"How To" Tuesday: "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer" From the Story to Play Script.

Todays post  it is slightly different from what I write here, but still I decided to make it, as my class will be participating in theatrical contest this month. My 4th graders need to participate in short play of their choice, based on a book of an English writer.
By short voting process "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer" was chosen, an amazing book and an immortal story of childhood power, boyish freedom, opposites and friendship. But now I need to create a play script, that fits my kids.

Am I alive? Hibernation post

Learning Personal Pronouns with MINIONS

Learning pronouns can be a bit hard for ESL students. Especially remembering what person they are, or are this or that pronoun plural or singular. But everybody loves Minions, right?

Grammar Monopoly and How We Used It

Hello everyone!

Later in 2016 I was scrolling down my Pinterest feed, searching for some grammar activities and I've seen couple of people doing "Grammar Monopoly" and I was interested how it works...

Absolute TOP-20 songs to learn ABC

This playlist includes all of my favorite songs I use in my classroom to learn English alphabet, phonics and some new lexic along the way.

STRESS FREE written homework Mega Check

Checking your students homework can be stressfull when you have a lot of children to handle. Even though I do look through my kidos' workbooks every lesson and pay their attantion to some detailes, there is one time a month when the Earth stops, sun never rises and stars do not shine. Well, at least my kids think about it this way. They call this day of the month "The Mega Check".

Morning playlist for classroom. TOP-30 songs for amazing mood!

Music helps a lot when it comes to adjusting your and your class mindset. Here's my TOP songs for entering the classroom and positive day start. From hip-hop to rock'n'roll, from jazz to rap and rock, up to club music and down to 80's jam, if it makes your body bounce and your face smile, it does it's job!

Learning COUNTRIES can be fun!

Hello, everyone!
Today we had an amazing lesson in 3rd grade, so I decided to share how it went with you.
We started this semester with "Where are you from?"  unit in our book. We talked about different countries and nationalities. There were some new countries to my kids, and they struggled with remembering flag <-> name of the country relation. Here what we did...

Tech Thursday: Using PowToon in classroom

"How To"Tuesday: 10 Ways to RELAX after a Long Day at Work

Let's be honest: our work is frustrating and stressful. Even with all great things that happen through out the day, it is not that simple to keep your mood up and energy high. It is hard to feel harmony, when you had to deal with up to 200 kids daily. Sometimes I feel like I spend whole day in juicer, and then was stomped by couple of elephants and hippos.;)

DIY Teacher Bracelet

Amazing FLEX adventures!

In september, our school family was really excited for our incredible student Milena Vasilieva, as she was chosen from hundreds of aplicants to be a proud representant of Ukraine in one of the schools of USA. She was so kind to send us a presentation of her and her second family adventures in America, and also about her FLEX friends.

What is FLEX? The Future Leaders Exchange (FLEX) Program provides scholarships for high school students from Europe and Eurasia to spend an academic year in the United States, living with a family and attending an American high school. It is a competitive, merit-based scholarship program funded by the U.S. Department of State. FLEX students who pass multiple rounds of testing earn a scholarship to spend an academic year in the United States living with a volunteer host family and attending a U.S. high school. FLEX students gain leadership skills, learn about American society and values, and teach Americans about FLEX countries and cultures. FLEX is a highly competitive program with over 24,000 alumni who have contributed over one million hours of community service in cities and towns across America. The students return home to active alumni networks that carry out inspiring activities. To discover and take part in this project, please visit FLEX website.

Here is what she experienced up to the middle of her trip.

Well done, Milena! Keep it going!

Setting 10 goals for 2017. Teacher Edition!

Hello, everybody!

Well, 2016 was not the best year, though there were a lot of traveling, searching and learning, I have high hopes for 2017! ;)

Anyways, I decided to set my goals and to put it "out there" to keep an eye on it and not forgeting make them not just a "goal" or "dream" but reality.

So, in 2017 I will:

1. Make Sheila Jane's Teach Happy 30 Days Challenge happen. For two years I was interested doing it but actually had no time for it. Now, the time has come!;)

2. Blog at least three times a week. It's a new thing for me, don't want to leave it out at start as I do sometimes with all new and unexplored.

3. Do something on YouTube. Maybe a teaching vlog? I do not know yet ;)

4. Start 10 Minutes of Daily Relaxation. Burnout is not a good thing and I don't want to experience it anymore in any other way.

5. Learn how to say "No". Seriously.

6. Strenghten my teaching skills in ways, that are considered "non-traditional" for my school. For example, I am really excited to start Google for Education.

7. Adjust my mindset. I feel that I can improve my teaching changing the way I think about it. So, reading some good literature, meditating and exploring will help a lot.

8. Get organized. Even though I did a pretty good job dealing with papers at work with Together Flexi Friend (look about it here), but there is no limit to perfection. Still it is hard for me to keep it stable and clear.

9. Brush up my pedagogical style. I can do so much better. It is time for me to understand how and to make it happen.

10. Travel to the most of my abilities. Sitting in one place for a long time is not my cup of tea. I feel it is a year of different seminars all around my country. 

Thats it! My 10 goals for this year are set and aired. No way back :)

What are your expectations, goals and dreams for 2017? Comment down below, let me know, I'm really interested!