Little things make a big difference

I never thought I would think so much about pencils before I became a teacher.  There are never enough, they are always dull and they have no erasers after a day of use.  Tell me you know what I'm talking about! Other supplies seem to be a big talk within the classroom: "My marker won't write!"  "The crayons are all broken!"  "These scissors won't cut!"  {Note that all of these remarks are said with an exclamation...every single time!}

On Friday, I came to a point where I was thinking there has got to be a better way.  My attention was on dry erase markers and math workbook bookmarks.

My kids are always complaining about markers and I am always responding with, "It is our responsibility to keep our classroom items nice for ourselves and others."  Well enough was enough...just one too many complaints.  I make labels at the beginning of the year with the child's name and number....I dragged them out stuck them on new dry erase markers and put masking tape on top.  I then gave my students The Responsibility Talk!

Our workbooks for math are enormous.  The kids have bookmarks to mark where we are at but they tend to fall out and then become useless.  So with my can-do attitude on Friday, I glued ribbon on to each of the students' workbooks...success!

 

It's the little time savers that make a huge difference in our day and hopefully I've made strides in my own :)

 

 

On to YOUTUBE!  Our school took off our restrictions to YouTube recently and it has been quite helpful.  We are working with numbers and place value.  On Friday, we started our lesson with this rap: Whatcha' Gonna Do? (Count by 2's, 5's, 10's)

 

Then we moved on to Place Value with Singapore Math:

 

 

Singapore Math really held there attention because it is not something we do often.  They loved how the guy was talking (but we couldn't see him) and he was using his computer to teach.

 

Afterwards, I wrote several numbers on the board and the students had to show there value by draw sticks for ten rods and dots for ones:

 

It was a great day in math!  Just a few little changes to engage the students make quite the difference.  Thanks YouTube :)