Come check out my new look!

Friends, my redesign is finished, and I couldn't be happier with the results!  Erika and Misty at Honey Bunch Blog Designs did a FANTASTIC job and I am in LOVE with my new look! If you are in need a customized look for your blog I can't recommend them enough.  They took my crazy vision of football and polka dots, and turned it into a reality.  Also, a BIG thank you to Nikki at MelonHeadz Illustrating for designing a custom football clip art package for me, it really made the whole vision for my blog come to life!

Since the redesign is complete, I'd like to formally welcome you to Fourth and Ten!  A new look and a new name to represent my grade level change.  The name is the brainchild of my dear husband, who pointed out that fourth graders are mostly ten years old, so the new name Fourth and Ten was born.  

For those of you who don't know, fourth and ten is a term to measure downs and yardage in football.   I'm a HUGE football fan.  Saturdays, in my family, are either spent watching Ohio State on television, or even better, at the Horseshoe in Columbus.  My daddy and I even danced to the Buckeye Battle Cry at my wedding as part of our father/daughter dance.  :) I also love polka dots, and love the fusion of the two that is my blog!

I hope y'all enjoy my new look! :)You might also notice that I have a Facebook icon on the right side of my page, so please check out Fourth and Ten on Facebook too! :)

Rockin' Through the Fry Words and Phrases

In preparation for my upcoming move to fourth grade, I've been reflecting a lot on the time I spent teaching third grade and recently interviewed for a summer school program in my district for struggling readers who are entering fourth my district. 

In the interview I answered a lot of questions about my experience teaching full language arts inclusion during the four years I taught third grade. It was an experience that I LOVED, and it also got my brain ticking on what I could next year in my classroom, as I'll be doing full inclusion in ELA again. 

Something that stuck out at me when thinking back on my experience with my friends on IEPs, and my struggling readers in general, was that many of them did not have a strong sight word vocabulary.  When supporting them in small groups, most words they needed help on while reading were sight words, think Fry and Dolch list words.   Of course many of my other students knew how to read tons and tons of the first 600 fry words, but could probably not spell many of the sight words they can read. 

There is so much focus on sight words in kindergarten and first grade in my district, but not so much in second, third, or fourth grades.  Which is the exact opposite of what my kiddos needed, and I'm very guilty for not including it in my instruction like I should have.  Sweet former students, I'm so sorry. :(

The inspiration struck me the other night for a resource that I can't wait to use next year, and hopefully in the summer program I interviewed for as well!

Oh my goodness, this file is a big one! I took the rockstar theme and ran with it, creating a 100+ file to support my kiddos at school, and at home, in developing their sight word vocabularies in the older grades.  I included large flash card for the fourth 100 fry words and phrases to use in the classroom in various games and centers, suggestions for the their classroom use are included.

I also created take home flashcards for the fourth 100 fry words and phrases, which are perfect for parent helpers and at home practice. Again, I included a sheet for ideas for their use as well.  

I also included a fry word sound check for you you to be able to assess your kiddos on their fry words, and an award to present to them once they have mastered all the fourth 100 fry words. 

 

I'm so excited to use this product in my classroom, and to eventually create similar files for the third hundred, fifth hundred, and sixth hundred.  I'm especially excited to use the cards for whole class games and activities, not just with my struggling readers!

If you would like to check out my Rockin' Through the Fry Words and Phrases for the Fourth 100 Fry Words and Phrases, it is available at both of my shops.  

 Teachers Pay Teachers

Teachers Notebook

Tomorrow I have a fun window shopping post lined up to share with you!  :)  I saw the rough sketch of my new blog design today, and LOVED it.  I can't wait to share it with y'all!

Book Organization for Special Books

I have lots of books in my library, lots.  I've spent hours analyzing Scholastic book orders to figure out what to spend my points on, and may or may not have taken my grandmother to Goodwill to buy books with me to get the senior citizen discount on more than one occasion. :) My library looks like this.  It's my pride and joy.  I figure the best way to get a child to fall in love with reading is to have lots of books available for them to read.  :)

However, even though I love putting as many books as possible in the hands of my students, there are some books I consider special, and I keep out of my library. 

I have two of the plastic file folder tubs above that I fill with my "special" books.  I put all of my seasonal books in gallon sized Ziploc bags inside one of the tubs, along with all my grammar/writing conventions books.  I keep books for lessons throughout the year, such as 9/11, Constitution Day, and the books I use for my first week of school that are oversized and don't fit in baggies in another.  
However, when fall/Halloween/Thanksgiving, Christmas/Hanukkah,  and Easter roll around, I do keep those seasonal books out for a little awhile, but it's easier to put them back in their special tub when the season is over, so I know right where they are for next year, rather than digging in all my book bins or asking, "Has anybody seen _____?"  

I keep my scared book bins in one of my closets, they're easily accessible for me, and easy to find!

I love this system, because it keeps my special books I need safe, and I know right where to find them.  For example, when I review nouns, I know exactly where Chicken in the City is, it's in the grammar baggie in my special book bin! :)

Thank you so much for the sweet birthday messages! I had a wonderful day with my family and sweet husband.  We went to my favorite cooking store, Penzeys, and to my favorite local pizza place.  It was a perfect day! It got even better when we drove by our lot, and saw this!

The rough framing of our house is almost finished! It rained today, so our crew didn't work, but fingers crossed that the framing is finished this week, so we can get a roof soon! :) That way the rain can't prevent work from happening, our projected closing date is already too close to the start of school!

Also, the blog resign process has began! So, so, so excited to share the final product with you! :)

Birthday Sale!

I've been receiving lots of coupons from my favorite stores this week, gotta love a good birthday discount, so in honor of my birthday, I'm throwing a sale! :) The sale is only good for today, June 9th, 2012. :)

 Teachers Pay Teachers

Teachers Notebook 

If you're still in school, it's a great time to pick up one of my end of the year products. :)

Or to pick up my newest product, Math Contracts for Addition Facts.

Enjoy your days, sweet friends! :)

The Friday Five Vol. 2 and a Giveaway Winner!

All images are linked to their original blog post/author via Pinterest. :) 

1. {this collection of healthy lunches}
 

 

Source: 100daysofrealfood.com via Lisa on Pinterest

I don't care if the blogger wrote this post about what she packs for her daughter's lunch, I'm so packing some of these for myself next year!  Packing a lunch is really my least favorite thing to do. I get excited about it for a week once school starts and then it becomes my arch nemesis again.  Thus the reason I usually eat Larbars, baby carrots, and fruit for lunch. There is little to no thinking required!

2. {this quote}
 

Source: blog.shopbop.com via Lisa on Pinterest

This time last year, I was touring Julia's kitchen at the Smithsonian! It was amazing to see all the gadgets she had collected. :) Especially since I love cooking myself.  Not only do I love Julia, this quote pretty much describes how I feel about teaching, so blessed to do something for a living I'm passionate and interested in!


3. {this mantra for everyday}

Source: a-ladys-findings.tumblr.com via Lisa on Pinterest

I ADORE birthdays, especially the birthdays of my family and friends.  Plus, MY birthday is tomorrow. :)  I LOVE birthdays!!! Birthdays are so magical, if only we could wake up everyday with excitement and wonder that a birthday morning wake up brings.  :)

4. {this missing parts bucket}
 

Source: mrsshannonsclass.weebly.com via Lisa on Pinterest

Seriously, how genius is this?  My students are always leaving cubes and dice and money on the floor and it drives me BONKERS.  I love the idea of having a central location for those missing pieces, and then putting them in their proper place place at a later, more convenient time!

5. {these end of the year awards}
 

Source: teacherideafactory.blogspot.com via Lisa on Pinterest

I love, love, love the idea of students making awards for each other.  I can't wait to do this with my fourth graders next year. I'm thinking of possibly having them do them once a month, so my kiddos get to hear how wonderful their classmates think they are ALL year long!

Do you have a Friday Five of your own? Please link up in the comments and share! 

I selected the winner of my Math Contracts for Addition Facts giveaway, drum roll please. :)

 Congratulations, Allison! I will be emailing you the file sometime this morning! :) 


Have a fantastic weekend, everyone! :)

Blogger Tutorials and Giveaways

I've noticed over the past few weeks, things were kinda quiet on the comment front.  I figured it was due to the craziness that is the end of the school year.  So I didn't think that much about it.  Until I went blog surfing yesterday.  I noticed that someone had me on their blogroll and I was SO honored.  Until I noticed my post was from January.  I then went looking in my Google Reader, because I follow my own blog, and noticed none of my posts had synced since the end of January!

Oh my word.  My heart sank.  No wonder nobody there weren't many comments happening lately, my followers weren't being notified that I made a new post! :( 

I did some investigating, aka googling, to find out why.  Which ended up taking forever.  Blogger's help boards aren't exactly the most user friendly place to hang out when you have a problem.  

Basically, I found out I played around with my Blogger settings a little bit too much back when my blog was a baby, and caused my new posts to not sync up to my followers Google Readers and Reading Lists.  

Since I had such a hard time finding the answer to why this was happening, and since it's a relatively easy fix once you know what to do, I made a little tutorial for ya'll.  Just in case it happens to you.  Which I hope it doesn't.  But just in case. My year and a half in girl scouts taught me to be prepared!  I know this solution works, because all of a sudden, BAM! comments started to happen.  :)

Now, if this doesn't fix your problem, I don't know what to do! :( Other than eat some chocolate, breathe, and call tech support. I suggest Dove Dark Chocolate Squares, but you go ahead and grab what is closest to ya.  A handful of chocolate chips from your pantry could work too!

Also, I purchased a domain for my blog, so that buttons and pins on other blogs would still lead people to my blog, rather than a dead link if I just transferred it to a new blogspot address, once my new design is completed.  Again, this is an easy process that but the steps to do so is not easily laid out in anywhere in Google/Blogger that I could find.  

I'd like to thank the poor tech help guys Blogger that I frantically spoke with on the phone yesterday.  I'd bake them cookies if I remember their names.  Or knew where to send them.

They would probably look like this.  I made these cookies.  They were good.  So here's your cookies Google Guys. 

So again, I made a little tutorial for ya'll for if/when you switch to your own domain name.

My apologizes for flooding your readers/reading lists yesterday!  I promise to never play where I don't belong, aka where I don't know what I'm doing, ever again!  Pinky promises, because I really wasted a huge chunk of my day on technology forums yesterday, which is kinda where I don't like hanging out online.  I'd much rather be reading blogs or pinning things.  However, it did help me communicate with my sweet friends again, so it was worth it. :)


On an unrelated note, there are lots of giveways happening in the blog world! Ginger has reached 1,000 followers and I'm so honored to be a part of her giveaway.  I'm giving away my Arrays Full of Sunshine craftivity!  Check out here giveaway {here}!

I'm also giving away my new product, Addition Facts Math Contracts {here}, I'm picking my winner tomorrow so enter soon! :) 
On my to do list today is a trip to Hobby Lobby.  I might not buy anything, but I'm getting some inspiration for a fun summer series for my bloggy! What's on your to do list today? Or do you forget about making a list since for many of us, it's summer?!

Math Contracts for Addition Facts {Giveaway}

A couple of times on this little ole blog, I've talked about my homework routine, and how math fact practice is a part of it.  I received many emails/comments about my math contracts, and I have been working hard on making my contracts into something I feel that could be used by all teachers in grades 1-5.  So far, I have addition completed, and will be working on subtraction, multiplication, and division soon.

 Teachers Pay Teachers

Teachers Notebook

I feel that fact fluency is really important.  I can vividly remember the tears and frustration my kiddos expressed when I taught third grade and we were doing two and three digit addition, with and without regrouping.  Most of those tears happened because they didn't know their basic math facts, and would have to use 100s charts, fingers, or snapping cubes to figure out the answers to the basic facts. Then try to apply the strategies we were currently learning in class for higher level concepts involving addition. 

You can only imagine how frustrated the kiddos got when we did two and three digit multiplication, when they didn't have their basic multiplication facts mastered.  :(

For many years, my district has used the Investigations math program.  For many reasons I love it. I love the critical thinking components, the rich discussions, and the encouragement to use more than one strategy to solve a problem.  However, it does not, at least with our very early edition, address math fact fluency.  So for many years, we didn't push that in our rooms, thus developing very strong problem solvers who didn't have multiplication, addition, subtraction, or division facts mastered by fifth grade, making the introduction of higher level thinking concepts using these basic facts very hard.  

For the past few years, my district has been doing fact fluency assessments, which has helped, but there was still a need for more to be done in terms of math fact fluency.   While I tried to fit in a few minutes in class, but it wasn't enough.  So I started the math contracts as part of my homework routine.  I had my students take them home on Tuesdays, and they were due the next Tuesday.  The mix of games and paper practice was the perfect fit for many of my families.  For example, on a busy night, they might not have time to sit down and do a spinner game together, but they do have on the suggested apps downloaded on their phone, so little Susy practiced her facts while waiting for dance practice.  

I do believe strongly in developmentally appropriate practices in mathematics, and believe that my students should have a strong understanding of the concept, strategies mastered for the concept (such as drawing a picture, number lines, etc),  and then move onto practice of a concept with for speed and accuracy.  

With this in mind, I've tinkered with my math fact contracts to create something I think works for everyone.  Included in my math contracts for addition facts pack is a basic contract that can just be used for general addition fact practice, as well has contracts that focus on sums to 10, sums to 12, and sums to 18.  Well it was appropriate for my third graders and end of the year second graders to practice sums to 18 for speed and accuracy for homework, I don't know if it's necessarily appropriate for a first grader, especially in the beginning and middle of the year.   


Below is a screenshot for the contract that focuses on sums to 10.

I addressed this in my teacher note in the download that there will be some boxes that may go over or under the focus sum.  I feel that this is okay.  Sprinkling of problems a little above the targeted sum can present a manageable challenge, while problems with a smaller sum than the targeted focus is always a good review!

 You can check out my math contracts in both of my stores, but you could also win a copy of your own too!  Just enter using the Rafflecopter below.  I'll be picking a winner on Friday!


a Rafflecopter giveaway

Also, my followers on TpT, you probably got a message saying Fourth and Ten posted a new item, that IS me! Some of you may have noticed a URL change as well.  I'm slowly transitioning to my new name.  I hope to have a blog redesign completed soon!