I have a total of 27 years teaching experience . After I received my M.Ed. from the University of Florida (hence the name "HappyEdugator"), I began teaching in elementary school, where I taught pull-out remedial classes for grades 2-5 and a section of K-1. Then I taught Pre-K for 5 years, before I went up to Middle School, where I have been in 6th, 7th, and 8th grade. Last year, I went back to 1st grade in a private setting. I have traveled worldwide and am also fluent in Spanish.
I have a total of 27 years teaching experience . After I received my M.Ed. from the University of Florida (hence the name "HappyEdugator"), I began teaching in elementary school, where I taught pull-out remedial classes for grades 2-5 and a section of K-1. Then I taught Pre-K for 5 years, before I went up to Middle School, where I have been in 6th, 7th, and 8th grade. Last year, I went back to 1st grade in a private setting. I have traveled worldwide and am also fluent in Spanish.
Roots with Meaning and Example Words Handout. Greek and Latin roots, prefixes, and suffixes along with their meanings and example words. alphabetical order. 5 pages, useful as a study guide for test preparation. Supports common core. - HappyEdugator
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.L.4.4b Use common, grade-appropriate Greek and Latin affixes and roots as clues to the meaning of a word (e.g., telegraph, photograph, autograph).
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.L.5.4b Use common, grade-appropriate Greek and Latin affixes and roots as clues to the meaning of a word (e.g., photograph, photosynthesis)
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.L.6.4b Use common, grade-appropriate Greek or Latin affixes and roots as clues to the meaning of a word (e.g., audience, auditory, audible).
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.L.7.4b Use common, grade-appropriate Greek or Latin affixes and roots as clues to the meaning of a word (e.g., belligerent, bellicose, rebel).
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.L.8.4b Use common, grade-appropriate Greek or Latin affixes and roots as clues to the meaning of a word (e.g., precede, recede, secede).
EST PREP Common Core Vocabulary for Middle Grades PowerPoint. Test prep for middle grades Language Arts. Academic vocabulary. Vocabulary words that may be tested on the new common core assessments for middle school Language Arts. Each slide has a word, a definition, and an illustration or animated graphic to help students remember. Can also be printed out on index cards and used for a word wall or as flash cards. Now updated with even more words! Helpful for test preparation. Includes Sprenger's words - essential and critical vocabulary for common core- HappyEdugator
Back to School Classroom Expectations PowerPoint. Just what you need at the beginning of the year. Use at Open House, Back to School Night, or Parent Night. A basic slideshow template of classroom expectations for students at the beginning of the year. Fill in your own specifics. Back to school expectations include behavior, routines, etc. Project it on your SmartBoard for the first day of school. Editable. Revise for yourself as necessary. I also play it continuously looping at Open House at individual student computers, set up like kiosks.
- HappyEdugator
Reading Assessment Form. Use to keep track of what a student's strengths and weaknesses are in reading and comprehension. There is a place to record the date, text level, accuracy, self-corrections, and a way to mark strategies for decoding, fluency and comprehension. May be used with any level reader from elementary on up as an assessment of reading ability and monitor progress.
- HappyEdugator
Conjunctions: Coordinating Conjunctions - Subordinating Conjunctions SMARTBOARD. An interactive Smartboard lesson and activities on coordinating and subordinating conjunctions and how they are used in sentence structure. Two slides present the acronym FANBOYS for remembering coordinating conjunctions, and another has a hands-on activity where students make compound sentences with them. Two slides present subordinating conjuntions and how they make subordinate clauses, and another slide has a hands-on activity for making complex sentences. Solutions to the activities included. Students will also use commas and periods to punctuate their sentences correctly. On the last slide, students must sort the conjunctions into the correct vortex. Engaging and interactive lesson on the Smartboard, where students can touch and move the sentences and punctuation around. EDITABLE for your classroom use. You may wish to divide the sentences into chunks. - HappyEdugator
ELA test prep interactive PowerPoint on parts of speech, subjects and predicates, sentence structure, types of sentences, verb tenses and superlative adjectives that could be on standardized tests. Language Arts grammar and mechanics practice questions with answers to help your students master some of the kinds of questions they might face on standardized tests. Use as an assessment or a practice before state testing of standards. 30 questions. Animated graphics and instant feedback. Enjoy!
- HappyEdugator
Nonfiction Vocabulary You Should Know Game Show PowerPoint presentation. A teaching game on vocabulary used in a nonfiction unit of study of informational text. Includes nonfiction, author's purpose, exposition, description, narration, and persuasion, types of nonfiction selections and their descriptions, nonfiction text structures, the difference between dialogue and dialect,as well as stereotype and bias. Good review for standardized testing. Reading more nonfiction is essential to the common core standards. Use for fun test prep. Prepare your students for the terminology. Supports common core state standards.
RI.4.4, RI.5.4, RI.6.4, RI.7.4
MLA Format Handout. This printable handout is a guide for students when making citations in essays using Modern Language Association (MLA) format. Includes general guidelines for margins, font and spacing, how the heading, title and page numbers should be formatted, and how to make citations for both long and short quotations, which are defined. An example included.
- HappyEdugator
TEST PREP Test Practice - Language Arts and Reading. Test Preparation practice for state testing. Several nonfiction reading selections, and questions based on standards. Helps students practice answering questions similar to ones that they could have on the state assessment. Can be used for 6th, 7th, and 8th grades as practice. Useful for preparing for any state test. Use a bubble sheet or scan-tron to make it more like the real thing. Supports common core. 33 multiple choice questions. Key included.
Finding the Main Idea When Reading Non-Fiction PowerPoint. Interactive questions with immediate feedback and animated graphics. Explains main idea and how to find it when reading informational text. Common core requires more nonfiction reading! Students need to have a good understanding of what they read, and this is a key skill they need for success. Good for test prep! - HappyEdugator
Behavior chart is a traffic light that you can display and use to manage classroom behavior. Fun for race car theme. Great to set up at the beginning of the year when you go back to school. This is a classroom management tool that should encourage better work and study habits. You can blow up poster size, print out, tape together and laminate. (Blow the poster up to poster size with a poster maker or have enlarged at a copy center.) Print out the 48 unique car name tags, laminate, and write names on them with transparency markers so that you can wipe them off and reuse them. You can attach cars to the posters using restickable glue sticks, which make them act like sticky notes. -HappyEdugator
Thanksgiving Homophones PowerPoint. Fun November Activity - a homophones search! It's an interactive Thanksgiving story to read. Students have to look for two incorrect homophones on each slide. There are twenty homophones (or homonyms)to find in all, two on each slide, and then students check themselves at the end. Key included on last slide. Fun and engaging, this original Thanksgiving story is about a little boy who travels across the country to visit his grandparents for a typical Thanksgiving holiday. Develops reading vocabulary and comprehension, spelling skills, and correct usage. Supports common core standards. - HappyEdugator
Keywords: Thanksgiving, Homophones, Thanksgiving PowerPoint, Thanksgiving interactive, Thanksgiving activities, Thanksgiving word study, Thanksgiving vocabulary development, Thanksgiving reading, making inferences, frequently confused words, Thanksgiving common core
TEST PREP Language Arts Standards Review PowerPoint is helpful for preparing for state tests. It has questions similar to those found on the standardized tests. 30 interactivequestions, 73 slides in all. Slides are set up so that students can answer the questions and then check their answers and discuss. Besides grammar, there are reading selections with questions about the selection as well. Supports Common Core standards for Language Arts. - HappyEdugator
Rikki Tikki Tavi Constructed Response Based on Common Core Standards. Writing assignment based on the short story Rikki-Tikki-Tavi by Rudyard Kipling. Emphasis on using text evidence for support a response to literature. Students must analyze the theme of the short story. Includes writing prompt with instructions for writing an argument that uses textual support for claims, a sample essay for students to use as a model for their writing that demonstrates how to use evidence from the text, and a writing rubric. Created to support writing that is highly rigorous as required by the new common core standards. - HappyEdugator
Independent Clauses and Subordinate Clauses. Worksheet or Quiz. Sentence structure practice, review, or assessment. Students will identify whether the underlined clauses are either independent clauses or dependent clauses (subordinate). Ten sentences with key. Supports common core. . - HappyEdugator
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.L.7.1.a
Explain the function of phrases and clauses in general and their function in specific sentences.
Middle School Language Arts Essential Study Guide. Practice questions on author's purpose, principal parts of verbs, subject-verb agreement, context clues, idioms and prepositions. This four page study guide or practice sheet reviews several areas of concern many middle school students have trouble with in Language Arts. Key included. Good for test preparation!
- HappyEdugator
End of the Year Poems. PowerPoint or Printables. Five original poems and photos to help you say good-bye to your students at the end of the year. Project on a whiteboard on the last day, or print them out on index cards to make inexpensive good-bye gifts. On PowerPoint, not PDF, so you can adjust your formatting to meet your needs. In color and plain black and white. Editing allowed for your classroom use only. Happy summer! - HappyEdugator
Coordinate Adjectives Handout and Practice Worksheet. Explains using commas and how to tell the difference between coordinate adjectives and cumulative adjectives. Coordinating adjectives are adjectives that must have a comma because they can have the word "and" put between them or their order can be reversed. Cumulative adjectives must stay in the order in which they are presented or they do not make sense, so therefore they do not need a comma. Handout will give students a reference to use, and worksheet has 18 practice sentences where students must determine if the adjectives are coordinate or cumulative, and place commas accordingly. Supports the common core standards. L.7.2a . No prep. Print and go.
Ratios, Fractions, Percents, and Decimals PowerPoint. Helps students learn the rules for converting equivalent fractions, decimals and percents. Also Includes a common equivalent reference sheet which can be printed out and kept in student notebooks. - HappyEdugator
CCSS.Math.Content.4.NF.C.5 Express a fraction with denominator 10 as an equivalent fraction with denominator 100, and use this technique to add two fractions with respective denominators 10 and 100.
CCSS.Math.Content.4.NF.C.6 Use decimal notation for fractions with denominators 10 or 100.
CCSS.Math.Content.6.RP.A.1 Understand the concept of a ratio and use ratio language to describe a ratio relationship between two quantities.
CCSS.Math.Content.6.RP.A.3c Find a percent of a quantity as a rate per 100
Digital Paper - Back to School. High quality digital papers for your creations. 12 different styles of Fall leaves backgrounds. Great for autumn or back to school. 12 X 12, 300 dpi. JPEG file format. Personal or commercial use. Enjoy! - HappyEdugator