Have you heard the news? 

Click here to visit my TpT store!

The TpT site wide sale is Monday and Tuesday, and my entire store is on sale! Use the code BestYear to get 28% off. 

Oh, and don't forget to enter my giveaway to win $10 to TpT - just in time for the sale! 

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Five Reasons Why I'm Excited for the New School Year

This is my last Five for Friday post during the summer. Teachers go back on Monday, and we will be completely starting from scratch since we got new carpet over the summer. Yikes!

That being said, here are five reasons why I'm excited for this school year:

As much as it freaks me out to put my room back together in a week, I am excited to start from scratch! I moved into a room that was completely filled with lots of teacher materials, and everything up on the walls so this is the first time that I'll get to start fresh. 

I've decided to do an ocean theme in my room this year, and since I cannot get into my room here are some things that I'd like to do as I set up my room:

Click the image to view the original source.

Click the image to view the original source. 

Next week I will be in panic mode while I set everything set up, but I am so excited to see how it looks when it's all put together!

This summer I read Explore Like a Pirate, which is about gamifying your classroom. Every Tuesday Rachael at Sweet Sweet Primary hosted a linky where we would post our thoughts about each chapter. This book was so inspiring, and I've come up with a bunch of great ideas for how I can gamify my room. I can't wait to start the new "game" with my students, and share how it goes with all of you!

Check out the old posts below, and make sure you stop by on Tuesday for the last chapter!

Week 1

Week 2 

Week 3

Week 4

Week 5

Week 6 

Week 7

Week 8

I had so much fun with my first giveaway, that I had to have another! Enter ASAP to win a $10 TpT gift card. I will email the winner on August 2nd. 

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I'm looking forward to having a sense of purpose again. I love having the opportunity to take a break from work throughout the year, but starting sometime in July I get really bored with summer vacation. I mean, it’s nice to travel and relax, but sitting around with nothing to do too many days in a row really takes its toll on me. I like the feeling of having something to do, and something to keep my brain engaged. It was going all summer anyway, but summer doesn’t bring the same challenges as managing 30 beasts children all at once!

Last but not least, the students! I can't wait to meet my new group of Corriganites, and to see the old ones, too. Especially since I dyed my hair red over the summer, and I can't wait to see their reactions to my new look. 

Click the image to go back to the linky. 

Flash Giveaway!

I am so excited for this 2nd giveaway!

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I was not planning on having another one so soon, but can you really ever have too many giveaways? 

This one is short lived - enter ASAP! I will email the winner on August 2nd.

Good luck!

The Things I Learned From Having a Difficult Class: The Big Picture

This is the last post in my Things I Learned from Having a Difficult Class Series. It has been a lot of fun sharing things I learned and turning my negative feelings about my past year into positive ones.

Today I'm focusing on the big picture. 

The big picture is... the year will pass. No matter how slowly it seems like its trudging along during the year, it will be over before you know it.


The big picture is... the ones who ask for our love in the least loveable ways need it the most. Remember this when that child is doing something less than loveable!


The big picture is... your students will learn something during the year. Even if it isn't your desired outcome, they will still learn during the year.


The big picture is... your students will be okay. And so will you.


And, if you need some inspiration for the new school year:

Thank you for stopping by to read my tips about dealing with the difficult class each week! I hope that you have an amazingly wonderful class this year, but if you don't that you can use my experience to make yours a better one. Good luck!

Tools and Treasures: Stockpiling Items and Earning Badges

Thanks for stopping by for Chapter 8 in the Explore Like a Pirate Linky! This week is all about different kinds of items and badges you could use in your gamified classroom. 

Oh my goodness. This chapter was full of so much information! I'll try to keep this post short and sweet. First, Matera describes the two different kinds of badges he uses in his classroom.

Seems easy enough, right? Well, of course there are an infinite number of mini badges that students can earn - you just have to figure out what will be motivating to your students and what is relevant in your classroom!

As interesting as badges are, I have to say that I was much more intrigued by items. 

The items that I think are the most applicable to my 2nd grade class would be battle point items, leveled items, rule benders, temporary modifiers, and player interaction items. I already did some things similar to these items so I think they will be the easiest for me to fully integrate into my class. 

Battle Point Items

Matera uses "battle points", or BP, which are items that students keep in their binder to use in different ways. Some examples he listed were:

• Using battle points as a tiebreaker (team with the most BP wins the game)
• Adding up the BP and using it as the team's starting score
• Using BP for a second chance for a question
• Using BP as an item block - can't target groups with their items for a given number of rounds
• Safety net - can't lose items for a given number of grounds
• Power run - every question after the first question a group gets right is worth double points
• Trampling - if a group gets a question right they get a private question for themselves
• Lucky Leprechaun - the winning group finds a pot of gold to earn items

 These are just some options you could use when playing games with battle points. I think for 2nd grade I will call them Game Points (GP) instead of battle points. 

Leveled Items

Matera suggests leveling some of your items as levels 1-3. Level 1 items are easier to get and are therefore worth less, and the rarity and battle points increase as the number does. He describes an Spear, which has various levels. Level 1 Spear is worth 20 BP, Level 2 Spear is worth 35 BP and skips the other teams turn once, Level 3 Spear is worth 80 BP and skips the other teams turn 3 times per game. So much you can do with this! 

Rule Benders Items

You can have a lot of fun with rule bender items! These items give the students the ability to break or bend the rules in their favor. These items could give students the ability to turn something in late, or have the option to redo an assignment. In my class, I think rule benders in the games we play in class will be the best way to use these items, but we'll see how it all plays out this year!

Temporary Modifier Items

These items are based on the "power up" mechanic that Matera described in chapter 7. If you missed it, click here to read about the different game mechanics! 

Some of these items could be in the form of a "spell", meaning you can cast a spell (or a curse) on the other team for a set amount of time that is determined by the item. Some examples were the Perfect Plums, which would earn bonus XP if the team doesn't break the spell by talking out of turn. This sounds like something you would want to cast on your own team, while the Staff of Swief is not. It is a spell that curses one player from another team and assigns them a perfect plum, or they lose all of the teams points! This is annonymous, so it is only revealed that someone has been cursed by the Staff of Sweif, but not who cast the curse. 

Or, you could use these items to earn bonus points for the next 3 questions in a game. 

Player Interaction Items

These items work well with incorporating the social interaction element into the game and would give the power to deflect items and control who they target, prevent the other team from answering a question, or steal items. Sounds fun, right? 

Once you start wrapping your head around the different types of items, use the guiding questions below for determining the best way to use them in your classroom!

In my underwater themed classroom, I've come up with several titles of badges and items. I am focusing more on items at the moment, and I'm sure the badges will come to me soon enough!

Some examples of badges I'm going to use are Captain, Pirate, School of Fish, and Smart as Paint. I haven't decided what they'll be for yet, but I think I'm set on the names!

Some items that I'm going to use in my underwater themed room are going to be the Black Pearl, Conch, and Trident. Again, not sure what they'll do yet.. but I've still got some time to figure it all out!

Thanks for sticking with me to the end of this loooong post! 

Click the image to go back to the linky. A big thank you to Rachael at Sweet Sweet Primary for setting this all up! Make sure you check back next week for Chapter 9 - X Marks the Spot: Finding the Joy in Playful Assessment. Only two more weeks to go!

Mixed up Sentences

It's finally completed! This product has been in the works for a long time. Mixed Up Sentences for the Year (formerly called pocket chart sentences) now includes all 12 months! 

Right now it's discounted to $5 for the first 5 buyers, AND it's on sale for 20% off until July 27th. Grab it while you can!

And the Winner is...

Congrats to Lisa over at From Second Grade to Sun Devil - you are the winner!

 Thank you to all who entered!