Math and literacy centers used to give me a headache. I’d be trying to run a small group while the rest of the class looked like the local zoo! I realized very quickly that centers would be a huge waste of instructional time if centers weren’t explicitly taught, and clear, easy to understand expectations were given. With some trial and error, I finally came up with the BEST possible way to run my centers and I’ve been running them this way for YEARS! Read my 5 tips for center success!

Need help picking out classroom jobs that will ACTUALLY make life easier? Let me help you!

It's SUPER important to build students' reading stamina during independent reading time.

Wanting to create a writing center station for your students to visit during ELA centers, but not sure how to make it functional and low-prep?! I’ve got you covered! There are 3 print and go resources that I use to create my writing center, and my students love coming back to this station each day because of these resources. Read here to find out more about our classroom writing center!

Organizing and managing a classroom library is actually a piece of cake! Let me show you!

At one point, I worked for a school district that told us “calendar time wasn’t really appropriate for First Graders anymore,” so they were removing it from our master schedule. My response to that was “on what planet?!”

Want to jump on the Sound Wall train but not sure where to start? Let me help you!

Celebrate the solar eclipse with these fun math activities, literacy activities, writing crafts and more! Plan your solar-bration!

Looking for low-prep, chaos-controlled, and standards-based Leap Activities to celebrate the Leap Year in first grade? Read about them all here!

Looking for a fun way to incorporate a daily graphing station into your math center block? Read here to find out how this can be done with hardly any prep!

Tracking student data would be a very daunting task if I didn’t have students help me do it! Of course I save their assessment and behavior data for my own records, but I also like having students track their data so that they can see their growth, and so I have visuals to show families during conference time. Read more about how I do this in my classroom!

Looking for easy ways to keep your class running smoothly?! Let me help you!

Build a sweet classroom community by featuring each student as the Star of the Week!

There is so much research that tells us that children learn so much more when they learn through hands-on learning, or play. That’s why I LOVE incorporating as many hands-on crafts as I can into our day to day learning. I’ve found ways to integrate crafts into phonics, writing, grammar, math, and science/social studies! Read here to find out more about my favorite “craftivities'“ for young learners.

Want students to practice fact fluency daily in math centers but not sure how to do it in a low-prep way?! I’ve got you covered!

love paper centers just as much as the next person because I love the hands-on approach to learning. What I don’t love is spending hours of my personal time cutting and laminating hundreds of math centers, just to have to redo them all in a few years because of wear and tear.

My first blog post ever! Find out what I’ll be sharing in my blog here!