The World's Best Pencil Sharpener!

Oh my word you guys! I have the best thing EVER to share with you.

I mean, it is something that will change your teacher life.

Literally. It will never be the same again!

You know in the movie Elf, when he sees the sign that says "World's Best Cup of Coffee" and then he bursts through the doors yelling "CONGRATULATIONS! World's Best Coffee! You Did It!"

Well, that just about sums up how I feel right now, except I want to shout out "I found it! The World's Best Pencil Sharpener! It Finally Exists!"

I don't know about you but I have tried just about every pencil sharpener out there and without fail, they always break. They sharpen better on one side than the other, they don't sharpen enough or they sharpen too much...the agony never ends! And no one can truly understand this dilemma unless they have been a teacher.

Well I am so excited to announce that your dilemma does not need to continue any longer! Classroom Friendly Supplies has the answer.

I do recommend that you have a little lesson to teach your students how to use it. It's not your average sharpener and they will need to learn how it works properly.

First, you will need to pull out the silver plate on the front:

 
Next, you squeeze the plastic knobs together on the top of the plate and slide the pencil through the hole into the sharpener.

Once the pencil is pushed into the sharpener, release the knobs. This allows the small "teeth" on the silver plate to hold the pencil securely while it is sharpened.

Next, hold the sharpener down with one hand while you turn the crank with the other.

One of the best things about this sharpener is that it won't over sharpen. You will feel the pressure stop when the pencil is done sharpening! Then just squeeze those little knobs again to release the pencil.

I sharpened many different pencils, including some that were only sharpened on one side from a previous pencil sharpener and all of them came out looking like this...

My students absolutely LOVE it! They are still raving about how sharp their pencils are and we've been using it for a few weeks now!

If you are looking for the pencil sharpener answer, I promise you will not be disappointed with this one!

Here's a video if you want more information about it:

If you would like more information then check out the website!  
www.classroomfriendlysupplies.com

I received my pencil sharpener for free from "Classroom Friendly Supplies" in exchange for this review. This review is my true and honest opinion about this product.

Do You Want a Warm Hug??

Who doesn't love warm hugs!?

Olaf does, that's for sure!

I recently got this in the mail and was so excited! All the little kids LOVE Frozen and Olaf. I remember last year when it came out....All I heard was *knock*knock*knock "Do You Want to Build a Snowman!?......" They would sing the entire song at the top of their lungs!

And then there was always "Let it Go! Let it GO!!!!!!....."

I knew all of the songs before I even went to see the movie! (Are you with me on that!?)

So when I pre-ordered my "Hug and Hide Olaf" in October, I was excited!

When you open it up, this is what you see:

It comes with a stuffed Olaf and a book. Now, when I ordered it, It made it sound like an "Elf on the Shelf" type of thing. BUT you could use this either in place of the Elf, or you could do it in January!

When I opened it up and read the book, it wasn't quite what I was expecting. Still cute, but it doesn't preface an "Elf of the Shelf" type of thing.

It starts out with Olaf telling you he loves warm hugs. He tries to give you a hug, but can't because he's in a book! He asks if he plays a game with you, if you'll give him a hug.

 "What game should we play?     Leap Troll?"

"Ring-around-the-reindeer?"
(These would be fun games for a class party....just sayin'!)

"Hide-And-Seek!"

 In the end the book opens up when you find him and he wants a hug.

You can then hide the Olaf stuffed animal included and find him to give him a hug.

I would definitely switch it up a little bit to have it be more like an "Elf of the Shelf" thing, but I thought it was really cute and wanted to share it with you in case you want your own. Just click any of the pictures to go to Amazon and check it out for yourself!

Would you like a fabulous FREEBIE to go along with this!?

 Mary from Sharing Kindergarten shared this adorable freebie on Freebie-licious Blog. Click the picture above to go to the post and grab it for yourself!!

Try to give out some "warm hugs" today. Thanks for stopping by!

I have a Helpful Hint for you! {And a Freebie!}

Have you heard of the fun linky parties that has been going on this week over at Blog Hoppin'? Each day has had a different theme! I'm actually linking up with Tuesday's Helpful Hints linky (on Saturday!)

Are you constantly passing out papers to everyone throughout the school day?

Well last year I decided to implement "Paper Helpers." Each student at each table in my room would take turns being the "Paper Helper" each week. Anytime I needed to pass papers out these students would come to me and I'd give them the papers for their table. Also, when anything needed to be collected these students would gather everything from their table, put them all the same direction, and place them in our "Turn in Basket."

It worked like a charm!

Then this summer I was doing some blog stalking professional development ;) and came across a different variation of this from Teaching with a Passion.

She basically did the same thing, except instead of "Paper Helpers"she called them "Table Captains" (How did I not think of that!?) lol. Also, instead of rotating students each day, like I did last year, she suggested rotating weekly, which I liked a lot more!

So I decided to switch it up a little bit this year! I implemented her "Table Captain" ideas and I can honestly say that my students LOVE it this year! They get WAY excited when it's their week to be the captain. I even had a lot of parents mention it to me during parent teacher conferences a few weeks ago!

Here are some pictures of what it looks like in my classroom this year:

 I found the little cones at Dollar Tree....I wanted different colors for each table, but I was searching RIGHT before school started and had to go to 3 different Dollar Tree's JUST to find these ones! I was just grateful to find any.  (I was at Dollar Tree recently though and there are a BUNCH of them again.)

I got the adorable picture frames for each table at Ikea for $0.99! (LOVE a good deal.)

I made the table numbers for the picture frames, along with the stars for each cone. I printed the stars on cardstock, 2 of each, and glued a popsicle stick in between them. Then I just stuck the stick into each cone.

Each student has a name tag at their spot on the table, and when it's their turn to be captain, they get to put the cone above their name.

In addition to this, I have a "Table Captain" display on my whiteboard at the front of the room. I put the student's names at each table on each circle. The star turns around to point to who is the captain for the week. After everyone has a turn being the captain I switch their spots around, but you could just rotate it around again too!

This could probably work if your students sit in rows too!

Is this something you'd like to do?
No need to make your own labels and stars....just click HERE to download mine!


Let me know if you use it. Thanks for stopping by and have a great weekend!