Crafty Classroom

I've been a busy bee this week beautifying my classroom. Yippee! :) Let's take a peek.

The first thing I did was make curtains! This was my big challenge and worry because I don't sew. At all. But I did it, all by myself and in my own way. Plus they are cute and turned out great!

So I started with cute polkadot fabric.

I picked a ribbon border to go with it. I chose brown,wide ribbon because my classroom colors are sky blue, lime green, and brown. My walls are the blue so I wanted to accent with the green. I then took good scissors, my rods, and fabric glue with me to school. 

My idea was to let the fabric do most of the work so I didn't have to.:) I did not want to mess anything up and the more I worked with it the greater the chance of mess up! I also couldn't find my tape measure, so there was even more risk for mistakes! Yikes!

So I started by making sure I liked the length of the already done fabric in the window. I thought it was great, so yea for no more cutting! I then checked my fabric against the curtain rod. Since I didn't have a way to easily measure, I just rolled out the tension rod to the right length and then "measured" with it.I had exactly enough fabric to do my 2 windows! What a miracle! 

I kept the fold that was already in the fabric. It was the perfect length. So all I had to do was "sew" the bottom. I folded my ribbon in half. I glued one half of the ribbon to one side with the fabric glue. I then turned it over and folded the other side of the ribbon on to the fabric and glued that.

What do you know?! A curtain!Without any sewing and only fabric glue. You could use iron on webbing as well, but I sometimes have bad luck with that. It eventually comes undone. Fabric glue never has, plus I didn't want to lug my iron and stuff to school with me. 

I just thread the fabric onto the rod and hung it up. A window with an actual curtain!

Not only one, but two! It only took like 15 minutes max, too!

 I also found the greatest stuff! Glitter tape! I got mine at Michael's but I saw that Wal-Mart had somein their scrapbook section. My Wal-Mart was out though. :( I thought it would be perfect for my hanging work wall to show off their awesome work. So I bought some glitter tape and clothespins and  I was ready to go. 

Easy peasy! It did take longer than I thought it would. The darn back wouldn't come off very easily. I finally figured out that if you bend the corner back and forth a couple times then it comes off much easier. All you do is peel and stick! How great is that?! Boring to bling in a flash! It took less than a 3 yard roll to do 22 clothespins. :) 

And now for my fabulous work wall! I love it!

Woohoo for fast and easy fabulousness!

Be fun and fabulous!

~Mrs. Sweeney

We are all different!

Variety is the spice of life! I love this lesson that lets little people know that being different is ok. It's a great beginning of the year lesson.  I use the book The Crayon Box that Talked by Shane DeRolf. Cute book and perfect when showing how different is good.

I start the lesson by drawing a picture with only one color in a crayon box. For example, I might use the color blue. I would color grass, a tree, the sun, a person, etc all in the blue color. I have the kids come up and add things, still using the blue. Then I ask what the picture is missing. Some might say a dog or a bird, etc but the answer you are looking for is COLOR! Then I talk about ice cream. Yeah, weird segue, but they get it. :) I ask the class if they like ice cream. Then ask those who like chocolate to  raise their hand, the same with those who like vanilla, and then those that like strawberry, etc. I then ask the children if they would still be friends with a person who likes chocolate ice cream even if they liked vanilla. Ask them how it would feel if their friend didn't like them because they liked a certain flavor. That gets a good conversation going. Then I ask if anyone knows what happens when you mix chocolate and vanilla together? It makes a swirl or twist cone. Yummy! 

By this time in the year ( a couple of weeks), we've been doing "All About Me" stuff, so we've talked a lot about same and different. We talk about that a little bit and then I mention how some people don't like others who are different from them. We talk about our picture and that if no one was different then we would live in a one color world and that would be BORING! 

Then I read the book. Then I  lead a discussion about how our classroom is like a box of crayons. All of us are different- different colors, ages, talents, etc., but we will all work together to have a great year! At this point, I usually tell the students to look at their neighbor and tell them something they like about that person after giving an example. :) I like this part. Ask the students how it made them feel to hear something nice. We want our classroom to be a nice place where we can all work together to have a great classroom. When we say nice things and treat each other kindly it makes us feel good. Think about yourself as one of the crayons in the crayon box. Each of you is special and unique, but we need all of you to make our world beautiful. Then we re-draw our one color picture using many colors in our box of crayons. We talk about which picture we like best and then talk about how we all bring unique things to the world, just like each color crayon. 

Then we make our own classroom Crayon Box. It is so cute and I love to display it. It is a great reminder to be good friends and support differences. They have to draw their head to look exactly like them. Well, at least they are supposed to. :)

This pictures was from when I was student teaching and my first time teaching this lesson. :)

Have fun and be fabulous!

~Mrs. Sweeney

Bulletin Board Fun and Fabulous Style

Who covers their paper covered bulletin board with electricity? This girl! But it was awesome and so cute! That makes the slight risk worth it, right? I think so. :) You probably do too, so just go ahead and do it.

During my many teaching courses I had to do an interactive bulletin board. It was Christmas time and I wanted to be able to keep the board up for at least a little while. No boring Christmas themes here! I did a winter board covered in Christmas lights. What could be better?!

The tree was on the board year round so we could just change it per season. The large snow flakes have the kiddos names in their Reading center groups. The small snowflakes are the various centers (computers, Big Books, Read to self, Work work, etc.) So all we had to do was change the small smowflakes each day. You could do it the opposite and have the kids be the moveable snowflakes, either way works. Then you add the lights, and voila! What a difference the lights make and sooo pretty when the lights are off. It would have been an okay board before the lights, but the lights add so much.  Do it, you know you want to. :)