Week 1's Winner and the Giveaway for Week 2

We are off to a great start! Last week's winner of the Classroom Friendly Supplies pencil sharpener is Ursula Gamler. Congratulations Ursula!

This has been a whirlwind week for me and my class. We have been trying to review for the upcoming benchmark testing which, as you know, is always so fun. Our heating unit burned up on Wednesday. We smelled something funny, heard a humming noise instead of the heater, and were faced with the possibility of either being in a cold classroom today or possibly being relocated. Thankfully when I got in in the morning they were working on it and it was up and running before the end of the first recess.

We have been reading The One and Only Ivan and this week we began working on the reading and discussion questions in small groups before discussing it as a class. It has been mostly successful. As in, yesterday it worked really well but today when the SUPERINTENDENT was visiting we were a hot mess: one group in disagreement about what they were going to do on their green screen (yes, apparently this became a group project we would share via media), one group off task, the small group with me was okay except one started stepping on some one's foot

and another couldn't find the right page in his book. Trying to settle all of these small fires while at the same time panicking over what the kids were saying and dealing with the other small issues - all 5 minutes before recess. Yeah, that was a great start to the day.

On the positive side, she has seen my class before so she knows they usually have it together, they were problem solving an issue without my help, and for the most part they all at least knew what they were supposed to be working on even if they were not currently doing it. It is the small things. So I am looking on the bright side.

As promised we are having a second giveaway. This week's giveaway is a $25 gift card to Staples. Staples has so many good things for use in the classroom - just the Mr. Sketch markers alone are worth a visit for me.

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