The Elf is in the House

Any teachers out there know how crazy the last few weeks before Winter Break can be. The kiddos are so excited about everything and are almost totally uncontrollable. It's totally amazing though. This year we've had a mysterious Elf come to our classroom in the mornings. He's been playing mysterious tricks on us, leaving us notes and, sometimes leaving us treats. It has made the students even more excited but they also know that if they want the elf to come back they have to be good. They've been working hard to be the best they can be!

On the first day he took all of our shapes (where we collect stars for treasure box) and he left us with giant tree shapes. He told us to try to get 25 stars on our trees!

On the 2nd day he left tiny paper snowflakes all over the room and brought us some special Holiday stickers.

On the 3rd day he left red and green blocks all over the classroom! He said that red and green are his favorite colors.

After we looked at all the blocks, we saw that the elf had also left us candy canes on our desks!

Then we found his footprints on the floor! He is such a tricky elf!

We can't wait to see what he will do next! 

Super Fun Stuff

I may be a little late getting on the Pinterest band wagon but, I am there now! Pinterest is absolutely amazing. I've found so many crafts and fun things to do (both at school and at home). I've already made the most amazing crayon box that my students absolutely love!

I've gotten so many more ideas to do in my classroom... If you haven't checked it out (and I'm sure you already have) YOU MUST!

November/December Bulletin Boards

Here's our November bulletin board. Turkey Feathers say what the students are thankful for. The candy corns were a story project. We read "The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything" and students drew/wrote what they saw first on the yellow section, next on the white section and made a prediction on what would happen in the end on the orange section. It turned out super cute!

Here's our December bulletin board. Each student created a snowglobe and then wrote about what was in their snowglobe! We used "Tiny Beads of Happiness" to make our snowglobes stand out even more. We made a total mess in our class but, our custodian Mrs. Sanchez was amazing and didn't even say anything about the glitter that was EVERYWHERE! Oh well, if we're not making a mess we're not having fun! ;)

First Blog Post

So I'm totally new to this. I was encouraged to blog by a quite a few friends but, now I'm wondering what on earth I have to say that other people would want to read... ?

I guess I'll start out by explaining the title of the blog. "Tiny Beads of Happiness" was something that a few friends and I started saying at work when we would sprinkle glitter over our student's heads as they did something amazing (or just about anytime they needed a pick-me-up). I the phrase really describes my job and especially my students. They are constantly providing me with tiny beads of happiness and I'm really excited to share some of those with you. Here's one of my most favorite recent conversations with a 5-year-old

This conversation occurred during Literacy, as we were learning about our unit "By the Sea." What made the student think of this at this time, I'll never know!

Student: I love Barack Obama.
Me: Oh that's great, why do you love him?
Student: Because whenever I say his name, it sounds like Broccoli.

I just love the sweet innocence of this age!