Tuesday, July 28, 2015

Assess Me! Yes or No, Get to Know Me! :)

I am very excited today to link up with Rachel from The Tattooed Teacher for a fun Get to Know You Linky! :)





Here is my Yes or Know:

I can't wait to read those of others that have posted!!! :)

Also, I will be celebrating a 500 TPT Follower Celebration next week!  Hooray!  If you haven't already donated an item, and you would like to, please click HERE.  Thank you!!!

Monday, July 27, 2015

500 Follower CELEBRATION COMING SOON!

I just want to take a quick minute to say that my 500 Teachers Pay Teachers Follower Celebration will be taking place NEXT WEEK!  Eeeekkk!!!


I had planned to do this awhile back, and got a little busy  with end of the year and vacation stuff, soooo....it's FINALLY happening NEXT WEEK!

I've had some amazing teachers offer up some great donations, but if you missed the link--there is still time.

If you would like to be a part of the fun next week, please fill out this form.  Thank you! :)   

Next week should be a great, FUN FILLED week! :)

I'm also starting a little fun over on my Instagram:  @immixingitupinmiddle.  I'll be starting today, so if you're not already following me-head on over! :)

Tuesday, July 7, 2015

Make Your Masterpiece!

Time again to link up with the fabulous ladies hosting the TPT Sellers Challenge!!  This week it was to create your masterpiece!


Now, this masterpiece has been a MAJOR work in progress!  For those of you who TPT, you will know what I mean.  I remember last summer just starting on TPT, and seeing all of these people with bundles of resources, and it was overwhelming to think that I will NEVER get to that point. 
However, a YEAR of hard work later, and some help from Ashley from Schroeder Shenanigans in Second, and Gina from All thing Algebra, I figured out how to bundle ALL of my 6th grade math resources into ONE place!


For those of you that have done this, you know how much works goes into just creating a bundle because the file sizes have to be just right, everything needs to be in ONE PLACE, and you want everything to be perfect!  I even had the wonderful Jill edit it all for me to make sure it was perfect!
Here is my MASTERPIECE! OVER 60 activities, and HUNDREDS of pages!   

There is a LOT of different materials in this bundle that are included for a YEARS worth of classroom instruction!
 I love tying in real world examples whenever I can, so these activities are GREAT for that!


 ALL of the task cards included are WORD PROBLEMS.  These are GREAT for a lot of things!  
-Test Prep
-Morning Work (you can set it up to do one sheet of task cards a week!)
-Interactive Notebook Practice
-Cooperative Learning-These DEFINITELY get your kids talking and discussing math!
-Math Centers


There are color by answer sheets in the bundle which make GREAT activities for early finishers, homework, no prep sub plans, etc!!  


There are other activities included for fun math centers, early finishers, practice, etc.


ALL of the 6th Grade Common Core domains are covered.  There are enough activities for each one to do at least ONE activity per week ALL year long!


I have included homework strips for Ratios & Proportions and Number Systems.  These work GREAT for making fewer copies in the classroom.  This year I will also be revamping my homework, so any new materials I add will be given to you at NO EXTRA COST if you already own my Mega Bundle!
 I also have holiday math activities for Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas.  There are enough activities to do ONE PER DAY the week leading up to the holiday!  Perfect educational activities to keep your kids busy and engaged during those tough weeks!

Want to know EVERYTHING that is included???   Check out the lists below! :)







  
When people purchase the bundle, they will be receiving over $60.00 off of all of the resources, plus access to any NEW resources that I create for FREE.  Think of it as a lifetime of resources for ONE great price!

Also, purchasers will be notified when any new products have been added. :)



Thursday, July 2, 2015

TPT Seller's Challenge: Dare to Dream!

Hooray!  Time to link up with some awesome ladies for their Teachers Pay Teacher's Seller Challenge (#TPTSellerChallenge).  

This week the theme was Dare to Dream:
This is a GREAT theme for the week, because as TPT-ers, we ALL have dreams, which is why we started, right?

So, here are mine:
 
1.  Financially stable is a biggie.  I am married to another teacher, so it seems like we are ALWAYS trying to make ends meet--not sure who else out there is with me on that one.  However, TPT has been a HUGE blessing so far, so the end goal would be able for me to stay at home with my son and TPT full time!

2.  If you read my blog, you know that I am the proud mom to a micropreemie!  25 weeker!  We would love to have another baby, but we are SOOOO scared of what could happen again.  So, once we get to be more finacially stable I would love to either try again OR adopt!

3.  My hubby and I really want a BOAT!  We live near a ton of water, so having a boat would be a BLAST!!!!!

4.  So, we are obsessed with the show "Tiny House Nation", and we would LOVE to get a house like that!!!  Maybe not to live in ALL of the time, but I would love to put it on some private land in the middle of the woods/mountains, just enjoy nature and RELAX!

What about YOUR dare to dream?!?

July Currently

Well, I haven't been to currently with my Currently's with Farley from Oh Boy, 4th Grade, so I suppose summer time is as good of time as any to get back in the game, right? :)



Listening: Well, since I am working on my Currently everyone else around me is watching "Big Bang Theory", so that is in the background. :)

Loving:  I'm sure my loving is the SAME as everyone elses---who does NOT love summer (I guess unless you're in the Southern Hemisphere?).

Thinking:  Back to School!  I know---sad, but when I spend my day relaxing on Instagram and seeing everyone's Target Dollar Spot photos, I can't help but get a little excited. 

Wanting:  So, every summer I spend a majority of it in Michigan visiting my family and my husbands family.  I swear the time just FLIES by which STINKS.  Blah.

Needing:  A GOOD NIGHT SLEEP!!!!  When you're traveling all summer with a two year old--that makes it TOUGH especially when they are throwing tantrums at night.  I'm actually surprised we didn't get kicked out of the hotel we stayed at on the way to Michigan.  We have now become THOSE people.  Right now we have been sharing a room with our son for the past week and a half, and he has woken up almost

every

single

night.

So, any mommies or daddies out there that have tried and true tips, please leave them in the comments! :) I'd love to hear 'em!

My All Star: I would have to say determination.  I am definitely the kind of person that once I set my mind to it, I do it.  Such as run a marathon, TPT, etc.

Well, I'm off to read what y'all are up to! :)


Friday, June 19, 2015

End of the Year Reflect and Refresh: Part 1

So, if you follow my blog, you know that I am an elementary teacher JUST turned middle school teacher this year.  I absolutely LOVED the transition!  It was so much more than I every thought it would be, and I LOVED everything about it!

That being said, now that I have one year under my belt it's a great time to link up with Mrs. D's Corner for a chance to Reflect and Refresh! :)

Communication:
I had a really hard time this year trying to figure out what level of communication I needed to have with parents.  When you're in elementary (as many of you know) you communicate EVERYTHING.  However, once students get to middle school I noticed that there is a lot less parent communication because there is a level of responsibility that now comes from the students regarding being responsible for things.  However, I think that this next school year I want to make my website more up to date of the things that we are doing in our classroom.  I want to include things such as what objectives we are covering, and big projects we are currently working on.  This is where some text message system might also come into play as well. :)

Organization:
I want to simplify my behavior plan a little more this year.  I loved how my teammate and I did our behavior system this year (which again was a challenge after being an elementary teacher for so long), but there are some things that I want to change. 

This year I also want to have my students have a very detailed syllabus for my math and science class with ALL of my expectations and procedures included.  That way it keeps us ALL on the same page.

I also want to revamp a lot of my procedures.  I wasn't exactly sure about WHAT procedures I would need this year.  However now that I know, I will be able to run my classroom a LOT more efficiently next year. 

Content:
I was VERY happy with my math instruction this year, however there are a lot of things that I want to revamp with my science instruction.  

This year I did create some very fun things for our interactive notebooks, but I want to make sure I do a lot more writing and reflecting as well.  I also want to spend more TIME on the content.  Things like real life research, webquests, etc.

My Big Summer Project:
Well, in all honesty family always comes first.  I will not be spending countless hours creating.  However, when I DO have time, I want to create some great science resources! :)

So, now it's time for some relaxation and recharging before the 2015-16 school year! :)


Makeover Maddness-TPT Seller's Challenge Week 1

I'm excited this summer to join up with some AWESOME teachers to work on the TPT Sellers Challenge!!  This is a great idea brought to us by: Third in Hollywood, The Peppy Zesty Teacherista, Teach, Create, Motivate, and Sparkling in Second.


The first week challenge was Makeover Maddness!  So, to start with I picked one of the FIRST products I made to make over the cover on...my End of the Year Project Based Learning Activities.  This has easily become one of my top sellers, so to thank it, I think it deserved a makeover. :)

Here is what my product cover USED to look like:


 At the time I thought it looked cute, but the more time I work on creating, I realize it could DEFINITELY use a facelift! :)


So, here is my final product:

Of course it wouldn't be complete without a side by side comparison. :)



Thank you ladies so much for hosting, and I cannot wait to see what other teachers choose to makeover. :)

Sunday, March 22, 2015

Cookie Towers, Interpreting Data, and a GIVEAWAY!

It's that time again!  Time to link up with the Primary Chalkboard for their...
This week we did more with our Statistics unit!  We took an idea from Jen Runde, and built cookie towers to get our data set!

This was a LOT more fun than just making up a set of numbers, and it was nice because the students had a BLAST building their towers, too! :)


I had the students build two towers if the time (and the cookies) allowed.  I then had them give me their BEST one, and I recorded it on the board:


I then had them use that data to create a box and whisker plot using that data.  They had to find the IQR, mean, median, mode and range for the data, too.  We then went back again to work on percents--such a tough concept for these guys.  I had the class find out what percent of the students in the class built a tower taller than 20 cookies.  They created all of this onto a mini poster:

The students have REALLY been having a lot of fun with this! :)

In other news, this past week I was matched up with some other AWESOME bloggers as we embarked on the...
I was paired with with The Class Couple who was cheering on Xavier, and I was cheering on Ole Miss...however, on my first day of the match-up I was ELIMINATED!  YIKES!  So, as the one that lost, I am to offer up a giveaway of one of my BEST TPT Products, so I chose...

You can read more about it HERE.  It is one of my best sellers on TPT, and I am giving it away to one lucky (hopefully luckier than I was in my bracket!!) person!  Just enter below to WIN!





I have also FINALLLLLYYYYY reached 500 Followers on Teachers Pay Teachers!!!!  HOORAY!  I was at 499 for what seemed like FOREVER, so I am in the middle of planning another AWESOME Giveaway!  If you're a teacher, and would like to donate if you haven't already please go here. :)  THANK YOU!

Thursday, March 19, 2015

March Madness BLOGGER Match-up!

Thank you to The Creative Classroom for an opportunity to have a little FUN!  I am paired with The Class Couple (who is rooting for Xavier), and I am rooting for Ole Miss!



If I happen to LOSE this match-up, I will be offering one of my BEST SELLERS on TPT for FREE to you all!  My Poppy Unit!  :)  I am already keeping up with the score, and it looks like it might be coming your way soon!  lol  Stay tuned for more! :)




Saturday, March 14, 2015

Statistics FUN (Mean, Median, Mode & Range) , March Madness, FREEBIE, and MORE!


It was another busy week in 6th grade, and again, I am linking up with two of my FAVORITE linkys (Five for Friday with Kacey and No Worksheet Wednesday with the Primary Chalkboard)!   So, here we go!

This week we started statistics in 6th grade (SOOOOO MANY fun things that you can do!)  We began by talking about mean, range, median and mode and added the following page and foldable to our interactive notebooks:

This is what the inside of the foldable looks like:


 The next day we used our notebooks to do a fun Mathtivity practicing finding the mean, median, mode and range of sets of data:
You can download this activity FREE by clicking HERE in my TPT store. :)  Please leave some feedback if you happen to download it--I appreciate it.

The students used their notebooks to help remember each vocabulary word as they completed the activity.

They used the work mat which had lists of score on it to answer questions on the data.

It was a lot of fun, and I hope that YOU enjoy it, too! :)

So, again this month, I am linking up with the Primary Chalkboard for the:
I have been having a LOT of fun with this, and I truly think that the students are enjoying it, too!  In the case of this project it turned into a No Worksheet Wednesday AND Thursday!
This week we did a fun March Madness activity with our new found learning on statistics!
We first added an entry to our interactive notebooks practicing taking a data set and displaying it into a line plot and a histogram:

I then let students choose a college basketball team that I had already printed out their season scores.  The students then needed to take all of the teams scores, and write them down, then order them least to greatest:

Once the students did that, they needed to find the mean, median, mode and range for each set of scores.  We also are participating in a #tbt in my classroom where we spend a little time reviewing things that have challenged us this year.  This #tbt we dedicated to finding percents, so I had the students also find the percent of games that their team won and lost. :)

The students also needed to display their teams data in a line plot AND a histogram.

The students did SUCH a great job with these!  It covered a LOT of standards in Statistics and Probability, made learning relevant, and the students were REALLY engaged, too!  The final products turned out great!


This week we also did our monthly class team builder/STEM lab challenge!!!
This was BY FAR the best one we have done yet!!!!!  The students had such a blast with The Pot O' Gold STEM Challenge, too!  Their goal was to build a tower out of straws that was TALL and STRONG.  They then had to put their "pot" (a mini cup) at the top of the tower.  The students had to then put as many pennies (gold) in as they could before the tower fell!  I awarded the teams points for height and then points for pennies, then totaled the two to find a winner.  For example, I had 9 groups, so the tallest tower got 9 points, and the smallest received 1.  Then once the pennies were put in the pots at the top, the most pennies got 9 points, and the least received 1. 

The designs were AH-MAY-ZING, and the students were the most engaged with this one that I created then they had with the rest!  Here are some of the designs:
 The tallest tower was 22.5 inches and the one that held the most pennies held 149!!  It was great!  There are some great extension activities, teacher directions and recording/planning sheets to accompany this STEM Challenge.  We are now looking forward to our April STEM Challenge:  Easter Marshmallow Launch!
Just one last reminder that I am FOUR followers on TPT away from 500---which of course calls for a celebration! :)  If you're a teacher and would like to donate, please complete the Google Doc form to donate. :)  I thank you in advance. :)