Office Depot NOW Decides to Sweeten Teachers’ Shopping Deal!
Yesterday, I stepped on out to the mailbox, and what did I find? Office Depot Coupons! Not only that, but some extra good news. Office Depot is now offering teachers a 10% discount all year long! They have redeemed themselves. I had always felt it was disappointing to shop at Office Depot and to have a teacher “discount card” that didn’t give you a discount on much…hmph!
For Teacher Appreciation week they are offering a 20% discount and a Teacher Discount Bag with product samples (my favorite!). The coupons in the mailer are for $10 off a $50 purchase and for 30% off packs of Elmer glue sticks–I still don’t know if that will beat Wal-mart’s glue stick deal at 0.10 cents! I’m feeling a little Black Fridayish about August’s back to school sales.
The ABSOLUTE BEST COMMON CORE RESOURCE EVER!
Have you been rolling your pants up to wade through the language of the common core standards? Oh, look, I think I just saw an octopus swim by! Well, I have! I have been working with the other math coaches in my district to build a guide for many days (both this year and last) to help decipher the common core standards into a teaching guide. After all of that hard work, I have happened across the most amazing resource to help teachers understand the standards. North Carolina has taken each and every language and math standard and broken them down into much more friendly language for teachers. In North Carolina’s own words, they have answered the questions: “What does this standard mean that a student must know and be able to do?” These standards are complete with examples, too! They have unpacked the standards for us! I don’t know about you, but I am really starting to be fond of North Carolina. Take a look at the example below. If you click on it, they you will be directed to the North Carolina website.
Back To School Teacher Appreciation Discounts and Events!
Don’t you love to walk into Wal-mart during back to school season? I do. I want to buy 10 boxes of crayons for 25 cents even if I don’t need them. And who can pass up spiral notebooks for 20 cents? Well, in the spirit of back to school season which is soon encroaching, I thought I would whip up a list of teacher discounts for you. Teacher discount days make back to school season so much more fun!
- Office Depot is hosting the event August 5th-11th, 2012. During this week you will enjoy a hefty 20% off of your purchase with your star teacher discount card. If you wait until August 11th from 9-11 you will also enjoy a teacher breakfast, and giveaways in my area. If you live somewhere other than near me in good ole’ Arkansas, you need to put in your zip code here to find out when the event will be held.
- At Staples’ back to school event they will be giving away free gift bags to the first 100 customers. Click here to find out when the event will be held in your area. (I especially love staples for their crazy shaped paper clips–ones that look like purses, high heels, flowers, animals, etc.!)
- Mardel’s will be holding their education sale on July 19th, 2012. They will be offering 20% off of all of their educational products and school supplies. They will also be extending their hours from 8 a.m. -10 p.m. You may also register to win an iPad!
- Big Lots (news to me) also has a teacher appreciation day. They will be hosting one Saturday, August 11, 2012. To find a Big Lots store near you click here.
- Office Max offers lots of goodies for teachers as well on their event day. You get a free tote bag and coupons. Also, they are offering 25% off of everything you can fit inside your tote bag. To find out when their event is held, click here to input your zip code. Sign up for a teacher discount card when you go to enjoy 25% off. (I am especially impressed with the way Office Max emailed me the details of their teacher appreciation sale after reading on my blog that I was unable to get details of their sale by calling the store.)
Make sure you bring your teacher id when you go! Happy shopping!
How Can You Design and Build Your Own Blog Template?
All, I can say is WHEW!! I have spent a tough two weeks going through a break up. So, I gladly welcomed the new love into my life. I am sure you all want to hear about him. I have spent hours gazing into his face, learning all his quirks, and reading his every movement. I hope you are all happy for me. This is going to be a long term relationship…I can just sense it. They say you just know that you know when he’s the one.
Gotcha! (maybe 😀 ) The breakup of course was with my old apple-y blog. I am so glad to be rid of the old theme! When I first started blogging, I had no idea there were so many teachers that were out there blogging until I saw the “blogs” tab on TPT. When I started seeing all the other teachers’ blogs, I desired a little more personality, and I’ll just say it–cuteness–in my own blog. And so, I made that one of my summer goals. And of course, my new love affair is with my new blog because I literally poured over making the template, uploading it, and working out the glitches. The last day I worked on it, my eyes were so red and my wrist was hurting from working on the computer so many consecutive hours and days. You may think that sounds like no fun, but I found working on this project addictive!
Before
To help save you some time if you are considering building a blog, I will tell you how I did it.
1. First of all I looked at some cute templates out there for sale, but I REALLY wanted to make my own because I had a design in mind. Plus I wanted to learn how to do this for myself. At first, I thought that I would have to know computer code, but after a little digging and you tube video watching, I found out that I could use Artisteer to build blog templates. Artisteer is a program that you can download for about $50. So, I used some of my TPT money and invested in this software. They have a trial version for free that puts watermarks on your pages, but I just went ahead and bought it without trying it out because I had watched the you tube videos. (sidenote I have a word press blog, but Artisteer works for blogger too!) Click below to go to the Artisteer site.
3. Then I used Photoshop which I already had on my computer to put the cute clip art together to make my blog header. I believe you can probably get Photoshop for less on Amazon.com because I checked prices on the updated version. Every now and then though Adobe has sales on their software, so it would be worth signing up on their email list to know about sales. There may be some comparable software to Photoshop that you could put your clip art together in, but I don’t know about it. Please comment if you know of something that works better. I will warn you that Photoshop is a learning curve if you haven’t used photo editing software like it before, and you may be better off paying someone to design a header for you, or paying for a template.
4. Lesson Learned: Choose from the fonts that are web fonts on Artisteer. Don’t spend hours trying out all the cutesy fonts you have installed from elsewhere because all of the browsers (explorer, mozzilla, safari) won’t read them the same or at all for that matter. If you want cutesy fonts in your header, then you will have to install them in a picture in Photoshop. I used KevinandAmanda.com’s free fonts in my header. The only way you can have cute fonts in your posts(in word press) is if you use a widget for google web fonts, but even those aren’t always read in their cutesy-ness by devices such as an ipad. I can’t speak for blogs with a blogger platform.
*****(July 27, 2013–Since the time I originally wrote this post, I found a plug in that works wonders. It is “Use Any Font”. That plugin gave me the ability to put the cute font on my headers, titles, and hyperlinks. This plugin will change the font in your posts as well, but I opted not to do this because the font was a bit wearisome to to the eyes. The plugin was a God send. I installed it and was able to see the results within a matter of minutes. It was so easy to use!)
5. Thanks to Wayne Gretzky for helping me to make a button for my blog on his great button maker site. Also, for a really great tutorial with step by step and picture instructions on how to make a blog button, go here to my pregnancybaby.com.
I hope the above helps you if you plan on creating a blog. I still have a few glitches to work out in my own blog, but it is almost where I want it 🙂 yay me! I feel like I just won a marathon.
Pardon the Mess
I will be working on uploading a new template for my blog today, so pardon the mess as I tweak everything.
A “Lofty” Deal
Summer Fun Day #3! So I was minding my own business yesterday just meandering through some stores…I was actually looking at some office furniture to tell the truth because I was checking dimensions for my home office…when all of a sudden I stumbled into Ann Taylor Loft. I was absolutely not planning on buying ANYTHING especially because they are so pricey. Well, I discovered they were having a half off of their clearance sale…you’ve got to love a discount on clearance merchandise! So I looked a little longer than I had planned. I found an adorable all cotton sweater (it is hard to find all cotton sweaters anymore–my favorite!!!) At first I looked at the price tag and thought I saw $44–not much of a clearance. Then I looked again. Are you ready for this? The tag said $4.88. I thought that it had to be a mistake until I discovered another one just like it priced for $4.88. Below you will see my oh, so, cute new sweater which I got for$5.29 with tax :). Yay, me! I figure I can wear this in spring or fall this coming school year. I am telling you about this fabulous find so that you can go shopping, too, and find some deals. Ann Taylor Loft is friendly to teachers offering us all a 15% discount and some other perks. To sign up for their perks, click here.
A Branching Unit–with a Makeover!
I’m so thankful for a summer vacation and the beautiful weather we have been having. Usually it is so hot and humid this time of year, but the weather has been so mild and beautiful compared to recent years. Yesterday was really my first day out that actually felt like a vacation. I have been going to trainings and working on our district’s pacing guide. With all of that said, I spent yesterday doing the finishing touches on a branching unit I had posted previously on TPT. One of my summer goals is to improve some of the items, which I feel need a makeover that are posted in my store. I am so much more proud of this unit now. I included some of the fun branching templates that a co-teacher and I devised to make branching and our hallway more fun which weren’t there before! I hope that those of you who have already downloaded this item enjoy using these materials even more now. Last summer was the first summer I got REALLY serious about selling on TPT, and in this year I have learned so much–from fellow bloggers, from TPT, and from my customers.
I am also considering doing a whole new makeover for my blog…hopefully to be coming soon :)!
Below I have posted pictures of my new and improved branching unit which I used when teaching my third grade class several years ago. The new part is the templates that we used to decorate our hallway with ‘branching trees’, more detailed teacher notes, student word problems, and I included some scaffolded practice for struggling students to group their tens and ones. I have posted a sample of some of the student sheets that you can try out for free. When you click below, the link will take you to my store where you can download the free preview.
Use Your “Time” Wisely doing this…
Never take your blank classroom wall space for granted. Below I have pictured what I placed around my classroom clock. Then I added some extra items instead of just the numbers around the clock with the quarters of an hour as I saw students having misconceptions about several concepts. I noticed students struggling with all of the different words that meant before (to, til, until), so I posted an anchor chart showing this around the clock. I also posted an anchor chart showing how each fifteen minute increment adds up as quarters of an hour. This is a picture from a classroom I had several years ago, and it isn’t the most beautiful, perfect clock display. If you use this idea or have done something similar, post a link in the comments to show how you displayed yours in a more aesthetically pleasing way since mine is lacking in this department :).
Try This Reward If You Have No Funds…
Last week we held a final championship for students in second through fifth grades for the classes’ highest percentage of correct answers during “Math Wars”. “Math Wars” is our affectionate name for math fact races. Surprisingly the underdogs (second graders) won the final championship while a fifth grade class had been winning all year. So, of course as second graders are, they were so EXCITED that they had won– as was their teacher. Since I didn’t have any funding for anything extra special, I, we’ll say ‘renovated’ an old trophy, which I found gathering dust. I cleaned it up a bit and made a new plaque for it as you can see below. I also handed out a golden abacus to each grade level winner. The golden abacuses were awarded and switched among classes all year after each “Math War”. Pictured below are all of the awards. I hope they give you some ideas.
Math Wars trophy for first place and golden abacuses for grade level winners.
For the math timed tests I used for math wars, click here.
For an example of how a teacher kept up with her own math races to prepare for math wars, click here.
For more about the math fact races, click here.
I Just Saw the Most Brilliant Use of a Flip Cam!
When I stepped into a classroom yesterday I was so intrigued that I couldn’t leave. Before I spill the beans on what I saw, I must say this. There has been a lot of emphasis at my school about having students share their work for a lesson closing. This idea could also spill over into the common core mathematical practices in which students must “construct viable arguments and construct the reasoning of others”. Now I understand that when students share their work in front of the class that this does promote other students’ higher levels of thinking as other students decide whether they agree or disagree. On the other hand at this late point in the school year the downfall of student sharing is that even with a doc camera and students’ micro phoned voices other students attention spans are likened to a fly hovering over a summer picnic buffet.
Now, onto what I saw. Ms. T was showing students a flip cam video of herself talking to a student named ‘Briana’, who was solving a double digit addition problem with base ten blocks which she had taped during the students’ work time. She showed the video to students after their work time and paused it after the questions she asked Briana in the video. Then Ms. T would ask the class what the answer was to the question in the video. The class would respond. Then Ms. T would un-pause the video to allow the class to see if Briana answered, counted, or exchanged blocks correctly. I absolutely loved this–so much more engaging than regular sharing!
Thanks to the literacy people who ordered these flip cams with literacy money! 🙂 They were originally bought for students to do book talks. Using them for math sharing–so much better in my unbiased opinion ;).
