Wishlist Wednesday Link Up!!

We are back!! It has been a busy couple of weeks getting our classrooms and ourselves students ready for the PARCC test but we are back into the swing of things! We have linked up with Hanging Around in Primary to mark down our most wish listed items! On Wednesday March 4, 2015 our top three wish listed items will be 20% off!! 

The following items will be 20% off: 

1. Finish the Picture Writing Prompts

2. Blank Monthly Calendars

3. Follow the Yellow Brick Road Behavior Chart

Make sure to check out the other sellers who have marked down their items! 

Wish List Wednesday!!!!

Is it March already?!?!?!

WOW! Where has the time gone! I am in shock that it is already March :) I am linking up with Oh' Boy 4th Grade for their Currently March....(only a few days late)

I am currently......

• Listening to Law and Order SVU playing in the background while I catch up on some TPT and emails....No matter how many times I see the same episode I still have to watch until it is over!
• Loving that we finished the language arts portion of the PARCC!!!! I can't wait until next week when we finish the math section and are done testing!
• I was thinking of getting Dairy Queen for lunch today, is it too cold out for ice cream for lunch? What are your thoughts? 
• I need want a new Michael Kors bag....what is your favorite bag designer? 
• THE SNOW NEEDS TO STOP!!! I can't remember the last time I saw my grass. I am over shoveling and cleaning my car off to go to work. Hurry up Spring!
• Spring Break seems so far away! We get the week after Easter off and we do not have any days off in March. It is going to be a long month but I am looking forward to spending some time with friends and family and relaxing a bit......what are your plans for Spring Break?

February Favorite Things Linky!!!

I have joined up with Teaching Trio again for their February Favorite Things Linky! I was having some trouble deciding what I wanted to focus on this month but decided to focus on my favorite Target Dollar Spot finds! I know I am not the only teacher with a small Target obsession :)  Every time I am at Target the first place I go is the Dollar Spot to see what new items they have that I can use in my classroom. These are three of my favorite finds this year so far..... 

1. I found these great pink and blue cardboard book bins from the dollar spot over the summer. These are great for personal book bins! Each student has their own book bin and inside it has three books on their reading level, their reading stamina graph, a non-fiction response journal, and for some of my students a E-Z Reader! Below are some pictures of the book bins and what is inside :) 

2. My second favorite Target Dollar Spot find is my mini pocket charts! I was so excited when I saw these that I bought 5 of them! I have no clue what to do with the other 4 of them but I use one in my word work center to hang up the students weekly spelling words. What would you use the other mini pocket charts for? 

 3. Dry erase boards and markers! What teacher does not love dry erase markers and boards! I use these all the time. I love these new ones that I recently bought with the lines already on the board! They are great for helping dictate sentences for journals and just helping students practice their letter formation. These items are almost always in the dollar spot and I always find myself buying tow or three each time I visit Target :) You can never have enough dry erase markers or boards right?

Head over to http://teachingtrio.blogspot.com/ to check out some other great blogs and find out what are some other teachers favorite things in February :) 

-Lisa @Sparkling in Self Contained 

Sunday Scoop 2/1/15!!!!

Happy Super Bowl Sunday!!! Even though my team is not in the Super Bowl (J-E-T-S!)  I am still excited to have family and friends over to watch the game! I am linking up with Teaching Trio again for their Sunday Scoop!

 

Having family and friends over means cleaning the entire house and making sure we have enough pick food for everyone! I am making one of my favorite snack foods, baked mac n' cheese bites!  

http://cupcakesandcashmere.com/food/mac-and-cheese-cups 

This recipe is so easy and yummy! Check it out if you have time, it is worth it! 

I don't know about you guys but we are supposed to get some more snow tonight! I am hoping that this is not like last time and we actually get some snow. I will be patiently waiting for a phone call for either a delayed opening or a snow day! 

Make sure to visit http://teachingtrio.blogspot.com/ and link up today!! 

-Lisa 

SNOW DAY!!

We had our first snow day today!! Even though we didn't get the blizzard that was expected we still got some snow and I totally took advantage of the snow day. I spent my morning watching Law and Order:SVU my absolute favorite TV show! If I wasn't a teacher I would totally be Olivia Benson! What would you do if you were not a teacher? 

How many of you use your crockpot often? I recently got one for my bridal shower and I was a little apprehensive about using it at first and leaving it plugged in and on all day while we were both at work but I must say I LOVE IT! Since it was a snow day it seemed fitting to make some chicken soup :) Soup and grilled cheese on a snowy day is the perfect combination! So I headed over to Pinterest (like I usually do) to help find a crockpot chicken soup recipe. I came across this pin for Chicken Soup and it smells GREAT! 

Besides binge watching Law & Order and scouring Pinterest for dinner I also took advantage of this snow day to create some TPT products and do my plans for the next two weeks! Our students are starting their state research papers and I found this cute song on YouTube that helps the students memorize the state capitals. This is a catchy tune and my kids ask to hear it almost every day! If you have never been to Marbles the Brain Store you NEED to go! There is one in our local mall and this store is great. This song is on a CD that is sold at Marbles along tons of other resources that are fun and educational. 

Tour the States Song

Did any of you have a snow day today? If so, what did you do? If not, how was your day at school? 

-Lisa Marie 

APPS!

How many of you have iPads or tablets in your classroom? My class was very lucky to have received THREE, yes you read that right, THREE iPads that are just for our class! Yay! We have a school set but it has to be shared between every class in the building so having our own makes it easier to ensure that my students will get time on them each day. I am also able to download apps that are appropriate for my students :) 

 These are a few apps that my students really enjoy using: 

Toontastic

This app is great for helping student to create stories and use their imagination! My students enjoy the fact that they get to pick everything from the setting, characters, and even the music that will go along with their story line.  This was a very easy app for my students to learn how to manage on their own! 

Splash Math

Splash Math is a fun interactive math game! The math questions in this app cover a wide variety of topics that are taught in the common core. Math Splash is available in different grade levels which is awesome for my multi grade class! 

I have a list of apps that I give out to my parents at back to school night so that they can download some of these apps if they are able to at home. I will post the list either later on tonight or tomorrow. It has a list of every app that is on our classroom iPads! 

What are some of your favorite classroom apps? 

-Lisa & Becka 

Sparkling in Self Contained 

Sunday Scoop!

I cannot believe that it is already Sunday!! I am pretty sure that we must have skipped Saturday... but on the bright side this is our first Sunday Scoop link up! I have been trying to keep up with my blogging and have been getting lost in some amazing blogs that I have found through linking up with others :) So here it goes.....

3 things that I have to do: 

1. I tend to get distracted creating products for TPT and I have to make sure that I am stirring my sauce every once in a while so it does not burn! It would not be a Sunday in our Italian house without sauce. 
2. My plans HAVE to get done today! I have everything copied and I have my new guided reading books for the week and the skill that I am working on I just have to sit down and write them in my planbook!
3. Food shopping probably should be #1 on my list of things that have to get done today. I dread going food shopping on a Sunday but that is what I get for saying "I can go tomorrow after work" every day this week and never going!

2 things I hope to do:
1. I really hope that I have time today to finish (or at least continue to work on) my Wizard of Oz themed classroom decor pack. I LOVE that movie and I have been creating different products to put up on TPT.
2. The dreaded "L" word! LAUNDRY!! Why can't there be a little laundry fairy to wash, dry, fold, and put away your laundry?!?! 

1 thing I am happy to do today: 
1. My husband is amazing and he is always taking care of me when I am not feeling well so today it is my turn to take care of him. In between gatorade and soup runs I will be trying to complete everything else on my Sunday Scoop list! 

On that note time to go stir my sauce and check up on the hubby :) 

-Lisa Marie