New Procedures: Post It LOVE FREEBIE! [with Sassy, Savvy, Simple Teaching]

Happy New Year friends! I hope you had a fabulous holiday break and a great start to your New Year. For those of you who are already back at school good luck! I am a week behind you on my year around schedule! Our students return the 11th. 

I am here to share with you a new procedure that I made for me as a Literacy Coach to build relationships, communication and to show some love! But, you can use this as a classroom teacher for your students.

I personally think it is very important in my position to have good relationships with the classroom teachers. This is for many reasons as I am sure you all already know. 

Here are a few things I do, some better than others, to build positive relationships:

• Walk to each teacher's classroom every day or every other day to say hello and see if they need anything. 
• Include affirmation, encouragement, thankfulness and other positive words in emails.
• Take an interest in the teacher's personal life, by getting to know them and relating to them.
• Be an advocate to the powers above for them.
• Take their ideas, suggestions and complaints to the leadership team for feedback.
• Try to provide them with any resources they ask for or at least seek out resources for them.
• Find answers to their questions if I can't answer them myself.

I have a goal for 2016 to find a way that I can manage to tell teachers what awesome things they are doing. Some great suggestions from colleagues of mine are:

• Email one team a week and tell them something great you noticed.
• Email one teacher a week and tell them something great you noticed.
• Write a note or letter to one teacher a week and tell them something great you noticed. 

I really liked these personal ideas and I knew I wanted to do something personal and by hand. I did not want to write an entire letter or spend $ on note cards.

So I went with personal quick notes on Post Its. Why? My thinking behind this is that I would rather purchase post it notes if needed but I can get them at school for free. Next as we all know, anything hand written feels more personal than an email. Also most adults seem to remember what your wrote to them by hand then by email. Some teachers may throw them out immediately and some may keep them for a little bit. Either way, their eyes will read something in my handwriting that is reminding them of the awesome things they do. That is something that will go further than maybe I can expect.

You can click on any of the photos below or HERE to grab this FREEBIE!

Here's how to set them up:

Print the master page from file on white card-stock and get some 3x3 Post It Notes. 

Place the Post It notes in squares evenly with sticky back at the top.

You need to know your printer! Place in printer drawer, decide what template you want and print!

Write a personal quick note!

I hope you find this simple, easy and effective with showing your students or staff some LOVE!

You can click on any of the photos above or HERE to grab this FREEBIE!

An InLinkz Link-up

Positive Parent Communication {with Mrs. D's Corner}

I am fortunate enough to have an amazing set of classroom parents... truly amazing. If I ever need anything, I can send an email, make a phone call, or even text (yes, from my personal phone) to a parent and ask. Now I don't take advantage of this very often because I'm not one to ask for anything... but just knowing that I have their support means more than the world to me.

So how do I do it?

Easy! I send home a parent know each day for each student. It might seem like a lot (especially when you have 20+ students), but I currently only have 7 students. It's a half sheet of paper and, in all honesty, the simplest way for me to keep track of behavior data and for parents to stay in the know about how their child is doing in school each day.

{ Grab the free Daily Behavior Tracker here. }

An InLinkz Link-up

The Moment of Truth! Communicating with Parents! [Using FACEBOOK with Sassy, Savvy, Simple Teaching]

Facebook for parent communication? Say what? You mean not to socialize with friends! YES!

It's Dianna here with you today from Sassy, Savvy, Simple Teaching!

Today I am here as a parent! Pretty interesting, that I feel more compelled to share with you what makes me so happy right now about my daughter's Pre-K teacher rather than what I do as a Literacy Coach. Sure, I communicate with parents every day about reading, assessments and laws. But what I'm about to share has knocked the socks off my husband and I. WE LOVE OUR DAUGHTER'S PRE-K TEACHER!

Why?
We LOVE her parent communication! DAILY and POSITIVE!
So what's so great?
We have a class Facebook page! Every evening I see my daughter and classmates in action for the day!

It is also the primary source of parent communication for all other classroom and school related things. Check out below some of the parent communication >>>

So, I have heard of teachers having private Twitter or Instagram pages for their class. But, I have never personally heard of anyone having a private Facebook page for their class.

Here's how to get started:

1. Aside from the county forms for photographs and internet, create a form for permission to join as a parent to the class Facebook page. Also to post pictures of your child for other parents to see on the page. Ask for the parents email address associated with Facebook on the form. This is important so the teacher doesn't have to be friends with all the parents on Facebook, she can invite them into the page by their email.
2. Create a note to parents of the powers of a class Facebook page, such as... Daily happenings in pictures, conversations with child about what they are working on in school, knowing the students in your child's class, collaborating with other parents on classroom activities, volunteering, donations, fundraisers, events, and more! This is really great for divorced or separated parents too. It makes communicating with 2 separate parties easier on the teacher. It is also really great for deployed parents or parents that travel, because if they have internet they can still be connected to their child's daily activities at school. No more loose papers either! Post the flyers in your page as a photo! 
3. As the teacher, log in to Facebook and create a private group. Add a cute cover photo and invite parents by email. 

Here are some pictures of my daughter below over the past few months. It's been so great for me to work full time but know each day exactly what is happening at school with her. Every day I use the pictures to discuss what she learned about at school or what she participated in at school. I see all her friends and the best part is everything is positive. 

These photos tell me what Harper Jane is working on at school each day along with showing how happy she is! As a parent, I couldn't have a better feeling each day!

An InLinkz Link-up