Find a Penny..

     You should have guessed by now that I’m the kind of person who picks up every penny I see on the ground. And from the last post, you should know that I accept any and all things people are getting rid of. If I can’t use it, I find someone who can or donate [...]

Pantry and Freezer Challenge

     After Christmas, I try to eat out of the freezer and pantry so we have very little grocery expense.  It makes it easy to pay off credit cards that we used to buy holiday gifts.  We keep a budget and do all our shopping with credit cards that we pay off each month so [...]

Debt Snowball

     Related to my last post “Be Your Own Bank,” is Dave Ramsey’s  concept of “ debt snowballing.”  The idea is to pay off a small debt balance, then roll that money that would be going to that debt to the next largest debt.  In our case, we went after the highest interest debt we [...]

Be Your Own Bank

     Anyone can see that a 700 billion dollar bailout of the banking industry has to have some effect on our schools and pocketbooks.  It will be difficult to pay for these budget deficits with taxes alone—especially if you expect that there will be some loss of jobs due to the economy going south (you [...]

2008 Edublog Awards: What Jewels Will Be Found?

     I really enjoy reading blogs of other teachers. There is never enough time to watch our fellow teachers hone their craft. Even the brief time in the lunchroom (and I do mean brief, once you deal with Bobby who lost his lunch money or Shakira who is checking out early) is only spent with [...]

Typing Content: Or Killing Two Birds With One Stone

     At the beginning of the year, several elementary teachers I know take their students to the computer lab to type their spelling list.  This accomplishes two things at the same time (maybe more). First, they learn their spelling words. Next, they learn to type and become familiar with the keyboard.
 
     They begin to learn [...]

Grading Writing Papers or Will They Even Read Our Comments?

We do a lot of writing in my classes. At this level, we are hammering how to organize their essays: topic sentence, detail sentences (or paragraphs) and conclusion sentences (or paragraphs).
 
It’s not enough to TELL them that they must do those things, you must show that their grade is related to whether or not they [...]

Prudent Classroom’s Collection Plate #1:Classroom ideas that don’t cost a dime…

The Two Writing Teachers blog talks about their take on NCTE sesson related to designing effective writing assignments.
Need some good handwriting worksheets or explanations for why it’s important?  Look no further:
Have you heard of “speed dating?” How  about sparking interest in reading by doing something similar with passing books after a few minutes? Here’s how at [...]

Dollar a day Eating Plan

A couple of California teachers ate food costing only $1/day for a month to prove it could be done. You can read about their project here. 
The wife is a vegan, so there was no meat involved in their diet. But, if you think about it, most of the world eats little meat. For years I could [...]

Hustling for Part-time Jobs

I was reading a blog the other day about financial security and the author mentioned using the time of our youth to earn some extra money and skills. Often, we think of our youth as the time to have fun and party.
Since I put myself through college without benefit of financial aid or scholarship (my [...]