Teacher Time Off

School is out for the summer! We’re a tiny bit sniff, sniff sad, a little bit woo-hoo happy and definitely zzzzzz exhausted! It’s been an exciting and productive year and it’s almost time to start thinking about the next one. But first we must refuel!

We’ll start by eating some necessities like these delicious Lemon Bars.

Then we’ll drink some refreshing drinks like this June Bug.

Last, we’ll relax in a chair by the ocean (me) or pool (Erin) and read, What Great Teachers Do Differently: 17 Things That Matter Most by Todd Whitaker.

Let us know how you plan to refuel and keep checking in. We have many Back-to-School ideas on the way!

Ann Marie

Summer Seahorse

A Guest Post by Christina

Ride out the last waves of the school year by making one of these adorable seahorses. Print out the pattern and create templates on cardstock to trace or simply run copies on various colors of construction paper. Have your students cut out their seahorses and glue them on a watery blue background. Add details like other ocean animals and plants. For inspiration, display a variety of seahorse pictures from books, magazines or the Internet.

Enjoy!

Summer Book Picks

Here's a list of some of our beloved, must-read, your life will never be the same again books! Let us know what your favorites are too!

Moo-ving Up to Second Grade

As we wrap up the end of the year I can’t help but talk to my class about how excited I am for them to be moving to second grade. (Although, if you read our first post, you know I'm a little teary-eyed too.) To celebrate we made our last hallway display of the year. We used cow patterns from DLTK and I created some moo-ving boxes, moo-ving trucks and highway signs.

I’ve created signs you can use for grades K-4. If you teach a different grade and would like me to create a sign for you, let me know!

For our display I projected the image of the truck and traced it onto a 12x18 piece of construction paper.

Erin

Fun in the Sun

Ann Marie and I are so excited to receive your feedback! I’m glad you’ve found some inspiration here.

This week my class did my favorite “Make Each Day Special” activity- bring a towel to school. When the list for the week went up my kids immediately latched on to this idea and I heard whispers about it all day: “Why do you think we’re bringing a towel to school?”, “Maybe we’ll have a picnic.”, “Do you think we’re going to get wet?”, “I’m going to bring my towel with Angry Birds!”

The morning finally arrived and the kids couldn’t wait to find out what we were doing. I had great behavior all day in anticipation of the big event. Students grabbed their towels, a book and a new pair of sunglasses (some fun star-shaped sunglasses from the local party store) and off we went.

I hope your last days of school are just as special!

Erin