Thinking in Primary

I am so excited to have joined the blogging world!  I can't believe that I have my own blog and that I even won an awesome giveaway!  I figured that it was time to pay it forward!  So I'm giving away a $10 gift card (to spend anyway you like) at  Teachers Pay Teachers! 4 Easy Ways to Enter 1. Follow my blog and leave a comment saying that you do! 2. Follow my  TpT  store and leave a comment! 3. Grab my S'more button and leave a comment! 4. Blog about my giveaway and leave a comment! I will pick a winner on Monday, July 11th.  Thank you for stopping by! Jody

I'm joining in with  Miss Kindergarten's  classroom management linky party! I think the most important thing with classroom management is taking the time to really teach and practice the rules.  I've been reading The Daily 5 and I love their method of having a student (one who is having a little trouble) model the inappropriate behavior first, and then model the appropriate behavior.  I think modeling is so important so I try to always use a soft voice and nice words myself (sounds easy enough but we've all had our moments)! I've also used Kelso's Choices  for the past few years.  We spend quite a bit of time role playing how to make good choices. For monitoring behavior, I use a red, yellow, green, purple behavior card system.  Students start on green and like the traditional red-yellow-green system they move to yellow or red if they make bad choices.  The purple card is my reward system.  It's pretty easy for kids to get on purple at the ...

One of my favorite stories to read at the beginning of the year is The Kissing Hand.  I made a Kissing Hand extension unit and you can get it by clicking  here !

Learning With Mrs. Parker  is giving away Heidi Songs!

Click Here!

Thank you Miss Kindergarten and friends!

I love my 4th of July crayons! I finally found the time to try making my own crayons!  I think they turned out really cute and it was SUPER easy.  I just arranged my peeled crayons in these silicone molds and put them in the oven at 275 for about 15 minutes. Once they were totally melted, I let them cool for a few minutes on the counter, then I put them in the freezer for about 15 minutes. They popped right out of the molds.  Voila! I had my students sort and peel crayons for a while on the last day of school.  They had a blast, but what a MESS!  Plus, they didn't get that many crayons peeled (it's kind of hard)! After my husband saw me peeling for an hour he brought me this little knife.  You just score the paper down the side and peel!  So thankful for time savers!