Idea for Pulling Sticks

Hey guys! Today I want to share with you something new I am going to try this year. In years past, I have used popsicle sticks to randomly call on students to answer questions. I use them a lot when I am doing review, specifically in Science and Social Studies. I love pulling sticks because the students never know who I'm going to call on, which causes them to pay closer attention. The only downfall I have is that I don't want to continually pull the same stick and have the same student answer multiple answer, or miss a stick and a student not have a turn. So I started laying the stick to the side once a student got an answer correct. This lead to another problem... Once the student answered a question correctly they quit paying attention because they knew I wouldn't be pulling their stick again. Sigh... This ruins the whole purpose of the review in the first place! However, I believe I have found the solution!

I have added colored dots on both ends of the popsicle stick using a sharpie: one blue, one red. (I choose these colors because it's the color scheme of my room. I'm a bit OCD about matchy matchy!) I'll begin by having all sticks having the same color sticking out. Once a student answers a question correctly I will turn their stick over so that the second color is showing. This way I know who has answered a question and who has not. It also causes students to continue paying attention after they have answered a question, since their stick is still in the cup and could still be pulled.

Here is my "sticks cup." I have two cups because I have two classes since we departmentalize. My homeroom has McDonald on the cup and the other class has their homeroom teacher's name on the cup. 

This is one of the sticks. I just used a blue and red sharpie for the dots. Easy and cheaper than buying actual dots to stick on it. 

I have seen an idea where a toilet paper role has been used hidden inside the cup. Once a student answers a question the stick goes into the toilet paper role, which keeps the pulled sticks and unpulled sticks separate.

If you use a different strategy for pulling sticks, I would love to hear about them in the comments!

I hope you enjoyed!

Organizing Student Papers!

  

I recently did a post on how I keep my papers in order in my classroom. If you missed it check it out here! I use a very similar method to organize my students papers as well. I use another milk crate and 25 hanging files numbered 1-25. I only have 25 because my class size has never exceeded 25. If you have more, then add more hanging files. :-)

Here's how it works: At the beginning of the year I give every child a number. This number is used for several things including their cubby number and book number. This number is also used in helping sort their papers. Along with writing their name on their paper they also write their number. I put all graded papers into a drawer and then sort the papers into the correlating file number. For example, all of #1's papers go into the hanging file with a 1 attached to it. Once a week I send a packet of papers home in their take home folder. I staple all papers in the same file together with a cover letter that informs parents of that weeks important information. Parents are to sign the packet and send all the attached papers back to school. I keep all signed packets until that grading period is over and then I send them home again to be kept at home. This does several things for me: 1) it keeps all student papers organized and ready to send home every week. 2) it allows parents to see their child's work and by signing it and sending it back I can know that they have seen the packet. 3) By holding on to all work until after the grading period I can pull any work if I ever need a work sample for a child.

My first year teaching I tried to file all of their papers myself, but was never able to keep up! That's why when the school system started an emphasis on having students take ownership of their classrooms and school by having "jobs" I had one of my jobs be the paper filer. That week one/two students file papers for me. I do talk to the students about not telling other students the grades they see, and I have never had a problem with it. I hope to post soon about how I set up the "jobs" in my classroom!

Maybe you can use this in your classroom! Do you have another method of sorting the students papers? If so I'd love to hear about it!

Organizing Your Papers!

Planning ahead and staying organized is what I consider a somewhat difficult task in the classroom. I found when I first started teaching that I would print my papers off for the next couple of weeks, but have no where to put them except in a large pile. Then, when it was time to teach the lesson I was frantically searching for my papers, which wasted precious teaching time. There needed to be a change and here was my solution.  I got a black milk crate from wal-mart and some hanging file folders. I labeled my file folders from 1-31and put them in my crate. Now the easy part. As I print off things that I need for my lessons they now go into my crate instead of a large paper file. I sort them by date and when it is that day all of my papers are in one place and all I need to do is pull them out. I also keep an extra file in the back for extra time activities. They don't get used very often, but you never know when you might need them. It makes life very simple, it keeps my room organized, and it keeps me from constantly trying to figure out where I put my papers. This is also great for if you wake up one morning to you being sick or your child. You have everything for that day in one folder already and you have extra activities on hand and you aren't trying to search for something. 

Classroom Ideas!

"Can I sharpen my pencil?"... If you're a teacher you probably hear this 15 times per child per day. It drives me crazy! SO I use these super cute jars to store extra pencils in. This way they can just borrow one of my pencils when they need it so they don't interrupt class to sharpen pencils. I used a plain mason jar and hot glued a ribbon to it to decorate it. I also write my name on my pencils so that they will know it's a borrowed pencil. It works great! Whenever they need a pencil they just get up and get one themselves. No more interrupting my lessons. I also store my red pens in a mason jar. We use red pens to grade work that is graded together.