Meet the Teacher!!

Link Up with Blog Hoppin' and tell about yourself...




Tell Us Something About You: This is my 14th year of teaching. I taught First Grade for 5 years, Second Grade for 1 year and Kindergarten for 8 years. I've been teaching All Day Kindergarten for 5 years now. I've been married for 14 years to my husband, Jason. We have 2 kids.. Hayley Danielle is 11 and Hayden Daniel is 8. I am convinced it was meant to be that my son chose me to be his parent....he has some learning issues and I really understand how to help him better than anyone else...My daughter is an avid competitive diver and my husband has endless patience when it comes to my career and the beginning of the year craziness!

You Might Not Know: I did not want to be a teacher...at first.  I was convinced it was too traditional and just not my thing. After some of my undergrad methods courses I realized it was something I was good at. I had a wonderful student teaching experience! I recently earned my Master Teacher accreditation through my school district which took me over a year to achieve. I HATE shopping unless I am by myself and even then I find it is a chore. Grocery shopping is ok. I prefer to do most of my Christmas shopping online. 

What Are You Most Looking Forward to This Year: Enlightening the powers that be.... in a gentle manner of course.  Just when we adopt and implement a new assessment, data tool, computer program, etc. our district goes out and purchases something entirely different. Or entirely similar! Sometimes these kinds of programs are not appropriate for this grade level! If I'm appointed to be on the committee and go through the training, I'm going to have to speak up. I enjoy the beginning of every year. I like being organized and implementing new things each school year.

What Do You Need to Improve: Daily 5! I really need to buckle down and implement it the way it is supposed to be and find a way that works for me. I'd like to streamline more of my record keeping, parent handouts and lesson plans digitally, and do less with paper. I'm thinking of working on a parent handbook on CD. I'd like to work smarter, not harder.

What Teaching Supplies Can You NOT Live Without: my DJInkers CD roms/downloads, Sharpies, Diet Pepsi (truly addicted), my laptop, Crayola markers, Crayola crayons, my document camera, my classroom rocking chair and large chart paper...the kind that feels like newsprint and has the blue lines... all of my Gail Gibbons books! Lastly, teaching blogs. I heart blogging!

Thanks for reading!