Prayers! Cross your fingers!

The other day, I posted about how the job I have now has been eliminated for next year.  Gotta love my luck.  However, I got an e-mail from another district yesterday and I'm waiting for a phone call.  So please, pretty please, with sugar on top and ice cream in the middle, say some prayers for me tonight that I get called!  I know that if I could get an interview, I could impress them with my personality, my education, and my knowledge base, but around my neck of the woods, getting the interview is the hardest part.  So any spiritual help you could throw my way would be greatly appreciated - I promise to send some your way as well.

Thanks in advance for the good juju - Lord knows I need it right now.

Goodnight blog friends!
<3 Ms. P

In need of some encouragement...

There are so many things that I am enjoying about teaching fourth grade ELA right now... having this school year end is not one of them.  I got word on Friday that the position I thought I had an opportunity to fill next year has been eliminated due to insufficient budget funds.  The majority of the school's staff is being shuffled to accommodate more students coming into fourth grade than they currently have now and all of this with one less fourth grade teacher.  Now don't get me wrong, I love reading teaching blogs and reading books about teaching - I'm taking three classes in Special Education this summer and I'm loving them.  However, I've been looking for a full-time teaching job since I graduated from my undergrad in 2008 and now it's 2011... and still nothing.  To be completely honest, my heart is broken.  There are no words for how frustrating it is to not have a classroom to call my own when I'm doing all the right things - I have two Bachelor's degrees, a Master's degree, and five different teacher certifications.  I couldn't possibly be more marketable at this point without getting another degree.

So I'm enjoying every single day with my kiddos, challenging behaviors and all.  I'm learning from this experience and it's making me a better teacher - I know that.  I just wish that it didn't have to end so soon.

Did anyone else have such a difficult time getting a full-time job?  Any words of wisdom to calm my frustrations?

-Ms. P

Busy, busy, busy!

I am so in awe of all of you fantastic teachers out there!  I'm currently in the last two weeks of my first leave replacement and I am amazed at all of the random paperwork type things that need to be completed and submitted before the end of the year.  Report cards, permanent records, and portfolios, plus I have to take everything off the walls because next year, another teacher is moving into the room I'm in now (unfortunately for me, the position I'm currently filling got eliminated for next year.  Back to day-to-day subbing for me).  Yikes!  All of that, plus Field Day, a field trip, a half-day, a day of character education assemblies, and I still have a whole week of lessons to get through.

So to recap, I'm in awe of teachers even more now than I was before.  You are all super heroes in my eyes!

-Ms. P

Let me not forget...

Tonight, I'm sending prayers to one of my favorite teacher bloggers, Katie at Queen of the First Grade Jungle.  One of her students was in a terrible car accident and passed away a few days ago, along with his triplet sister (the third triplet is recovering).  I don't know Katie personally, but her blog is beautifully written and her passion for teaching and her love of her students is obvious and incredibly admirable.  So if all of you lovely bloggers could take a second and say a prayer for Katie, her student, his family, and their school community, it would mean a lot to me.

Sending prayers to you, Katie - may God send all of you peace, strength, and enduring love.

<3

Summer Reading List!

Hi everyone!

Well, the school year is quickly coming to a close and I have exciting news to report - I've been working every day since the beginning of May! I got offered a leave replacement team teaching fourth grade with one of my childhood best friends and it has been challenging and exciting (and extremely enlightening) - I could not be happier!  However, now that the school year is ending, I am looking for books to keep my mind engaged (not counting the textbooks I need for my three summer classes in Special Education haha!).

Here's my summer reading list:


The Book Whisperer: Awakening the Inner Reader in Every Child





The CAFE Book: Engaging All Students in Daily Literary Assessment and Instruction





The Daily Five





Notebook Know-How: Strategies for the Writer's Notebook


Math Work Stations: Independent Learning You Can Count On, K-2


Literacy Work Stations: Making Centers Work

I know there are some great book discussions on Teaching Blog Addict that I have stalked and admired from afar (since I have very little real teaching experience to contribute to the discussion).  I am really trying to equip myself with as many tools, tips, tricks, and tried and true strategies to be the best teacher I can possibly be when I do get my own classroom!

What's your summer reading list? :)

Prayers.

Just a quick post tonight. In the wake of the devastating storms that have ravaged the South in the past few days, I am reminded of just how blessed I truly am. I am sending all of those affected by these storms lots of prayers for safety, peace, and strength. May God bless you all, keep you safe, and help you recover and rebuild.

<3

The joys of looking through old computer files...

Hi all!  I've had my computer for a couple of years now and to be honest, all I do is compulsively save great ideas that I see on the internet - whether they are pictures I see that I'd like to mimic one day in my own classroom or lesson plan ideas that seem fantastic!  However, in my excitement to save these incredible ideas I sometimes forget to save where they're from as well.  So here's Part I in my "This is a great idea but I don't know where I found it" series: a Popcorn Words pdf file (grab it for yourself by clicking the link!).  If anyone knows where this is from, please let me know so I can give credit to the incredible creator!

For a while there, I was teaching a five-year-old how to read and I used this popcorn word template to print out all the high frequency words I thought he should learn and he loved it!  I typed Dolch words onto the popcorn templates and printed them out on cardstock.  I didn't laminate them, but you certainly could if you wanted them to be more durable.  Laminating them would also be a great way to turn this into a literacy center - your students could use dry erase markers to trace the popcorn words!  I hope that it will work for you all as well as it worked for me.  In addition, if you're looking for a great game to play with popcorn words, check out POP for Sight Words Game on Amazon - it's inexpensive and ADORABLE!

Have a great weekend and Happy Easter to you all!
-Sara

Welcome!

Hi there blog world!  My name is Sara and I am currently a substitute teacher with too many ideas and no classroom to call my own to use them in.  This economy is truly hitting my job search hard, so I'm taking to the blogosphere to share my ideas with all of you.  Soon, this blog will be full of links and lessons and hopefully some freebies for all of you who can use them in your own classrooms!  I look forward to your feedback and hopefully learn a little bit from everyone who reads this blog.

In the meantime (while you're waiting for me to get myself in gear), head over to Amazon and check out the Kindle.  Seriously - it's my best friend and I take it everywhere.  More on that later!

Love to all you teachers out there - I know how hard you work and I respect you all!  Can't wait to share my ideas with you.

-Sara