Hanging Out With Mrs. Strout: May 2015

Monday, May 25, 2015

Splish-Splash It's a Summer Time Blog Bash!

Join me and 40+ other bloggers in a Splish Splash Summer Time Blog Bash! These bloggers have generously agreed to blog hop and offer up a freebie, and a giveaway as well!!!

The way this works is you will hop from blog to blog to get each freebie! Then you can click the rafflecopter on ANY blog. Feel free to leave us a comment, share and leave us feedback! We would love for you to get to know us a little better!

I don't know about you but I have started the countdown to summer vacation. I have 24 days left and I can't wait!!! Normally in the summer I direct and teach at a summer camp. This camp was my baby. I started the program over 11 years ago with about 5-10 kids. I had the pleasure of teaching with one of my best friends and we loved it! Together we expanded our program into something much bigger. Some were students we had taught at our school and many others were children from surrounding communities.

As much as I loved summer camp and doing all of the fun projects that there never seemed to be enough time for during the school year, I have decided not to do summer camp this year. Even though I will miss all my campers I am so excited to have this summer OFF!!!! I am looking forward to sooo many things! I love to read! I read a book by Lisa Harris over April vacation and I can't wait to read the next one in the series. I love reading Christian suspense.

I'm looking forward to spending time with great friends!

You can't beat hanging out on the rocky coast of Maine and eating seafood!

I'm so excited to share my freebie for this blog hop! This is something I made for my kiddos in my classroom.

We will be planting seeds and watching them grow.

I made this cute journal for my kiddos to write their observations.

This cute Plant Journal will ONLY be free during the Blog Hop so make sure you grab it for free while you can. Once the hop is over, you can still purchase it at my TPT Store.

My kiddos have also started working on their Plant Lapbooks. They love working on these and showing what they have learned. I love them because they are hands on and even my reluctant learners love to do them.

This lapbook is filled with vocabulary cards, a living and nonliving sort, parts of a plant, life cycle of a plant, and a graphing activity of favorite plant parts. It's a great activity to do throughout your plant unit or as an end of a unit project.

You could win a copy of this Plant Lapbook!

Want to win?? Enter below

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Saturday, May 23, 2015

2 More Days!!!!

Hi All! I'm excited to announce a huge event that is happening in 2 days! I'm joining up with over 40 bloggers to kick off the summer with a HUGE blog hop. We will be sharing lots of freebies and hosting some fantastic give-aways. Starting on Monday, May 25th you can start here and download my new freebie at my TPT Store. It will only be free while the blog is going on so make sure you grab it while it's free. Then while you are here enter my giveaway to win an exciting new product from my store. Then hop on over to the next blog to get some more freebies.

It's going to be a week long freebie and giveaway event! We are excited to get this Splish Splash Summer Time Blog Bash started!!!!!!

TeachersPayTeachers flock Together

It's hard to believe it has been almost a month since 60+ teacher pay teachers got together in Binghamton, NY!

Our theme for the day was

I was so excited about this get together and I was not disappointed. It went beyond anything I could have imagined. I am still amazed at how much work these ladies put into this day!

Susan Kalkman of The Math Spot, Selma Dawani, Sherri Tyler of Literary Sherri, Ellen Weber of Brain Based Tasks for Upper Grades, Front Row: Mary Beth Brain Waves Instruction, Donna Tyler of Worth A Thousand Words, and Robyn McMaster of Brain Based Tasks for Upper Grades.

The day started with a yummy breakfast donated by TPT's. We also got these cute bags filled with lots of goodies.

Jen Jones from Hello Literacy was gracious enough to come to our meet up and share some great tips.

We did several roundtables sharing ideas and tips to improve our stores. My favorite one was when we shared our best seller. As we passed them around the table of 5-6 sellers, we talked about what made a great product. I loved hearing everyone's ideas.

Names were drawn throughout the day for giveaway prizes. There were enough prizes so that everyone got one. These were not just your ordinary prizes either. The table was filled.

I won the cutest tote bag and t-shirt donated by Lauri Wolfe at The Class Clown! I started using the bag as soon as I got back home. I love it!

I also participated in the Teacher Tool Exchange. To be a part of it, all you needed to do was purchase one of your favorite teacher tools. Then put it in a gift bag and tell what you love about it.

Out of all of these gift bags I chose the one from Michele at Triple the Love in Grade 1. The tag on my bag said the gift "will make you smile" Michele, you were so right!

My kiddos love SCENTED MARKERS!!!! Thank you Michele!!!

Overall, it was a fabulous day with fabulous people! I met 60+ new friends that have already shared so much with me!

Thank You!!!!! Thank You!!!!! Thank You!!!!

Tuesday, May 5, 2015

Teacher Appreciation Dollar Deal!!!!!

Welcome to Day 2 of Teacher Appreciation Week! If you missed out yesterday, you can check out some great teaching secrets for your classroom HERE. Also, you don't want to miss out on the two giveaways we are hosting this week. If you didn't enter yesterday, you can do so now. Make sure you enter for both prize bundles so you have double the change to win!

Enter to Win Prize Bundle #2 Here

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Enter to Win Prize Bundle #1 Here

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Today, we are offering a collection of high quality classroom resources at a huge discount. Below is a list of Best Selling Resources that have been discounted by 20%. You can receive an additional 10% off at checkout by using the code THANKYOU.

An InLinkz Link-up

We have also put together a collection of $1.00 Deals to help stock up your classroom for the rest of the year and next year. I know I have added several of these deals to my cart. Don't forget to use the code THANKYOU at checkout for maximum savings!

An InLinkz Link-up

Monday, May 4, 2015

What Works! Teacher Appreciation Linky and Huge Giveaway

I'm so excited to join up with a group of fabulous teachers to bring you a HUGE giveaway with lots of teacher tips!

My first teacher tip is all about words. Whenever I am teaching a new sound I use word cards with that particular sound. I put the words all over the place. I put them in the hallways, in the classroom, anywhere my kiddos will see them.

I put up the words in the morning so they can see them. It really builds excitement for reading. As soon as they see the words they start asking if we are going on a word hunt. When it's time, my kiddos take turns to go find a word. They bring it back to the classroom and read it to the class.

Everyone gets a chance to find a word. We can then use the words over the next few days for various activities like word sorts and games.

My 2nd teacher secret is a highlighter. We love highlighters in first grade!!! I like to photocopy the stories that we are reading in class so they can take a copy home and practice reading. Before the story goes home we use a highlighter to highlight the sounds that we are working on. For example, if we are learning the long a sound spelled a-e then they would go through the story and highlight all of the words spelled with a-e.

My 3rd tip is a tech tip. We use the Smartboard throughout the day and sometimes it's hard for some kids to move things on the board using their finger. Another teacher had shared the idea of using a pompom to move things. It works great! The other thing that is difficult for my kiddos is writing on the smartboard. They use the markers that come with the board but their letters often are very large and/or don't come out neatly. Then it's hard for the others to read it. That's when the lightbulb went off! They could try using the pompom for writing too. It worked!!! They write the same as when they write on paper.

Now it's time for a giveaway! Enter the rafflecopter below for a chance to win some fabulous prizes. Remember, the more entries you have the more chances you have to win!