Teacher’s Brain

How To Create A Stellar All About Me Presentation For Back-To-School Night

It’s that time of year again! Time to start preparing for your back-to-school night or “Meet The Teacher” night. If you are looking for an easy and super quick way to make an “About Me” presentation that will wow your new students and their parents, I have you covered! 

As many of you know, I love Google Slides. They are so versatile and easy to use in-person or online for virtual learning! You can easily personalize them and add your own flair without paying an extra cent on supplies. This makes them perfect for teachers looking to save on classroom spending. 

With all of that in mind, I created this All About Me Presentation Google Slides resource to make your back-to-school night experience easy and stunning. 

all about me

This All About Me resource comes with 13 slides that you can easily edit and personalize with your unique personality. The fun and colorful theme will help you make a great first impression! 

all about me

 

After back-to-school night is complete, you can still use these templates for your Star Student! Just switch out your information and add student info for a fun and unique way for students to feel special! 

all about me

Check out the video tutorial for how to use these Google Slides!


If you are looking for an easy print-and-go resource? You can easily print these! This resource also comes with a black and white version. 

all about me

If you love Google Slides as much as I do, check out my post here on how to use them to create a virtual calendar for your Calendar Time this year! 

You can also check out my Virtual Calendar Google Slides Templates here. 

Looking for more back-to-school ideas, check out these classroom decor tips!


 

Tips For An Amazing Meet The Teacher Night

If you are here, chances are you are planning out your Meet The Teacher or Open House event for the next school year. Back to school night is a great time to meet and greet with parents and students, introduce yourself, show everyone around the classroom, exchange important information for the school year, and more. 

Needless to say, it’s a big night! We all want to make a good impression on parents and our new students. Don’t worry, I have you covered whether you are doing an in person event or virtual! 

Last year, a lot of teachers had to learn to do everything online. It was a huge learning curve for many but we made it through and now we know the magic of Google Slides. Google Slides is now my new GO TO resource when teaching. It is perfect because you can use it virtually or in person. You can easily customize them by adding your text, photos, videos, music, and more. This makes it the perfect teaching tool. 

My Virtual Meet The Teacher Resource uses Google Slides to create a beautiful, cohesive, presentation.

It is so easy to pull your event together with this template for back to school. Just edit the text boxes, add a video or some personalized pictures. 

meet the teacher

This resource comes with 28 colorful and fun Google Slides with titles, edit text boxes, directions and ideas as well as 28 Google Slides with cartoon characters with the same titles so you can decide what you want to use and delete what you don’t.  This resource also comes with a French version as well. 

meet the teacher

meet the teacher

The best part? It comes together easily and quickly so you can get it done and keep your weekends to yourself! 

meet the teacher

Check out my video tutorial on how to use this resource and your back to school event will be ready to go in no time. 

Looking for more resources for the school year? Read my post here for everything you need to survive kindergarten!

 

meet the teacher


 

How To Have A Stellar First Day Of First Grade

The school year is wrapping up everywhere so it is time for teachers to start preparing for next year! If you are a first grade teacher, it is fun because school is still so exciting and new to the students. 

The great thing about that is that even though school is still relatively new to them, this isn’t their first experience with it. This means they have a little more confidence and independence than they did in kindergarten.  

Here are some tips for having an amazing first day of first grade: 

  1. Get to know each other! One of the biggest reasons for those first-day jitters is that students aren’t familiar with each other yet. Spend the first day playing some ice breaker games or crafts. You can pair students up for some activities so they can start developing friendships from the start. 
  2. Make sure to cover the rules. They may be familiar with a lot of them because they are likely similar to kindergarten rules, but summer break is a long time so it is always good to reiterate what is expected. Don’t forget to cover rules for the classroom, lunchroom, recess, and hallways. 
  3. Read books about the first day of school. Everyone loves a good book! Reading some about the first day of school is a fun way to illustrate how even though you may be nervous, it will all turn out okay. 
  4. Explain how your classroom schedule will go. Explaining to students what they can expect when they come into school is another great way to ease some of their nerves. Don’t forget to review going-home procedures so they are all prepared at the end of the day. 

After 20 years of teaching, I created an easy and detailed first day of first grade lesson plan! This includes a full day of detailed lesson plans with printables, links, editable plans, suggested plans, ideas, and activities! 

first day of first grade

Here is what’s included: 

  • 31 printables including detailed lesson plans, links, planning checklists, Welcome to First Grade welcome sheet, directions for the icebreaker name game, materials for First Day Jitters, name crafts, a photo poster, an All About Me Home Connection activity, name tags, and certificates!
  • An Editable PowerPoint to easily add students’ names to certificates, crafts and edit your own lesson plans
  • Classroom rules posters
  • Gingerbread Man hunt to find all the important locations at school!
  • Morning greeting and goodbye posters

first day of first grade

Everything you need for an amazingly fun first day of first grade!

Love these ideas but teaching kindergarten? Check out my post here.

first day of first grade

 

 

 


 

Kindergarten Morning Work Activities

Kindergarten is a very big deal for young students. For many, it is the first time they are away from home regularly. While it can be scary, there are ways we can help ease the stress of the unknown for them and show them how fun school can be! 

One way to do this is to establish a classroom routine early on so they learn what to expect. Setting a daily schedule and routine can be a huge relief because they know exactly what happens and when.

 Morning work is a great way to ease students into the daily routine. As soon as students come in the door, have morning work on their desk ready to complete. They can work on their morning work independently while you work on other tasks. This is a great time to respond to parent emails, address student issues, and otherwise prepare for the day. 

kindergarten morning work

Here are some benefits of kindergarten morning work 

  1. It is great for review. While at the beginning of the year, kindergarten students won’t have much to review yet, as the year goes on, you can focus morning work on the crucial skills they need like sight words, letters, and numbers. Circling back time and time again will help increase retention of this vital knowledge. 
  2. It helps with classroom management. As mentioned above, having assignments ready to go when students come in for the day helps free up time for classroom management tasks. Having that time really does improve the flow of the day. 
  3. It teaches independence.  As we all know, students learn so much more in kindergarten than just letters, numbers, and reading. They learn social skills and independence too. Kindergarten students are very young so they have likely not had much experience with doing tasks independently at home yet. Morning work is a great way to teach this. 

Ready to try some morning work? Try my kindergarten morning work packets for August and September!

kindergarten morning work

This no prep morning work resource includes 40 printable pages of meaningful morning work for your kinders! Model it once and then they should be able to work independently each month. 

This packet covers handwriting, sight word practice, color recognition, number sense, tally marks, counting, number lines, and writing numbers. 

Looking for more tips for kindergarten, check on my tips for the first day of kindergarten here! 

Do you assign morning work? Let me know in the comments!