Best of 2016

Whew! 2016 has really been a fabulous year! It is hard to believe in a few short days we will ring in a New Year. In celebration of the wonderful year it has been, I am teaming up with many, many TpT friends to highlight our bestsellers of 2016. For you it means those bestsellers will be discounted 20% from December 28th to December 30th. 

To make things a little easier for you, this will be a hashtag sale. In the search bar on TpT, enter #bestof2016sale. You will see all of the bestsellers of the TpT sellers that are participating in this sale. 

Below, you will find my Top 10 Bestsellers of 2016. You will not find all of these by searching the hashtag sale, but all of these resources will be on sale. 

 

#1: Geography and Map Skills Interactive Notebook- This interactive notebook comes with 13 templates, plus a cover template and table of contents. This is a great way to teach geography and map skills. Students remain engaged through the hands-on portion of the interactive notebook. In addition to the hands-on activities, students produce a product that is useful to develop good study habits. For some of the templates there are a couple of versions to choose between for differentiation purposes. This has been my #1 bestseller this year.

#2: American Revolution Interactive Notebook Templates- If you are teaching the American Revolution, this is the perfect product for you! This resource comes with nine templates, individual template directions, pictures of templates in an interactive notebook, a unit cover page, a table of contents page, and possible answers and information for each template. Students love using interactive notebooks!

#3: Grammar: Parts of Speech Interactive Notebook- Grammar Interactive Notebook covers all parts the of speech you teach your students in your language arts classroom. Perfecting the parts of speech can be fun and engaging! In this bundled unit, you get eight separate interactive notebook units to use in your classroom. teaching nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, pronouns, interjections, and conjunctions just got easier.

#4: Civil War Interactive Notebook Templates- If you are teaching the Civil War, this is the perfect product for you! This resource comes with eight templates, individual template directions, pictures of templates in an interactive notebook, and possible answers and information for each template. The templates included are: Terms to Know, Economies of the North and South, King Cotton, A Nation Divided, Causes of the Civil War, Civil War Leaders, Turning Points in the War, and Women of the Civil War.

#5: Reward Coupons and Incentives for Middle and High School Students- Reward coupons and incentives for Middle School and High School Students is a great behavioral management system. Students are able to earn reward incentives through their kind deeds, actions, and performance in class. This is great for those students who need a little incentive to get busy on an assignment or who need a little praise for effort. These are great for students in grades 5-12! My students love them!

I keep these reward incentives in an index card holder for easy access, and it takes up less space around my desk. The students are able to ‘cash-in’ their incentives at certain times that I set up in the classroom. I have found these reward incentives save me a lot of time correcting negative behavior, and we are able to focus more on positive behaviors and learning. The fabulous thing about these incentives is you can use them year after year!

#6: American Government Interactive Notebook Templates- If you are teaching a unit on American Government, this is the perfect product for you! This resource comes with 14 templates, individual template directions, pictures of templates in an interactive notebook, and possible answers and information for each template. Students love using interactive notebooks!

The templates include: Terms to Know, Articles of Confederation, History of Democracy, U.S. Constitution, Articles of Confederation vs Constitution, The Amendment Process, Bill of Rights, Rights vs Responsibilities, Levels of Government, Branches of Government, Individual Branches of Government, and Voting: Every Vote Counts!

#7: Stargirl Novel Study- If you teach the book Stargirl, this resource will help you greatly! It is 82 pages of material to use before, during, and after reading the novel. Included in this novel study are pre-reading lessons and activities, vocabulary, chapter questions and discussion, journal writing prompts, character analysis, literary analysis, and reading skills. Check out the preview to get a glimpse of how it is organized.

#8: Bill of Rights Match-Up- The Bill of Rights Match-Up is a great resource to use when teaching a unit on government. This resource contains ten badges with the amendment numbers, ten badges with what each amendment states, a recording sheet, and a handout for the students to illustrate the meaning of one amendment. 

Students will match the amendment number card with the card containing what the amendment states. Once the students have sorted and matched the cards, they record their answers on the recording sheet. In addition to the recording sheet and center cards, there is a printable for the students to choose one amendment and illustrate it so that others will be able to understand its meaning. 

#9: Civil War: Major Battles PowerPoint and Organizers- Civil War {Major Battle PowerPoint Presentation and Organizers} contains 50 pages total. There is a 25 page ppt covering major Civil War battles. There is a 25 page document with organizers to help your students organize the information for the major battles. 

The battles included are: Fort Sumter, First Battle of Bull Run (Manassas), Shiloh, Fredericksburg, 
Antietam, Siege of Vicksburg, Gettysburg, Chattanooga, Spotsylvania, and Appomattox Court House.

#10: Prepositional Phrase Task Cards- Prepositional Phrase Task Cards are great to use in your classroom as a center activity, as skill reinforcement, and as practice for upcoming assessments. Your students will read each task card, identify the prepositional phrase in each sentence, and record the answer on the Prepositional Phrase Recording Sheet. There are 30 Prepositional Phrase Task Cards. The answer key is included.

Remember these bestsellers will only be on sale from December 28th-December 30th. So hurry on over to Right Down the Middle with Andrea to check out the resources. Remember to use the search bar and hashtag #bestof2016sale to find all of the resources on sale. 

I have a couple of fun giveaways coming up very soon! Make sure you like and follow me on Facebook and Instagram (rightdownthemiddle). You will not want to miss these upcoming giveaways! 

Testing, Testing...Day 5 (A Little Late)

Please accept my apologies! If you were following my testing incentive posts, I am a week late with Day 5. I am not sure if it was because I was SOOOOOO excited to be finished with our standardized tests or what, but I am late. 

Testing Day #5...the race to the finish. (Or at least that is how I viewed my sweet students as I observed them taking their tests. You would have thought it was a race!) The last day of testing was over social studies content. While I feel certain my students were prepared for it, I am a little concerned at how soon they ALL finished. I know it was the last test they took, and I know they were tired of doing nothing except reading and answering questions. I understand their frustrations, as I was once a student myself. They flew through it and were ready for....drum roll, please...to go outside and run out all of their nervous energy! They all brought in their basketballs and footballs that morning, and when I greeted my homeroom students, they all wanted to make sure I was going to let them go outside after the "all clear" testing announcement was made. 

So, you guessed it! I hurried them out the door as fast as I could when the testing clearance was announced, and they ran and played for an hour until it was time to go to lunch. Luckily after lunch, they were tired and sleepy and compromised with a video. 

For their incentive on the last day, I filled a bucket of different candy and posted the "Wishing You Luck on the Test" printable. If you are looking for testing incentives to use in your classroom, check out my Motivational Ideas for Testing and Assessments Pack; your students will love them! 

This week we are back to grindstone, reviewing old content, previewing next year's content, and next week we will begin our last novel together. Stay tuned to more posts about "what happens after testing." 

Testing, Testing...Day 4

 

 

"Reach for the Stars" was our theme for today. I thought it was appropriate since they were taking the Science portion of their standardized tests. The looks on their faces were not confusion, but they were looks of sincere determination. My students have been working so hard lately, and I am truly proud of each and every one of them! I think they really needed the candy to keep them going today. Some of them looked a little bit sleepy.

 

We can officially say we have completed four out of five testing days. Only one more day to go! Yahooo...I think I might just be a little more excited than the students. Now, don't get me wrong. There are many other things that they would rather be doing than taking these high-stakes tests, but as the test administrator for my students, I am exhausted! (There will be a follow-up post about this!)

 

If you have missed my other posts about the testing incentives I use, you can find my Testing Incentives and Motivational Ideas pack. This is my go-to resource for all testing incentives. I simply choose the incentive I would like to use, print, and attach the candy. It is wonderful, and it has made my life so much easier this testing session.

 

Here is the little present I had sitting out on all of my students' desks as they walked into the classroom this morning. (And I didn't have too many empty candy wrappers to pick up today, so I was very pleased!)

 



Testing, Testing...Day 3

 

Today marked the third testing day for my sweet darlings. They are officially more than half-way finished with testing! Hooray! Today's test was the mathematics portion of the test. They worked their fingers to the bone coming up with their answers. I always love to see my students work hard and feel good about their work.

 

Because it was the third day and half-way point in the testing, I decided I wanted them to know that I was cheering for them 100%. I put Cheerios in ziplock bags for the students to eat during their break to fuel their brains. They enjoyed their snack and were very appreciative.

 

If you need ideas for testing incentives, check out my Testing Incentives and Motivational Ideas for Assessments pack for a resource to use throughout the year, year after year. 

Testing, Testing...Day 2

Day 2...Language Arts!

My students came in pumped and ready to go this morning. They knew they had prepared for their test, and they felt good about it. This is the first year our county has used the Common Core Standards, so where the students were feeling good about things, I was sweating bullets! Our test is also kept under lock and key, and we are never allowed to preview, see, or look at the test questions. This is a HUGE NO-NO in our county/state. Still sweating bullets! 

After the students began their test, I walked up and down the rows to make sure everyone was bubbling in their answers on the correct form. Although I did not (and repeat cannot) stop to read any test item, I did notice that it looked very long. When they were finished taking both sections of the test, they immediately said they felt good about it and that most of it seemed easy. I was relieved! 

For their little incentive today, I decided to give them bubble gum. They were given some before the test, during their break between section 1 and section 2, and some after they finished. This was a treat for them because they are never allowed to chew gum in my class...I despise cleaning it off of the carpet! 

This is how today's incentives were displayed. 

If you missed my Testing, Testing...Day 1 post, you missed where I get my incentives from. For my go-to resource for testing ideas and incentives, click HERE. There are 11 ideas to use, ready to print! They came in three different formats for each idea. 

Motivational Ideas for Tests and Assessments

Testing, Testing...Day 1

(Today begins a series of testing posts. The posts will span our county's five day testing session.) 

It is that time of year again. Testing! Testing! Testing! My students have worked diligently and learned the standards for their content areas. We have been reviewing and setting more goals, as each student wants to excel and do his/her very best. 

Our county chose to test over five content areas during a two-week period. Day 1 tests Reading, Day 2 tests Language Arts, Day 3 (during the 2nd week) tests Math, Day 4 tests Science, and Day 5 tests Social Studies. The students are not fond of the two-week spread of testing, but I guess it helps prevent ultimate burnout! 

Today, my students took the Reading portion of the CRCT. They read for 70 minutes on Section 1 and answered questions. Then, they took a 10 minute brain break to recover. As soon as our break was over, they read for 70 more minutes and answered even more questions. As I observed them testing, I noticed each and every one of them was taking the necessary time to read, comprehend, and respond to the questions. I was so proud of them and their hard work today.

To get them motivated this morning, I placed a little incentive on their desks. Today they received "Good Luck on the Test 'Smartie' Pants." They loved them! And I had fun preparing the goodies. 

If you are interested in my "go-to" resource for testing incentives, clink HERE. In this resource, there are 11 motivational saying/incentives for testing. Simply print, add the candy, and give to your students. 

Motivational Ideas for Tests and Assessments

Tomorrow my students will take the Language Arts portion of the test. They are ready! I hope you will check back tomorrow to see the goodies they will receive.