Introducing the New Other Half of A Dot Does A Lot…

Hello, I am Kristie! I recently moved to North Carolina and was lucky to be introduced to my colleague Ms. Sarah Swilley (soon to be Stephens)! In a few short days (yes, days!) we really hit it off together, both professionally and personally!  She has quickly become a very close friend and colleague and shares a strong passion and love for teaching. We both agreed that we could get much more accomplished if we teamed up and put our minds together, so HERE we are… The NEW “A Dot Does A Lot Team”…

So a little about myself! I am also a Kindergarten teacher, (with my classroom and Sarah’s separated by only a column!)  I grew up in Arizona and New York and now reside in North Carolina. My boyfriend, Nick (who is also an elementary school teacher!), and I made the big move to NC and love the area and are even making plans to buy a house! Although it has been hard to move away from family and friends, we are incredibly lucky to be blessed with such awesome friends and coworkers…

Personally I have many loves, which include teaching, shopping, reading, teaching, chocolate, Italian foods, and did I mention teaching?!?... My dream job has been to be a Kindergarten Teacher, since I was in KINDERGARTEN myself! I am so excited to be fulfilling that dream and to have the opportunity to share my experiences with the teacher blogging community. I love reading your blogs and ideas and bringing them into my own classroom. I also truly enjoy having someone to collaborate with in addition to Nick. Nick and I have always been a good team together and continuously bounce ideas and resources off of one another. Having Sarah around to discuss our ideas has greatly influenced us both and we both appreciate her constructive criticism and positive collaboration...

I am huge literacy advocate; I believe it is important to include reading and writing in every aspect of the day! I think that we as teachers need to portray our love for reading and writing (as well as math and other subjects across the board) so that our young scholars learn to be confident in those academics…  I am also a huge advocate for Children with Special Needs. I always take each student’s individual needs into consideration while planning and creating activities. This is something that comes easily for me, as I grew up with a sibling who has had to overcome several struggles presented by his ADHD and Asperger’s. I also saw where and how he struggled throughout his schooling and aspired from a young age to help ensure that other children didn’t come home from school feeling the way he did…

I could go on forever about my interests and beliefs about education, but I want to stop before I get too involved!  (I want to make sure I still have something to blog about later!)  I am very excited for this opportunity to blog with Sarah and look forward our future as team bloggers! We both hope you like what you see and decide to continue reading! J

First OFFICIAL product on TPT = Giveaway!!!

Hello everyone!

Whew!  I already looked up to all the wonderful teacher bloggers out there that have created so many great products for us to purchase on TPT, but I have a new found respect for them!  I have been working on a packet of reading logs that contain nightly tasks for students to complete that are directly correlated to the Common Core Standards and will hold students and parents more accountable to the nightly reading homework!  I am slightly embarrassed to admit that I started this project several months ago and have just now finished it TONIGHT! Yikes!

Regardless, I feel like it is finally ready to be posted!  And for the first week it is up, I have marked it down to only $6!!!  Click the picture below to go directly to my store. But..... if you are one of the first 6 (I'm just liking that number today:) people to become a follower and post a comment about my new product, you will get it for FREE!

New Blog Design!

Ta-da!  You know how you feel when you lose a couple of pounds and put on a new outfit!?  You feel like you can conquer the world! Getting this new blog design kinda feels like that!  I am so, so excited!  I have to say a huge thank you to Sweet Bella Roos!  Emily did an awesome job setting it up for me and creating custom icons for facebook, etc.  Everyone should go check out her etsy store and blog!

I'm sorry I haven't been posting much lately!  If you have ever gone through the process of buying a home, you will completely understand when I say it feels like it is consuming us!  Almost every day we are trying to track down a new document or piece of information!!  I know this is completely normal, but I still can't wait for the moment they hand us the key and tell us we are done! :)

Another Amazing Giveaway!

Just the other day I was sharpening pencils for our math benchmark test and I thought to myself... "ugh, what was the name of that pencil sharpener that I read about online that is supposed to be so quiet and so amazing??  I wonder if I'll be able to find the name of it if I google it..."

And then a few days later I discover that Kimberley Ann, on her blog Live, Laugh, I LOVE Kindergarten, is GIVING AWAY one of these famous sharpeners!  I haven't had a chance to try it yet, but they are supposedly THE greatest thing!

Click on the picture to hop over to her blog and get yourself entered!

Tackling Misconceptions about Kindergarten

Hey everybody!  Tonight our school hosted a Curriculum Night and each grade level set up a few stations to provide parents with more information about what our students are learning and how they can support them.

For Kindergarten, I was in charge of the station dedicated to the Common Core Standards.  To make things a little more fun, I created a "pop quiz" for parents to take about the standards :)  Several of the questions address some of the misconceptions our team has found many of our parents have about Kindergarten.  It ended up initiating many AWESOME discussions with parents tonight!  There were lots of ah-ha moments and many misconceptions were erased :)

Here it is for you to grab!

Let me know what you think!

GIANT Giveaway Over at Keepin' It Kool

Wow!  I am so impressed!  Khris, of Keepin' It Kool in Kinderland, has reached 100 followers and is having a crazy huge giveaway!  I can only aspire to be that successful by the time I hit 100 followers!!!!  (Right now I'm super ecstatic about my 5... hehe :)  Click on the picture below to go check out the amazing packets you can win and start entering!

And while you are at it, go ahead and follow me too! :)

Class Dojo and Our Clip Chart

Mrs. Wills (one of my absolute favorite Kindergarten bloggers) mentioned a great new app/website called Class Dojo in her most recent post.  I commented on her post about how much I loved class dojo and mentioned that I was using it in conjunction with our clip chart that had already been established in the room.  

Then later this evening a fellow teacher asked me to describe in a little more detail how I had made this work.  (Thanks, Jena, for inspiring this post! :)

Rather than respond in the comments section (I'm having some trouble figuring out how to change the font color on the comments on my blog so they are currently very difficult to read) I figured I'd do a quick post about this!  

Like many of you, my kiddos start on green every day (see the image above).  Prior to class dojo, they would move up the chart when caught doing the right thing and down after a warning or two... When we (my  instructional assistant and I) decided to give Class Dojo a try, we realized that we were frequently giving points but clips weren't getting moved as often and we didn't have a clear system for communicating points to parents.  

So we started looking at their point balance at the end of the day and moving clips up or down based on how many points they have.  Every 5 points (good points) equal one move up the chart.  So for example, let's say Susie has 8 points at the end of the day and was already on blue (when we were lining up for lunch she was the only one in 'traveling position' without a reminder so she got to move up for remembering the expectations when no one else was) so she will go home "on purple".   Once I explained that 5 points equals one move up the chart they were much more eager to earn those points!

In my newsletter I explained to parents that we were utilizing the new app and it would factor into their color for the day.  I also asked for updated email addresses so parents could be entered onto the website and a report could be sent to them each week.  

I love that Class Dojo makes it so easy to quickly provide positive reinforcement to several children at once. My instructional assistant keeps her iPhone with her at all times and can give or take points in a matter of seconds.  It eliminates the loss of instructional time associated with having to go over to the clip chart all day long!  By incorporating the two together, it gives me the flexibility to utilize either one at any given time and my students seem to be even more aware of their choices....  

The greatest thing about it is that you can tweak it to meet the needs of your kids!  Maybe some classes need to set the expectation at three points at first, some classes may get so many points in one day that they need to earn eight or ten... it just depends on your kids!   Please don't hesitate to comment if you have any other questions!  Or if you utilize Dojo another way, I'd love to hear about it too!  I love to hear new ideas!

Whew!

I am so excited to finally be posting again after disappearing over the holidays!  I had intentions of getting back to blogging much sooner, but things in the classroom haven't been quite how I expected them to be since coming back from break...

You know how we usually long for that mysterious, yet magical, period of time right after Christmas break where things suddenly start to click for our Kindergartners?!  We tell ourselves that its alright that they aren't that independent yet, because after Christmas it will all start to fall into place... Well this year...

These first couple of weeks back have felt like....

the. complete. opposite.

Don't get me wrong, I was fully prepared to review routines and procedures and give them (and myself for that matter!) a few days to wrap our minds around the fact that we were already back at school; but I never expected my little smarties to require that much support and redirection!  :)  After our first full week back I was so drained that I stayed in bed practically half the weekend!

I have spent the majority of the school year thus far bragging to anyone who would listen about how wonderfully independent this bunch is, and how impressed I am with all the progress they have made in such a short time... and so it was that much harder to accept that I was going to have to back-track and explicitly review all our routines and procedures.

But... I did review them all at the beginning of this week and kept trying to convince myself we were making some progress... until yesterday I overheard another teacher talking about "filling someone's bucket" and I realized my "bucket" was so close to empty that our class needed to make some changes (and fast)!

I did some serious reflecting the rest of the day (and borrowed the book about filling other people's buckets to read to the class :) and came up with the idea to simply flip-flop our schedule for the day... just to see if that would spark their curiosity just enough to keep them more engaged, but not change things so dramatically that it took us back to square one.  So, once I got over the fact that I hate to start new things in the middle of the week and tomorrow was going to be Thursday, I shifted my lesson plans a bit, and mentally prepared myself to teach writing first thing the next day rather than math :)

And the crazy thing is....

it. totally. worked!

If you had walked in my room today during Daily 5, you would never have know that yesterday I had redirected students over and over and over again during the same exact activities!  I was soooo relieved!

Isn't that just fascinating!?  It certainly is to me... None of the routines themselves changed a bit, the format of the workshops and the types of independent work were the same, and yet the difference was like night and day...

I'd love to hear your thoughts!

And for those of you that stayed with me through that longgggg winded post... here is a freebie! :)    Regardless of how independent the majority of one's class can be-- there seems to always be at least one or two that need a little extra support.  This file contains an individualized behavior log that you can adapt to fit your needs!

Click Here for the Behavior Chart

Live, Love, Laugh Everyday in Kindergarten has a Great Giveway!

Hey guys!

I am so tired tonight so I'm not making this long... but I just wanted to quickly tell everyone about a great giveway from Tammy over at Live, Love, Laugh Everyday in Kindergarten!  She is giving away a $25 gift certificate to TPT!!!  Click on the picture below to hop on over and enter the giveaway too!

Patterns? Should We Teach Them? (Freebie alert!)

I certainly think so!

I doubt this is the first time you have heard that question since the release of the Common Core standards, but I think it's great that teachers continue to reflect on  and discuss the changes and how they impact student learning.

Over on her blog, Ms. Kerri of Ms. Kerri and her Krazy Klass, brought up this question back in September.  I completely agree with everything she said and thought there were some great comments from other readers as well!

In addition to everything that was pointed out, I think its important to keep in mind that the Common Core standards are designed to be the "final destination" or end goal for our students but that it has been left up to us to determine the path students take to get there!  For example, the Kindergarten standards don't state that "students will activate their prior knowledge, or schema, before reading" but we know that in order for students to comprehend text (and therefore master the standards that are listed in the Common Core) teaching them how to do this is critical.  I view the concept of patterns in math to be a lot like schema in reading... in order for students to truly understand other math concepts such as counting by 10's (K.CC.1) they need that foundation with basic patterns!  So although the standards don't specifically state that students will identify and extend patterns, we have to be mindful of the fact that it is part of the necessary foundation that must be laid in order for students to master some of the other standards.

All that being said, my wonderful team has starting teaching patterns and I am working on a packet of Fall themed pattern activities to post in my TPT store!  Since its not completely done... I'm linking up with Classroom Freebies for Manic Monday with a FREEBIE!!!  Click on the picture below...

If you would like to visit my TPT store you can also find it there by clicking on the picture below...

Thanks for stopping by! 

--Sarah--

Heidi Songs!

I may or may not be way behind the learning curve on this one, but I'm just glad I have finally discovered how wonderful Heidi Songs are! I showed my kiddos the "go" song on youtube on Friday and it was a HUGE hit!  I think we probably hit repeat about 10 times...

Anyway, two days later I'm lost in blog world and I stumble upon Jenn's amazing blog, Seriously Primary, where she is hosting a GIVEAWAY for a $20 gift certificate to anything on Heidi's website!!!!  (Talk about good timing... I was literally about the buy the first DVD:)  So I'm linking up to her blog post here, so you can go enter as well!    You can also click on her blog button below to visit!

It was MAGICAL!!

I don't have time to write much, but I have got to share my excitement about the magical moment we had today during Daily Five!!!! For the first time since the beginning of the year I looked up from my small group and every single one of my little smarties was fully engaged in one of the Daily Five stations!  It was that wonderful moment when I was able to take a relaxing breath and realize that the hard work was starting to really show... (then I quickly handed over the sight word cards in my hand to one of the students in my small group, grabbed my iPad and captured the moment via video... Just in case I need to utilize it later on to show them what they are capable of ;). I'm going to double check that all the students seen in the video have a photo release, and if so I may post it on here!

My first TPT upload... and its FREE!

I am so excited to announce that I have officially posted my first product on Teachers Pay Teachers!  (and its FREE of course!)

Our school is working really hard this year to promote the importance of reading at home (and at school!)  If there is an area that we need to see the most growth this year as a school, it is definitely in reading.  In an effort to promote reading at home and hold our students more accountable, the K team, like many other grade levels at our school, has incorporated an interactive book log into our nightly homework routine.  We send home various books for the students to read with their parents and then include a quick, but meaningful, activity on the book log to further bridge the learning from school to home.  I am working hard to put together an entire packet of these interactive book logs to post in my store, but in the meantime I have posted a sample and would love to hear what you all think!

Click on the image below to find this product in my store!

I Did It! Now I'll Introduce Myself...

Soooo glad I got that over with!  Now I can actually tell yall a little bit about myself...

My name is Sarah Swilley, I am a Kindergarten teacher in North Carolina, and am a future wife (to that handsome man in the picture!), a teacher, a Christian, and a great friend!  My loves include Brian (the wedding is exactly one year away!), shopping, hanging out with friends, reading, salty/fried foods, and all things southern (I apologize in advance if the word "yall" bothers you!)  I also love, love, love what I do.  I am frequently accused of working too much, but the reality is... it is way harder for me to turn my "teacher brain" OFF than it is to keep it ON :)  I, like so many others, spend most of my spare time browsing and reading teacher blogs and pinning things on pinterest!  Just the other day my sweet (and super supportive!) future hubby said, "Do you really have to be on that thing [the computer] alllll the time?"  (Smile.)



One of my favorite things about teaching is talking with other teachers and colleagues about teaching strategies and sharing new ideas!  I actually aspire to work in Curriculum & Instruction one day and am one of those 'nerdy' teachers that is always carrying around several different professional development books and analyzing standards and curriculum just because I like to :)  For that reason, I also greatly enjoy reading all of the amazing teacher bloggers that are out there!  I have been following some of my favorites for almost two years now and am definitely a better teacher because of those awesome ladies!!!

Like I said in my first post, it has taken me quite a while to even post on this blog, due to a whole plethora of fears and anxieties about starting a "teacher blog"!  But I am realizing that I may never get started if I don't just push some of those aside...  I hope that if you have made it this far, you will like what you see and will become a follower!

Now or Never!?

Ok, here it goes... I just have to stop finding excuses and POST! :) I have literally been planning to start a blog now for over a year and am just now typing my very first post.  If I don't just go ahead and do it... I may never stop finding reasons to wait!