Yay! We made it to summer! After the CRAZY year that was 20-21, you deserve a break!

I don’t know about you, but the first 2-3 weeks of summer, I AM NOT thinking about school. I need that time to decompress, get my summer routine going, and to fill my cup a little bit. After that, I feel like I am ready to start putting some time into thinking about the beginning of the year. Whether you are the type to do a little each day or get it all done in a week, get some things done in the summer so that you can get some of your time back during the school year. As we all know, teachers do not just work during the school year. We DO work in the summer, but what you work on in the summer can help you leave at contract time and leave all that work at school!

Long Range Plans

If this is not your first year in the grade or school you will be with next year, you probably already have some of these. If you are a first year teacher or it will be your first year in the grade level, get with your team and plan out every week in your year. What order will you teach your standards in? Do you have a curriculum you need to follow? What is the outline of your year?

Check out my team’s Long Range Plans!

Dig A Little Deeper

Once you and your team have an outline for the year, you need to go through on your own and create your personal classroom’s long range plan. Your probably thinking… Uh what?! I just did this! That is true, but this time we are going to dig a little deeper. You’re going to take your outline of standards or skills and your going to assign a strategy, book, or manipulatives you want to use with each standard or skill. For example, if you will be teaching summary, will you use Somebody Wanted But So Then or will you use Beginning Middle End? Now don’t worry. These are not set in stone. However, this will help a TON when you are planning during your planning time.

Picture this… You are in the middle of your planning time because you only have 50 minutes and you already spent 5 minutes using the restroom, 10 minutes talking to your team mate, and 5 more minutes finding a snack. You only have 30 minutes left to plan! But lucky for you, during the summer you already chose which strategy you’re going to use and what book your going to use. You don’t have to stay after school or take it home! You can plan the whole next week in about 2 planning periods!

Take a peek at my lesson plans! I print these out and put them in my happy planner.

Make Templates

I personally use Google Slides to help me stay organized with my life in the classroom. If you ask my teammates, if my head was not attached I would lose it! So, in order to keep myself organized, I use Google Slides. This is one of my biggest time savers! I make templates for how I want my day to flow.

The very first thing I do is write out exactly what I want my day to look like. I mean minute by minute. (Tip: Write out even the time it will take your class to clean up and walk to lunch/specials. About 5-10 minutes) This will help you chunk your day. What will your reading block look like? Here is an example of what my Reading Block will look like:

10:45 – Pick up kids from specials
10:45 – 10:50 – Walk back to the classroom
10:50 – 11:00 – Word Work/Vocabulary
11:00-11:10 – Mini Lesson
11:10 – 11:25 – Read Aloud/Model
11:25 – 11:35 – DEAR Time
11:35 – 12:00 – Skill Groups/Conferences
12:00 – 12:05 – Closing
12:05 – 12:10 – Clean up
12:10 – 12:15 – Walk to lunch

When I look at this lay out I am looking for important information I will be teaching. I see Vocabulary, Mini Lesson, Read Aloud, DEAR Time, Groups, Closing, and Clean Up. Each of these will be a slide I will create for my template. I can also add timers to these slides because I know just about how much time each bit will take. Now If you are a first year teacher or even a second year teacher, this will be a little more difficult because you might not be 100% sure what you are going to fit into your time. Talk to your team to see what they typically do and maybe that can give you some ideas.

Here are some of the example of my reading block. I got these slides from Maddie Fairchild (Fairchildin5th) on TPT. I will link them here. This is the best because you can change the background and colors and fonts whenever you want, but you already have the flow of your day.

I hope some of these tips will help you save some time during the year! You deserve to have time outside of the classroom during the year! So go enjoy your summer, but get some things done. Your future self will thank you!

The end of the year has come at last. My planner is full of great, engaging lessons and meetings that could have been emails… (can I get an amen!) Call me crazy, but when my summer starts, I immediately get excited to get my new teacher planner together! I put in the date on the calendars, I fill in the holidays that I get off (most important… duh!), and begin planning my first week back. I don’t know about you, but I love the way a paper planner feels and how easy it is to look at and access, and how beautiful and custom I can make it with stickers (and flair pens!). I have created an easy to use planner for those teachers that love to create their own paper planners like me! Looking for a new planner? Well this is the one for you! Want to see the planner for yourself?! Look here!

What Comes in the Planner?

In this planner, there are many teacher tools that help keep us organized and give us more time at home and less on lesson planning. There are may title pages that give us easy access to the sections we need. These title pages include Class Information, School Information, Professional Development, Grade Book, Class Data, and Lesson Plans. There is also an editable title page that you can create for your specific needs! This will fit everyone’s needs for an amazing, customizable planner.

Parent communication is key to a healthy, well-rounded classroom and can be a crazy unorganized mess! There are pages for Conference Logs, Volunteer Logs, and Communication Logs. Everything parent related can be found in one place! No more searching everywhere for that volunteer log to get some help with your holiday party and 25 sugary students.

To fill your planner, there are many other pages that help keep all our information in one place. You will also find a Log in page for all of your username and password needs. And let’s face it, we have 6 billion usernames and passwords so there are plenty of places to put your information. To help stay organized with your students information there are student information pages that include Mom and Dad’s information, transportation information, allergy or medical information, and IEP or 504 information. Everything in one organized place! There is also a place to put your student’s birthdays because we can’t forget those.

Drum roll pleaseeeeeee….we have the calendars and lesson planning pages. This is my most favorite part (hehe!). For these pages, I have dated the calendars for you left the weekly planning pages blank. I realize that everyone follows the same yearly calendar, but not everyone has the same weeks or days off. I wanted it to be easy for you to print however many weeks you wanted or to be able to fill as you go. This is a vertical layout meaning that the days of the week are at the top and the subjects (also editable) are across the side.

Not only are there dated calendars, but there is a Year at a Glance Page and a Week at a Glance page. The Year at a Glance page is where your long-range plans would go OR your focus skills for each month. This page is with me EVERYTIME I plan. It is essential for me to be on track with my team and this page is a life sae when it comes to that. The Week at a Glance is a bit different. This is special for me a s a teacher planning my upcoming week. There is a To Do section, a To Plan section and a To Copy section. I love having this page with me when I plan do be sure I have everything I need for the upcoming week such a materials, copies, and anchor chart ideas.

What Binding Do Is The Best?

Who else gets a random.. I mean super important piece of paper that YOU NEED TO KEEP from a meeting and then end up losing it… This seemed to be my life until I found The Happy Planner Binding System! I am sure you have heard of this system, but I am here to tell you it has saved my life! (Dramatic?… NAH!) It is so easy to punch the paper and put it in my planner. I can’t be alone that when I get close to the binding my handwriting gets cramped and sloppy? Well, with this binding system you can take the page out to write those beautiful plans then put it right back in with no trouble! It is the absolute best! Not only is this system easy, it has so many accessories that come with it. At Michael’s I walk around and window shop (mostly actually shop) the Happy Planner accessories. My most recent purchases are the Checklist Pages and the Teacher Stickers. Can you say “easy peasey lemon squeasy”?! Happy Planner Hole Punch is linked here. The Happy Planner Binding rings I used are linked here. The Big Happy Planner Covers I use are linked here.

How Do I Set Up My Planner?

I love setting up my planner. There is something so calming and exciting about setting up my new planner. I ask myself what worked last year and what I need this year. I found that setting up my planner was a bit more difficult this time around because I am starting a new school, however this is a challenge I will happily accept. I like to keep all of my personal information in the front like my Logins, my PD Log, and my School Information. Having it in the front is a great reminder of the things I need to do to get my professional self together. After my information, I keep my student’s information. This is for easy access. If I need to call a parent or write a note home, I know who I am talking to and I can easily log it. Behind the student information, I keep my beloved (sometime be-hated) calendars and lesson plans. I have purchased these Erin Condren monthly tabs from Amazon. They have been essential to my Teacher Planner for a few years now and hold up great. They are linked here. I like to keep my grade book in the back so that it is easy to flip to and I have a more sturdy place to write. At the very back I keep my meeting notes. This makes it easy to add my random.. I mean SUPER IMPORTANT notes from all the meeting that should have been emails!

This planner is essential to keeping me organized and stress-free! I hope this helped you in your journey to happy planning and to continue to grow! Happy Planning! Do you want this planner and become ridiculously ourganized?! Get it here!

-Madi

Author: fullbloomclassroom

How To Use Some Time In The Summer To Get Back Time During The Year