Holiday Cheer in Afghanistan

A friend of mine had posted on Facebook that she was looking for holiday decorations for her base holiday party in Afghanistan.  Immediately I thought of putting my incredible thoughtful and talented artists on the job!  We wrote notes, made ornaments, and these incredible snowmen to bring some cheer to our U.S. airforce troops overseas.  Theresa has promised she will send pictures and keep us updated!  Great job, Second Graders!

Laptops!

Exciting news!  The portable laptop labs are now ready to use!  We do need to share them, but it is so nice to have more 1:1 computer time! Matthew is our photographer and was able to take a few pictures of them in use. 

Currently we are using them to get onto Xtra Math, Kidblog, Dancemath Typing, and Education City at least 3x during the week.  The kids are super motivated to use them and are learning quite a few...ummm...troubleshooting strategies.  All part of the fun! 

Long time, no see!

For some reason I am always more motivated to catch up on things when I am SUPPOSED to be doing something else....like report cards, for instance!  I thought this might be a good chance to update everyone on our new classroom behavior management.  As I notified families through a notice, we have started using a Clip Chart in class.  It looks like this:
 

I like that EVERYONE starts at Ready to Learn!  This gives all students the opportunity to move up the chart or down.  Even if they move down, they can work to move back up the chart.  Students should be bringing home their reporting sheet marked each day. 

I also wrote to you that I would be using a free program called Class Dojo.  I really like that it shows students very specifically why they are moving either up or down the chart.  I can show students individual reports, or how we are doing as a whole class.  Here is an example of our first week using Class Dojo:

Through my own use of the program and reflection, I remembered how hard it is to pick out the POSITIVE behaviors!  This is not because the kids aren't doing the right thing, but rather, the negative behaviors stand out because there is SO MUCH positive behavior.  On that note, I am trying to be very mindful of the positives (in addition to helping students understand why certain behaviors are considered negatives in a classroom setting...though they might not be in other settings.)   

This really is such a great group of kids!  As they keep those positive behaviors coming, I will make an effort to keep acknowledging them!  Ready...set...go!