New Year, New Goals!

I have been on a little bloggy break! December was so insanely busy (I had one week with a meeting after school EVERY day!) and once break started I decided that my Christmas present to myself was to put everything aside and enjoy just being a mom. The first 2 days I had off, but my children didn't. So my first mommy activities involved helping in classrooms and some cutie lunch dates, getting some shopping out of the way, and cleaning my very neglected home. What a great start to a week!

After a fun 2 weeks of Christmas, New Year's, XBOX game nights, play doh, painting, and playing it is time to get back to real life. I am rested and ready to roll! :)

I have spent the last couple of days planning my first couple weeks back. We are going to start back strong with some goal setting by my students. If your students are like mine, they are at all different levels in math and reading. I am going to find some time on Monday morning to discuss setting goals and how to reach them and then quickly conference with each student to help them come up with a good goal. I give them a watered down version of how to make a SMART goal. They have to make it specific, measurable, achievable, results-focused, and time-bound. My students have to choose an ELA or Math goal, we usually choose a math fluency, reading fluency, sight word, or reading goal. We base our math fluency goals on Xtra math data and there is district data for the ELA goals. I conference with them to help them come up with a measure that is achievable and results-focused. The time limit is the month of January. The students are not expected to know they are making a SMART goal, I just want them to get in the habit of making goals this way. I also want them to think and write about how to get to their goals, so they know that they have to do something for their goal to be met. I had my kids make them at home too. #teacherkidproblems