I recently found myself doing something I hadn’t done in years… Setting up an entirely new classroom. After 24 years of teaching—and nine years in the same classroom—I knew exactly where everything belonged. I’m actually the opposite of a hoarder. If anything, I occasionally get so overstimulated by clutter that I throw things away…and sometimes […]
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My classroom was a well-oiled machine. After 24 years in upper elementary education, I knew exactly what worked. My classroom was organized and streamlined. Years of refining my practice had created systems that felt almost effortless. I knew my standards inside and out and had built a collection of lessons, activities, and resources that could
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I recently came across an Instagram post claiming that homeschooling was “easy.” As someone whose only personal homeschooling experience came during the Covid years with my own children, I immediately laughed out loud. Those years taught me many things, but “easy” was definitely not one of them. As I read through the comments, I found
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Teaching multiplication facts is certainly a challenge. I surveyed more than 20,000 teachers about their biggest challenge teaching math, and the overwhelming response was that students don’t know their multiplication facts. We’ve all experienced it. Some students easily memorize their multiplication facts, and other students memorize most of their multiplication facts but struggle with the
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It’s a Tuesday afternoon, and we’re well into the school year. I’ve taught my reading mini lesson and have already met with one guided reading group. I look around the room and everyone appears to be on task during their independent reading time. Things are running perfectly. But not really. One student “finishes” at least
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These Day After Halloween activities are here to help!! I’ve come to the conclusion that one of the only days more challenging than Halloween is the day AFTER Halloween. There is nothing quite like a room full of children who’ve eaten nothing but candy over the past 24 hours. I’ve heard many teachers say that
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These Halloween math activities are a blast for students! They’re so much fun and full of great math content. Here’s an overview of the Halloween math activities included in the Halloween edition of the Multiplication Math Centers. As with the other centers in a booklet format, everything can be copied into a single booklet. This
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Teaching students how to restate the question and support their answer with text evidence is not always the easiest (or fun) part of the year. However, I also know that it isn’t an option. Restating the question and providing text evidence is something I have to teach and a skill students will be expected to
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