Teacher Vlog: Back to School

[Music] honestly those are the two that caught my attention and I want to share those with you as always if you're not on teachers connected is totally free for so sign up if you are an international teacher all you have to do my understanding is to email them and let them know you really want to join and they can kind of work around the issue of your school not being present because the schools listed are just American schools because we definitely would benefit from an international perspective for sure good afternoon guys I'm sitting in my dining room because I just finished clearing some things off of my dining room table that I need to take to my classroom I have put them in this bag which is I'll turn this way so you can see the front this is the teacher bag that I've used the past couple years I did get a new one that I showed you guys and I think the first hall and I will be showing you what I've packed in my teacher back to start the school year when that time comes it is about noon and I woke up at about 10 o'clock I was up til 3 o'clock in the morning last night because I've been in this very big organization kick not the things that have been super disorganized but there's just been little pockets of my life that I wanted to be more organized so I was putting laundry away and I was organizing or rearranging how I organize my jewelry and I will be showing you guys that I just haven't decided if I'm gonna show it to you in this vlog or show it to you when I talk about how I organize my closet and I'm holding off on that because I'm trying to have that coincide with this magazine article that should be coming out with CTA magazine that featured Megan from too cool for middle school nice so I was up until 3 o'clock in the morning doing that and going through my teacher back because there was just a lot of random stuff in there so I went to bed at 3 woke up at 10 and then I had to respond to some emails and make a couple will make a phone call regarding my collaboration with storybird I'm to say that we are coming up on the tail end of that and soon enough I'll be able to tell you what exactly I was doing for them and give you some resources that you might find helpful as far as this weekend today I don't know why my lighting is so terrible but it is as far as this weekend today it's because I don't have natural light let me turn myself this way that's a little bit better as far as this weekend today I have today and tomorrow and those are my last days of summer break I have my first contract day back on Wednesday the kids don't come back until next Monday so this week my focus really is on getting myself together getting myself prepped and set up to be back on a schedule and that includes trying some meal prepping you guys should be proud I went to the grocery store yesterday because I really had no choice and I bought food for these breakfasts egg cups that I want to make and for a crock-pot what is it crock-pot fajitas that I'm going to be making so I will show you guys that I think cuz I'm my intention is to do that today and on top of that I have a long list of errands to run that is on my phone somewhere and I'm getting ready to start taking care of those errands it is just the lighting I'm sorry guys I'm getting ready to start taking care of those errands so today let's see I need to update the calendar on my classroom website like the district calendar I have the these watches that I have that I'm not sure if I want to keep them I have to put some shoes and shoe boxes I need some eel prep go to the credit union I was gonna get a car wash today but I'm gonna do that tomorrow I need to drop this stuff off at my classroom I need to do some editing I need to work on chapter 8 of math for intentional math planning and I need to send an email to teachers connect so that's what I have to do I'm getting ready to leave right now and get on that stuff I might send my email first just to get that out of the way but yeah so um that'll be probably the focus of this week is just kind of making sure I get things together make sure I have myself ready so that next weekend or no so this weekend I go to bed on Sunday feeling ready for the start of a new school year so there's that so I'm gonna check in with you guys later and um yeah I'll talk to you later hello everyone let me turn on my kitchen light cuz it's dark I'm home for my errands and from school and from getting my ice coffee my hair is in a ponytail I hope that you guys don't mind but I just wanted it pulled away from my face a little bit better so I'm in the kitchen right now meal prepping that's what I'm gonna try and do with my life today so I'm milk prepping egg bites um way back when when I did South Beach diet years ago probably five six years ago they have a recipe for 8 bites now and make those and I would take a couple every morning and I would eat those and they weren't bad but I wanted something a little bit different because those are just spinach based and I think they were egg beaters that you used so I went on Pinterest to see if there were any recipes and of course there were so I'm making one variation and I will be sure to link this recipe in the description box for the link to my pincher or the link from my Pinterest page in the description box because they give you a lot of different options so last year I ate Jimmy Dean breakfast bowls for breakfast and they were a protein base like they would have 24 grams of protein but at the same time they were processed and we know processed foods aren't really good for us so I'm trying to avoid that this year I feel like I really fell off the wagon with the win that last year and I just want to get back on track with that so here's what they look like I'm just in my kitchen watching a YouTube video that's not teacher related at all just finish cutting up so I am putting in these egg bites arugula goat cheese and tomato and then what you're supposed to do is spray the muffin pan with cooking spray you're only supposed to make 6 but I about doubled the recipe because let's beero let me flip the camera around I'm eating one of those is not going to suffice as breakfast for me so many two of these every morning and probably have some fruit to go with it to get me through to recess so you put these ingredients down at the bottom and they give you different options for rest two or four ingredients sorry I'm choosing these three and then you poured the egg on top of that and then you bake it in the oven for 20 minutes I believe it is at 350 degrees so I'm getting ready to put the egg on top put that in the oven and then I'm going to put this stuff for the fajitas in the crock-pot and I'll show you that as well and hopefully I remember to add the UM recipe link for that as well so that is my goal this school year less processed foods at any I don't want to eat a salad every day I want to have like an actual lunch where I feel like it's warm and failing and not just food I'm eating to survive so that's what I'm gonna do so I will show you the finished product of that when it's done and I'll be sure to show you the beginning stages of the fajitas when I get them in the crock-pot so I'll talk to you in a few minutes [Music] [Music] all right my eggs and cups just finished cooking I'm gonna turn down the TV right now the news and what we see there apparently is a another fire in Santa Clarita I don't live in Santa Clarita I live pretty far away I know a lot of you when you find out something like that's happening in California express concern which I appreciate but I don't live near Santa Clarita but there is another fire in California so the eight cups are done here is what they look like as you can see I got a little overzealous with pouring and these here so they're a lot bigger than the ones in the back which is fine so they look good now I just need to let them cool and then pop them out of those little tins and package them up for the week I will probably put those in sandwich bags but I kind of wish I had like a little container like a reusable container that I can put them in I might put them in something like this now this is ghetto status right here but this was a leftover container that I got from a restaurant called Wood Ranch but I kept it because I'm like this is a perfectly usable piece of plastic and it may be holding my eight cups so those are cooling I prepared everything for the fajitas well that was happening so here's what I have so far the recipe calls for a fajita seasoning mix I didn't find one so I just got the taco one because I figured it can't be that much different to bell peppers one red onion I was supposed to get two pounds of meat but I forgot my list when I went to the grocery store last night and I got only got one and a half pounds so I'm actually getting ready to go back to the grocery store to get another half a pound of this fajita meat that I bought from stater brothers and then 20 ounces of salsa so you're supposed to take all of this put the salsa at the bottom of the crock-pot and then put the other stuff in mix it and cook on low for six to eight hours or high three to four hours so that's what I'm gonna do I'm actually going to go to the grocery store right now get an they're half a pound of that meat I need to return this muffin tin because I thought I needed six holes and I thought they were like bigger muffin sizes than what they were so I already have a muffin pan and that is working just fine so I'm gonna take that back while I'm at it and come back put all of it in the crock pot and then I'm just gonna be it's not I was gonna say to drilling around the house at this point the time for tootling is over like I'm gonna be actually doing some legitimate work I'm not sure when I'll check in or if I'll check in because I kind of need to focus but that is what I'm about to do so I'm male prep you guys should be proud there's food I don't have dinner for tonight I'm gonna probably pick something up my blue apron shipment comes tomorrow so I'll be back on track with that so I'll check in with you guys a little bit later so I'll see you good morning it is about ten minutes to 11 I'm just doing a quick check-in to start the day I last night did not make my goal I ended up going to bed at about 2:30 in the morning so of course I didn't go to Orangetheory at 8:45 I rescheduled fat I will be going this evening at about I think I signed up for 4:15 I think it is which is interesting because I've never gone to Orangetheory and the evening or not in the morning plus I don't like going to workout at that time of day because I do not like exercising with makeup on my face but I will deal with it today so I believe as far as I know I finished everything I needed to finish for storybird I sent everything over and I'm just waiting to get confirmation that there's nothing else that they need from me at this time I had a I mean a good time working with them I was a good working relationship so that went well and I'm very thankful for that opportunity and I got it done just in time because contract days start tomorrow so what I'm getting ready to do right now is I'm getting ready to go to a meeting at a nice restaurant at our local mall and I'm with the parent engagement committee for the african-american parent educator committee or APEC and we're just meeting before the school year starts to kind of get some ideas as to what we would like to do as a committee so that is where I'm headed after that I need to go to my classroom and just put put my desk where they need to be put chairs where they need to be because the one more thing that I do need to do for storyboard is I need to send like a shot of my classroom put together like a pan around shot and right now I have chairs like stacked everywhere and all of that so that's what I'm gonna do after the meeting so I need to go cuz I'll probably be a few minutes late as it is so I will check in with you guys later on all right it's about a quarter to two I am in my classroom right now I actually came here earlier then I had to go home and come back because I forgot this camera that I need to take some shots at the classroom for storybird but my agenda for being in here right now is I need to put all the chairs back where they belong because as you can see the desk are set up but the chairs are stacked there and put some stuff away because I have to take some classroom shots and then I am going to show you the picture books that I have for the month of August so I think that's what I'm gonna do is as each month approaches or even a month in advance if I really have it together I will show you the books that I put out in my classroom for that month I did find this let's hope that I still know where it is I did find this it's not in here but I'm pretty sure it's at home I found yet another flash drive over the summer that might be the flash drive that has the list on it if that is not the flash drive that has the list on it in my list I'm talking about the monthly list that I use to choose what book I'm going to read if that does not have the list on it then I'm just gonna like list these dates in the description box when I share the books with you so I'm gonna put you down I am going to be working on putting the chairs back and then I'll show you those books and then I'm getting out of here so gotta get to work [Music] all right it is now ten minutes to three I have put all the chairs back I have put things away for the most part there's some things that I need to put away more meticulously tomorrow but I don't really have time today my main objective was just to clean the room up put things away so I can take video shots so here's my room now it's starting well it looks like my classroom again things are put back in its place I put the TP back up I don't know if you guys noticed last year but there came a point where I actually took that TP out a because it took up some valuable carpet space because I had a larger class size last year I 29 students this year I'm only supposed to have 22 and you know kids the TP was causing some problems they couldn't quite manage who's turning wants to go in there and couldn't get in it without playing around so I just took it away because as I said to them we were not able to handle that any longer so it's back oh and I don't think I showed this to you because this happened over the weekend I came in on Sunday with my family my dad hung up my picture for me and in the process of hanging this picture up I really realized where I get some of my pickiness from because you'd be surprised what an in-depth conversation me my dad my brother and my mom had about the placement of this picture the things that should be around it whether it was Center off-center was whether it was in the right spot or not but we ended up putting it here right up there so that ended up being the best spot I did want it to be a little bit more lowered down but there really wasn't anywhere to put it that would have been too low so the issue was then there was this odd spot that was empty there so for right now I've put that there that used to be right there so we've moved it so that's hanging and I'm happy about it cuz that was a highlight of my school year last year and my profession all together so now what I'm going to do to close this little segment out and wrap-up my time now is I'm going to get the books out for you guys that I use for the month of August which is our first month of school so I'm gonna go pick those up I'm gonna show you each book that I have in the basket I don't really know how this is gonna work in terms of the book I will try my best to link them in the description box that sounds easy enough but you know you start to get busy and that would take a little bit of time for me to go and Amazon in search and get all those links for you guys so we'll see we'll see what happens at the very least you'll see the book you'll know the title of the book and that is at least someone helpful so let me get the books so I keep all my books in these bins here that I got from Walmart last year this label is from school girls style it's actually a calendar label but I use them for my book baskets and each basket has one of these in it I hang this on the wall this is a job in the morning a student reads the fun fact if there is one if there is not one they will say there is no fun fact for the day so for the month of August there were I think there's only two actual days that I have a particular book that I read because of it so I'll just go down the list of the days in August and then I'll show you the books that I have in total and then I'll show you the books that I use for the two particular days of the month that I have a book so August the 10th is Missouri emissions day so you'll hear a lot of those because this was a list I created in fifth grade and we study states and capitals in fifth grade so I included statehood anniversaries for States on August 17th was the Klondike Gold Rush began August 19th is Benjamin Harrison's birthday that's President obviously in fifth grade I would read a little bit about each of those presidents I didn't do it in 3rd for some reason but I think I'm gonna try and be better about that this year because a lot of kids found that interesting because I have quite a few kids that are just into history they find it fascinating so April the 22nd is national Tooth Fairy day and that's a book that I do have not April sorry August the 22nd August the 27th is lyndon b johnson birthday and August the 28th was the anniversary of the I have a dream speech and it's also the day that Barack Obama became the first african-american presidential nominee so these are the books that I have for August a lot of them are focused on getting kids excited about reading or reading instruction or character development so the first one is called I am the book and this is a book of poems I don't really read this one often so I don't have a whole lot to say library mouse because we take our first trip to the library in the month of August library lion I usually read this book on the first on our first visit to the library as a class and my apologies for the lighting I don't know why it's so dark I don't know I put this one here we are all wonders just because it's a good book to kick off the school year with in terms of conversation I am special because I am me you know what guys I will try to just link these books because that would be the right thing to do March on this is about Martin Luther King you know because of the I have a dream speech anniversary I always also have this one that's informational text it is I have a dream speech in translation what it really means so it's in like kit talk the kids really pick this one up every now and then each year I'll read those snippets from it but it's just there for kids if they'd like to look at it how I spent my summer vacation by Mark Teague missus McBroom clean up your classroom I like to use this one to talk about the fact that I like to keep a nice and tidy classroom first dog this kind of relates to Barack Obama because I believe that this is the dog the type of dog that the Obamas had I think that's why it's in there the energy bus for kids this is the one that I use for the tooth fairy you think it's easy being in the tooth fairy of course everybody has this one first day jitters I think this one is just in here well maybe just for fun but you could also use this to talk about manners our pirates polite this one could also go with the Tooth Fairy mrs. Watson once your teeth this one's just a random one how smudge came home and I actually think that's in the wrong place now that I think about it Beckel this is another random one just for fun the best part of me I do like to try and do this project at the beginning of the school year I didn't do this project last year though snatch a book for the library and getting kids excited about reading and how full is your bucket so those are my office books I display these on the board I will probably put them up now since I have them out and the kids know that you they cannot just take those books and read them they can look at them once I've read them to the class because I'm selfish and I want to be the one to read it to them for the first time but after I've read it they're more than welcome to go look at it read it again those are books that they are not allowed to take home because they are more expensive they are extra books so those are the books that I have I'm going to try really hard to link all those books for you guys and I'm the description box so I'm gonna put these books up there that I'm gonna leave I have to be at Orangetheory in about an hour so I gotta get going so I'll talk to you guys later [Music] all right good morning it is about 7:15 I just finished getting dressed I'm getting ready to head to work woke up at 4:20 this morning went to Orangetheory with lies that came home got dressed and Here I am so here's my first outfit of the day of the school year so I'm going to turn this around I am wearing this shirt from Target if you follow me on instagram you saw it it says wake up hug dog and hustle and as a little touch let me see if I can turn the camera around so you could see better I am wearing this necklace here that was given to me by a student last year it's like a little wiener dog but it's as close as she could get to Genesis and I thought that was cute and it went well with this outfit and then I'm wearing these jeans from Nordstrom Rack they're Hudson brand and then this is how I'm styling my Birkenstocks for the first time again if you follow me on Instagram you know that I was unsure if I could pull off the Birkenstock so I think I like it I think I'm gonna keep them so I'm getting ready to head to Starbucks right now to get an iced coffee I don't have to be at work until with the Lighting's bad I don't have to be there until 8:00 because that's when the meeting technically starts but breakfast is served from 7:30 to 8:00 so I'm gonna get there a little bit earlier but yeah here we go first contract day of the school year so I will check in with you guys as soon as I can all right good evening it's not afternoon I'm home now it is 6 o'clock and this really is the first time that I had to check in I went to school and we had our meeting from about 8:00 to noon so obviously I wasn't gonna vlog during that time then we went to lunch and then after lunch I came back and just had a lot going on and things I needed to do and some of that was meeting with my team and just right now it wasn't the time to be vlogging because it's the beginning of the year we're all kind of like at a point of just being very focused so we plan talked about the first day primarily met with our special ed teacher because we do have a mild to is it mild to moderate it might even be I think it's a moderate to severe as see classes at our school and we do work on inclusion meaning that the kids and the mod severe classes and the kids in the general ed classes we try and create opportunities for them to interact as much as possible so she was a member or a part of our team and we were just kind of talking about ways to create inclusion activities throughout the year so that was that and then I just was twiddling around my room doing random things so I'm home now I'm home a little bit later than what I intended I've probably been home for about twenty to thirty minutes I was just talking to my mom on the phone my intention for this evening is I am first gonna go upstairs and change Oh update on the Birkenstocks there they are I'm keeping them guys they were very comfortable I liked them I'm happy with them there's still White's all was good the only thing is the bottom of my foot is really ashy right now as she means dry I assume that everybody knows what that word means but I learned not too long ago that not everybody uses the word ashy so note to self I need to moisturize my foot more when I'm wearing my Birkenstocks but yeah so I'm going to go upstairs change clothes I'm gonna come back downstairs cook my blue apron meal and work I used my happy planner today there's not much to show you but I did use a little checklist because I need to just get myself in the habit of that there's a few things I want to accomplish tonight while I'm home so I said let me pull out my happy planner with my little checklist that I so diligently bought I bought two sets I think I showed you guys the first set where one side had like a to-do list and then the other side had like times of the day and appointments and then I saw these and I just bought them because it was cute it was purple and it said all the things which I like but the only thing I don't like is it really is just a list there is no site that has time of day or you can put appointments and then the other side having the list that you could use so for tonight I need to adjust plan I don't know if you guys can see that sometimes and schedule changes need to be put in there I need to make sure I know exactly what I'm doing on the first day and then put all the calendar items that I learned about at our staff meeting inside my plan book and inside my phone so that is those are my priorities and then I'm also going to be working on cutting the first round of these math games that I bought because I am gonna try and do more small group stuff so this is one of the activities it would be math games at the students play this is from I think her name is Laura or Lauren Santos and her shop name is Core inspiration it is currently on sale right now and the teachers pay teachers I think it's the back-to-school sale I don't know how long that lasts but it's 20% off if you're interested so this is short and sweet I love you guys but I need to be focused so I'm going to say goodbye for the day here I will be up early tomorrow because we have a dist district breakfast so I will not be going to Orangetheory but yeah busy first day I mean I'm excited to be back just to kind of meet some new kids and work with my team but you know I'm not gonna lie it was rough waking up early this morning and it's rough to tell myself you are now on a schedule and you do not have things that you need to do in a timely fashion so I don't know that's it so I will talk to you guys tomorrow good afternoon it is Thursday at 12:21 I checked in with you guys earlier but I don't know if I'll use that footage because it was kind of a mess and I need to close my door because somebody might walk in hold on a second okay so this morning we have to be here at 7:15 I got here at about 7:00 because we had our district breakfast and we it's just the best this continental breakfast that we have at the beginning of the school year to kind of welcome everybody back all the school sites are there and we take a bus there so that we don't have to deal with parking so I had to be here at 7:15 I got here at around 7:00 and then and then we came back to school and we've been working since then so I had to buckle down and get some things done I needed to readjust plan book calm because our schedule changed a little bit so I did adjust the times and then I absolutely positively had to figure out exactly what I wanted to do on the first day and I just finished doing that so I typically when I'm prepping over the summer those last few days before the school year starts I typically just concern myself with making sure I'm ready for the first day because our very first day of school is a minimum day so they will be dismissed at 1:15 so we have like a chunk of time after school to get like the nitty-gritty of lesson planning for the first week done so that's my strategy so I feel pretty good about the first day so I'm gonna tell you what I'm planning for that very first day so I like to try and mix like procedure teaching with actual stuff but but the first day is pretty light because it is the first day and everybody's anxious so the first thing that they're gonna do is they're gonna walk in I obviously need to take attendance and get acquainted with everybody and while I'm doing that I just have a very fun word search that my teammate Peggy just gave to me I need to find it here it is so just a word search it's there's nothing really epidemic about it it is strictly just for fun strictly something to keep them busy that is not threatening to anyone for the most part and then after that we're going to do a little activity where they're gonna see how well they know me as a teacher so I have a paper with some questions on it you could run this off for everybody but anytime I could find a way to not use a bunch of paper I will and anytime I can convert a worksheet into like a more conversational piece I will do that so this paper has questions about me that they don't know the answer to so they're going to just have to make some guesses and of course I'll give them the right answer along the way so the first question is how many years has your teacher taught the second question is what college did your teacher attend the third question is what is your teacher's favorite color fourth question is what is your teachers favorite subject to teach fifth question is if your teacher was not a teacher what other job would he or she have and the last question is what does your teacher like to do for fun when he or she is not at school so we're going to use a Kagan structure called numbered heads together and anytime I refer to a Kagan structure it is a training that my district had us all go through we went through five days of this and it's just different types of cooperative learning structures that you could use to get kids talking interacting and making all kids accountable for listening participating in learning so in numbered heads together I made a slide for them with the directions that I'll project and the slide I bought on Teachers Pay Teachers and I'm going to show you this about plant Volcom in case some of you don't use it one of the nice things about plan book comm is you can put links directly in there so I've put that on my first stage so I can just click it and here is the slide now these slides I bought from Teachers Pay Teachers from I'm not sure yet but I can link it later and there's just different ones and I feel like I showed this last year but maybe not so let me just make this a little bit bigger so you can see it but there are pre-made and you're just filling in these boxes so I'll project this I got to change the date so it's number heads together from 8:30 to 8:55 is my plan it's there's a section that tells them what materials they'll need so in this case a whiteboard and a marker what the objective is so get to know Miss Robinson a little bit better and then here are the directions for a numbered heads together so first I'm gonna read a question or posed a question to the class and give them some time to think privately about their answer and write it down on their board when they're done they're gonna flip their board over to signal to their group that they've written their answer down when all the groups are ready so everyone in the table group has flipped their board over to signal they're done and all the groups are ready I'm gonna get give each group time to discuss what their answer to that question was then as a team they're going to take some time to come up with the consensus like agree on one answer if they have very are several different answers and then I will choose a number from each group so all my table groups have seat numbers there's always a seat 1 C 2 C 3 C 4 etc and I will call them one of those seats to share the answer of that table group and then if they get it right I'll give them a point and the team with the most points wins I'm not sure what they're gonna win yet it might be a table point it might be a dojo point I haven't figured that out yet so we're gonna do that then after that we have a welcome back assembly where where they will be spoken to by the principal and all of that and when we get back from that I'm gonna play a video that I made with my class last year called a day in the life video that a couple of you may have seen and that was on accident that's a private video and then it should be recess and then after recess the read aloud that I'm going to use for the day is this book I bought off just over the summer call it schools first day and I'm going to try and be better this year about pulling like more concrete lessons out of the read aloud so this one I could use to just talk about what personification is personification is not a skill that we're specifically studying right now but it doesn't hurt to introduce the idea of personification to them because this book is told from the perspective of the school so that will be the read aloud and after that we are going to are they are going to take part one of a math prerequisites skills test so that I think got it kind of get a sense of where they're at and if kids finish that early they will be starting this all about myself II project I got this from my teammate it's from Teachers Pay Teachers I'm sure and I think it was free and then after the prerequisite test they will go to lunch and when we get back from lunch we have just a short period of time about 30 minutes or so and they'll continue to work on that in that day as things arise I will intersperse teaching procedures so when recess comes I will talk about how do we get ready for recess when lunch comes I'll talk about my expectations for going to and from lunch at the beginning of the day we'll talk about procedures and at the end of the day we'll talk about procedures and we'll just talk about that continuously over the next couple of weeks until it all becomes habit so that is what I have accomplished in the last I don't know hour or so well it's probably been more than an hour I'm getting ready to take a break for lunch and before I do that I'm going to show you this lunch bag because I put it on my interest Orie last night and I've gotten so many questions as to where this bag is from so it looks like this disclaimer and this little pin doesn't come with it I put that on there but it looks like this and I got this from Amazon I saw another teacher here on campus with it just like a lot of you thought oh that's a cute lunch bag I asked her where she got it she said she got it from Amazon I'm pretty sure it cost about $12 so I will be sure to link that into the description box because so many of you have asked about that so that's where I'm at I got my class list right now I have about 20 24 students and I feel ok I still feel like I have a lot to do but I think that's just the nature of the game at this point of the year and in teaching in general but at least I have my first day plans mapped out I know what I'm doing so after lunch I'm probably gonna start doing things like fine-tuning my back to school next presentation because that is tomorrow so that's real autonomy is that as far as my happy planner there's not a whole lot going on just yet because we just started but I am able to check off my list first a plan cuz I added this in their little checklist so I had three things on it and I have checked all three things off and I will be putting more things on it right now so I will talk to you guys a little bit later all right good evening you guys it is in fact Friday and about 9:20 and this is the first time I'm checking in and it's unfortunate because my intention was to wake up this morning go to school and vlog more in my classroom today because it's back-to-school night and that's kind of information that if you're a newer teacher many of you would like to see but at the same time I saw myself I had to prioritize and there were things that I needed to do and obviously vlogging does take you off that productivity kick because you have to stop pick up the camera and start talking so I kept saying okay eventually there will be a point where I feel comfortable enough or prepared enough and ready enough to put down the camera to talk and that just never happened I had things that I really needed to get done to make sure I was prepared for tonight then I have to come home change to get ready and then by the time that happened I didn't have a whole lot of time so I didn't even get to show you how I set up my room for back-to-school night or what I was choosing to give to the parents or like my finalized presentation and I feel really bad about that but at the same time I don't feel that bad because I you know I have to prioritize and the priority is making sure I'm ready and not necessarily being able to capture every single thing that I do on video and I'm sure there are other teachers out there and YouTube that have shared that and all of that but just to be very brief about back-to-school night my big goal this time around was to send home minimal amounts of paper that was one of the things I wanted to share with you last year spend a lot of time making this flips book with all this very valuable information in it like as far as supplies and procedures and things like that thinking they'll take this cute little flip book clip it on their refrigerator as a reference and all our questions will just be at their fingertips only to find that I quite often got asked questions that were directly answered in that flip book which told me they weren't using that flipbook they were not putting that on their refrigerator they probably threw it away when they got home or I was even told they lost it so this year I said I'm not gonna waste my time prepping something like that if it's not gonna be used the way that my mind is thinking then we're gonna use it so I wanted to go as paperless as possible I do make my back-to-school night presentation which is pretty meaty with information I do put that on my website and leave it there all year so it's not as though I'm not providing them any resource that they can go back to it's just I'm not gonna waste paper I'm not gonna waste time copying I'm not gonna waste time folding if it's really not a tool that parents find like useful or significant enough to save so the only thing I gave to them to take home if you're interested is a flyer that explains about all the books was which is a district competition that kids can start participating in in third grade the current book order forms from Scholastic because I mentioned you know book orders do in fact help the class and the personalized paper they need to sign up for class dojo that is it no flip books no long letters no love notes no lists no nothing but in my presentation on at least two occasions I did show them my website and just really drove home how important it is for them to get acclimated with that and to use it and show them the resources instead of just saying I have all these resources on my website I went and physically showed them all the links the resources and let them know some of the things that I may have included in my flip book like you know supplies and donations and things like that is on the website so that is stuff I wanted to show you in the process of me vlogging but I just didn't have time but I just finished writing my post for teachers connect and it's just a really honest post and if I have to tell you right now I am so overwhelmed at the moment like I left back-to-school night glad that it's over with the same feeling that I always have every year that I was probably standing up there speaking gibberish because I always feel like I'm just talking and talking and nothing that I'm saying makes sense because the face is looking back at me are just very deadpan you know when I cracked what I believe to be a joke no one chuckles so that I'm like you must not be saying anything coherent so I left with that feeling and I think I'll have that feeling all the time because that's just who I am but I just left there and the best way I can describe it is right now I just feel mentally exhausted that's number one and just like frazzled brained and I'm not even sure what I'm frazzled about I'm planned for Monday which is the first day of school what I need copied is copied so I'm prepared but at the same time I feel like I'm prepared and I think it's only I don't even know what that's about and that in and of itself is making me mad like everything that I need is prepared Rand copied it's in my plan book it's planned out I know what I'm doing but I just feel like uneasy and I think what it's really about is that I currently have that all going on getting ready for back to school but I do have these other projects that I'm working on that I you know really need to will not need to get done but want to get done want to do a good job with and those are I mean they're kind of heavy responsibilities for me so I think the fact that I'm getting ready for back to school as well as making sure I meet the deadlines that I have for these projects is a lot plus dealing with Genesis she's fine but today she has just been sneezing a lot so just the reminder that my dog has allergies in some days she just is really going through it and just everything that entails getting ready for the school year so I am still in what I wore for back-to-school night I have not taken a shower yet I have not eaten dinner yet and I need to work tonight because I need to work on something from one of the projects that I'm working on for a story Berg and I gotta get up early tomorrow cause the cleaning lady's coming and I got a hair appointment tomorrow which is not stressful but that's time I got to go back to my classroom to refill something tomorrow and so I'm just telling myself if I just oh and I'm gonna eventually have to edit the vlog to be uploaded on time which I mean I love you guys I definitely want to get it uploaded but that's just a responsibility that I need to make sure I get taken care of so I just am telling myself right now if I just work tonight and get my stuff done tomorrow on Sunday I will be able to rest and relax so on teachers connect I wrote a post about my feelings right now but just it's almost like diary format so you should check it out and speaking of teachers connect now that I'm gonna get off my little woe is me soapbox I'm going to put you guys down so that I can share with you a couple of questions that I answered and a couple of interesting posts that I find so I'm gonna put the camera down so I can find it and I'll be right back okay I'm gonna share one question that I answered and then one question that was posed that I can't answer them sending out to you guys in the hopes that if you can you can go on and answer this for this person because it's a good question and it revolves around something that I've seen starting to pop up quite a bit so this is a question that was asked that I actually responded to it's from I believe you pronounce her name - Stassi ax and she wants to know what would you say are the three critical components of guided reading got some really good question because when my previous school took on guided reading for the first time it just felt like this super overwhelming thing to take on because there's so much to it so there was a lot of consistency in the responses I responded girona responded and Bridget from the letter classroom respondent and we are all pretty much kind of in the same mindset as to what it is so I said number one a clear objective for what you're looking for so that you aren't trying to solve all the world's problems in one lesson in other words like one of the overwhelming things about guided reading is there's so many things you can be addressing with the student as you hear them read as you pick a book that you really want to just tell yourself okay in this particular session I'm only going to be focusing on this so that you don't feel just shoveled and all over the place with responding to the student when they're reading number two building a strong background and introduction this is one of the big things I learned when we first started getting trained you don't want to skip the introduction to a book and the introduction is it just looking through the pictures and making a prediction and not just letting them make a prediction without telling you why they're predicting that but also looking at the book to make sure there isn't making sure that there isn't some information that you have to thoroughly give to them for them to access the story better so if it's historical fiction is there some historical information that you want to very briefly tell them so they understand like the circumstances of the story or understand the setting of the story so that they understand how the characters are behaving and reacting and then number three definitely you want to have some opportunity for discussion for the kids to be able to share what they thought share their reflections share any connections they may have and then I gave her a bonus and I said you definitely want a book that you know that your students will be engaged by so just making sure you know what kinds of topics and texts your kids enjoy and trying to pick books accordingly so that was one that I answered one that I think is really interesting if you can answer it is from where did you go yes Mary her question says does anyone have any suggestions or resources on developing effective routines and procedures and departmentalized classrooms I am switching from all subjects to departmental eyes this year would love some tips so if you are someone that teaches in a departmental eyes and my understanding is like okay I'm the language arts and social studies teacher and someone so is the math and science make sure you respond to Mary's post it looks like she has one response from Denis and she's departmental eyes and she's just telling her how much she loves it and gives her a couple of tips so if you are a departmental eyes teacher and you're looking for some information check out Denise's response to Mary so honestly those are the two that caught my attention and I wanted to share those with you as always if you're not on teachers connected is totally free for so sign up if you are an international teacher all you have to do my understanding is to email them and let them know you really want to join and they can kind of work around the issue of your school not being present because the schools listed are just American schools because we definitely would benefit from an international perspective for sure so with that being said and the fact that I'm starving and I'm overwhelmed I'm gonna go ahead and close out this blog this is the last summer vlog the next one you see I will be in full swing of the school year so I hope that you guys enjoyed it if you did definitely give it a thumbs up if you have not subscribed please do so once I hit 10,000 subscribers I will do my very first giveaway and I will make it a good one if you have not I've never said this one before I don't think make sure you do hit the notification bell so that when I upload you are notified but for the most part you guys know that I upload on Sundays at 8 a.m. West Coast time or Los Angeles time or Pacific time I think it's called but thank you guys so much for watching thank you for all the positive responses that I got to last week's vlog where I kind of touched on my experience as a vlogger or as a teacher vlogger that is also a teacher of color and what that means for me and what challenges that comes with I was very apprehensive to talk about that because I did not want it to come across the wrong way but I just wanted to be honest about my experience in case you are a teacher of color or a male teacher or a teacher that is not the norm and you're thinking about starting a YouTube channel I just wanted you to be aware of those those things so you don't get discouraged if you feel like your channel is kind of just inching along so thank you for that thank you so much as always for all the kind comments that you leave in general thank you for being so motivating give the video a thumbs up if you liked it subscribe if the notification bell pray for me then I calm myself down and then I have a good first day and I will see you guys in the next vlog thank you so much it's been great spending my summer with you let's start the next school year bye guys

Channel: SmartieStyle

Views: 7,843

Rating: 4.9546742 out of 5

Keywords: vlog, blog, teacher vlog, teacher blog, back to school, daily vlog, a day in the life, third grade

Id: vbNRLR7FgDI

Length: 51min 52sec (3112 seconds)

Published: Sun Aug 05 2018