The One Where I Move Grade Levels Again

After a short year in fourth grade, I will be moving on up to fifth grade next year!! Chandler Bing knows how I feel...

I'm pumped that I get to move up with an amazing group of kiddos. I'll be teaching ELAR to all of 5th grade at our campus. I taught half of the fourth grade class last year, and taught many from that same group back when I was in second grade. Needless to say, I already dread having to say goodbye to this group at the end of next year!
Reflecting for a sec on last year...
Things that I LOVED: I changed the way I thought about teaching reading, and as a result I saw my students change the way they felt about being readers. It was awesome. I read-aloud to my fourth graders. Every day, no matter what. We laughed and cried together. Books changed us. I saw my students grow as readers and people.  My students saw themselves as readers (insert all of the heart eye emojis!!).
Ways I want to GROW: Connect more. I want to participate in The Global Read Aloud (I think my classes will do Pax this year) and be more active on Twitter and Insta.  Be more intentional about purchasing new books for our library. I need work in a few areas, especially NF. Share more reading with my students.. I'm thinking blogs, websites, articles, newspapers, magazines... Meet with my students to talk about their reading more often. I did reading conferences last year, but didn't really find a method or routine I was happy with. 
 Right now I'm still enjoying summer, but it's around this time each year that I start to feel the itch to get back in my classroom. Of course, a new grade level means moving classrooms, so lots of work to do! For now, I'll be that typical reading, Pinteresting, napping and Netflixing teacher of summertime.

Camp Write-Along

Camp Write-Along was pretty great! There are definitely some things I want to change and add for next year, but I think I did decent for my first year at Camp! 
Our students brought in their camping gear on Monday morning. We made trail mix to snack on throughout the week, watched a Tellagami from our Camp Director aka principal, and got started on our camp activities! 

Combining Sentences Task Cards and Homophones Task Cards from Texas Teaching Fanatic

Each day we did editing and revising stations and an expository writing prompt to review for STAAR. I'm super proud of my kiddos.. They worked hard all day every day and I saw some lightbulbs going off for sure. They have already asked if we are having a Math Camp and a Reading Camp for the other state assessments we take this year! I call that a win!

Our awesome administrators threw a pizza picnic lunch in the courtyard for our students to celebrate their hard work. On Monday we will do some more review and get our room ready for Tuesday morning. We're coming for you, STAAR!!

Blogging is hard, y'all...

Well... I haven't visited my own blog since October.. Fail. 

I actually find myself wishing I would have MADE the time to blog. It would've been great to look back and see everything my kiddos have accomplished this year! It only seems logical that since this is the craziest time of the school year (hello, STAAR) that I would try to document the happenings in our classroom.. Right?!?!
My fourth graders are up against the STAAR Writing test the last week of March. We have been doing some intense test prep the last few weeks, but next week we are going to be ENGAGED in Camp Write-Along! Our entire fourth grade team will be participating in camp-themed activities throughout next week to get ready for the big test in an exciting way. Many of our activities and ideas came from Fabulous 4th Grade Froggies. Everything is ready to go for Monday morning!

Be back soon to share all the fun!!

New Vibes

I am loving the new look!! Huge thanks to Alexis at Laugh Eat Learn for taking my ideas and running with them!

Currently.. This is how I am feeling about the weekend being over...

It always goes too quickly!! I'll be back soon to share some fun happenings in our classroom!

Let me break the ice...

Hi there! My name is Rylee Brazeal. I'm coming up on my fourth year of teaching. I taught second grade for my first three years, but for my fourth year I am movin' on up to (gasp!) FOURTH grade!! I am teaching Reading and Writing this year and couldn't be more excited.. and nervous.. about it. Mostly excited!

The first thing I did when I found out I would be switching grade levels was start researching and blog stalking! I had found some pretty great second grade teachers to follow, but it didn't take me any time at all to find some upper elementary teachers to inspire me. I am new to blogging, but have been stalking blogs for what feels like forever!! I kept waiting for the "right time" to start a blog (is there really a "right time" for anything?) but the excuses were always there. I have been using mostly Instagram (follow me:@brazealr) to feed my teacher stalking obsession lately, but I still feel the nagging urge to start my very own blog. My reasons and hopes for starting a blog are simple:

• share and borrow from/with other educators
• collaborate instead of sitting on the sidelines (huge introvert here!)
• become a better writer so that I can become a better writing teacher
• reflect on what we are doing in the classroom

So, here we go!!