Blogging Mom Vanished

Oh my goodness!  It has been a LONG time since I last blogged.  I figured I would work to get one last blog posting in before the month of June passed me by, so here I am giving you the rundown of Molly's life.  Some of my loyal blog followers probably think I fell from the face of the Earth.  Nope.  Honestly, life has had me so very busy!  Let's see if I can update on a few things.

What about the weight loss?  I am still exercising.  I am following the same routine as I have been for the last seventy days or so.  I am continuing to watch my intake of bread and sugar and the exercise takes about an hour a day.  I am down about 15 pounds and many inches. I guess this means that the weight loss plan has been somewhat successful.  Yeah for me!  Although I will say that it is still very hard.  I just love bread, no two ways about it. I still  have a long way to go.


A new job for me!  I am headed back to teaching in the fall. I will be moving from third to fourth grade. I have taught fourth before, but it has been seven years. For those of you that are just blog followers and not family or friends, you will remember that I took this year off to stay home with my little Hudson, who is now 15 months.  I was blessed to stay at home this year, and I also consider it a blessing that a job was available for me to return to for the 2011-12 school year.  Now, with that said, I am a bit stressed about being able to handle everything once I return.  Keep in mind that I have a twelve and a fourteen year old that have very active athletic schedules and a husband that is a head basketball coach.  With my little guy now having to get up at the crack-of-dawn for me to go to work, I know he will need to get to sleep early.  This is going to be one of the many challenges of my new schedule.  How can I be two places at one time?  not sure about that one yet.

Speaking of the job, I figure if I plan this summer accordingly (what's left of it), I can get my thoughts and lessons planned out, at least for the first nine weeks of school.  As you can see from the pictures below, I have been a busy bee! I plan on making many more things before the first day of school. Why?  Because I need to be able to leave school each day as close to 4:00 as possible.  After all, I have a family to get home to!!!


 

Designed this great lesson plan book that is personalized for ME.  It has everything in it that I know I will need, such as lesson plan pages, calendars, roster lists, student info., curriculum maps, etc. There are 200 pages of needed info.

This is one of the lesson plan pages.

Because we teach United States land features, I made a mini book that is specific to the land features outlined in the standards that we teach in the 4th grade.

Pages in the Land Features book

I also designed a file-folder United States Land Features board game.  I really think it will be a lot of fun.
Although this can be used in a center of just a few kids, I decided to make 9 games, which is a class set if three kids play against each other.

Because I needed to brush up on Native Americans and figure out how I would teach it, I worked to figure out how to connect the land features to where the designated tribes lived.  We focus on six tribal regions and then six tribes within those regions. This is the cover of Native American book I will make with the kids.

Inside the cover of the book, we will discuss where these Native American tribes are in relation to the land
features just introduced.

I have also made games/centers that go along with the first unit in Math.

Plus, I have made about 10-12 literacy activity games for a group to do while I am in guided reading groups.
I ended up making a skill sheet to go along with the activities in order to get a grade if I so choose.



In addition to all the hard work, isn't there time for fun?  of course!  How 'bout a week at the beach!!  I shall be leaving shortly and will post some pics when I get back.  Who knows, I may even update my blog while on vacation.  Needless to say, I will be in a condo for a couple of hours each day while Baby Hudson naps, so I'm sure I will be looking for something to do.

This is the kids' beach picture from last summer.

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First Day of School Activity

The first day of school will be here before you know it. Yeah, I know..... summer just started, but time flies! The first day of school is a time when you want to set the stage for what is expected. It is also a time of getting to know your students; helping them to feel comfortable in this new environment. In order to do this, a variety of activities can be used. With that said, I have put together a beginning of the year/first day of school packet.  If interested, please check out all the details by clicking on the link below for Teachers Pay Teachers.



First Day of School Activity

If you are interested in purchasing the packet, please click the link below.

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