Muslim Woman in Amman

     Today was the last day of Parent Teacher Conferences at my school. I think it went well. I tried to stay to my plan that I wrote about  here . I am hoping that what I was trying to say was actually heard and it was not taken as something else. That was my biggest problem last year. I was trying to say something and the parents heard something else. So I am hoping this year went great. One thing is for sure, I did a lot better this year than last year. Hopefully I will continue to get better year after year.

     Once again I find a boat load of stuff at Daiso. This trip wielded some magnetic pencil holders. A adorable piggy bank for our pet fund. A new hole puncher, that punches stars. Finally, a new calendar chart for my Math Center. I love Daiso.

     I do not think there is a teacher out there that does not think about how to make her classroom better. So when I got a coupon for 25% off at Micheal's I went shopping. And bought only two things. A small chalkboard and a chalk board marker.     The reason for the purchase is to put up the days schedule for my kids. My original chalkboard was made up from chalkboard tape on a cupboard. Unfortunately it was not smooth and looked like trash. So I bought a new chalkboard for $12.99. The marker I borrowed the idea from the middle school teachers at my school. It looks a lot nicer than plain chalk and no dust which is great on my sinuses. It was $3.99 much pricier than actual chalk but hopefully the benefits will outweigh the price, plus its purple.

         Parent teacher conferences are next week and I am a little anxious. While I have no problem standing in front of a group of children and talking, when it comes to adults I get nervous. Last year I somehow upset a bunch of parents during the conferences. I was not prepared that well, and I spoke so fast that some people misinterpreted my words. I spent the rest of the year putting out fires I caused from those conferences.      This year is different. I am well prepared, I have documentation, and I put together a little checklist to help me remember what to talk about. Conference Form I divided it into different categories and I will individualize it to every student, writing down notes for each category. I will go through it one by one and talk to the parents about it. Lastly there is space for concerns I have or the parent has. Lastly I have space for interventions I did or plan to do to help the student improve. Allah willing ...

My fourth grade students are going over their multiplication tables in math this week. I thought to bring a little more fun with it so I created some flash cards to help them visualize the idea. First I created the number sentences like the one below. I personalized the numbers so each number has a different look. All numbers from ten on are holding hands to show that they are a group. I also created flashcards with flowers or pencils on them to use as a more visual representation of the number sentence. If the number sentence is 12*8 they would need to put down 12 groups of 8 flowers.  I have a few other plans to do with these cards, I will post here when I try them to let you know how they turn out.

It's Friday! I love my kids but I love the weekends more, especially when Monday is a staff day and I am kid free for three whole days. Anyway here is a look back on my week.  We started out cooperative strip paragraph this week the unedited version looks good. We started the editing process today. Unfortunately we were not able to finish editing today but hopefully we will finish it on Tuesday. I'll post the completed version next week. I was talking to one of my parents on Thursday and he told me the greatest thing I have heard all year. "My son is really engaged this year. He comes home everyday and tells me what he learned that day. Thank you." Things like that make my week. Starting a new unit soon so I have been working on setting it up this week. We will be learning about energy and matter and how they interact. I created a carbon 13 molecule clipart that I am going to put on my class door and then put my kids faces in place of the neutrons, p...

     Columbus Day was this week and since our unit is about exploration we had a few Columbus activities. One activity was to put Columbus back together from all his broken pieces.  I found the template here The kids had fun coloring him and putting him together. I had one student who decided she would rather have Christa Columbus and gave him long hair and a skirt. Unfortunately she did that after I took the pictures below so I do not have the pic.      We also did a team project in which the teams had to create a picture of the Nina, Pinta, or Santa Maria using craft supplies. The sails are made from felt, the ships from popsicle sticks, clouds from cotton, and sea and sky from colored paper, finally a little glitter to jazz it up.