Fall is finally here and I’m excited! I don’t know about you, teacher friends, but I’m all about sweatshirt weather, fall leaves, and candy corn. If you need to get excited about this season, look no further than the October issues of The Mailbox® Magazine. I spent some time looking at all the grade levels…
Sometimes it’s easy to come up with the title for a blog and this is one of those times. Check out this collection of terrific freebies and helpful products—including a FREE fall writing activity from The Mailbox®. Start your week off on a great note with all this good stuff. Go here for FREE…
Encouragement is an action giving support, confidence, or hope. In my opinion, this is one of our most important jobs as teachers. Hope is necessary for a child to have a growth mindset—and we’re in the business of creating life-long learners. Yesterday, September 12, was National Encouragement Day. So this is the perfect time to…
Labor Day has a lot of associations. It celebrates fair working conditions, but to a lot of people it also means the end of summertime and the beginning of the back-to-school season. And let’s not forget that Labor Day also means picnics and a day at the pool to a lot of us. Whatever your…
Wednesday, September 1 is Ginger Cat Appreciation Day! My husband and I have four ginger cats—Moose, Ralph, Rufus, and Droolie—so I couldn’t let this particular day of appreciation go by without recognizing it. They are all chunky troublemakers that we love dearly. To celebrate this rather random day, print this learning center on decomposing…
Do you remember when you were a child and time seemed to stretch on forever? As an adult, I feel time is like a roller coaster. You buckle yourself in for a new month. The month itself lasts about five seconds, there’s a bit of screaming involved, and you end it with your hair blown…
It’s hot. Today the heat index was 99 degrees in North Carolina, and I know it’s been higher in other locations. Although many schools have air conditioning, it often isn’t very effective, making some rooms feel like the Arctic Circle and others like the tropics. When you combine extreme temperatures with a school dress code,…
I have an old friend whose Facebook profile is peppered with photos of his children—running around barefoot, splashing in their backyard pond, covered with mud, and climbing up trees. They spend a lot of time outdoors wearing a layer of dirt. When I was a kid, I also spent most of my time covered with…
When I was a classroom teacher, one of my favorite phrases was, “no prep.” That meant an activity could be put into my lesson plan without going to a copy machine, or cutting out a bunch of stuff, or even making a quick run to a store. Prepping lesson plans is one of the many…
Whenever I go to an art museum, I tend to forget that the art I’m viewing is specifically chosen by a professional curator to give me a certain experience. And that’s why I was surprised to read this article about the Baltimore Museum of Art. They’re having an exhibit curated by their security guards. And…