It's certainly hard to believe we're already into in-services. I had so many intentions for the summer months...
Anyway, it's time to gear up again and I want to share a couple of ideas I've used with success in my classroom. The first is some whiteboard or small chalkboard erasers for students to use. I start with a large black eraser (I've even used my old, used ones, now that I'm blessed with a whiteboard and Activboard in my classroom.) First, you go into the stitches between the part you hold in your hand and the folds of felt and snip the stitches. There will be single flaps on the ends and doubles in the middle. Once removed from the stiff board, you will remove the stray threads and then cut the middle flaps apart. Last, you can see from the picture below how I've taken one felt rectangle and glued it onto a large tongue depressor. Elmers or wood glue works fine, but be sure to get the corners. Let them dry and you have 6 small student erasers for the price of one larger one. They are much cheaper than commercially made ones.
The other "goodie" I want to share is an idea to save the disagreements over whose coat hook is whose in the closet. For this I simply used cleaned out milk cartons.First, I cut them apart and removed the top and bottoms. (The top does make a good funnel and the bottom can make a small dish for holding word cards or other small items, like paper clips. For this purpose, though, that makes for a lot of precise cutting and maybe those would be better made from another milk carton.) Second, I cut the long sides into rough rectangles (the dips and indentations won't matter so don't be too particular about using only flat pieces.) Then I take them to the die-cut machine and select ovals or other fist-sized cutouts. I cut one shape for each student and I punch a hole at the top and voila! You have a very sturdy tag on which to use a permanent marker to label student names. Our rule is: this stays on the back or bottom part of the hook and the jacket or coat goes over it. The backpack is kept on the front or top hook for easier access. Once you put these in place, many battles simply subside. Our closet is small, if I have a large class; so I often have to place early "arrivers" on the bottom rows and late "arrivers" on the top row. At year's end just use lighter fluid or some sort of acetone (nail polish remover works too) to erase the names and you are ready to go for the next year's prep.
I'll try to include another idea or two soon...I hope. For the rest of my time this evening, I'm off to soak up a mystery on TV and maybe tackle some of the dreaded ironing.
Later,
Pam
