip chart.


The next part of my "vacation ramblings" are trying to decide how to fit 23 kids in 23 desks and still to actually be able to move around the room. I mean...we are not going to fly across the room, drop into a chair, and stay there until dismissal. I have these wonderful "hold our book baskets" item that my husband and I built.

This pic was my set up for summer school. It is 22 desks. Crowded==yes! When I didn't have as many kids I changed to three groups of 7 desks==21 desks. Crowded--not as much  but I really want to have smaller groups. In order to do that I will have to maybe remove the "hold our book baskets" shelf. But that creates a problem of having a place to store those book baskets. The kids use them frequently for their poetry book, read to self, etc.

To be continued!