 Good morning guys, welcome back to the channel. Today is Monday, September 24th, and I just walked in the door. I was looking for, so I walked in, and I immediately went to grab my tripod, but I noticed that the little pin that goes in the top is missing, so. I know that this has been sitting on my desk, and I know that I've had some children touching my desk without permission, because I have had to remind them not to touch items on my desk. So I'm wondering if somebody, you know, some little ninja decided they were gonna pick this up and like fling it around, and then the pin fell out. So, I'm gonna make that a mission today to find the pin, but I wanted to update you guys, I am gonna try really hard to vlog this week, because I feel like I haven't been here on YouTube as much, and I just miss vlogging and sharing everything with you guys, but I have to be real and honest, like I am struggling with balancing everything, and filming and editing vlogs is part of that struggle of balance. But I wanted to tell you guys why I haven't been vlogging, and that is simply because I have a lot more expectations upon my shoulders this school year than I ever have as a teacher. First of all, this is the first year, since like my first year of school that I've had to submit lesson plans Sunday night, and the people that are walking through my classroom are looking to see the correlation between my lesson plans, what I'm teaching, and the curriculum map. So, I have a lot more pressure because I have people actually holding me accountable. Now of course, as a teacher, I know that I'm supposed to be teaching along to the curriculum map, and I'm supposed to be teaching what I say that I'm teaching, but it's just harder when people are actually coming in, and it's more stressful, and it's like a lot of pressure. Basically, any break that I get throughout the day, I'm planning, and I'm prepping for the next week, and it's just really hard to pick up a camera when I have so much to do and so little time. My specials time, I have 30 minutes, and then at lunch I have 35 minutes. Yeah, so I basically get an hour a day during the school day to get anything done. I get here at seven o'clock, the kids don't come until 8.05. If I have a duty, I go to duty at 8.05. If I don't have a duty, I have about an hour and 20 minutes because school begins at 8.20. School is out at 2.55, but I leave at 3.30, which is the exact time that I'm allowed to leave. So I get to work about 30 minutes before my contract begins because my contracted time is either 7.30 to 3.30, or 8 o'clock to 4 o'clock. And because I live so far, I could hit really bad traffic if I don't leave early enough. So I usually, so I have an expectation for myself to be at work at 7 and to leave at 3.30, which will get me home before 4.30. So with that being said, I have to be like a huge busy, I have to be a busy worker bee throughout the school day. If I wanna get everything done, then I need to get done. That way I don't have to take anything home with me because that's the goal. I'm refusing to take work home with me unless it's like typing a lesson plan because when I'm at home, I wanna be mommy and I wanna be Mrs. Valdez, Scott's wife. So I just walked in the door. Everything that I need for this week is already prepped and planned. So I'm just gonna show you guys how I organize everything. I use these drawers like I did last year and like many teachers do, but I actually use them and I update them daily. So today's things are here, ready to go. So all I have to do is pull everything out of here. For today, I am going to be starting to teach multiplication strategies as far as like facts go. They already have had the introduction to multiplication and modeling it. Now we're working on strategies for multiplying by twos, threes, fours, fives, things like that. That's for math. I am also teaching point of view and perspective this week. So I printed these little mini posters. These are going to go in their reading notebooks. There's a point of view one and then there's a mini poster for each different point of view that they can have. And then we're gonna do an activity where they get personal perspectives and different perspectives on different topics. So I'm also teaching perspective because in third grade, they have to compare their own perspective or point of view to that of the narrator or the characters in the story. So I thought this would be a great way to kind of get the kids collaborating, moving around using perspective. So I pulled those out and then I actually put them over on my bench, which is where I usually keep all of the items that I'm using for the day. So I'll move those over there in just a minute, but I have everything copied and ready for Tuesday, everything copied and ready for Wednesday, everything copied and ready for Thursday, and then everything for Fridays actually in this tub because on Friday I had things in here already, so I'll just move all of these up to Friday. But that's basically how I organize my week so that on Monday morning I walk in, everything's already ready for me and all I have to do is sit down and start planning for next week. So today is Monday the 24th and today is picture day. So I have a lot of things going on. I also have a woman from the Avid, our district Avid representative is coming today to just take a look through the classrooms of people that went to the Avid conference this summer, which if you guys have been following me for a while, then you watched my Seattle Avid visit video, which I didn't get anything about Avid in at all, but that's okay because I was super engaged in the learning that was taking place at the Avid conference. So it wasn't a huge deal that I didn't get a lot because I was engaged. So I'm just, I gave my Avid coordinator the wrong times that we would be in the classroom because we're going to pictures and then I forgot we had specials at a certain time. So I'm really like, I apologized. I was like, I'm so sorry I wasn't better organized. Last week was really rough. If you guys don't follow me on Instagram, make sure you're following me on Instagram because I post a lot more frequently there and just more like personal experiences. Basically, Cash had a lot of issues last week. He was sick for a day and then we had chiropractors appointments and we had to cancel those appointments and we had a childcare thing and it was just weird and scary, but everything's fine. It's all settled and fine, but this week is gonna be a lot better, but I apologized to her for being unorganized and I don't know if the Avid people are gonna come in today. If they do, awesome. If they don't, oh well. I'm not really worried about it. So I'm just gonna update the schedule. At my school, we don't need to have ICANN statements. We can do a topic and a do. I personally prefer to do ICANN statements and my principal does not care whether or not I do a topic, do objective or an ICANN statement. He just cares that what they're doing is on the board so that he can correlate the schedule to my plans and plan book. So I'm gonna update the schedule really quick and then, yeah. Okay, so really quickly, before I start my day, I wanted to share a couple of classroom behavior management strategies that I use in my classroom and that you could totally use with your classroom. Some of you probably or might already do these things, but I have gotten a lot of questions this last week about behavior management and I just wanted to share a few things. Disclaimer, I am not in any way claiming that I have the best management skills because I am mega struggling this year with this group. They're super chatty. They are super, like, they have very strong personalities. They have a mind of their own and I am working through managing behavior day to day and every day is a different struggle. So I'm using these tools to help me manage their behavior and they seem to be doing pretty good. We'll see how they go. So one of the very first things that I use is the Holbrein Teaching Scoreboard and I got these on Teachers Pay Teachers. I forget who the seller is but basically I use the scoreboard here. And as you can see, there's an oops and an oh yeah area and basically any time my students do anything that I ask them to do the first time or correctly, I will give them an oh yeah point. If they do not do it the first time I ask or they don't do it correctly, I give them an oops point. At the end of the day, if my students have more oh yeah points than oops points, they get to pull two sticks out of this kerplunk. I've seen this used on Instagram. That's where I got the idea. I don't remember who exactly it was but once all of the balls fall into the bottom container, the class gets a reward and they get to vote on what this reward is. Last Friday we had a donut and hot chocolate party because the balls were had fallen. Now I usually do one stick at a time but that is usually geared up more toward if they're good all the time and my students need a little bit more of a push. So I'm allowing my kids to pull two sticks out a day just so that that first reward could get there quickly so that they could see oh yeah, we get a reward. She's not lying. The second thing that I use because my class is very, very chatty and that is blurt beans and basically all you do with blurt beans is you get two containers. So I have a small jar and I have a large jar. This jar is for me and this jar is for my students. So basically every kid gets four blurt beans at the beginning of the day. Anytime a student talks while I'm talking or is talking when they shouldn't be talking, I tell them that they owe me a bean. If they owe me a bean, they bring it up and they put it into my jar which is usually placed right here on this little black table up front so it's out of the way but it's always in the same place. So they put a bean in my jar if I tell them that they owe me a bean. They do it immediately, there's no waiting. It doesn't matter what we're doing at that moment, they get up and they put a bean in the jar. Once the end of the day comes, whatever beans are left in the student's possession, meaning they have left, they pour all of their beans into the big jar. As you can see, there are some goals on here, goal number one, goal number two and goal number three. My lettering for goal number two got destroyed so I just put two on there. Once the beans touch the certain goal lines, the students will get a reward. So basically I'm pushing rewards right now because my kids are having a really hard time following directions, behaving correctly in a classroom. I think that they just have a lot of old, naughty habits that I'm trying to just. So once that first goal is met and I, whatever, what they will earn for that first reward is 45 minutes of free time at the end of the week. So I have a 45, 50 minute block of writing time at the end of every day except for Wednesday because it's early release day. They will earn free time for that 45 minute block instead of doing writing. So they are really working toward reaching that goal and it seems to be working pretty well. I also manage student behavior with bathroom sticks and today's Monday so I'm glad that I'm talking about this because I'm reminding myself to pull them out. So every week on Monday, I give my students three popsicle sticks, three. They use these as their bathroom ticket. So I take one scheduled break after specials every day to allow my whole class to go to the bathroom. They also have recess in the afternoon and they also have lunch. If they need to use the bathroom at any other time, they have to bring me a popsicle stick and put it in this jar that's over here by the door which if you guys have seen my classroom tour, then you know that this changed a little bit but basically they put their stick in the jar. Once they run out of sticks, they may not use the bathroom. If it's an emergency, they either have to pawn a stick off of somebody else so like borrow it from somebody else or they have to give me a couple of grabbers, two grabbers which are these PBIS tickets that we pass out which is another behavior management tool. So if I am walking around or while I'm teaching I kind of hold onto these and students that volunteer to participate in a class discussion, students that are doing things that I ask them to do on a more personal one-on-one level, I pass these out. They have a grabber store that they can go to on Fridays and they can cash those in for like money to buy things at the grabber store. So I use those as well. Where was I going with this? I don't remember, I just lost my train of thought. In addition to the things that I just shared I also use class dojo and I use class dojo for a lot of reasons. The number one reason I use it is for parent communication. I have 98% of my parents on class dojo and I love it because I teach in a predominantly Spanish speaking neighborhood and class dojo translates everything to them so if they sign up as a Spanish speaker anything I type in English goes to them in Spanish. So it's really nice for parent communication. I also use that for students to take and receive points. I probably should bring my dojo store back but I haven't done it. What I've been doing is making weekly goals. So if my students have three points by Wednesday they get to bring gum and chew gum and we call it Tuesday, which should be Tuesday but usually my kids can't get three points by Tuesday so we go for Wednesday or we just pick a day. So if I forget or something it's Friday or whatever. But I think I need to do another goal. So like five or more points you get to do this or bring my store back. I'm not sure yet. Oh, I think I know where I was going with this. My popsicle sticks. If my students keep all three sticks on if they have all three of them on Monday before I pass them out, they get an extra dojo point. So there is like positive reinforcement for not using the bathroom during the school day and using it at other breaks. So I feel like, okay, is that everything that I do behavior management wise? I'm pretty sure. Class dojo, blurt beans, kerplunk, scoreboard, bathroom sticks, grabbers. There's a lot going on but honestly it never is a dull moment to give these kids positive reinforcement and I feel like there can't be too many things going on at once, I don't know. The dojo thing is just nice because parent communication and that's what I really like. What is this on my camera? It's temperature, it's overheating. Oh my gosh, really? Okay, that's my cue to take a break from filming. So this is the kind of stuff I'm talking about. Like the reason I'm so stressed out all the time and not wanting to vlog is because I'm making mistakes on things that I wouldn't normally make mistakes on. I get up at five o'clock every day and I have to be out the door by six to make it to work on time and today I decided to take both sets of keys so my husband has no access to the car so he can't go anywhere today and that means if there's an emergency with the baby he has to call an Uber or a taxi. Like this is the kind of stuff that I'm talking about. Why I'm not vlogging, why I'm just going to work, getting my stuff done because this kind of stuff is happening to me and I don't, this is stuff that normally does not happen. Like I don't take both sets of keys. So I'm really stressed out. I'm really just tired and I just, I need to just not be so tired. Just stop being tired, Charlotte, stop it. On a positive note, I am ready for the day. I'm ready for the week. So I'm just going to get my projector up on the board. I have everything ready to go for the week and I'm not going to keep stressing. Just stop stressing, Charlotte. I need to just stress. I need fall break to get here which I have next week, I have next week and then I have fall break. So I'm ready for that. Hey guys, so it is lunch time and I am just having some leftover pizza for lunch today. I made a frozen pizza for dinner last night and I had a few pieces left over. So not the healthiest of lunch options, but food is food. Ooh, Kayla's food looks good. I'm in Kayla's room using the microwave because I don't have one. So the day has gone pretty good. We got through most of the reading activity we were gonna do. We still need to meet with a friend and get their point of view on the certain topics. And then the math lesson today was kind of like yes or no. It's going through the multiplication table and looking at patterns, which I don't really think is really necessary. So I gave them all their multiplication charts or tables and I put them in a sheet protector. That way the students can draw on them and they can use their whiteboard markers to track where they are. And so we were just looking for patterns today. Not a huge deal, but we are getting ready to start talking about strategies for multiplying different factors. So that will start tomorrow. I think that'll be a lot better, but math lesson today was like a dud. Who's creeping in there? Oh, it's you. You're hidden by me. Look how teeny tiny you look compared to me in my big old heels. I look like a giant. Kayla is quite small, but she's not that small. I put seven, so imagine the difference. Anyways guys, so lunch time it is. Hopefully the end of the day goes smooth. It should. My centers are pretty ready to go. I do need to make some copies though at lunch, so we'll get that done soon. All right guys, so the day is over. Dismissal has happened. The kids are gone and I'm exhausted. I do wanna reflect though on my writing lesson. So I've taught my students how to write opinion essays. But guys, I think that I am struggling with this because I have super high expectations and I just assume that my kiddos know how to do certain things and they just don't. So I think that as a teacher it's okay to reflect. And right now I am reflecting and taking a step back to really reflect on how I can switch this up and change it so that it is more instructional writing rather than just showing them a process and letting them do it. I actually need to teach them how to go through the process slowly, giving them models, giving them sentence frames so that they can be successful. So it's just one of those things that I have to do as a transition to third grade from fourth grade. I need to not assume that my students know how to do anything and make sure that I scaffold and teach every step really carefully. So yeah, opinion writing. Some of my kiddos are doing a really, really great job so I don't feel like I need to do that for every student but I definitely think that it would be beneficial to slow down and kind of just map it out a little bit better. So I'm gonna get going and I'll see you guys tomorrow.