Hello everyone!!!
Today we are throwing a big, humongous bash to celebrate YOU!
Last year we blogged about our favorite non-school related things, this year we have decided that we will share with you our favorite school things! So here we go:
My first favorite things I'd like to share are my favorite educational subscriptions. At our school, we have subscriptions to both Tumblebooks and BrainPOP, Jr., which are sites I use all the time.
Tumblebooks offers an online collection of books for you to use in the classroom- whole group on the Smartboard, or individually on iPads or computers.
Here is a list of the different types of animated picture books they offer, right from their site:
Story Books are our animated, talking picture books. Users have the option to automatically or manually turn the pages. iPad users please note that the iPad-compatible Story Books on the Mobile site have been converted to an mp4 video format and thus the auto/manual feature is not available.
Chapter Books/Read-Alongs are our early chapter books for older elementary readers. While there are no animations, the ebooks are narrated. They also include Chapter menus so that you can jump chapters, and a bookmarks and notes feature which are cookied onto your computer. Our Chapter Books also allow readers to change the colors of the background and text, as well as the font style, size, and line spacing. This helps our ebooks to be even more accessible to a wider range of readers.
Videos are from the world renowned National Geographic! Simply click on "Watch Online" to watch the 2-5 minute clips on various topics. Most of our videos have been paired with ebooks as a way to introduce a topic!
Featured is where teachers, librarians, parents, students, and TumbleBooks staff can recommended a book! It's a quick and easy way to find books on those rainy days!
Puzzles & Games accompany each book and reinforce concepts from the books, allowing for a fun and educational learning experience.
Language Learning is an easy way to access our French and Spanish titles!
Non-Fiction contains our growing collection of non-fiction titles in subjects like health, science, astronomy, biology, and nature!
Playlist allows you to access our pre-loaded playlist. The eBooks play back to back just like a music playlist! In addition, you can create your own playlist! Simply click on the "Add to Playlist" button below a TumbleBook to create your own! To access your customized playlist, click on the "Playlist" button in the silver nav bar! Please note that this feature is cookied onto your computer. To access your customized playlist from any computer, create a MyCloud account and save your playlist there.
Here is an example of one of the books I found on Youtube- just to show you what they're like.
BrainPOP, Jr. is another one of my favorites for the classroom. It has wonderful, kid-friendly videos and games for any and every subject area you want to explain. It's perfect for science and social
studies.
Next, here are some of my favorite organizational tips! We have five iPads in the classroom. Since some games require students to sign in and continue where they left off, I have certain iPads assigned to certain students, one from each group as we switch. I take a picture of the students who will always use a certain iPad and use that for the screen saver. Ta da! They always know which one to use.
I know this picture doesn't look anything like organized- but actually it is one of my favorite tips.
I keep a copy of ideas and worksheets that go with books right inside of the book. That way, if I need a quick activity, sub plan, or even if a friend needs a quick activity for something unexpected, I can just pull a book that I love out and know that it will have a great activity right there with it. Sometimes I keep a class set of copies in or beside the book, so it's ready to go if I need an activity.
Below are the papers that I use with Rainbow Fish and Pattern Fish. Just click HERE if you would like them.
I have the children color rainbow fish as pretty as they can, then I put on a special shiny fin when they are finished. This is my sample fish. I usually only put one or two sparkly fins on the kids' fish.
I used left over shiny silver border for my fins. I keep these inside the book, too.
I also copy the cover of books that I use for certain lessons and keep them in my folders so I don't forget the books I want to use. I know I could just write the titles, but I like the photocopied pictures.
It's always nice to be able to pull a book with an activity to go along with it, and know you've got at least a 45 minute activity to do.
Finally, I love this idea from Bethany at Ship Shape First Grade for organizing extra crayon!
Here is what my extra crayons look like now. I can't wait to change them into the colored containers!
Finally, here are some of my favorite fonts. Just click on the picture to get a PDF with the links to all of them. I tried to show some of them to you in this picture. (Not sure if that worked out so well!)
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Come and visit my other teacher friends' blogs for their favorite websites, organization tips and much more!
Link to link up http://www.inlinkz.com/new/view.php?id=585883
What a great giveaway! Thanks for introducing me to all these fantastic bloggers.
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