Catching up with Teacher Week

I missed Must Haves Monday (I was enjoying my last day in NYC before returning to reality). So I am doing both before I'm 3 days behind!

My Must Haves
1. Flats! I have a pair in every basic color and also a few fun colors:)  I wear them to work almost every day and they are perfect.  I tend to pick pairs that have rubber soles so they are easy to move around in. My MUST HAVE color is definitely silver because I can wear them with almost every color of pants.  

2. 3 drawer carts- I use them for storage all over my room.  I have a drawer for each student's personal goal work.  I have one for puzzles.  I have some for student task storage.  I also use them at my center areas.  At the center areas the drawers have pull off numbers and the students know to go through the tasks in numerical order.  This also makes it easy for task areas to be cleaned up independently by the students.  (I'll post pictures of my classroom soon!)

3. Velcro- I bet this is on every special ed teacher's list of must haves!  I use it like CRAZY!  I Velcro tasks, I Velcro signs, I Velcro PECS around the room, I make adapted books using Velcro, there's Velcro everywhere and I can't imagine how my classroom would be without Velcro!

My Technology Tip

Fortunately, I have an iPad for my classroom and also one at home! I use my iPad everyday in my classroom and it really helps engage my students.
Here are some of my favorite apps:

Personal Use:

• HBO GO- you can watch full seasons of ALL of their shows, even new episodes!
• Netflix
• Hulu Plus
• Vtok- this is basically GoogleChat for iPad
• Flixster
• Pandora
• AppsGoneFree- a daily list of apps that are free, they are often apps that aren't very useful but keep checking because once in a while there's a great educational one

School Use:

• grasshopperapps.com- All of their apps are great and a lot of them are free.  They also give options for differentiation on many of them!
• Sight Words-Photo Touch
• Things that go Together
• I Like Books (a collection of 30 books!)
• Tell Time
• Bugs & Buttons- a ton of great games that teach fine motor skills, matching, patterns, and etc.  This app is worth the few dollars it costs.
• Fisher Price apps- they're all cute and educational
• Adding Apples 
• Subtracting Sardines
• I Can Write 2
• Toy Story Interactive Book
• TocaBoca apps -these are student favorites and they often go free you just have to keep an eye out
• Toca Store
• Toca Hair Salon
• Monster Kitchen
• Toca Doctor

A great newsletter to subscribe to for free & discounted apps is: Technology in Special Education 

Link up at Blog Hoppin' for Teacher Week!

There are some great giveaways going on right now.  Click below to enter yourself!

                   

Thanks for reading and please consider becoming a follower if you're not already.  My app is new but I am excited to be entering the world of blogging as a blogger.

Thirsty Thursday

Not that kind of thirsty....  I'm thirsting to get into my classroom!  My husband and I got married on July 28 and since then we've been all over the map.  We had a mini honeymoon in Traverse City (our favorite place to be and also where we got married!!)!  And now I'm following him on the road for work, first we were in Toronto and now we're in New York.  I'm sure it sounds fun and it's great spending time with him but as it gets closer to the school year beginning I just want to be home getting ready.  I've bought so many great products that I can't wait to make and I have an idea of the theme I want in my classroom and I've been collecting ideas of how to pull it off!  I also know from my brother, who is house-sitting, that all of my great buys from Amazon have been slowly arriving.  So, I'm calling today Thirsty Thursday!

There are also a gazillion pins on Pinterest that I'd like to create for new tasks for my students.  Here are my Top 3 that I'd really like to get done before September 4th when school starts for my kiddos:

Positive Behavior Support:

Token Economy Boxes- This idea came from Classroom in the Corner and I think it's perfect for my students. She has one for herself and each of her paraprofessionals.  They are filled with all the things that motivate her students as well as visuals for expectations and the coins they can earn while working.  I could see it being a good place for a social story about behavior as well. 

(click the picture to link back to my PBS pinboard)

Getting to know you activity:

Student & Staff Memory- This idea I came across last year from A Place called Kindergarten but I never used it.  This year I'm going to use it in two ways.  First, I will create a memory game of just the students and staff from our classroom.  Then, I will create a memory game of the other important staff members my students should know around the building.  With my more verbal students I will urge them to say the student/staff members name each time they flip a card.  For my non-verbal students I will work on having them match the picture to the actual person in the room (this will most likely be a hand over hand activity but that's okay), hoping to help them make the connection.  

(click the picture to get to my September pinboard)

Reading Area/Break Area:

I have a lot of limitations in my classroom as far as set up because there are many things that need to be accounted for.  I would love a cozy reading area like the ones I see in everyone's classroom pictures but for now that is just not possible in my room.  However, I think I found something that can serve two purposes:

(click the picture to get to my classroom setup pinboard)

I also want to share that Erin & Leslie at First Grade Fanatics are having a great back to school giveaway and I'm really hoping I win!  I find lower elementary curriculum to be perfect to use or modify for my class. Click the picture to get enter yourself!

Unique learning system

Let me start by celebrating the fact that I just found out that Scotch Laminators are on sale!!  I couldn't help myself and I bought one (I chose the one I did because it comes with a variety of sleeves for laminating and I figure I can decide which works best for me and invest in them in bulk in the future) as well as these goodies for the upcoming school year:

I've decided to teach manners in September alongside Rules and People in our school.  Hopefully I get through it all!  I have a plan but my students may not agree with it (behaviors often limit how much I get through)!

Lite Brite!!!  I'd like to use this for my stations (in my classroom it's basically centers).  I've seen some great ideas on blogs and Pinterest and I'm excited to use some.

I saw one of these books at Target and immediately bought one but ended up gifting it to my nephew because he liked it so much.  They will be great for my kiddos because they are very reinforcing.

I bought these to go with I Spy activities in this packet I bought from the sale at Marsha McGuire's TPT store.  It's way more than I need (I only have 6 students) but I'm sure some will get lost throughout the years.

ALRIGHT, onto some more helpful information for those of you reading (I hope there's some!).  Last year when I got my job I was starting from scratch.  While there were plenty of resources in my room for teaching from they were all over the place and I wasn't sure where to start but I just did my best until...I found out my district purchased this amazing curriculum: Unique Learning Systems (the link will take you to a sample Elementary unit).  This curriculum is put together by the same company that publishes News2You if you're familiar with them.  If you're not, they're pretty great.

Why do I love Unique Learning Systems (ULS)?!?!

*The lessons are aligned with the Common Core Standards!!  Each lesson tells which CCS(s) is being addressed!!!!

*They incorporate Science, Social Studies, Math, &  Language Arts

*They include 3 levels for many of the lessons (and the levels fit most CI or ASD students!!!)

*There is a new theme each month that I can easily supplement if necessary. 

*The curriculum is revolving- there are 3 years worth of lessons and then you can either repeat them or move up to the next level.

*They have a lot of literacy experiences for the kiddos.  

*Recipes, science experiments, games, and etc.

*Many of the lessons also have online options.

*I could go on and on with all the great features of this curriculum.  And I'm not writing this to promote the company for any reason other than it's a great curriculum and I am so much better off because of it.

Let me know if you have any questions and I can do my best to answer them!

Back to School Shopping!

I just bought 8 items!  My wishlist was twice that size but I decided to hold off (8/12-I may give in and buy the rest tomorrow- 8/15- I did buy more before the sale ended!).

Here are some highlights (please excuse the images, I'm playing around with PicMonkey):

I've had this on my wishlist since I came across it in June in Alessia Albanese's Store.  My students last year loved play dough.  It was an activity that would keep them engaged for quite some time.  I never gave the activity too much structure because I was surprised by how freely they were able to explore and create on their own.  Often times students with Autism struggle with open ended activities.  This year I'm going to try to balance free play with some more structured time with play dough to take advantage of how much they like the stuff!

Here's another item that's been on my wishlist for months.  Last year I was hired for my classroom RIGHT BEFORE the start of year.  I was in another mind set (I was going to be teaching K in a different district) and I didn't do a word wall!! I know it sounds crazy but I was not sure of what my students would be like and how many were reading and etc.  This year I WILL HAVE A WORDWALL and this product is going to help make it super cute!  I started fooling around with it and it's very easy to edit so I can use all the Dolch words that I get to this year and beyond!

I came across this unit Friday at Kreative in Kinder's Store and I think it will be perfect.  I don't have a science curriculum of any sort so I'm always looking for new resources.  I think this will be perfect!

I bought Bead It from Marsha McGuire's Store, to extend and give more structure to the center activity.  I usually just write words or sentences on index cards for the kids to bead but this takes things a step further.  I look forward to starting this at my Fine Motor station in the fall!

I've been waiting for this sale all summer and I'm glad that I was able to take advantage of a lot of great deals.  Thanks to all the creators of these great products.  Maybe I will eventually get to the point that I can create such amazing curriculum too.  

There are still some sales going on so it's not too late!
Happy Shopping:)

(click the images!)

Hello Blog World!

I've been wanting to start my own blog for a while but decided to wait until I was no longer planning a wedding (I got married July 28th!).  Well, it's been a few weeks since then so I think it's time.  

I discovered the teaching blog world in June 2011 and was upset I was missing out on all the wonderful resources and people for so long!  However, now that I've been a blog reader for over a year I feel that I am a better teacher because of all of the amazing teachers who are sharing their knowledge and ideas.  I hope that I can be as inspirational to others as other have been to me.

I am currently sitting in a hotel room while my husband (crazy using that word!) is at work.  He travels for his job and I decided to come along for a little while to keep him company.  I've been taking advantage of all of this time on my hands to get ready for next school year (it's been on my mind since before I finished last school year but I had to focus on the wedding).  

I started reading the link-up for Daily 5 and I was especially interested in the Special Ed teachers with self-contained classrooms who were finding it to be a successful teaching tool. As a teacher of students with Autism I'm constantly looking for new ways to help my students learn and make connections. 

 I've been working on finding a way to incorporate the Daily 5 with this amazing curriculum my district has purchased for us: Unique Learning Systems and I think I can do it! 

I feel like my first blog post is already too long but I will make my next few posts about how I will be improving my classroom for next year (last year was my first year teaching in an ASD room)!

Thanks for reading,

Amy