Meet the Teacher Monday!

Hi! It's Meet the Teacher Monday! I'm linking up with Blog Hoppin'...and excited to introduce myself to the blogging world! My name is Tanya and I teach first grade in Arizona. This is my 15th year teaching, and my third year teaching first grade. I taught 2nd grade for about 5 years and enjoyed it, but a few years ago I had the chance to move to Kinder, then I looped with my class to first. And I absolutely LOVE IT! So here are some things about me...

Things I Love!
1. My husband
2. Living in the desert. I love the heat...am not loving the humidity and rain right now, but we need it!
3. My bulldog
4. New markers...I bought a set of Mr. Sketch markers recently and I'm using them on everything! I'm finding lots of reasons to make anchor charts.
5. A quiet classroom in the morning. I like to get to school early and enjoy the classroom before everyone gets there...it's so relaxing!
6. A classroom full of children! I love the fact that we get a fresh start every morning!

Some interesting tidbits about me...
1. My first year of teaching was in first grade...I really thought I would not make it as a teacher after that year and I KNEW I would never teach first grade again...well, okay, I thought I would never teach first grade again. I am so glad I did not stick to that decision! At this point, I'm hoping I get to teach first the rest of my career!
2. I'm a mentor teacher for the first time ever...I'm hoping that I help my teaching partner, who's just out of school, not feel like I did after my first year of teaching. I want her to feel confident about her first year and excited that she chose teaching as a profession!

What I am hoping to accomplish this year...
1. I am implementing Daily 5/Cafe and Math Work Stations (Debbie Diller). I know, a lot in one year, but I am super excited and motivated so I have high hopes for myself...and my students!
2. Our school is starting to buy Mimio Interactive Whiteboards. Although I will be sharing with 5 other teachers, I get to figure out how to use it and help K-2 teachers (there's 6 of us) learn the basics. I am thankful that we are able to start using this technology and I have lots of ideas about how to incorporate it into my lessons!
3. I want a cute and fun blog! I love all the ideas I see out there...and I am just a little guilty of blog stalking...okay, a lot guilty! I oohhh and aaahhh over so many blogs and wonder if I'll be able to keep up, but got to try, right?

Thanks for letting me introduce myself! I am looking forward to meeting lots of you in the blogging world and hope you will stick around to see how our year progresses!

Learning about Shapes!

We've been reviewing the number of sides and vertices that different shapes have. We made this chart (got the idea from Debbie Diller's Math Work Stations) and then went on a walk around the school and found different objects for each shape. We had lots of fun finding things around our school!

Welcome to our Classroom!

Wow! It took me a long time to post these pictures! But here they are! This is our classroom:)

Our classroom library area...

Small group and guided reading area...

Our math work stations and math manipulatives...

This will be our writing area...this mural was painted by one of my parents a couple years ago, isn't it beautiful?

Thank Goodness for Smart Phones!

So...I'm not a big texter, I don't Facebook or Twitter, and I just got a smart phone about a month ago. It drives my friends crazy! 


Well, today I learned how valuable a smart phone can be. I got an email from Staples with the weekly ad and it had composition books on sale. So I got in the car and drove to Staple to buy a class set. When I got there, the sign for the composition books said $.15 for the first three and then $.40 for any after three. So I asked the cashier about it and told her about the ad I got and she informed me that the ad was for Tucson (our closest big city) and the sign was the right price and she could match the price but only if she had a copy of the ad. So I got on my little smart phone, signed into my email, pulled up the ad, and showed it to her. So guess how much I bought 30 of these little beauties for?

10 cents each, y'all!!!  That's 30 books for $3.00!!!

Gotta love a smart phone!