A Love of Paper: Big and Small

What seems like forever ago (but it probably wasn't) I wrote about the EDExpo2015 and that I did formulate some ideas from this trip.  There were so many products and so many ideas floating around that my brain had to clear a bit before I could "act" on any of these thoughts.

Well Spring Break has come...my house has been purged, reorganized, the girls have been playing/dancing/singing.  My head has started to clear.

When I was walking around the Expo I came to Pacon's exhibit.  There is just something about paper.  Notebooks, post-its, graph paper, notepads....it just does not matter...I love them all.  My eyes immediately fell on a small composition book.  The representative was so kind and offered to send me one in the mail.

Well, they did not send me one, but TWELVE!

Currently I use composition books to take running records on my students during guided reading.  Problem. They are pretty thick, take up quite a bit of space, and I waste a lot paper. 
These have only 24 sheets of paper in them.  They are skinny and just the right size for my guided reading groups.  But I could not wait until next year to try them out.  So I have been using them with my new RtI group.  It has been perfect.  It fits right into my binder that holds all my materials.

So my thoughts for next year....I want to use these in my guided reading groups with all my students.  Maria is thinking about also using these for her writing notebooks because she feels that the students need a smaller composition book that is more manageable. 

I am always so grateful to be able to try out new ideas in the spring.  It allows me to get excited about the changes I will make for the upcoming school year.

When I received this box of small composition books another long, tall, skinny box came.  Inside I found four rolls:

They are backdrops from Ella Bella Photography and Pacon thought I might like to try them out.  Oh my goodness!! I had never thought about using backdrops before.  But my team has already decided that we are going to have these backdrops up next year at Open House with props for families to enjoy. 

I could not wait to next year to bust these puppies out!  We had a writing celebration on Friday to show off all the great animal research our firsties have done.  We decorated with a zoo/safari theme.  I set up the backdrop with some props for students.

 
 My firsties thought it was so cool that it looked like real wood planks. I think I need to come up with some more creative ways to use these backdrops.  Do you have any ideas?

Thanks to Pacon. You have sparked my creative juices!