META TAG

Thursday, July 30, 2015

Back to School SALE!

I am ready for the upcoming Teachers Pay Teachers Back-to-School Sale!  The sale is August 3 & 4th, and I updated all of my multi-select math resources for 3rd, 4th, and 5th grades. It took three fun-filled days of making sure the content standards are comparable to others states, but as a lover of math I felt it was necessary.  I do use the Florida Math Standards since I teach in Florida, but Common Core standards are the same (from what I understand the Florida Standards are only different with 2 standards) just a different name - just ask any Fl teacher. 

This is all new to me, and I am enjoying creating each new resource simply because I am learning so much as I read and reread the standards.  I don't know about you, but multi-select questions are not what I grew up learning.  I was taught there was ONLY one correct answer.  That you could always get rid of one obvious wrong answer, and then figure out the correct answer from there.  Now students need to find 2 or more correct answers per problem! Sometimes all of the answers are correct.... it's MIND BOGGLING!   It's not just a learning curve for the students, but for us teachers as well!

A little background on why I started my store:  Last year I wasn't satisfied with what our district gave to teachers to prepare our students for the new assessments.  So I started to do what I always do (and what many teachers do), I created what I needed.  Poof!  :) My teammates saw what I was using, and wanted to use it too! Next thing I knew the other grade levels were asking me to make math resources for them as well!  That's when I really knew I had something special.  It's one thing for me to use something that I make, but when my colleagues find value in it.... :)   

Everything that is in my store are products that are used in either my classroom, or something that a colleague asked me to create for them- with 2 exceptions.  The Math Center Task Cards.  This is a huge deal to me.  Last year my students asked me to create centers for them instead of practicing with the standard "worksheet" style.    I'm going to be honest with you.  All I did was take the same questions from the original resources and made them into centers.  
Here is one: 3rd Grade Math Center: Operations and Algebraic Thinking  
Here is the other: 3rd Grade Math Center: Number and Operations in Base Ten
It was a HUGE hit!  Students loved it, didn't realize they had seen the same problems in the other format... and of course I was happy because they were practicing and were highly engaged.  Highly engaged students makes me an incredibly happy teacher!

I realize what you must be thinking.  My store must only contain math resources.  That is not true at all! I have classroom management resources, Language Arts resources, and a few other goodies as well. One of my favorite items I  have posted is a close read rubric/ assignment that my students use every single week.  I print 100's of this rubric monthly.  It's simple but HIGHLY EFFECTIVE. I use Level Readers and students complete different activities based on the book, using the rubric each night.  Parents are a key component to this assignment because they have to sign the rubric in order to earn full credit.  Without the parent signature, the highest score a student may earn is 80%.  Most parents won't just sign a piece of paper without seeing the work that goes along with it.  Now I know that each week parents at least see what their child is reading, and possibly engaging with them regarding the content that is being read.  I have used this assignment rubric for 5 years now, and the positive feedback from parents has been overwhelming! 

As always, Happy Teaching!  Happy Learning!  :-)
Sandra Dobrin


Here is the direct link to my Teachers Pay Teachers store:  https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/The-Happy-Learning-Den  Make sure you click the star on the top of my page to follow me.  That is the best way to see when I post new resources.

Follow me on my Facebook page for all things sweet about teaching and learning!

No comments:

Post a Comment