MEGA! MATH! GIVEAWAY!

I love teaching fourth grade math. Like, LOVE-LOVE. I know I've said it before, but I had to say it again.

Here are a few things I love teaching about math:

- Manipulatives

- Hands-on lessons

- Engaging activities 

- Math conversations

- Messy math papers full of strategies

- When kids who hate math leave my class loving math

- THE SUPER FANTASTIC MATH TEACHERS I HAVE MET THROUGH TPT, FACEBOOK & INSTAGRAM!! Let me shout out to a few of my faves & tell you a little about them! 

To The Square Inch: Kate is SO AMAZING. I stumbled across her blog a few years ago and my mind was BLOWN! Such creative and engaging lessons! So ofcourse I had to cyber-stalk her immediatly. I'm elementary and she's secondary, so I modified a few of her lessons to fit my classroom- THEY ROCKED THE HOUSE. You have GOT to check out her Adding, Subtracting, Multiplying and Dividing Bingo cards. To quote my son, "Legit-ness!"

The Teacher Studio: Oh Me, Oh My, The Teacher Studio... I don't know if I can count the ways I love her! My class loves her too, because I USE HER TPT RESOURCES ON THE DAILY! Concept sorts, problem solving, number lines, help with any operation... You need it, she has it! JUST LOOK at this amazing pack called Digging Deeper into Problem Solving: A Resource to Teach Perseverence... How much do you need this?? 

4MulaFun: Jennifer is probably one of the sweetest, most generous people EV-AR. I've participated in a few other giveaways with her and she SPOILS the winners! I LOVE her Solve-and-Snip products!! It's a no-fail system for your kiddos!! Solve, find your answer, snip it and glue it! If kiddos can't find their answer, they know to come ask me. GENIUS!! My personal favorite is the Fraction Operations Word Problems set... 2cool4school!! Check out all of her Solve-and-Snips HERE. Find your TEN favorites and write them down... Just trust me on this! 

Miss Math Dork: A few years ago I went to CAMT (a big ol' Texas math conference) and I MET MISS MATH DORK! She was there! Selling fantastic CDs with amazing math products! I even got a pic *TPT FAN GIRL MODE* Have you seen her Math Relays? Kids are solving math problems and with each correct answer they are creating an image. SO. MUCH. FUN! Check out her Customary Conversion of length, mass and capacity: Rainy Day Relay!! 

Create, Teach, Share: Rebecca ROCKS MY WORLD! What kind of resource are you needing? Oh, really? GO TO HER TPT Store. She has it! Interactive math notebooks? CHECK. Problem solving? CHECK. Not a math teacher? NOT A PROBLEM. I go to her for amazing reading inspiration as well! Told you: ROCKS MY WORLD! But back to math: Check out her FANTABULOUS Collection of 50 Problems Solving Tasks! She pushes kids to go way beyond regular problem solving!!

Digital: Divide & Conquer: Do you PBL? As in, do you do Project Based Learning in your classroom? Then you need to hit up the PBL GURU, Digital: Divide & Conquer! Peeps, MATT IS AMAZING!! Your kiddos will be SO engaged, SO challenged, and having SO much fun they won't even realize they're doing SO much learning!! SO much math goes into his PBL products - they will KNOCK YOUR SOCKS OFF. Go check out his Geometrocity: Building a City with Math - YOU NEED THIS! 

Prep Toon: Joseph over at Prep Toon contacted me a while back about chekcing out his AWESOME math videos that BRING MATH TO LIFE in your classroom! You pick your concept, watch an engaging and informative video that STOPS and asks QUESTIONS along the way! Such fantastic product you NEED!!! Go sign up for a free trial RIGHT NOW! 

Now.... Are you ready for the most fabulous news EVER??

All of the FANTASTIC PEOPLE above are participating in a MEGA MATH GIVEAWAY with me!

You get:

- Adding, Subtracting, Multiplying and Dividing Bingo by To the Square Inch

- Digging Deeper into Problem Solving: A Resource to Teach Perseverence by The Teacher Studio

- 10 Solve and Snips of your choice (check them out HERE) by 4MulaFun

- Customary Conversion of length, mass and capacity: Rainy Day Relay by Miss Math Dork

- Collection of 50 Problems Solving Tasks by CreateTeachShare

- Geometrocity: Building a City with Math by Digital: Divide & Conquer

- A YEAR long subscription to Prep Toon 

I'm also throwing in my Math Glyph Bundle which includes ALL of my math glyphs! What's a math glyph, you ask? Well, it's basically a "color by answer" using math problems. Your kiddos answer a problem and based on their answer, they color their picture a certain way. I LOVE using these becasue 1) they're fun and 2) it's SO easy for me to see who doesn't get it and who does... All I have to do is look at the color of marker in a kiddos hand! 

ARE YOU STOKED? I hope you are! This is basically all you need for a STINKIN AWESOME SCHOOL YEAR!! To enter, check out the RaffleCopter below! Winner announced on Friday, September 18th! :) 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

TPT Seller Challenge: WEEK TWO

Here are some things I love:

- Teaching

- TPT

- TPT Seller Challenge

- Week Two's Challenge: Dare to Dream!

Before my Dad passed away last August, he told me, "Katie, God will continue to give you good ideas. So share them". I love that TPT has given me a platform to share the things I make for & and use in my classroom, and I'm constantly encouraged and inspired by the amazing teachers on TPT. TPT is a huge blessing.

DREAM ONE: GIVE IT TO GOD

God has blessed my TPT store. I've needed a new car for a while. I knew it wouldn't be possible unless I had some extra income. My TPT was doing well, but it needed to do better in order for me to afford a monthly payment. I put it in God's hands and BOOM, my TPT has hit, or exceeded, the number I asked God for. I've learned (and experienced) DON'T PUT A LIMIT ON GOD. He wants to bless you and take you to places you can't even dream of. THANK YOU GOD FOR MY BLESSINGS! And to quote my Dad again, "The Lord keeps blessing me and I say, 'Thank you and send me more', AND HE DOES!" True words, daddy. Miss you every day!

DREAM TWO: PAY OFF MY CAR

I am SO thankful I was able to purchase my DREAM CAR - a new to me (used) GMC Yukon - thanks to my monthly TPT income. Y'all, I love my Yukon so much. So, so, so much. I talk to her. She has a name. No trash is allowed in her. I constantly wash the exterior. IT HAS RIMS. I love herrrrrrrr!!! BUT.... I need to pay her off ASAP. I have a 15 year old son who is going to drive. SOON. We have the car part taken care of thanks to his dad BUT what I didn't account for is INSURANCE. YIKES! I'd love to get my car payment over with so I can focus on his insurance!! EEK!

DREAM THREE: VACATION 

I looooooove to vacation. I mean, who doesn't?? I would love to be able to plan and pay for a big vacation each summer for my family without cringing because we're taking out of savings. That would be such a blessing and SO MUCH FUN! 

What's are your dreams?? The sky is the limit!! 

Be sure to link up and share your dream! Just visit these fabulous Blogger Babe's blogs! 

Peppy Zesty Teacherista 

Teach Create Motivate 
Sparkling in Second 
Third in Hollywood 

Fractions... Decimals... Number Lines... Snow Day?

Today is a "Snow Day" for my district... I'm in a coastal town in Southern Texas... We don't get snow. So today is a WASTE OF A TEACHING DAY!

I know, I know, I should be thankful for a paid day off in the middle of the week... But I LOVE to teach. I LOVE my students. I LOVE my school.... So I WANT TO BE TEACHING! Not to mention, because of district benchmarks, holidays and a random late-start weather day last week, I haven't been able to get in a full week of teaching since before Christmas! Ugh!

Since I'm home today, I've looked at Benchmark data (lame to some but so interesting to me), worked on RTI ideas and paperwork and most importantly, made a new TPT product - Rockin' Number Lines!!

I'm super excited about this product... I decided to make it because I have a handful of students still not understanding numberlines. The majority of my classes get it, so I want a quick, fun way to review with them. Have you ever heard of Quiz-Quiz-Trade? It's a Kagan Cooperative Learning Strategy that ROCKS.

Here's how it works:
- Each student gets a card and holds it in their hand all sneaky like (since the answers are on the back)
- Students find a partner and take turns quizing each other, then they trade cards and find a new partner to quiz
- For this set of cards, the students will need to see the number line and identify the point as a decimal or fraction (the set contains halves, thirds, fourths and fifths)

What's awesome about this is the students are constantly getting new questions to answer AND ask... So if you use this as a 5-10 minute activity, they've been exposed to numerous questions and answers AND they've had the opportunity to teach their classmates AND if they miss a "quiz", that card becomes theres to ask so they're exposed to the question again AND, AND, AND... the list could go on and on. But to sum it up, Quiz-Quiz-Trade is a fabulous activity and KAGAN is genius.

ADDED BONUS: Once you're done using the task cards, throw them in a center. If you purchase my set of DVD Games for Centers or Stations, there's always a math game ready for the kiddos to play - grab some task cards, grab a DVD case and BAM! Instant game time. My students LOOOOVE these.

Hope you can get some use out of these Task Cards! Stay warm peeps!

November... December... and Hello 2014!

I have really been lame about the updating- Sorry! Here's a quick run through of what my holiday season at home and school has looked like... (PICTURE HEAVY!)

~SCHOOL~
I had SO much fun with Elf on the Shelf this year...
Our Elf, who we named Jingle Jack, came bearing gifts and treats. It was great fun!

But then we has some behavior issues....

Our beloved "JJ" did return a few days later, however he was touched one day by a student (thankfully the Dept. of Elf Surveillance sent magic dust to restore his health) and I basically became too busy to snap pics of his cuteness... 

Anyway, we had ugly Christmas Sweater Day at school. Check out this ugliness!

~HOME~
I did not get my fill of ugly sweaters, however, so we threw an Ugly Sweater Holiday party at our casa!
We had an Ugly Sweater Contest, Christmas Trivia, a Hot Chocolate Bar, and a photo area complete with props! GREAT FUN!

That was not all of the festive dress up... We and a few friends of ours participated in our town's annual "Santa's Night Out" where it's common to dress up like Santa. Since we like to be different, we chose to dress like snow-women!

My boys and I decorated a TON of homemade Christmas Cookies (my oldest made a gingerbread poop cookie) and I've been eating them for days now... Perfect companion for my coffee!

 And just yesterday, my baby boy turned 11!!!!! His birthday was a lot of fun. He is truly and angel - both my boys are. I am so blessed!!

Now that all these fabulous festivities are over, I'm going to sit back, relax and enjoy the start of a New Year... And by "sit back" and "relax", I mean redo our bedroom. :)

To celebrate the upcoming year, I'm hosting a sale in my TPT store!! I'm offering 20% off my Rockin' Math Journals and Rockin' Math Journals Basic Set Up! Plus, the first 5 to puchase (according to my TPT sales log) will get an Area and Perimeter Zoo pack for FREE! Be sure to visit my store Jan. 1 - 4 to start your 2014 math instruction off with a BANG!

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Katie-Texas

HAPPY NEW YEAR!
<3 Katie

SALE!

Have you heard about the huge sale going on at TeacherPayTeacher.com?? If not, let me fill you in.

Most sellers are offering 20% off their products, and TPT is offering 10% off with coupon code BTS12. That's up to 30% OFF!!!!

If you visit my store, here are some of the goodies you'll see on sale:

Get over there and shop 'til you drop!