Spark Motivation- Cat Cash

Time to link up with Joanne over at Head Over Heels for Teaching for Saturday Motivations. 

We are a PBIS school. 

That stands for Positive Behavior Instructional Support. 

For those who don't know what that is, it's a way to focus on positive behaviors for students which will lessen negative behaviors. 

We are in year 2. Last year, we worked on common goals in all common areas of our school. 

Our motto focuses on 

Be Safe

Be Responsible

Be Respectful

This year we are focusing on more rewards. 

We are implementing "Cat Cash" (we are the wildcats) 

Here's how it works: 

Each teacher and aide was given a book of Cat Cash. There are duplicate copies. 

All adults "catch" students being safe, responsible and 

We give them cat cash which they can redeem for rewards. 

We have Reward Fridays where students redeem their cash. They can purchase outside time at lunch, they can wear a hat during the day, "buy" lunch with a teacher, stuff like that. We actually have a school wide bulletin board that shows all of this for the students. Sorry, I don't have a picture for you. 

Teachers can receive "Cat Cash" too. If we attend an after school event, community event, things like that one of the PBIS members will reward us with cat cash. We use ours to "buy" a jean day! We can also "buy" a period off or a longer lunch break. 

 Things are going well, but we have a long way to go. We are coming up with more rewards and more opportunities for students to spend their cash. We also have to get more teachers to give out the cash. 

I am GUILTY! I just plain forget to give it out. 

So, since I am sharing this, it is my goal to give more. I support PBIS 100%, now I need to prove it! 

UPDATE: I started this post a LONG time ago. Since then, I am happy to report I am giving out more cat cash. I have found that on my duty day, which is Friday mornings (ugh!), it works wonders to keep them calm until the bell rings for first period! 

My new goal is to get some more reward ideas, things that are simple and free. I saw some coupons in the Winter Freebies from TpT and that has sparked some ideas. How about a late pass??? Our kids are ALWAYS tardy, I think they would like this one. 

How about you? How are you keeping your kids (or yourself) motivated right now? 

Link up and share! 

Five for Friday, a Winter Edition

Finally FRIDAY!!!!!

 ONE

What a typical week in Texas it has been. 

This week, I wore Capri pants and flip flops Monday-Wednesday. We had a high of I think 87 one of those days.

Yesterday, it was about 57 degrees when I went to work. When I left work though, it was 39 degrees!!!! 

That is cold folks!  

I was home for less than five minutes and I was changed and bundled up for the night. I had hoped for at the minimum a late start today, but it didn't happen. It did in the surrounding school districts though. That's like a stab in the back for us!!! 

It is C-O-L-D!!! It is 34 degrees and raining!! 

TWO 

 It's a perfect day for winter to hit though. There are some awesome Winter Freebies going on right now. 

3-6 ebook 

7-12 ebook 

           

I will be honest though, I am bummed about most of them. I have six days with my students. The last three and a half days before break, we have semester exams. I am in full blown serious teaching mode. It is hard to be festive. 

I want to be, I actually have a few things planned, but we also have a boring study guide they HAVE to do!!! This test is 10% of their entire semester grade!!! 

This is the downside of teaching middle school for me. 

Plus, I work at a low performing school and we are obsessed, I mean driven by data. It's hard not to get depressed and just count the days to the holiday!!! 

Enough complaining, huh? 

But I did participate in the Cyber Monday and Tuesday and even shopped on Wednesday (LOL) 

I did some festive stuff for my kids and necessities as well. It was fun! 

THREE

Today I am testing. These days I actually get stuff done. I decided I was sick of all the clutter and junk that has accumulated over the past 15 weeks. So, I started cleaning. Oh my! It feels so good. It feels like it did when school started. I just needed to throw extra junk away and get organized again. I wish I had taken better before pictures, but I started throwing stuff out before I thought about posting. 

This is the area right behind my desk. Its just a junk magnet. 

And now, it is organized! 

The area right next to my desk is ridiculous as well. This is embarrassing. 

And now, it looks so much better! I even moved it a little. I wish I could hide the wires, but impossible. 

 This box is deep... it is FULL of just extra papers I have collected since the beginning of school. 

I wish I had taken a before of this area, it was the main reason for my cleaning mission. All the papers in the box above were just lying on top of those crates. It was nasty. 

This was step one to the cleaning process, I liked it, but it still seemed cluttered. 

Then, I just got a bit obsessive and cleaned up a lot more! I love it now! 

FOUR

We started Secret Santa here at school. I always join in on this. I love this kind of stuff. My secret Santa waited until today to share, but it was worth it. They know what a die hard Aggie I am! This is PERFECT!!! 

FIVE

Sadly, I must confirm that our beloved high school team was knocked out of the playoffs last week in the third round. It was so heart breaking. Yes, we made the trip. My boys were devastated. My four year old keeps saying they won. I guess when we don't go to another game, eventually he will get the concept that our season is over. It was fun while it lasted though. 

Go Wildcats! 

WINNERS!!! In time for the big sale!!!!

WINNERS!!!!

Congratulations ladies!!!

Hope you can find some great things you need!!!


Courtney, you have $10 in my store and Misty, you have $10 to spend on TpT.

Emails are on their way!!!

Thanks for playing!

a Rafflecopter giveaway


Check out the savings at my store and many others!!!

DECEMBER!!!!! Currently, a Giveaway and Cyber Monday and Tuesday!!!

It is December 1st! WOW! 15 more school days and then two weeks and 2014 will be here. When I think of all that needs to get done, my head starts spinning. So, instead, I will blog about the fun stuff! 

It's time to link up with Farley for this month's Currently! Always a fun linky party! 

I have had a great week and really dreading the alarm clock tomorrow. There is so much that needs to get done!!! I really should go to work and make some copies, but seriously? do I want to? No way!!! 

I am looking forward to having my friends and neighbors over for our annual dessert party though. We have done it for 5 years and every year it just becomes more fun. Time to get my house in the holiday mood! 

I am also having an appreciation giveaway for reaching 300 followers! It coincides with the fabulous TpT Sale going on tomorrow and Tuesday. 

Click here to join the giveaway! 

Happy December All! 

A Giveaway, just in time for Cyber Monday!!!!

A milestone crept up on me this week. 

I have 300 followers!!!! (301 actually) 

Thanks Creative Clips for the clip art and Live Love Math for font

And of course, that means time for a GIVEAWAY. I was trying to think about what to do with all the great sales about to happen. I need this to happen fast! 

So, here's the deal. I am having a giveaway with TWO winners. 

One winner will win $10 from my TpT Store and another winner will win a $10 gift certificate to TpT to use on any of your favorite stores.

 I will announce the winners Monday morning so you have time to shop!!! 

So, start making your wishlist and join in on the fun! 

And, thanks for following me! 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

 

TpT Cyber Monday and Tuesday Sale!!!!

Cyber Monday is coming! And it is joined by Cyber Tuesday! 

I am not much of a Black Friday shopper. I have done it once. I am just not a shopper. I guess I never really have the money at the time and I just don't like people that much to fight crowds. 

I don't do well with things being "picked over" and I am not going to fight to save money. I know the savings can be big, but people are crazy out there and I like to sleep in. 

Writing that makes me sound like such a grump. I can't blame that on my age, I have always been that type of shopper. 

Thankfully though, we can shop from the wonderful warmth of our home and even though there are six of us here, it's not too crowded at my computer. 

   TpT is offering site wide sales December 2nd and 3rd. All items will be an additional 20% in my store, combined with the TpT discount, that is 28% off! 

I have already started shopping. My cart is filling up! 

My favorite finds (so far)

    

   

  

  

My best sellers: 

My newest products: 

 

Hope you find everything you need and a little of what you want as well. 

Happy Shopping! 

Tried It Tuesday- Football Party

I really want to link up with Holly at Fourth Grade Flipper for Tried it Tuesday, but going to warn you, this is NOT SCHOOL RELATED. 

Last week was my youngest sons 4th birthday and we had a football themed party for him. He is obsessed with football. He "plays" football while it's on TV. If they run the ball, he runs, if they pass, he passes. He always wins though. Once, a player was hurt and all the other players were on their knees, I look over and he was on his knees too. It was actually a very significant injury and they had stopped the game for about 15 minutes. He eventually went from his knee to sitting criss cross on the floor. He takes this stuff seriously people. 

So, once he told us he wanted football, I let my Pinterest obsession go to work! It was soooooo fun! 

My football man! 

The tailgate table!

Saw this on Pinterest for gift bags. So easy!
The tops came from Catch My Party. FREE printables! Gotta love that! 

My husband made this awesome cake. He is an extremely talented cake decorator.  

I actually thought of this on my own, last minute. My husband helped me throw it together real quick. It was a perfect way for the guests to enter the party though. 

My husband also had this idea. He made this for our guests to sign for Hamilton. I love the keepsake. 

I saw this idea on Pinterest too. My husband made all those cups. He is such a perfectionist.
The water bottle labels came from Catch My Party too. (Again, FREE!)

I made all the flags from FREEBIE from here. Such great party ideas!

Again, the hubby made these strawberry footballs. Talk about yum! 

Even made the condiments fun! 

Saw this online too. Thought it was super cute! 

We served hot dogs. Again, simple people, simple! 

A few years ago, my husband made this football toss for a community event.
It was perfect for this party.
All the kids loved playing outside! 

We all got in the fun with our jerseys and eye black. 

Even my older ones wore eye black. Anything for their brothers! 

Frugal Mom and Wife had some GREAT ideas too. 

It was loads of fun and super easy. 

Thanks for letting me indulge and share a little about my kiddos.