Pinterest at Work/Magnetic Paint Review

Hello everyone!  Wow has the last week been busy.  Wednesday was our first day back the kiddos don't start until September 4th and I have been hard at work getting ready.

Sorry in advance for all the pictures.

First of all I told you in my last post about Rust-oleum Magnetic Primer.

I used it on some old white shelves that I have had in my classroom and were looking a little grubby. I wanted to make the sides usable for center activities.

I used 3 coats on the sides of the shelves.  The paint was very grainy.  I think it would have been an easier go if I had laid the shelves down.   

 Here is a picture of them finished.  The left pictures shows two magnets a large and small one.  The end texture was very rough though.  My original idea had been to paint over that with chalkboard paint but after feeling the texture I realized it wasn't going to work.

 I decided to paint the shelves lime green to match the rest of the color scheme in my classroom

The picture on the left shows them mid paint.  It took me 5 cans of spray paint to cover 4 shelves this size.  My finger was numb for a week!  The picture on the right shows the finished project.  As you can see the smaller magnet didn't stick anymore, which was slightly disappointing.  They turned out cute though and everyone who has popped into my classroom has commented on them.

Another project I have been working on is repurposing my old National Geographic Explorers.   I save them and reuse them because sadly we can't afford to get a classroom wet every year.  SOme years a couple teachers will go in on them and buy them and share or sometimes F.A.C.T will surprise us.  SO I cut the magazine in half and put it into these page protectors.  I still need to make a label for the front cover.  My plan is to use them in small group instruction and let the kids write on the plastic protectors with white board markers while identifying non-fiction text features.  

1 down a million to go.

Finally, here is a sneak peak at my classroom.

Entrance from the front door

These shelves are right around the corner from the front door.  This is the first year they have EVER been organized.

Table bins.  IKEA ran out so I still need to get a few more.  Each table gets a bin for each subject.  That way everything stays neat and organized, I hope.

My desk and on the left on the floor is going to be where my listening center is.

My hook for headphones on the back of my computers.  I have been wanting to do this since I saw it on Pinterest.  I'm also going to make website card rings to hang on the hooks with website addresses and log ins.

View of my library and small group area.

Library, the brown magazine rack is where my seasonal books or focus genres are going to go.  Ignore the brown paper we were getting ready to make trees.

View from the library still a work in progress.

Small group area.

I can't wait to show you all when its done!!

So MANY PROJECTS!!

So the kids don't come back till September 4th but next Wednesday is the first day for teachers.  Out of that week and a half only 3 days are classroom days and half of one of those 3 days is meet the teacher day!!  So since I will only have 2 and a half days and that is not enough time I have been going in since the first week of August when the carpet was done.

Between all my projects, cheer camp, and the lovely husband being out of town on business things have been crazy.  Lets just say my darling Bugsy Bear is missing his Dad and being stubborn.   Did I mention I forgot my gmail password and couldn't figure out how to get photos from my phone to my computer without using Facebook....so if your wondering where I've been thats it in a nutshell.


When I walked in a few weeks ago this is what my room looked like:

From the door (a little blurry)

From my partners side...do you see something exciting?

MY NEW DESK!!! IT LOCKS and everything!!! I'm so excited

My partners side, where most of my furniture was

Lucky for me our awesome custodian was bored and moved everything for me but you don't get to see until its all done.

While I was there I started one of my projects painting some ugly white shelves that I've had FOREVER, they are actually from my bedroom growing up.

I bought some of this magnetic primer to go under green spray paint.  My thought was I could uses these shelves to hold center supplies and buddy reading books.  I wanted them magnetic so I could let the kids make words on the sides or magnet labels on them.

Shelves before I painted them there were 4 this size

This is what it looked like after 1 coat.

I'm anxious to get it and see how well the shelves actually attract magnets but they were waxing the hallways today so you will have to wait!!

SO after I drove back home from finding out he hallways were being waxed I decided to work on my next project.  I saw discovery bottles on Pinterest...I can't find the original post for the life of me so if you know it please let me know so I can give credit.

I typed up and color coded all the sight word lists.  Sine I have low kids they need LOTS of practice.  I make them their own personal lists of words they don't know for their folders, then when  they get caught not working I call them over to read them to me and any they don't know they have to write 10 times each...guess how fast my ADHD boys learn them. lol.  But I wanted a fun way to practice that they would ask to do.

FIrst I died the rice.  I previously tried pom poms but the words stuck to them.  I also tried beads but they were too noisy.  

I only have 3 jars done.  I only had 3 colors of dye so I need to get more.  My plan is to label each jar with how many words are in each.  The kids will be challenged to find all the words in each jar.  WHen they do, and write them down, they will have to read them to me.  Once they have done that they will get that color next to their name on the sight word master list.   I'm thinking of some kind of reward for finding and reading the words in each jar.

I will post more pictures when everything is done.

What back to school projects are you working on?

August Currently/ OMG....is it really August!?!?

HOLY COW its AUGUST!?!?!? NOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!

In honor of summer coming to a close I liked up with Farley for her August Currently.  I also did this to avoid doing any of the actual real work that needs to get done....like cleaning the stairs that are covered in dust and dog hair or typing up spelling lists.

SO I actually have been doing work.  I went into our classroom last week because the floors were done.  I pretty much have all the big furniture where I want it (now I just need to put the kids tables into place.  This is harder than is seems because our school enrollment is off the charts this year and I'm most likely going to have 35 students, or my partner it, either way I have to get the room set for that many.

Also, check out Amy's give away over at Step Into Second Grade!  She also has a freebie!  She is my favorite!!

Hopefully I will have pictures of my classroom for you tomorrow!!