Katie's Classroom Make-over

Katie Huff is a second grade classroom teacher in Keller, Texas. 
This is her story.....

During the snow and ice that overtook Texas in early February, three pipes in my classroom burst. Water spewed from the wall and underneath the sink leaving approximately one and half inches of standing water in my classroom and storage closet. At first, I was told it would be a quick fix with a couple days of drying time. However, as more people came to investigate, it became obvious that my students and I would have to relocate to a new classroom for a while. Various workers came to remove the carpet and repair the wall. The wall repair went fairly smoothly. Unfortunately, that was not the case for the carpet.

I have quite a collection of “stuff” in my classroom. When they came to remove the carpet, they of course had to remove ALL of my stuff. When they put it back, it just kind of got thrown in the middle of the classroom. Then they had to scrape the carpet glue off the cement. This left a yellow, powdery residue on EVERYTHING in the classroom. It was on every surface, in books, on walls, in pocket charts… EVERYWHERE.

After learning that it could be this summer before they get the flooring replaced, my principal and I decided that my class and I should move back into the room on the cement floor. After living in an empty classroom for four weeks, it felt really good to be home in our regular classroom! It took some major work and cleaning, but we survived :)

As a result of this, I had the awesome opportunity to replace some of my things with “Dots on Turquoise” products. It really helps brighten my window-less classroom!


CTP to the rescue!
The marketing folks at CTP had been wanting pictures of  the new Dots on Turquoise products being used in a actual classroom.  When they heard of Katie's plight they sent a big box of materials for her to use to re-decorate her room. 

In the box she found name-tags and name plates.

There were 6" and 10" cut-outs and two styles of computer paper.

There were three different posters.

There were borders

and bulletin board sets.

This  bulletin board set looks like one

that would be used at the beginning of the year.

Katie turned it into an interactive learning center.

The parts of speech are written on DOT computer paper.

Words to be sorted are written on the guitars from the bulletin board set.

Here is another bulletin board idea from Katie's classroom.

The CAFÉ board is part of the Daily 5 by the “two sisters”. 

This is their website http://www.thedailycafe.com/.

This reading bulletin board uses one of the DOT borders,
the 10" paisley cut-outs,  and the DOT computer paper.

C    Comprehension

"I understand what I read."

A    Accuracy

"I can read the words."

F    Fluency

"I can read accurately, with expression, and

understand what I read."

    E    Expand Vocabulary

"I know, find, and use interesting words."



Students and Ms. Huff offer suggestions to make better readers.
Other reading strategies are written on the DOT computer paper
and posted at the bottom of the bulletin board.

Thanks, Katie for letting us be a part of your make-over. 
We love the pictures and your ideas. 


Katie's room in the midst of the mess!

Katie's room this morning!

Have you done anything in your classroom with  any
 CTP product that you would like to share?
 
Send me your pictures at tommie.netzer@creativeteaching.com.

The next post will feature many other ideas of ways to use the new
Dots on Turquoise products.

I love DOT! 



Legoland Discovery Center Comes to the Neighborhood

In my last entry I introduced you to Mayor Tate.  One of his most important jobs as mayor of Grapevine is bringing new businesses to our city. 

Well, he has out-done himself this time. 

Our newest neighbor is Legoland Discovery Center. 

We are so excited! 

There are five Lego Discovery Centers in the world, but only two in the US. 

One is in Chicago and now one is in Grapevine, Texas. 

There is also Legoland Amusement Park in San Diego. 

Since we wanted to be good neighbors we invited two guys

from Legoland to come to our class to see the Lego neighborhood

that we had made. 

 Craig and Cal paid us a visit last Friday.

They really liked our Lego buildings.

 Lego fire station



 Lego hospital

One of our new neighbors is Craig. 
He does the business part of running the discovery center. 
He wears a suit to work.

Our other new neighbor is Cal.  He is a Lego engineer. 
Cal actually graduated from Grapevine High School. 
He went to the University of Texas at Austin and received a degree in engineering.
 
He had an interesting job interview with Lego. 
Two hundred people were invited for the interview. 
Each was given a bag of Legos. 
They had 30 minutes to create a Lego structure. 
The winner got the job. 
Cal won! 

Now, he plays with Legos all day.
He made all the displays in Legoland.
Cal wears a sweatshirt to work.

Who will be the next Lego engineer?

It could be any of these kids!!

Since Legoland Discovery Center is such a good neighbor

Craig and Cal invited us to pay them a visit. 

On March 24, our class (just our class) will be attending

the media open house at Legoland Discovery Center. 

 People from the local television stations and newpapers

 will be there taking pictures. 

Of course, I will be going because I am the class grandparent and 

 my job is to attend important events and to take pictures.

The next project for Legoland in Grapevine will be a two-story,

45,000 square-foot aquarium that will house more than

5,000 marine animals. 

It is made from Legos.

Lego engineer....that would be a fun job!!! 

Mayor Tate, keep up the good work.  We really like our new neighbors!

We Live in a Great Neighborhood

If you want to give yourself a treat become a Class Grandparent…..not a Class Mom or Class Dad. Classroom parents have to plan parties, collect money and do work. A Class Grandparent is….well, a grandparent. Our job is to show up at important events, bring presents, take lots of pictures, collect numerous hugs, and then...go home. I particularly like being a kindergarten class grandparent because kindergarteners are always doing fun things (important events) and they are the most generous with their hugs.

I first became a class grandparent five years ago when Trevor was in kindergarten. Now, I visit in Kate's kindergarten class.  Trevor and Kate call me “G” so that's what all the kids started calling me.  My visitor name tag at school says Tommie Netzer, but to the kids, teachers, and staff I am just “G”.

CTP makes the “taking presents” part of my grandparent job easy. I have a closet filled with samples of new CTP products. I have everything from books to stickers in that closet. I take something every time I go to school. In return, I ask the teachers to let me take pictures of anything “cute” that they do.

People sometimes ask me where I come up with all of my ideas for product.  It is really very simple; I steal the ideas from creative teachers.


                             A few weeks ago, I took Mrs. Hill two packages of 10” cut outs.

                                       One was the multicultural people.

The other was the big speech bubbles.

 I asked her, “Do you have any ideas for these?”

Her answer was “YES!”

They were just starting a unit called We Live in a Great Neighborhood.
Its culmination was to coincide with Open House.
She wanted to do something to decorate the kindergarten hall.
Look at what they did!

     

First, she paired the kids. Two kids worked on one person. 
Together, they decided which neighborhood person to make.

Then, she used poster board to make simple patterns
for shirts, pants, hats, and shoes. 
The kids would use the patterns to make clothes to dress their people.

Finally, she put out a stack of construction paper and
turned the kids loose to create their neighborhood.

The kids had to make a building and a car that would go with each person.
  (Notice the McDonald's sign.)

The McDonald's guy makes people happy!

The kids had to decide what their person liked about his job. 

Mrs. Hill wrote their answers in the speech bubbles.

The doctor likes taking care of people.

The soldier protects our country.

The baseball coach is an important neighbor.

On Friday, Mrs. Hill invited Bill Tate, the mayor of our neighborhood,

to come to class for a visit.

He has been mayor of Grapevine for a total of 32 years.
He is quite a storyteller. He has lived in Grapevine his entire life and remembers when it was just a sleepy little farm area.

We discovered from Mayor Tate that Grapevine has 212 restaurants. 

That takes a bunch of cooks. 

(I calculated that you could eat in a different restaurant every night for more than six months and not make it to all of them.

Maybe I should take that as a challenge.)

I think Mayor Tate would make a great class grandparent because

he really likes stories, kids, and hugs! 

The kids are right...We Live in a Great Neighborhood!



Be a Star

Did you watch the Academy Awards last night?  I have not seen The King's Speech, but it is now on my list of things to do. 

It was fun to watch the stars on the red carpet.  The ladies had on their fancy dresses and jewels and those shoes!!!   The guys looked pretty good, too.  

Anne Hathaway must have changed dresses about 20 times. 

 Life is short! So many dresses and so little time.....

Maybe you should set up a red carpet for your students.  It is easy with the new mini bulletin board from CTP. 

I laminated all of the pieces before I started so I could change it out and use it for different kids.  Of course Kate is my star so she got to walk the red carpet.

She chose pictures of her and her farmily to post along the walk.



I used the star cards in the bulletin board to make a book.  Each card was laminated.  Kate used a Vis-a-Vis pen to answer the questions.  I bound it with ring-its so it was quick and easy to make.   When another child is the star I can wash off the ink with a wet cloth and reuse the book. 

It even comes with an Emmy!

The award in front of the bulletin board announces the Star Student.

In kindergarten everyone is a Star.  All it takes is a crown!

Or....maybe they are all clowns with crowns!

Congratulations to all the Winners!



Valentine Sweets

One of the nice things about working for CTP is that I always have cute stuff to do kindergarten projects.  So when Kate came home and said she had to decorate a box for her valentines, I was all over it!  I have hearts of very color and size.  First, we covered the box.  Then, I put glue dots on the back of the hearts and she stuck them on her box. 

When it was all done she took the box to school.  That afternoon I asked her if hers was the cutest box.  (I am all about competition!) She said, "Well it definitely had the most hearts!" 

PERFECT! 
Remember my saying...less is less!  More is more!

   



 

So, this is Kate's decorated cereal box. 
I think there are exactly the right number of hearts.


The party was a little "over the top" too. 
 Mrs.  Hill knows that more is more!

The CTP 10" designer cut outs made perfect place mats for an elegant party.  Water served over crushed ice from Sonic  in the tall glasses makes a delicious nectur.

Several dainty sweets were served. 

Each couple was introduced as they entered the room.  They were addressed as Master or Princess.


(I talked to several of the kids from the upper classes later that day.  They could all remember the name of their partner at the kindergarten dance. )

Of course, everyone used their best manners at the elegant party.

So what do you do when you have given the children a ton of sugar??? 
You have a dance and let them work it off!!






YMCA

   

 

Hand-jive!

The Chicken Dance

Girls Just Want to Be Girls!

The Tango!!

What were the parents doing during this elegant party? 
Taking pictures, of course!

Memories are made of this........

Sanity Savers....New Products from CTP

Today, I remembered why I live in Texas.  I don't like cold weather!
It has been cold and icy all week. Cabin fever set in on the third snow day.  A sheet of ice covers everything and more snow is forecasted for tonight.  Looks like there will be no school again tomorrow. This afternoon I decided to venture out into the cold.  I got my boots, gloves, hat, and coat from the very back of my closet.  I was ready!  I opened the garage to find a 3-foot ice sculpture had formed from a downspout to the driveway directly behind my car.  There was no moving it....maybe it will thaw by May. I went back inside the house and put all my snow clothes in the very back of my closet. See you in May!

I saw this on Facebook this morning!

Tomorrow is the fourth day.  Don't expect too much from me!


Actually, I did have a few Sanity Savers.  The new product samples from CTP came last week. 
I sat down with scissors and glue
to see what I could do! 
(Oh, dear! I am starting to rhyme.)

 
This is the new bulletin board called Dress for the Weather.  This would be perfect for morning circle time.  You could record the weather using the spinner and then dress the kid appropriately.
He has quite a wardrobe. Look at all the pieces. 





This is what I did with it. 
The backboard is magnetic. 
I put magnets on the back of each piece of clothing. 
The dress-up kid is taped securely in place. 

This would be great for a center.  Kate was visiting when I as working on this. She spent at least an hour dressing and re-dressing the kid. 
I added a laminated speech bubble.  You could write different messages from the kid with a dry-erase pen.  Since the piece is laminated you could erase and change the message.

Here is another new bulletin board called Happy Helpers.  This cute helpers chart features monkeys and bananas. 






It is great for tracking your helpers.
But.... 
I always try to look for a different way of using things.  This bulletin board screamed Chicka Chicka to me. 

This again is a magnet board. The chocolate stitch letters have magnets on their backs.  This was another favorite with Kate.  She moved the letters around as she read the book.  Then, she made words with some of the letters.

This bulletin board looks really good with the hot-pink paper for the background. If you use paper on top of your magnet board but sure to use strong magnets so that the magnets work through all the layers of paper.  I used craft magnets attached with glue-dots.


Thanks to CTP for sending me what is new.
With scissors and glue I now have plenty to do!