A Day In My Shoes

Sooo . . . (and yes I do realize that I start most of my sentences this way!) I need some followers. Otherwise, this whole blog-adventure is pointless, so I am linking up with Katie at Adventures of a 6th Grade Teacher! Check out a day in the life of a scattered second grade teacher!

6:30: My alarm goes off but I stay in bed until at least 6:40 but sometimes as late as 7:00, especially when I don't have to be in early!

8:00: After grabbing my daily Dr. Pepper from McDonalds, I head to school!

8:30: I run next door to annoy Jen and pick her brain or make her relive whatever shannanigans I have gotten into on my way to school or the night before. (I'm usually very scattered in the morning, well okay I am scattered all the time but some how everything I need to do gets done!)

8:45: My little Sugarlumps start arriving. A little blonde Sweetums always arrives first and gives me an amazing good morning greeting everyday.

My kiddos start to do what we call the "P of the D" or Problem of the Day. Sometimes it is written in the board and sometimes I project it on my SmartBoard. They also log on to their Xtra Math accounts to start practicing those basic facts!

9:00: It is now 15 minutes until the second bell and I am telling myself not to forget to do the attendance. I tell the closest Pudding Pop to help me remember. I am also coming up with an awesome idea to enhance my math lesson at this time and I am scrambling to get it ready before 9:15.

9:15: Math Time!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I love math! My kiddos this year are super math students! We go over the P of the D, I award them with a sticker in their math journals for completing it. I go into a 15 - 20 minute lesson where we use our Math Leader, our Questioning strategies, and our Big Ol' Brains! I then let them practice independently and invite Sweetums who are confused to meet with me at my "back table."

10:15: (Usually more like 10:30 or even 10:40 because I try to milk math for all its worth!) RECESS!! I chat with my Snickernoodles or my teacher pals. (Today for instance one pal and I were discussing a student's unusual winter wear style)

10:50: Planning/Specials: I actually had a lot typed here originally but I realized all I was doing was gripping so I am just not going to say anything about what I actually do during this time. :)

11:35: Writing!! So, math is my favorite but I am loving writing more and more. Most days I follow the Lucy Caulkins model of Writer's Workshop but occasionally we get a little bit casual. Like this week we are working on prompt writing using this super cute printable I found from Scholastic.

12:15: Social Studies! I love to teaching Social Studies! I feel like its an AWESOME opportunity to integrate character education when you don't really feel like you have any other time to squeeze it in. Right now we are about to begin a unit on Natural Resources. I always like to use a mentor text like this one:

It is similar to The Lorax by Dr Suess but it is better, cuter, and was published before The Lorax. (I do think that the last lines of The Lorax are pricless though!)

1:10: Lunch Time! So we are all advised to at all cost STAY OUT OF THE TEACHERS LOUNGE! But I have found that 20 minutes of chatting about second jobs/boyfriends/husbands/The Bachelor is SOO refreshing after being surrounded by munchkins all day.

1:40: Daily CAFE. Our school adopted Daily 5 last year and CAFE this year. I am totally sold on Daily 5 and I am still working to incorporate CAFE into what I already do during reading instruction. But Daily 5 SOO works! On our 100th day of school I made my students read 147 books (our goal was 100 but I made them keep going!). They read steadily for over an hour!!! I was SO proud of them and I have no doubt that they will have the reading stamina they will need next year in third grade.

3:30: Dismissal for Carpool

3:45: Dismissal for Buses (I am putting these down as two seperate times because 3:30 - 3:45 is the longest 15 minutes of my day EVERY day! These kiddos are chomping at the bit and so am I. Sometimes we play a fun game but mostly I make them play the silent game)

4:30 - 7:00: I leave school somewhere between these times. Unless it is Wednesday and then I stay until 9:00. I keep telling myself that I am going to go home at 4:30 but I NEVER do. Argh.