HUGE Giveaway!

My sweet friend Rebecca over at Teaching First is hosting a huge giveaway!  Several of my favorite bloggers are participating... Sassy in Second, Rowdy in First Grade, Loving and Learning in Pre-K, and yours truly! 

 

Yvonne's Facebook LinkYvonne's TpT Store Link

 

Caitlin's Facebook LinkCaitlin's TpT Link
 

Jennifer's Teacher's Notebook Link 

Julia's TpT Store Link 

Rebecca's Facebook LinkRebecca's TpT Link 

Head over to her blog to find out how you can enter to win!

Non sequitur

Oh wow!  The response to the Be My Valentine Exchange has been UNREAL!  Since Friday, we've had so many people sign up to participate in the gift exchange, class exchange, and sponsor a giveaway.  In fact, we have more than 14 sponsors!  This means we will be able to give away more than 1 fun prize each day from February 1st through the 14th!  You guys have been so incredibly generous by donating items for the giveaways.  Because the response has been so overwhelming, we are going to close the sign ups for sponsoring a giveaway on Wednesday, January 18th.  This way we have plenty of time to get in touch with everyone and get things organized.  So...head over on over and sign up if you would like to sponsor a giveaway!  Sarah and I are so excited; this may be more fun than Holly Bloggy {could that even be possible?}!

In other super fun news...Diana from Cole's Little Pups and I are ready to have lunch with our friends in Western KY/Southern IN!  We are planning a lunch date for Saturday, January 28th at 1pm.  Email me at mspreppyblog@gmail.com for all of the details.  We hope to see several of you there!

Last week I started teaching bar models to my 2nd graders.  Wheweee....some of them totally get it, but the rest of them are having a rough time!  I asked you guys for some help and some of you pointed me to some great technology resources.  But I still couldn't find any great centers or hands on activities.  So, I've been working away this week creating some bar modeling activities.  Here's a little freebie/preview!  I hope to have the whole shebang up in my TpT store by tomorrow.

Students read the problems, use the bar to create their bar model, then sort based on whether the problem is part-part-whole or whole-part-part.  We LOVE sorting activities and this really helps them to understand what kind of relationship the bar model is demonstrating so they can choose the correct operation.  Grab your copy here.

Hope you guys have an awesome day off tomorrow!  I'm so excited about having another day to sleep in, blogstalk, and watch Lifetime movies!  We ended up having a snow day on Friday, so I'm enjoying a four day weekend.  Be jealous.

Be My Valentine {2012 Exchange}

Sarah and I are back and ready for yet another fun exchange!  We had tons of fun organizing the Christmas exchange and seeing all of the amazingly cute things you guys made and purchased for your partners.  We have a few exciting additions for Valentine's Day!  Check out all of the details below:

Sign Up to be a Participant:

-Sign ups begin now and close on Sunday, January 22nd.
-We will send out partners by Wednesday, January 25th.
-Craft and/or shop and send out your gift by February 6th to make sure it arrives in time.
-$10 limit, excluding shipping.  Be creative and fun!
-Please make sure that you follow through if you sign up.  It's no fun to work so hard on creating a special gift for a new friend and not receive one in return!
-Our Canadian friends will be able to participate as long as there are other Canadian friends!  Please note in the subject if you are from Canada.
-To sign up, email the questionnaire below to teacherbloggerexchange@gmail.com by January 22nd.

Be My Valentine Questionnaire

Name {for monogramming}:
Mailing Address:

Email:

Blog/Website {not required to participate, but will help your partner get to know you better}:

Grade level:

Favorite color(s):

Favorite candy/treat:

Favorite fast food:

Favorite magazine:

Favorite lip gloss/nail polish:

Anything else you want your partner to know:

Class Exchange:

We are also organizing a class valentine exchange.  More details will come on this in the next couple of days.  If you are interested in participating in this part of the exchange, please send an email to teacherbloggerexchange@gmail.com with "Class Exchange" in the subject line.  Include your state, grade level, and number of students in your class.

Sign up to Sponsor a Giveaway!

The giveaways for Holly Bloggy Christmas were so much fun!  This time, we plan to do a giveaway each day from February 1st through Valentine's Day!  Simply participating in the exchange will be your entry for each giveaway.  We will use random.org to choose a winner each day.  But...to make this happen, we need some fabulous sponsors!  We want to give away some units/products for K-2, some for 3-5, and then some things that are just plain fun like gift cards, jewelry, decor, etc.  If you would like to sponsor a giveaway, please fill out this form.  We will select sponsors by January 22nd.  Sponsors will be mentioned in any email sent or blog post made about the Be My Valentine Exchange!

Grab Our Button!
{HUGE thank you to Lauren at The First Grade Diaries for making this for me!}

<center><a href="http://mspreppy.blogspot.com/p/be-my-valentine-exchange.html" target="_blank"><img alt="Be My Valentine" src="http://i1081.photobucket.com/albums/j352/mspreppyblog/Valentine_Exchange1.png"/></a></center>

Hope you will join in the fun!  As always, if you have questions feel free to leave a comment or shoot me an email!

Oh, how I missed the children!

I love a good break.  And a nice, long weekend.  And even a snow day or two...or ten!  But I also love, love, LOVE the children.  Absence most definitely makes the heart grow fonder.  And I had been away for far too long.  Here are a couple of highlights:

A third grade teacher in my building was doing a journal entry and had the kids drawing and writing about a secret club.  One of the darlings made a sign on the door of her club that said: "Don't make no messes and don't do no trash talk."  Ignoring the grammar, that is excellent advice for life.  So many things could be avoided if people didn't make no messes or do no trash talk.  I probably need to make my own sign with that rule.  Or maybe a t-shirt?  I'll let you know when I launch my clothing line.

Today one of my little friends came in and was so incredibly sad.  He put his head down and just cried and cried.  I went over to give him a hug and to see what I could do:

Me: What's wrong?
Tears: Someone in my family died.
Me: Oh, no!  Who died?
Tears: I don't know.
Me: You don't know?  Was it someone close to you or did you just hear your parents talking about it and it made you sad?
Tears: Well, she couldn't walk anymore and she kept falling and so we had to put her to sleep.
Me: ...I had no words because I was thinking they put his grandma to sleep or something and I couldn't wrap my head around why they put someone in their family to sleep.
Tears: [sobbing] It was my cat!
Me: Oh, your poor cat!  I'm so sorry.  [Thinking: Whew!  Thank God it was just a cat!]

Obviously, my brain was still asleep because I really thought a grandparent had been "put down" and I was really concerned for the emotional well-being of this child.  And concerned that I may become involved in some kind of murder trial since this kid just told me about how they put a family member "to sleep".  But by the end of the day, he was back to his normal self; falling out of his chair and kicking his neighbor. 

I don't know about you guys, but I really work hard on manners and just developing socially acceptable behaviors with some of my friends.  I had a heart to heart with my kindergartners earlier this year about how instead of announcing, "I GOTTA POOP!", you should just ask, "May I go to the restroom?"  We've been doing really well with it.  Until today.

Little Darling: I GOTTA POOP!
Me: What should you say instead?
Little Darling: I GOTTA POOP, PLEASE?
Me: No...try, "May I go to the..."
Little Darling: May I go to the poop?
Me: "May I go to the restroom?"
Little Darling: Oh!!

{For the record: the conversation took much longer to type than it did to actually have with the child.  She didn't have those scary EMERGENCY eyes either.  We weren't at risk for an explosion!  I thoroughly assessed the situation prior to making it a teachable moment.}

Oh, the cute moments totally make up for all of the times I end up beating my head against a wall.  For the most part...  Have any of you had a funny or sweet moment over the past couple of days that made the alarm clock {almost} worth it?  I want to hear 'em!  That way I'll have lots of funnies and warm fuzzies to save for a rainy day.

A Splendiferous Soap Net Sunday...and a freebie!

Oh, I love Sundays.  Especially when there's a marathon of The Lying Game on Soap Net.  Seriously, life couldn't get any better.  {Well, I guess it could.  I could not have to hear my alarm in the morning.  That would make life exponentially better.  Love my job.  Hate my alarm clock.}

I'm gearing up to teach a whole entire week for the first time this year.  Thank God it will be followed by a three day weekend!  I really need to know why school has to start at 7am.  Why can't we start at 10?  I would be so well rested at 10am.  I would probably even have time to put on a full face of makeup instead of cheating and using Whoorl's "five minute, five product face".  Win-win situation.  {As if the kids care about my face.  But then again, they do have to look at it all day.  Maybe some fun costume makeup would result in more time spent with all eyes on me?}
Anyway, like I said, I'm gearing up to teach this week.  I'm introducing bar models to my second graders.  Whewee.  This is my second year bar modeling and let me tell you, bar models make me want to head to a bar!  Do any of you use Singapore math or Math in Focus?  Any awesome bar modeling activities?  I'm trying to find some inspiration to make my own, but asking you guys just feels easier.  I'm just really into my stories right now and can't pull my eyes off Soap Net long enough to make anything.

I do want to share a few things with you party people though!  I found a super fun new blog over the weekend.  Please take a look at this adorable clip art:

You need it, right?!  Lauren over at The First Grade Diaries has a darling little Etsy shop with some cute clip art!  Make sure you go show her blog and store some love; I know I'm always looking for new clip art that doesn't come complete with a wishy washy legal team.
And for sticking with me through this ramble-icious post, a little freebie.  I'm teaching number words to my little kinder friends this week.  Thought you might be able to use these worksheets too!

Download them here! 

Have a super fabulous Monday, my friends!

...updating...

Long time, no see, my friends!  Thank you for sharing your critter stories and wishing me luck last week.  Some of your stories gave me the heebie jeebies.  Luckily, I did not see anything scurrying about.  Whew!  Really dodged a bullet there.  My coworker told me about something that you can plug in and it lets off some kind of sound or something that the little mice don't like.  I am definitely going to invest in some of those.  Because I'd rather not see another mouse.  Ever.

I only worked one day this past week.  The first day back from break.  So the kids were exhausted and not really with it.  My sub said they were awesome the rest of the week, so hopefully the awesomeness will continue when I have to work a full five days next week.  Why was I out, you ask? 

{I'm the short one.  The tall girl is my little sister.  I only clarify for you because waitresses at restaurants can't seem to get it straight.  She gets the drink menu and I get the kid's menu.  Never fails.  Every time.  I'll enjoy my youthful looks for as long as I can.}

My little brother was deployed to Afghanistan for a year.  He's enjoying {and by enjoy, I mean training all day long} sunny Texas {see why I said enjoy?  Texas has to be funner than Afghanistan} for the next few weeks and then he will head on over.  So we spent a couple of days in Indianapolis having some family time {at PF Changs.  Yum!} and seeing him off.  I told him that I have about 450 or so teacher friends that I can count on to keep the mail coming all year long.  Please let me know if you, your class, or your school would like a soldier buddy to send letters, etc to throughout the year.  Either comment or email me {mspreppyblog at gmail dot com} and I'll get you hooked up with all of the information. 

In other superfun news, Sarah and I are all in on a Valentine's exchange!  We will be posting details very soon, so check back with us.  We have some exciting things up our sleeves!    

When it snows, it's a-thrillin'....

I'm sitting here on the couch, enjoying my last day of break, and watching the snow fall.  Part of me hopes it sticks but another part of me can't wait to see my little friends again.  The weather report says it's not going to be significant, but the flakes are big and the rooftops around me are already covered.  So who knows.

But for now, I think it's safe to assume that my break is coming to an end.  I haven't quite figured out how I'm going to break the news to my couch and TV.  We've become rather close and they will be lost without me.  I tried preparing them yesterday and today by going to school for a few hours.  There's always so much work to be done.  I found myself wondering why I didn't just go every.single.day we were off.  Then maybe I would be caught up.  Psht, who am I kidding?!  I would still find myself wishing for just a little bit longer so that I could be on top of things and maybe even ahead of things.  But here I sit, still trying to get some work finished and thinking about the fact that my alarm is going to ring tomorrow.  And the fact that I have to be brave and head back to my classroom tomorrow, despite the Incident...

On the last day of school before break there was an Incident.  The Incident has made me a smidgen nervous to return to my classroom tomorrow.  Really, I think it scarred me for life and I will need therapy.  I was sitting in my classroom after school when all of a sudden, a mouse scurried across the floor.  I may have screamed.  Loudly.  And I may have immediately changed from a sitting position in my rolly chair to a standing position in my rolly chair, arms flailing about wildly.  And then I may have called my neighbor and made her pack up my belongings for me and hold my hand as I walked sprinted out the door.  She may or may not have tried to comfort me with a story of how she found a cute little mouse in her room last year and I may or may not have interrupted her and said, "Shut up, Cinderella and get me out of here now!"  And then I may have begged her to check through my bags to make sure that the mouse's BFF wasn't trying to sneak home with me.  And I may have stomped all the way down the hall and made lots of loud noises yesterday and today when I was working at school alone so that the mouse, or mice, would know that I'm large and in charge. 

Like I said, those events may or may not have happened.  But let me tell you what will happen for sure if there is another invasion...I will spend the rest of the year teaching from on top of my stool.  Because I will DIE if one ever comes near me.  DIE.  Oh, it was awful.  I know they like to hang out at schools because we're super nice and like to keep food in our rooms and because the children are messy and like to keep food on our floors.  But I don't like mice.  I need to know how to evict them.  Would any of you like to come to my classroom and make sure they're all gone?  Please?  Will you at least say a little prayer that they won't show up while I'm getting my teach on tomorrow?  Because the last thing the children need to see is me losing my mind over a mouse.  Maybe you could even try to comfort me with a critter story of your own.  One that ends with you being victorious and never having critter problems again.  Because I love happy endings.