Summer Piles Linky

I found this cute linky party today over at Bunting, Books and Bainbridge and could not resist showing off my summer piles of teaching materials!  I have been enjoying seeing everyone's piles and reading all of their blogs!  It helps to know that my house is not the only one with piles of random teaching materials all over the place.  So here goes, check out my mess:

This may not technically count as a pile but it is definitely school stuff.  This little cabinet is a cool storage place for my kids school stuff and our arts and craft supplies.  As you can see they each have a drawer for their things with baskets for all the items that I find laying around the house.  This system works pretty well during the school year but now that it is summer, I have taken it over.  The plants and pets from my classroom live here for the summer.  Pancakes and Sprinkles (gerbils) also have taken over a shelf for their food and that big ugly bag is full of their bedding and other supplies!

 This pile of stuff is in my dining room and is a collection of empty containers that I am planning to find a use for this summer.  I love pringles cans for power towers and icing containers are great for holding dice, calling sticks pencils and other small items. 

The orange container is actually a drawer from my classroom that was a hot mess at the end of the year.  I brought it home and organized it one night while catching up on Grey's Anatomy!!


This pile is currently in my family room but moves between the family room and my office depending on where I am working at the time.  It is my plan books from last year, some laminating that still needs to be cut out, my ipad and my super important notebook where I keep all my different lists of things to do!  The best thing in this picture is my cute little kitten named Ollie!  We just adopted him from my teacher friend who found his litter abandoned in the woods behind her house. 

This pile is also in my kitchen.  In fact it is on top of the kitchen table.  It is my paint box and a few classroom crafts.  I already got the calling sticks painted so I can cross that off my summer list.  Next I will be painting the clothespins to use on my behavior chart next year. 

Make sure to check out the linky party and join in the fun!

Last week of school = Camping and S'mores!

The last week of school is always crazy for me and the kids.  The weather is beautiful, the pools are open and keeping the kids focused can be a challenge.  This year my team planned a camp like activity for the last week of school.  We each planned an activity to do with a class and then created a schedule that rotated each class through to each teacher.  It was super fun.  In my rotation we used water colors to create murals, they worked in 4 teams per rotation created awesome murals!  After murals dried each teacher got 4 big murals that we used to help us cover empty bulletin boards which made our classrooms look bright and cheery instead of packed up!  

The other roations included Father's Day pet rock creations, volcano experiements, and stain "glass" creations

On the last full day of school we had kids bring in flashlights and we had a big camp out.  I had three tents set up in my classroom and kids created their own campfires using toilet paper tubes and construction paper. 

I found an awesome youtube video of a camp fire that I had playing on the board while they worked.  When they were finished we turned out the lights and they used thier flashlights to read by the campfires. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1nu_8IQd78

After they read we talked about smores!  They shared their experiences with making and eating smores and then I told then that we were going to make smores in our classroom.  They were beyond excited.  We watched a video on making smores in the microwave.  It is a great little youtube video that was perfect for my kids to watch and they write about making smores. 

After we made and ate our smores, the kids wrote the steps to making smores.  It was a perfect conclusion to all our camping fun!  I found this wonderful smores writing paper and some fun camping ideas at Rulin' the Roost!  Be sure the check them out!

Happy Summer to all my awesome teacher friends!!