The Evolution of Homework Collection - A New Routine To Keep It Simple

Teaching is a wonderful world of constant change. Although some of the changes we make in our classrooms are mandated, many are based on our own professional judgement. We are given the creative power to tweak our classroom environment and routines in ways that make each school day meaningful and exciting for students. One of the best things about being a teacher is making small tweaks within a year or throughout several years to maximize efficiency in the classroom. 

Tweaking Your Homework Collection Routine

One of the classroom routines I have been tweaking every year for seven years is my routine for collecting homework. Those first few minutes when students walk into the classroom are filled with a lot of hustle and bustle...and an occasional unexpected surprise. Homework collection should be quick and seamless. A few routines I have tried with short-term success are:

TURN IN BIN

Students place their homework in a turn in bin. The pros? Homework submission was quick for students. The cons? I often found nameless papers and it took too much time to sort through the pile to figure out who had & hadn’t turned in homework.

CORNER OF THE DESK

Students place their homework on the corner of their desk before starting their morning work. Teacher walks around and collects homework from each student. The pros? I was able to greet each student at their seat first thing in the morning. It was easy to see who had & hadn’t turned in homework. The cons? The collection process was time consuming and homework crowded students’ work space.

STACK ON THE STATION 

Students place their homework in a pile at a central location on or near their table group. Teacher walks to each group’s “turn in spot”, thumbs through papers and collects. The pros? I was able to collect homework fairly quickly. The cons? My less organized students who benefit from visual cues (they didn’t take note of the flat stack of papers piled near their seat) consistently needed reminders to turn in homework.

My Favorite Homework Collection Routine

The routine that has been most efficient for my students is very similar to the group station routine with an added layer of organization. The Homework Drop Box makes turning in assignments quick and easy for students and teachers. 

HOW IT WORKS

At the end of each day during Tidy Up Time, our Teacher’s Assistant places a drop box at each table group. 

When students arrive the following morning, they walk to their group drop box, find the file folder with their name on it, and drop their homework inside the folder. Students place their assignments in their folder standing tall in portrait-style rather than laying down in landscape-style. This allows the teacher to quickly walk to each station, thumb through each folder and instantly see who has and hasn’t turned in homework. 

The teacher can then grab the top of all the papers at once and pull the assignments out into a neatly organized pile. 

In my classroom, the Teacher’s Assistant then moves our drop boxes out of the way until we need them later in the day, or until the next school day. 

Having a smaller file box at each group, rather than a larger one for the entire class eliminates the problem of a long line to turn in homework. This means students settle into their seats and start their morning work without wasted time.

Although some of the changes we face as teachers tend to throw off our equilibrium for a moment, focusing on smaller changes that benefit our students helps bring us back to a more balanced and efficient groove in the classroom. 

BRING THIS ROUTINE TO YOUR CLASSROOM

If you are interested in trying the Homework Drop Box routine in your own classroom, grab my free Homework Drop Box Labels here and my favorite study, slim file bins here.

Organizing Assessments and Evidence of Student Growth With Portfolios

Creating a strong student portfolio is an essential component of showing student growth and evidence of learning progress. The following is a collection of tips for creating a student portfolio that can be used first as a tool for parent teacher conferences, and then as a learning memory book at the end of the school year.

Setting Up Your Portfolios

Using legal-sized hanging file folders is the first step to creating an organized portfolio system. These slightly-larger file folders are perfect for filing special “Wall Worthy” projects that are often larger than 8.5”x11”. After you add name tabs to each hanging folder, organize them in alphabetical order by first or last name. 

Next, add two legal-sized manila file folders to each student’s hanging file. One folder will be designated for portfolio items such as projects, writing pieces, reflections, and important assessments. 

The second folder will be designated for forms such as confidential assessment data, parent surveys, student goal sheets, copies of IEP, SST, or 504 forms, and other student information sheets for teacher use. 

Preparing Portfolios for Parent Teacher Conferences

In the months leading up to parent teacher conferences, begin to take notes on student goals, strengths, and areas of need. You can type these notes into a form divided into two sections: Way To Go and Ways To Grow. Organizing information in this way quickly shows parents a few things going well for their young learner (in the Way To Go category) and areas that need development (in the Ways To Grow category). 

Next, collect evidence that can be woven into your conversations with parents at conferences. Providing them with visual evidence to support your commentary about their child’s progress makes these conversations more meaningful and easy to digest. 

Transforming Portfolios Into Learning Memory Books

Before your parent-teacher conference ends, decide which portfolio items you will send home with parents and which items you will keep until the end of year. 

Keeping all writing final drafts and art projects on hand and in chronological order is highly recommended. This allows you to easily host a learning celebration during which students can read through their best writing pieces, look back on all their artistic creations, reflect on their growth, and make plans for future learning. You are sure to feel a tingle in your teacher heart when the classroom fills with the sounds of flipping pages and tiny giggles as students look back on how far they’ve come since the first day of school. 

Everything Is Ready For You

This easy-to-implement portfolio system will keep you organized for conference season and provide you with a physical culmination of student learning at the end of the school year. If you are ready to bring these ideas to life in your own classroom, visit my Teachers Pay Teachers store to grab your own Editable Student Portfolio Toolkit.

What I Wish I Knew My First Year of Teaching {with Core Inspiration}

My first year of teaching is what I like to refer to as my golden year. I had an amazing group of students, supportive and flexible parents, and a team that made me feel like I was way more proficient in my new profession than I really was. The school year was filled with fun and excitement and by the last day of school, I was completely in love with my new career. I was a rock star. I was unstoppable. I was on top of the world.

In reality, I was blinded by excitement and didn’t know what I didn’t know… soooo many things I didn’t know.

One of those many things was the world of of Google +. Also known as the best and easiest way to keep classroom parents in the loop. Here’s the scoop.

At the beginning of the year, create a private Google+ community.

Double check the community settings to ensure the privacy settings are secure so you can post class photos.

Brainstorm what you want to post in the community. Pictures with descriptions of what students did in class each day/week, classroom newsletters, parent polls, updates about upcoming classroom events, questions to spark dinner time discussion, parent volunteer reminders and needs, etc.

Invite every parent in your class to join your community.

At back to school night, show parents how to turn on alerts for your community posts. This ensures they will receive a notification each time you post an update.   

Set parameters for community postings. Decide if you want to be the sole poster or if you want to give parents permission to create posts as well.

Create a schedule for when you will post to hold yourself accountable. I don’t recommend sharing this schedule with parents because life happens and you don’t want them emailing you when they don’t see your post published at 3:00 on Thursday.

At the end of the year, don’t delete the community. This serves as an awesome memory book for the families in your class.

Although Google+ wasn't thought of as a classroom tool when I first started teaching, it has certainly become one of my favorite parent communication tools. Do you have any recommendations or favorite ways to use Google+ in your classroom? I'd love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.

Tips For Packing Up Your Classroom {with Core Inspiration}

Packing up an elementary school classroom for the summer brings a variety of emotions. While it’s exciting to gift, recycle, purge, and tidy the contents of your classroom with thoughts of a fresh new year on the horizon, its also quite a bit of work.

Rather than inefficiently working through the process before and after school, get your packin’ up done during school hours with the assistance of the most eager helpers in the world….your students. With a solid packin’ up strategy and a few helpful tools, you can make the most all those extra helping hands and be ready for summer when the last school bell rings (or pretty close to it).  

Student Portfolios

During the last days of the school year, every teacher has a moment when they think, “Maybe I should just take all this work I’ve been filing for student portfolios and send it home in the weekly folder.” Yes…so tempting. Then you realize you kept those unique art projects and written works for a reason…so your students can reflect on and celebrate the growth they’ve made this year.

Schedule a time when every student in class sorts through their personal portfolio. Make sure they have room to spread out. Give them the challenge of putting their work in chronological order and have them answer a few reflection questions along the way.

Projects and Art Work

Which of these projects are you most proud of?

What makes you proud of this project?

Which project would you like to improve?

What would you do to improve this project?

What can you do next year to make your “wall worthy” projects even more impressive than this year’s projects.

Writing Portfolio

Explain three or more skills you learned this year as a writer.

What part of writing is most challenging for you?

What part of writing comes most naturally to you?

Which writing piece are you most proud of?

Why are you proud of this piece?

Which writing piece would you like to improve?

What would you do to improve this piece?

What can you do this summer and next school year to grow as a writer?

What do you hope to learn as a writer next year?

Then, have them tuck their work inside an oversized envelope, a binder, a folder, or a box to take home and share with their family. Now your student files are empty and you can check something off your packin’ up list. Interested in prepping this quickly? Download my Editable Student Portfolio Toolkit. 

Tidy Up Team

Make a list of all the tidy up jobs in the classroom your students can do without teacher assistance. Take the tasks on that list and type up direct instructions for exactly how you want the job completed so you don’t have to go back and redo it. Print your instructions on cards or as a list that students can refer to any time they have a spare moment during the last two weeks of school. Watch your long list of tidy up to dos downsize dramatically.

I prefer the card approach in my second grade classroom because I always seem to have an eager helper that isn’t so detail oriented. Any jobs that aren’t completed to packin’ up standards can be placed back in the to do pocket for another helper to pick up. If you are interested in using the same approach, swing by my Teachers Pay Teachers Store for your set of Editable Tidy Up Team Cards.

Class Auction

During the process of tidying up each year, you will come across classroom resources that are outdated or not as precious as they once were. Gather those goodies up and host your very own class auction. Your students will happily take them off your hands and their parents will be thrilled with the new collection of treasures their child brings home (okay that second part probably isn’t true).

May your end of year packin’ run smoothly so you can spend a few extra moments of your afternoon enjoying the summer sun. You’re almost there! If you’ve tried any of the tips above, I’d love to hear from you in the comments below.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Classroom Tips For Going Green {with Core Inspiration}

Going green tips…yes please! I live and teach in the San Francisco Bay Area, and we are total fanatics for clean, green living. If you don’t abide by the high standards for saving mother earth, you will get some…looks. If you have more material in your garbage bin than in your compost and recycling bins around here…that’s a fail. We definitely take pride in being one of the greenest areas to live in the world. Most of my second graders have lived and breathed sustainability since birth, making our classrooms a place where waste is not tolerated.   

Here’s a peek at a few ways my class gets educated with sustainability in mind.

STEM Materials (S.T.U.F.F.)

We have an entire corner of our STEM lab dedicated to clean recyclables, called S.T.U.F.F. (Scraps That Are Used For Fun). Students and families deliver clean recyclables to our STEM lab frequently to keep this area generously stocked with materials that are prefect for building.

Living Classroom

Each month, my class participates in a Living Classroom lesson. This district wide program focuses on helping young learners make a strong connection with the natural environment. This leads to an appreciation for life cycles, an understanding for how to grow healthy food, and the birth of environmental stewardship. Here’s a peek at our garden where these lessons take place.

Online News

Rather than sending paper communication to and from home, our school sends communication digitally. In my classroom specifically, all newsletters are uploaded to Google Drive and shared with parents using Google Sites. More frequent photo updates are shared with parents via Google+ so they can get an actual peek at our learning activities throughout the year. You can grab my Tweets From the Classroom and other editable newsletter templates here. 

Number of the Day Binder

Rather than copying or buying daily math warm ups, my second graders work in their Number of the Day binder first thing every morning. Page protectors make these pages reusable every day of the year, giving my students enriching and consistent place value practice without wasting paper.

School Wide Waste Management

All day, we recycle and compost as many materials as possible. Our office staff and custodial crew go above and beyond to ensure students are using receptacles in the classroom and in our picnic areas properly. 

Our class environmentalists and recyclers (student jobs) do the same for our class specifically at the end of each day. You can grab my Classroom Job Cards Freebie in my TPT store.

Waste Free Lunch

Many of our students come to school with a waste free lunch. That’s right, not a single item in their lunch bag is trash. They pack their lunch in washable containers and sleeves. Food scraps are composted when the lunch bell rings and everything else is packed away to be washed at home and reused another day. 

Reusable water bottles can be found on almost every desk so students stay hydrated without using not-so-eco-friendly plastic water bottles.

Hope you enjoyed a peek at a few of our favorite tips for building a sustainable classroom. Remember…every day is Earth Day!

2nd Annual Teacher Blogger Interview {with Lauren from A Teachable Teacher}

I am honored to introduce you to Lauren, blogger and teacherpreneur from A Teachable Teacher. I connected with Lauren early in my TPT journey and had the pleasure of meeting her in person last year. I must confirm she is as sweet as she looks. :) Her Teachers Pay Teachers store is stocked with quality literacy resources for primary grades and classroom organization and management tools for all. Read on to learn more about what inspires her to blog and create. 

When I was getting my teaching credential, I would read teacher blogs.  I enjoyed getting to “know” other teachers and their classrooms!  I waited a long time before starting my own blog because I didn’t think anyone would care to read what I had to say since I was young new teacher.  Thankfully, my husband encouraged me to start one anyway. =)

Blogging has really challenged me to constantly growing in my teaching (hence the name, A Teachable Teacher).  I never want to think that I know it all or that I have it “down.”  I can always know more and do better.  I only want to teach/write about/post the best of the best...so I’m always reading and researching.  More importantly, all the tips, tricks, skills, and ideas I’ve learned from other bloggers have vastly impacted the way that I teach and run my classroom!

Let’s be real...I DON’T keep it all balanced.  I know that I don’t blog enough.  I put God, my family, church, and my students first, which means that blogging is often the back burner.  Because I spend so much time making resources for my students, I end up spending a lot more time creating and posting on TpT than I do blogging.  One of my goals this summer is to develop a good “rhythm” of blogging so that I can keep it up next school year!

As far as family goes, I do think it is easier for me because I don’t have kids yet.  My husband commutes a long distance each day for work, so I have a lot of time home alone on weeknights.  When I started blogging and creating resources, I realized that I was ALWAYS on the computer.  (To say I got addicted would be an understatement).  I told my husband that if at any moment he felt like I was ignoring him because I was glued to my computer screen, he needed to let me know.  It’s been almost three years and so far, he’s only asked me to close my laptop twice.  It’s a great system because I never have to feel guilty for “working”!

I would encourage you to blog and create about the things you are passionate about and the things you need in your classroom.  I remember when I created my December Behavior Incentive and showed it to a friend.  She encouraged me to blog about it, (I originally wasn’t planning on it), and I did.  The post was written on a whim and I’m ashamed at the quality of the images, but that is one of my post popular posts to this day.  Every teacher needs behavior incentives during that crazy month!  Chances are, if you have need, other teachers do too.  

My all time favorite resource is my All-in-One Reading Passages Bundle.  I was teaching first grade at the time and my students were not applying our phonics skills in reading whatsoever.  I was so discouraged!  I created one page (for the vowel team, ai) and “tested” at school.  It was so neat to see them actually read words with “ai” in the context of a story!  More importantly, they felt accomplished.  I knew I had to make more!  Now I teach reading intervention and I literally use them every day.

You can follow Lauren from A Teachable Teacher at her Teachers Pay Teachers Store, Instagram, Facebook, Bloglovin', and Pinterest. You will absolutely adore getting to know more about this talented teacher.