Thanksgiving Break Came at the Perfect Time

Well once again I have failed to update on a regular basis. I am terrible at this blogging stuff. I can not seem to figure out how all these other teachers have time to share all their ideas through pinterest! I will say I am so happy they do! Pinterest has been a life saver to me! It has awesome ideas!! Well first grade has been super busy at Nash! We kicked off last week for KAH College goals. We had a door decorating contest. I am happy to say 1st grade teachers took 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place. 1st grade rocks! My class won 2nd place! Woo Hoo! Besides the fun stuff we have been learning to read, write, and do math. Our lives never slow down. K-2nd is also taking on a new guided reading program called Bella. As a campus we are rocking it out! I am so proud to be part of this amazing campus and 1st grade team.
Well last week about wore me out! We focused on Thanksgiving in all areas. We created thanksgiving lapbooks. That may be my last lapbook ever! I am glad the kids enjoyed it! Well Christmas is right around the corner! I can not believe it. Hopefully next week my students are ready to get busy to wrap up the 3rd 6 weeks! Half way there! I will post pictures soon! :)

Miss Hampton

A few quick quotes...

Well it has been over a month since my last update! Shame on me. Things are a little crazy on my end. Not a lot of time to blog!! But I have a few quite funny quotes I would like to share.

A few weeks ago one of my reading groups was reading Turtle and the Hare. We were discussing determination and what we would never give up on. I had the students share a few ideas. Here is a reply I received "a pie eating contest." My jaw dropped. This student is very much over weight. Sweet kid but wow!!!! Then a classmate responded "Yes Miss Hampton you just gotta keep eating till it's gone." I just cracked up! My students have big dreams and goals ahead of them. What will they say next?

So one morning I had a student come in complaining that the orange juice tasted BAAD this morning. Mind you this student always has something wrong with him. Really he just loves to visit our nurse!!! So I told him he could get a drink of water and I would be happy to put a trash can beside his desk. So I do as I said and go back to my desk to finish our lunch count for the day. A few minutes later he says..."Miss Hammptoon this orange juice tastes like wine." I giggle to myself quickly jot this down so I will not forget. I did not ask him how he knew what wine tasted like or even what wine is. We just moved on for the day. Little innocent minds.

One more pretty funny quote. In one of my reading groups we start talking about what boys like to do with their grandpa's. We were changing the story we read previously Nana's House. Some of my students were struggling to think..... So i redirected some of the boys to think about what they enjoy doing with their dad's. Here is a response " My dad, all he does is math. " Too cute! Guess what this child is one of the smartest kiddos in 1st grade at my school!! Dad must work with him!!! :)

I will have an update by the end of the week. We are making musical instruments and I hope to post pictures of their creations!!! They are looking great!!!

Happy Halloween!!

It has been a day or two,,,okay, maybe a week,

Well I have been non stop the last week or so. My life has yet to slow down. So many things going on in the 1st grade world as well as my other life. :) Well last week was slightly interesting or should I say a new experience for me.
I am greeted Friday morning by my principal, and she had been greeted by a mother who was freaked out about an incident and not too happy with me. Her son lead her to believe that another student shoved a crayon inside his ear. He also told her that he informed me and the other student was in trouble for the incident. Here is the kicker.. Although he had an crayon in his ear I would not allow him to go to the nurse. OH ME. Guess I like for my students to suffer. Well the story got more and more interesting with very outlandish details. Now I will give him the fact he made a comment that he couldn't hear and could he go to the restroom. (this child asks to go to the bathroom every time we sit down to begin a lesson) So I told him no, he could wait till after the lesson. Never heard him say anything else about his ear again. So just like anyone else I forgot about the comment. So I am told the crayon in his ear is yellow. We are also informed that the ER could not remove the crayon Thursday night and he would go to the ENT Doctor Friday morning. Also he could possibly have to be sedated to have it removed!!! OMG..... crazy. Well since the details of the student were a little off I decided to check his desk for his yellow crayon. What do you know.. the tip is broken off of it. Yep I bet you are thinking what I was thinking. Well I have a pretty good relationship with this child's mother so I shot her an email with my apologies as well as the information on the crayon I found. I told her it could be a complete coincidence. I feel awful about the situation all weekend.... Then bright and early Monday morning I get a reply. She was not thinking it was so much of a coincidence. She told me to give her a call about it. I did it and I worked my wonderful parental skills and she was on board with my story!! :) I have yet to discuss the issue with the student. Well Monday afternoon we are doing an activity using crayons. Well he discovers that all his crayons are missing. Yea i removed every last one of them Friday afternoon. So he comes over to my desk for a little discussion. After a few lies he finally admits he did it to himself!!! Forgot to tell you he gave the name of the person "who did it" to our principal as well as to his mother. He didn't even know the poor girl. She wasn't in my classroom. So Tuesday morning i receive a hand written letter from him apologizing for the entire situation!!!

More drama...... on the playground Monday one of my students fell off the slide. He is a little guy very fragile. He was just a crying... so I sent him to the nurse to check it out! I wouldn't want him to suffer. Well dad comes and picks him up. So Tuesday he comes to school no cast or anything. In tears from the moment he walks in the door. So several teachers at different times send him back to the nurse. Dad requests for him to go back to class he will be fine. Dad knows he loves to visit Ms. Bridgette our nurse. Well Wednesday morning he shows up smiling from ear to ear. He says "Ms. Hampton look." and puts his arm in the air. Yep it was broken! Poor little guy! He got his hand cast on Wednesday. Thursday he thought the cast was so cool. Today he is not loving the cast so much!!!!

Well our days are getting better in the classroom. I am getting into a routine of things. This week was great I was out doing TPRI testing a day and a half so my week seemed to fly by!!

Kids say the funniest things:

Student: Ms. Hampton your hair is tangly.
Me: Well it is just curly.

Me: Okay change your card to yellow, you were pretending to sleep.
Student: I just didn't want to share.
Me: That is fine just answer Ms. Hampton next time.
Student: Okay, can I change back to green now.
Me: Sorry that is not how it works.
(JOURNAL SHARE TIME)

This is one I get alot..
Me: Okay why did you have to change your card?
Student: because I am bad.
Me: You are not bad, you just make bad choices sometimes.


This week we have been learning about the Constitution so my students drew and labeled U.S. Symbols. Here are few:

Go Ole ABE. 

 

The White House and George on the left

U.S. Flag and the Liberty Bell

And a few others

Well all papers are graded.. what a way to end this crazy week. 

Miss Hampton

Finally a new post...

Well it has been forever since I have posted. Last week was a little busy, well actually a lot busy. Things seemed as if they were falling apart last week around Wednesday. I just wanted to curl up in a ball and hide in a corner. Well that didn't happen, I made it through the week actually. I am still getting used to 1st graders. I think I will be saying this for several more weeks. Maybe even the entire year. Before I taught 1st, everyone said coming down from 4th I would just love 1st grade. Now the same people are saying "I don't know how you do it." LOL. People really tell you what you want to hear. :) Also the big date for 1st graders to grow up is after Christmas. I will let you know how that is in a few months. I hope their words of encouragement are true! Towards the end of the week I was feeling a little better about the situation. I finally got all of my student books for the Journey's curriculum atleast. I still do not have my student consumables for ELAR or math. And our goal is to cut back on copying. How can I do that with out those materials. CRAZY!! I am trying new things everyday! We will make it through I just know it! I have finally gotten a little bit better with my organization. If I hadn't I would be a total basket case! Well for all who care I am still at work from 7AM till about 7PM. Yep 12 hour work days. There are not enough hours in the day.. seriously!

Well I did enjoy my self this weekend. I didn't think about school until about 8:30 last night. I was able to go to Fayetteville, Little Rock, and back home. All day yesterday I work on the new apartment. I was shopped out and worn out from the entire weekend. I have decided that restful weekends are so much better! Hopefully I will be resting this coming weekend. I NEED IT!

Friday, it was an awesome day to listen to my students share their journal entries. It about gave me chills. TO see the growth even in the last few days is amazing. They are writing like crazy and expressing themselves through journal writing!! THEY LOVE JOURNAL TIME!!! We are up to 15 mins each day for this activity!!! AMAZING!!

So let's talk about today. We are working on comparing numbers and ordering numbers in math. We are using words like greater than and less than. These are tough concepts for my students. Even my students who pick up things very fast. Maybe I am the problem. I think my class needs so neat hands on activities for learning. ANY IDEAS ARE WELCOME!!! Well today during this lovely math lesson we had a walk-through. For those of you who do not know what this is it is a weekly visit from an administator, it lasts 4 minutes. It is basicly to track if we are meeting objectives and if the students are engaged. Well last week our visit consisted of 3 admins at one time. Yep your right sounds a little overwhelming. Today it was just 2 admins. Well they ask the students randomly what they are learning. Yes your right, it makes them a little nervous. Also they listen to questioning and answers given. My student today was so nervous of the thought of them he could not give an answer that made sense. Right when they walked out he answered correctly! YEp just my luck!!! Oh and by the way.. I had 2 students craying about their stomachs, one student standing because he can not stay awake and another laying her head down!!! FAIL!

Well let me fill you in on a funny..... today we had a little class meeting about homework and books. I was telling the students to handle our books with care because the are REALLY EXPENSIVE to replace and mommy's and daddy's do not want to pay money for them being ruined. Here is a reply from one of my student's....."My mom is broken. All she has is a credit card" Another child responds.."How much credit cards?" "Not very much." HAHA... Another child came up at another time and was talking about her fundrasier. She said " I sold, and she wrote on one of those paper bills." Talking about a check!!! It was too funny.

Well please give me any ideas to help my classroom get more hands on!! I am open to any suggestions!!

Miss Hampton

I am still worn out..

Well this past week has been full of new experiences and learning opportunities for me. I ended my week working till about 5:30 Friday afternoon. This is the only day I didn't work 11 and a half hours. I worked about 10 and a half. I wrapped up the week with about 56 hours at school. Hopefully I will not have many more weeks like that. The first week of school is always the hardest. You as the teacher are getting into a routine as well as these kids who have been on a summer schedule. I even have kids asking if they get nap time in 1st grade. They are just so worn out. By the end of the day at car dismissal, I have about 4 students crashed. I even had one in my class fall asleep sitting Indian style straight up as I read a book at the end of the day. These poor babies they are just worn out! I have discovered I am a teacher, nurse, and 2nd mom to these 1st graders. I must say that I love it though. This week my team and I are diving into the curriculum. I am hoping this gets us in a good daily routine. I am doing my best to find and pull ideas from everywhere. Like I said before, I wasn't sure when I would receive my teacher resources. Well It is looking like it will be around November. So I am going to make the best out of the situation. I have a great team that is willing to help with anything which is awesome. I know you don't always find people like that. I have learned that I have very caring parents. I have received about 5 e-mails and a phone call just telling me they are here to help with any thing I need them for. :) It is good that I am already building good parent-teacher relationships. This will help down the road I am sure! 

This past week I learned something real fast. Dresses are my new best friends. I have bought 3 in the last week. With this horribly hot weather, pants are miserable to wear. It is amazing how much cooler it is when you wear a  dress. Those of you who know me well know this is a big step! I never wear dresses. :) Y'all should be proud. 

I tried to finish nailing out my "minute by minute" schedule for the week, I made it through Monday! I will try and gets these finished up by tomorrow evening. My goal this week is to leave by 5 everyday if possible!! 

Can't wait to see my kiddos in the morning. I already miss them over the weekend. Although I ran into 2 of them on Friday night. Saw on at Walmart and one at Dillards. Goodness I love my job. It can be physically draining, emotionally draining, but in the end it is worth it because I hopefully made a difference in their lives. 

Bring it on week 2!!!

Miss Hampton

EXHAUSTED!

Well I will continue to say that I just love that 1st graders love you... In our journal time today I had them write at least one sentence. Several of them wrote I love my teacher. :) I even had one say that Miss Hampton is my best friend. I know they always say don't be best friends with you students. HAHA. I think a lot of them wrote that because my name was on the board. :) In the end this is what makes me love my job. 

I do have a lot of learning to do. This is so different from what I taught last year. So very different, but I am willing to take on challenges. Maybe once I actually have my teacher resources for my curriculum. When I do not have everything I need I do tend to get a little freaked. I have been a basket case not having these materials. I pray every night that it will magically show up at my door. Hopefully it will get here soon. I have to make what I have work. :)

Kids say the silliest things, I have heard... "Can I go into the school house and get my jacket" mind you it is 100 degrees outside. Also "The Spanish class took it off" referring to the bandage on her finger. There will be more and more quotes I hear. I need to start writing them down so I do not forget. We have one student who thinks she is a dinosaur at recess, she makes crazy sounds. HAHA. Also I will become a professional shoe tier by the end of the year. I am still working really hard to see how I want my materials in my room and my desks rearranged. 3 times a charm right?

If you have any ideas for my 1st grade class bring it on! :) 

Now today I forgot to set my alarm!!! OHHH NOOO!!! My mom woke me up at 6:50.. Ladies and Gentleman I like to leave my house at 6:45. But I got ready in a flash and actually made it to work by 7:20. That was a close call. Lets just say my alarm was set at 7 this morning for tomorrow morning. :) CLOSE CALL!!!!

Well after 3 days of school I am extremely worn out. Hopefully my body will get used to it. :)

Two days till the weekend. Friday night I get to go on a date night with Malachi. I am very excited about that. 

Miss Hampton

Day one is History, tomorrow still a mystery.

I survived my first day of first grade. That one was a little different. 5:45 came very early to this woman here, but  I manged to make it all day! I arrived at school at approximately 7 o'clock this morning which is a usual arrival time for me. I got the last bits of prep done and right at 7:25 I had parents and kiddos in my classroom. They were bringing in supplies by the bags. Lucky for me majority of my students brought all supplies and some. I had a wonderful system going on to get it all organized!! We had a great start this morning. They truly are hard workers. We went over and over and over all the classroom procedures and hallway procedures. We even had to discuss the procedures for the restroom. I think they will have it down by the end of the week. :) I have a few here and there that are testing their limits but hopefully I can get control of that situation really quick. Down the 1st grade hall you see so many things... I can not even begin to tell you how many children ended up in my room on accident. Their little minds are not programmed to the correct room yet. I didn't see much of that in the 4th grade. I also got questions like, what color is your hair? They are precious! But these little ones are NEEDY, I got a big laugh out of my team when I mentioned that word. 

It is amazing how different a fourth grade classroom is compared to a first grade classroom. I know I am going to enjoy my year though. I realized today I need a minute by minute schedule to keep me on track. I worked on tomorrow's today before I left school. Lori cracked up at me today when I came in her room at the end of the day to inform her of this. She promises me that it will just get easier. I can only hope at this point. :) 

I will say nothing is better than the love of a child though. As my students left today I was overwhelmed by the amount of hugs I received as they left. They are awesome. I decided to put my desks into groups as well. So I will let you know how that goes. Tuesday folders were going to be the death of me this afternoon. I will say they are looking awesome and ready to head home with the students tomorrow. I was able to leave at 6:30 this evening. 11 and a half hours, and some of you thought I had an easy job. But I love it and truly can not wait for my min by min schedule tomorrow. 

I had my students make pictures of their favorite weather today I will have to take pictures and post. They are super creative. They were given 3 cotton balls, sheet of paper, glue, and crayons! They really were cool. I will update pictures soon. 

Talk to you soon. 

Miss Hampton

Game Time is approaching quickly.....

Whew, the day is alomost here. I have had a lot going on since my last post. We had meet the teacher on Thursday night, 19 of 20 showed up with family members. That was a fantastic outcome!! I am so ready to begin molding their little minds. I am keeping this post pretty short because I am totally worn out. I have updated pictures of the room.

Calendar time with clock and weather now.

 Objectives are posted and ready for day one! This will also be our incentive board as well as our AR goals.

Just a look at my cabinets with my pictures and diploma posted.

 Desk is ready for the 1st day. Probably the only time you will see it this organized.

 I bought new containers, I have to say containers are my new favorite purchase. Dollar Tree has the best ones!!! I actually ran into an aunt of one of my student's, that I met Thursday night. She is so sweet.

 Calendars with updated birthday's posted.

 I had these out for my students on Meet the Teacher.

 A look at the room from the front corner.

 One little desk ready to go. This one had a birthday over the summer.

 Mailboxes with lamp and photo.

This is going to be an exciting adventure and I can not wait to give you all the little details that happen in a classroom. Hope to post again Monday night. I might be really worn out then!!

Miss Hampton

Four short days until my year begins..

Okay, the last three days have worn me completely out. I started my day on Monday at 6:45 a.m (this is sleeping in compared to next week) and attended training from 8-4. Honestly when you have to sit ALL day it truly wears me out. LOL! I continued cutting and sorting all kinds of things for my classroom than night. Then I began my day yesterday with an 8:30-3:30 training (another day of sitting ALL day) followed by a visit to my campus. I worked in my room until 7 o'clock. The room is still not finished!!! SIGH....I was able to glue pockets and name cards on all my desks and clean up the room a little bit. I forgot to take pictures of my desks. Today, was a pretty productive day. We had training this morning until 11:30 and the rest of the day was working in our classrooms. I finally finished my outside bulletin board. 

Each little iPod contains the student's name and has a caption bubble. We will brainstorm what we can do in the 1st grade. I will write the students thoughts on their bubble. The iPod in the center is not flat to the board. I had to have something that had dimension. 

This was the big piece I needed to complete before meet the teacher tomorrow night. I am so excited about meeting the kiddos. I am working on a little treat for them to take home tomorrow night. I will post pictures once those are completed. 

Well our team met today and outlined the first week. Rules and procedures is the name of the game. We have lots to learn in the 1st grade before we can begin. I know this is going to be a successful year. I absolutely love the people I am working with. I have also been appointed to take a higher group of students everyday during the year. We will explore all kinds of  "literacy workstations" (right ladies?) Also I will get the chance to bring writing and reflection to the next level with these students. I am so excited about my new appointed task. :) Thanks to Bobbie Nell and Lori! Today was truly my most exhausting day. It takes a lot of work  to get this show on the road. 

Well wish me luck tomorrow night! 

short and sweet..

Miss Hampton

Last weekend of summer!

So this weekend is the last weekend before my summer ends, and yes I am sitting at home blogging on a Friday night. Although this was still considered summer this week I spent many hours in my classroom. Today I got busy working on "1st grade words to know" for my word wall. Must I say that list seems like it is never ending. I ran out of mini index cards so I will be purchasing those this weekend. I had an awesome lunch with all the new staff at Nash. Did you know that On the Border has a fajita wrap? It is DELICIOUS! Well I wish I could say that I had an amazing weekend planned, full of excitement. I guess resting up and taking advantage of the No Sales Tax weekend will have to do. I do have a list of supplies I need to get before school starts!  Well I am going to keep this post short. I hope all of my fellow teacher friends are taking advantage of their last weekend before school starts. Maybe I can plan something for next weekend before the kiddos come back on Monday!

Miss Hampton

Tomorrow is Friday already?

This week is truly flying by. I have worked the last two days in my classroom for a total of 8 hours. Now this doesn't sound so bad, but I have been running from store to store totaling another 6 hours or so. Plus sitting in my own living room cutting and cutting and cutting laminated things for at least 3 hours at night. It is so worth the time because my room is finally coming together. Here are a few updated pictures since my last post. 

This is my word wall. I am actually pleased with it, I will be working on my words in the next few days. The large empty space to the left is for our Journey's Focus Wall poster.  

This is just another angle of the word wall with some added posters. The book shelf is going to have "Featured Readings" on it. I thought this would be a great way to pull books that we have read as a class and place there. More like familiar reads. 

Calendar time is a must at this age. This will be a new experience for me. Calendars just existed in the fourth grade. :) We will also have a chance to discuss money, place value, and time. I am still lacking a clock to post, thus the open square of space. 

Thanks to Mrs. Hambleton I have a place value chart! They are out of these everywhere in this town and the company's they order from are out as well. :(

This is where my "Student Friendly Objectives" will be posted every day! 

I can not decide if I like this huge rug in my room, give me your thoughts... I may try it out the first few days and see how I like it! 

Desks are spread out for the first day of school. Miss Hampton means business! :)

Moved my computers a little bit. Also I am so thankful for the printer in my room, now if we can get it hooked up to my computer! Pencil sharpener is between printer and computer. The pencil sharpener is used before and after school only. A little technique I picked up from last year. 

Labels I have been working on to go around the room.

I am proud of my little project I did last night! This is just a little reminder board for myself. It is just above my desk. I would love to make more of these if anyone is interested. 

I made this last year before school started! Need to get one more year of use out of it before I become Mrs. Reeves. This is right outside my door in the hallway. 

Cutesy hall passes, had these last year too. Do not know if we will even use them but I hate not putting them out because I think they are precious!  

Well I feel as if I am actually accomplishing things this week. Guess now is the time since I will have students and parents in my classroom a week from today for Meet the Teacher night. I am so ready to meet my little babies. I say babies because my students last year were big 4th graders. I actually had a student that was taller than me and I am no shorty at 5 ft. 8 in. 

Can't wait for tomorrow I get to eat with all the new staff. On the Border will be catering. :)

Miss Hampton

Slowly getting things ready...

Today I was able to work in my room. I also met with my team for the first time this summer. Exciting things happening on the first grade hall. I know I am going to love working with my fabulous team. We have finalized our schedule so one check off on the check list before school starts. I have gotten border paper and borders on all my bulletin boards inside my classroom, but they are not yet completed. Everything is a work in progress. My hope is to finish up my classroom bulletin boards by tomorrow afternoon.

Here are a few pictures:

This will be my word wall, full of high frequency words. This is something new for me. In 4th grade I did not have to keep up with a word wall. I think it will be great the classroom. More pictures to come.

The blue bullein board will contain my calendar and  few more items. I have no finalized what I will put on the black board. I finally got my alphabet hung above my whiteboard. As you can see I have yet to get my desks in the correct place and clear them off. Lots of work to do!!!

The best news of the day today is that I got mailbox for my class. My Principal already had it ordered for me, and I got to pick it up from the office! This excites me beyond belief these things are like $100 and now I do not have to my own personal money! :) Thank you Nash Elementary!

I built this all on my own, well with a little help from Evan! I definitely love having a little brother to help out.

Tomorrow will be a day of shopping for more classroom supplies, and Malachi is going to join me. I love to have a little bit of company.

Also our 1st grade team got to choose new books for our classroom with scholastic money that was left over. Getting new books for my library is so exciting. In my above pictures you can see my reading center. Almost every single book that I have is from multiple friends and family donating them to me. What a blessing! The students will love having access to so many book choices.

The days are getting closer and closer to meeting my students. I can hardly stand it!

Miss Hampton

And the journey begins...

Do you ever have those days where you feel like you are getting nothing done? Well this week has been exactly that for me in my classroom. I have been a little overwhelmed trying to get my room in order. I have purchased all types of containers hoping to get a little bit of organization in my room. Walking into a brand new classroom is about like staring at a blank canvas. Last year working under my mentor I knew exactly what I needed to decorate my room with, also I was in a 4th grade classroom. 1st grade is a whole new ballgame. 

I have to say I am in love with my room. It has beautiful wooden blinds and wood paneling. 

 The round tables were for the kindergarten students and will not remain in my classroom. 

 All kindergarten supplies. These are now completely cleared out, thanks to my amazing principal. :)

These photos were taken in May and I have done a little bit of work since then. This week I have been tackling all the boxes from my classroom last year. I have about cleaned out all of them, thank goodness! I mastered the Laminator this morning and it is fabulous. Oh my gosh the small things in life that brighten your day! LOL! I can already tell I am going to love my new campus! 

UPDATED PICTURES: 

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