Busy, fun day

Not only do I teach school all week, but I teach dance classes 4 nights a week and Saturdays. Our studio has recently undergone construction and expansion so today we had our grand re-opening. Our teams performed their new routines and then had a nice night out with some great parents and kids from the studio.Gotta love a fun day like this. Above is part of the acro piece my dancers are doing this year. Below are some fun pictures from today!

Want to Win a Free Laminator?

Heather over at Sensational Seconds is running a contest to win a free personal laminator because she loves her new one so much. I just signed up to follow her blog. Check her out and you might win a free laminator.

Soooooo Early

Up at 3:00am today because the dance studio I work at is being featured on our local Fox News Morning show from 5am-8am. I am super excited for this opportunity for our dancers, but right now am wondering how I will survive the day (plus Wednesdays we have our super fun-filled faculty meetings to implement common core!) - I think I will need a Starbucks IV to make it through the day.

September 11, 2001

I can still remember this day exactly. I was teaching in my first classroom in second grade at English Estates Elementary in Fern Park, FL. I had a parent volunteer come in and tell me a plane just flew into the Twin Towers. I said "Oh, OK" and went back to teaching. Then, about 5 minutes later, I walked back to her and said "What?" when it hit me what she had actually said. At the time, all the principals in our district (Seminole County) were in a district meeting and off the school campuses. Our school was also having picture day just to add to the craziness. I can remember shortly after the announcement from the parent, an announcement on our intercom to tell teachers to turn off their tv's. I think at that moment was when I realized how serious it was. I didn't actually get to see any footage until my lunch break when we all huddled around a tv in an office. A member of the emergency team came around to classrooms to keep teachers posted - I was worried about family members in NY and a friend who lived in DC. Then, the parents started coming to pick up their kids which added to the confusion and nervousness of the kids and teachers. I know it was being talked about that Orlando could be the next target since it was the home of Disney World or the Kennedy Space Center. Which is why our parents were coming in droves to collect their kids and get home to be together.  I know we all have our stories, but this is mine. What's yours?

If you are teaching September 11 today in your classroom, there is a great Brain Pop video that I found out about from the Joy in the Journey. I showed it yesterday and found it to be a very informative and well done, easy to understand video to start off discussion probably most appropriate for 4th-6th graders.

Prayers today for all those heroes of 9/11 and those who lost their lives that day. May we never forget.

Currently Linky Party

I am linking up with  Farley's September Currently...link up and comment! I thought it was a fun way to meet some new bloggers!

New Stuff / Freebie Linky Party

I am linking up with 2nd Grade Pad in her Favorite Freebie Linky Party.  My favorite freebie I have created is a group of 3 since they all go together. I have made black & white polka dot jobs & classroom numbers, black & white polka dot calendar icons, and black & white polka dot classroom objective signs/labels.

The story behind these is this year our school wide theme was detective and I could not find much to go with it. Plus I was in a car accident in May which left my summer funds pretty depleted. After trolling Pinterest and blogs all summer, I decided to try my hand at graphic design and make my own things for the classroom. I have had a ton of downloads of these items from my teacher pay teacher store.

Hope you can enjoy these items!

So I spent some time this morning making new games for my classroom and that I could put on TeachersPayTeachers.

I have created two new center games working with prefixes and suffixes.

You can download samples of the games or purchase from my store. The games are geared for 3rd-5th graders. The first 3 people to comment below with their e-mail address will get a free copy of my new games.Also, the first 5 new followers will get a copy of these games and one item of their choice of my TeachersPayTeachers store so send your friends on over.

Here's a "snapshot" of the new games. Click on the pictures to go to their pages on my tpt store.

Swamped

I have been totally swamped this year and haven't had much time for blogging. I am currently teaching my lovely 5th graders all day, then 3 days a week I run to physical therapy right after the bell rings (I was in a car accident in May the last day of school and still nowhere near healed), and then 4 nights a week I teach dance classes (plus Saturday mornings). Also our district has implemented a new "1/2 hour" training time once a week (which my school does 30 minutes earlier on Wednesdays. Plus, I am trying to catch up on implementing common core, etc. Can you say overwhelmed. I will try to get back to some creating & sharing in the next few weeks, but please hang with me.
Thanks