I cannot even BEGIN to tell you how happy I am to write this post.  Because.....

I just went back to school this week. I have been out for a month. 

I had an injury.

I was running in front of a speeding train to save the life of a young child who fell on the tracks and got her shoelace caught in the rails, when the train nicked me in the leg as it whizzed by.

Just kidding....

Truth is,I fell and hit my head on the street while walking the dog and gave myself a concussion.  True story. I'm sure it looked quite graceful. Don't ever get a concussion. It has not been pleasant.

I hope you're taking it easy and giving yourself time to heal properly. Concussions are never fun and can definitely make things feel off for a while. It’s good to hear you’re still able to share this though—it definitely shows you’re getting better. If you're looking for some easy ways to automate tasks while you're resting, Latenode could be a huge help. Whether it's setting up workflows to manage your personal projects or automating tasks related to your business, Latenode's low-code platform makes it easy to connect apps, automate processes, and get things done without needing to write a line of code.

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The upside is I watched A Lot of Netflix.  A Lot.  As in 3 seasons of


which was unbelievably good. I highly recommend it. I also watched all 5 seasons of


which was also fantastic.

So anywhoose...

I did manage to be a productive member of society this week and I'm linking up with Doodlebugs Teaching to share my Five for Friday.

If you like it, you can grab the FREE label here.

We have been reviewing opinion writing so this week we wrote our opinion on which we liked best: indoor or outdoor recess.

I am thrilled to be linking up with Cole From Teach Glitter Grow to share my Top 3 picks for President's Day. Actually, since we are working on American symbols in my class right now so I figured I would share some resources I have found with you. This has turned into 3 categories because I had so much to share!  I hope it's helpful! Make sure to check out the other blogs that have linked up for more great ideas


A video on the Statue of Liberty

Watch this 3-minute highlight of Washington DC for Kids. Take a trip through our nation's capital with your students and lead a discussion with them pointing out American symbols that they see in the video.   

I love using brag tags in my classroom as positive reinforcement.




My students are absolutely obsessed with them!  My classroom management system is described in detail in another post that you can find here.

Students store their brag tags in these pocket charts I found at the dollar store.



Students collect brag tags they earn and they can wear them on Fridays.

I love the brag tags. The only thing I didn't love was storing them. 

First, I tried this:


But there was 2 problems with this method.
 
      1. We aren't supposed to hang things on the wall in our new school. Oops.
      2. I have a friend who can't keep his hands to himself.  Ahem.

So then I tried hanging them inside my closet door at school. I don't have a picture of that because it was just ugly. Ugly as in...

brag tags on the floor...
brag tags tangled up...
brag tags thrown inside the lego bin that I took away last week when no one was cleaning up, because who has time to untangle brag tags.
brag tags just thrown everywhere in the closet.

It.was.a.hot.mess.


So then I tried this...


But there is no way I could afford this for my 65+ brag tags.

Then one day, I was walking through JoAnn Fabrics because I had a medical condition that forced me to go shopping. True story. I'll tell you that one another day.

Anywhoose.....I was walking through JoAnn's and found one of those thread spool thingies.  It probably has a more sophisticated name but I have no idea what that is so here's a picture of it.


Immediately I thought of my brag tags and HOLLA!  I think it holds 120 spools of thread or something like that. I got it on sale and with a teacher discount for less than $18.  Bam!

As soon as I got home I used a Sharpie to label it with the names of my brag tags. If you have more patience than me and want to go all fancy you could probably make labels and go all "Martha Stewart" but I'm cool with it like this:


You can hang it on a wall or off a hook or stand it on a shelf or table since it has a "kickstand" in the back.  I love it because the tags hang so nicely and they are not getting tangled anymore or taking up an entire bulletin board or wall space (Mr.Alan and Mr. Nick-you're welcome).


See how nicely they hang?

Here's a side view:


Some do touch the ground but I'm ok with this since they aren't tangling.

And now this mess:


Is all nice and neat now.


Life changing for me, folks I tell ya!  Life changing.


Do you use brag tags?