Friday Favorites

Welcome back to Friday Favorites! I hope you have all had a great week! 

Students as Inspiration

This week,  I was lucky to be included in choosing our 5th grade student council officers. Sitting in on these interviews really brightened up my whole week. Sometimes I watch the news and get really nervous thinking about what our world will look like in 10 years, 20 years, even 50? Listening to these students and their thoughtful answers made me very hopeful. The things these 10 and 11 year olds were saying were nothing short of inspirational. They were genuine, caring, and showed depth of character. I used an amazing app that I will introduce you to on number 2 of Friday Faves to create some "Pin" worthy material. Enjoy! 

Canva

Canva is a fantastic little app that I was introduced to at a technology seminar last summer. You can create cute logos, picture overlays, postcards, presentations, flyers, and more. The best part...they look totally professional. You can click the "Canva" heading above this paragraph to go to their website. This is the app I used to make the student quotes in number one! 

They have some premade templates that you can edit, or you can design your own. 

I started with a template and designed these...

I used the Facebook Cover Picture tab, searched for coffee, and then made this fun creation...  

The possibilities are endless. I apologize in advance for the time you will waste spend playing with the designs. I haven't explored the website too much, but just from the homepage, it looks like you can create really cute invitations and Save the Date cards as well! 

Organization

I love finding new ways to organize my materials. For 10 years while I was teaching first grade, I kept my files in file folders organized by the weekly story like this...  

#hotmess!
These files still live down in the first grade hallway as "just in case" files. Just in case the internet is down, just in case the H drive disappears, etc. This was a great system for papers, but I also put  shoved teacher examples, games, laminated cards, posters, and all kinds of other things in there. You can imagine the mess that created from time to time. In fact, just looking at this is kind of stressing me out right now.

Thanks to Pinterest, I have a great new way to organize my counseling files. Binders! 

Each counseling theme has its own binder. It is so much easier to find what I need and the papers and examples aren't all crumpled up when I pull them out. I put everything in protective sleeves and organized it by grade level.

I even put books that I use with the lessons inside the sleeves. 

If you have another great way to organize files, please let me know. For now, I am loving this system! 

Beautiful Oops!

We have been discussing our mindsets the last two weeks in guidance lessons. For my non-educator friends, having a growth mindset can basically be summed up with the words perseverance, grit, resiliency, and determination. It's ok to be wrong, it's ok to make a mistake, it's ok if you don't get what you want, it's ok if things don't go your way. You are learning from all of these experiences. 

In first grade, I read the story Beautiful Oops and the kids LOVED it. It has pop up pictures and very cool illustrations. It is perfect for K-2 kids.

 I painted "oopsies" all over these sheets of paper. 

Then I asked the first graders to help me make the mistakes into something beautiful. They were so creative...

Goggles

Zebra

Roller Coaster

 

Triceratops

T-Rex

This is just the beginning of the understanding that life is messy, but it is also beautiful. 

The weather forecast for next week! Finally, cooler weather!

 It's time for pumpkins, scarves, vests, and boots. Oh, the boots. I bought this pair of UGGS at the Nordstrom anniversary sale this summer and they have been staring at me, begging me to wear them ever since.

Have a great weekend, yall!