Easy As Pie Series and New Life Science - Human Body for Interactive Notebooks

I can't believe how long it's been since I've posted.  Ever since school started back up, I've been so busy just trying to keep my head above water.  And since I haven't had a common planning day with the rest of the science department since early December, I am struggling...BAD!  Luckily, tomorrow is an in-service day for me and Thursday is the science department common planning day.  YAY!!

The good news is...
I've spent a lot of that time creating new products for my classroom and my Teachers Pay Teachers store. 

Today, I added the Life Science - Human Body for Interactive Notebooks (that has been a work in progress for about a month).

I've also started a new formative assessment series that I am calling Easy As Pie.  I currently have 6 different products in the series, but there will be more to come.  The idea stemmed from a way to help students distinguish between 2 contrasting ideas or concepts in science.  I started with an Elements/Compounds Pie and then created pies for Observations/Inferences, Convergent/Divergent/Transform Boundaries, Rotation/Revolution, Physical and Chemical Properties/Changes, and Solid/Liquid/Gas.  Each pie slice has a different example or definition.  Students must decide if the example/definition applies to one term or another. 


Teachers just need to print off the pies and cut out the individual pie slices.  Simply place the pieces into a bag and have students reassemble the pies, so that they have an Element Pie and a Compound Pie, for example.  This quickly assesses students' understanding of some of the basic scientific ideas. 

Click on the following links to be taken directly to the product on Teachers Pay Teachers:

Life Science - Human Body for Interactive Notebooks
Easy as Pie - Rotation and Revolution
Easy as Pie - Convergent, Divergent, and Transform Plate Boundaries
Easy as Pie - States of Matter (Solid, Liquid, Gas)
Easy as Pie - Observations and Inferences
Easy as Pie - Physical and Chemical Properties, Physical and Chemical Changes
Easy as Pie - Elements and Compounds 

Taking My Girls Shopping and the Clip Art JACKPOT

A typical Sunday consists of church, then lunch out, then I come home and get out of my uncomfortable shoes, then I'm off to the grocery store with my coupon binder and 7-year old in tow.  I usually don't take my 4 year old for several reasons.

     1.)  She's a bit of a wild child.

     2.)  She'll talk to everyone, whether we know them or not, and will typically make inappropriate comments about the person while they are still within earshot, like "Mom, why did that old man have hair coming out of his ears?"  EMBARRASSING!!!

     3.)  She runs all over the place, gets in the way of the shopping cart constantly and pulls whatever she wants off the shelf and tries to throw it in the shopping cart (and is often times successful - until I notice at checkout.)     

     3.)  And for many of the above reasons, I must put her in the front sitting part of the cart (which she hates, so she throws a major LOUD fit).  BUT....this is where I need to put my Couponing Binder

Needless to say, the 4-year old hasn't gone in quite awhile.  Today, I decided to take her.

I wanted to give both of the girls a task to complete - their own list of items to shop for at the grocery store.  It will give them both ownership and something productive to focus on.  My 7-year old has always been very helpful, can read everything, etc..., but I wasn't sure about my 4-year old.  She knows her numbers and some letter sounds, so I knew a picture would be very important.  On Lila's List (the 4 year old), I tried to include numbers and items that I wouldn't really mind what she grabbed (for example, I'm very picky about the firmness of the grapes I buy, so I wouldn't want to leave that up to my 4-year old.)  

I created a shopping list for each of them and while I was searching for clip art, I found the MOTHERLOAD.  I had intended on going shopping yesterday, but after hitting this jackpot, I immediately started downloading everything, which took me forever and pushed the shopping trip back to today.  (Keep reading for the ClipArt link.)  

Here is the shopping list: (I printed on cardstock and then cut it in half)

The girls were so excited and proud when they got their lists to look over - they can't wait to go shopping today.

And now for the ClipArt Motherload (and it's free - did I mention that?!?)

Click HERE to be taken to Sweet Clip Art

They have the clip art organized by category and many cute selections.  I can see so many possibilities for things in my classroom and at home.  

Happy Sunday to you all.  I am soooooo not ready to go back to work tomorrow.  Luckily, this is only a 3 1/2 day week (I have early out on Thursday and no school on Friday.)  I guess it's a nice way to ease back into things.  

Office Organization and Printable/Editable Round Labels FREEBIE

I wish that I had taken a "before" picture because saying that my home office was a hot mess, would be the understatement of the year!  As I mentioned in an earlier post, I finally convinced my hubby to buy a new computer, so we were both motivated to finally do something about the office/crafting room.  We made a lot of donations, moved a few things to the attic for storage and got rid of tons-o-stuff.  It felt great!

As I was going through stuff, I realized there were a few areas that needed a little organization, but I really didn't want to have to purchase anything new to do that.  It was time to put on my Crafty Hat.  As the office/crafting room cleaning process began, I continually found more and more greeting cards.  This would be my #1 crafting mission for the day.

Create an Organizational System for Greeting Cards

I am always looking for things at the Dollar Store.  Sometimes I see the cheapo stuff and can immediately visualize what I want to do with it.  Other times, I just buy it and decide to come up with a use for it later.  In this particular case, I happened to have this storage box lying around from a purchase I made a few months ago.

I laid a piece of cardstock on the front of the box and traced the shape.  This would serve as my template for the dividers.  I looked through all of my greeting cards and grouped them into categories.  I had about 10 different stacks so I created divider tabs for the different categories with round labels.

I drew a faint line on the back of the labels, marking the middle of the circle.  This allowed me to glue the labels onto the dividers uniformly.  

I'm guessing this would have been enough, but I am going to laminate mine for durability.  (I haven't gotten around to that step yet.)

And to further organize this system, I created a Birthdays and Anniversaries Calendar.  I shrunk it to a size that would fit in the storage box (but stick up a little further).  I punched a hole, added a ring and some coordinating ribbon just to dress it up.

I also had some spare fabric storage boxes in my daughter's closet, so I decided to use these to store random office items such as extra supplies, electronic cords, envelopes of various sizes, etc..  

I wanted to be able to label these boxes, so I created these editable round labels.  You can download the editable PDF form HERE.  Simply type into the round label, print the pages you want on card stock and cut out (I use a circle punch to speed up the process.)  These will be great around the house or in the classroom.  

Party in a PDF

I am so excited, I can hardly contain myself.  I finally convinced my hubby that I needed a new computer and I absolutely MUST HAVE Adobe Pro and Photoshop.  I am having way too much fun creating PDF documents that are editable.  I can't wait to create all sorts of new stuff on Teachers Pay Teachers for my store.

I thought I'd share my first editable PDF document  with all my blog buddies for FREE! (Scroll to the bottom of this post for the link.)  Now, since this is my very FIRST creation, I'd really like some feedback.  What works?  What doesn't?  What could be better?  Whatever your thoughts are, please share them.  Who knows...I may have royally screwed something up and have no clue.

Without further a due...here it is
Click HERE to download the Editable Foldable Templates