Hi y'all! I'm Marisa the silly and sarcastic blogger from The Kinder Adventures of Mrs. Tinez's Kids. (I'll explain the name in a bit)
I'm so excited to have started blogging and having the chance to meet such incredible teachers. I have to be honest and tell you guys that I started my teaching blog last year and was totally all about it. I thought "I can do this...I've got tons of things to share and can learn so much from everyone else." And then life happened and I feel off the blogging face of the Earth. :( WHOMP! WHOMP!
During my period M.I.A. I was still stalking other teacher blogs like crazy and loving on all their ideas and TpT stuff- I couldn't stay away. So I'm back with all of my silly sayings, way to honest comments, and sarcastic-ness.
If you couldn't tell already....I'm from Texas- born and raised and I must warn you I say y'all ALOT!!! I took the being Texan thing to heart growing up here and that y'all sticks with me in everything I do. :)
I promise we don't all wear boots just because we live here- It was boot day at school. |
{The Blog Name}
I go by Mrs. Tinez because when I first started teaching in Special Education- I worked very hard to help one of my students learn my name. When he finally said my name he said Tinez and I couldn't have been more excited. So it stuck....He's called me that ever since (he's in middle school now and still shouts it when he sees me-melts my heart) and it caught on with my fellow teachers and friends.
{Personal Life}
I am a Kindergarten teacher in good ol' Texas and entering my 6 year of teaching. {It definitely doesn't feel like it's been that long} I'm married to my college sweetheart, Mike who just became a coach. {Lord help us! 2 educators in a house is trouble} I am the proud momma of two sweet little ones- Cammy, who I swear is 4 going on 25 and paying Momma back for all the grief I caused my Momma growing up. And the ever so sweet and 5 weeks new baby Grayson- who already has my heart and has Momma preparing to keep the girls away.
Along with our sweet babes, we are the proud owners of a crazy little husky named Bandit aka The Coots (don't ask about the name....we have nicknames for everyone in this crazy family- hang out with us and you might get one too!)
We are a sports obsessed family as you will tell from my blog- I live in purple on Friday nights (for the hubs' HS team), burnt orange on Saturdays (Hook 'em!) and red/navy on Sundays (P...A...T...S! PATS! PATS! PATS!- yes, I'm a Texas girl who loves her Patriots and ....NO- I'm not crazy...YES-my dad is embarrassed as a Cowgirls fan that I'm cheering for another team)
Ladybug and I in our Pats gear |
{Teaching}
I previously taught 4th grade general ed. after teaching 4th grade co-teach as the Special Education teacher for one year, and Kinder and 1st grade co-teach as a Special Education teacher for three years.I wanted a class of my own so bad and couldn't wait to try new things. I was lucky because in the words of my fellow Special Ed. teachers...I was one of those that was able to "escape" onto the other side. :) Apparently y'all, [according to them] once you're teaching in Sped. they say no one gets out....except a few. :) After 6 years of teaching though, I have figured out that Kinder by far is where my heart is!!!
{What I love teaching}
There are so many things I love about teaching-by far, my favorite subject to teach would have to be Reading/Language Arts. I can not tell you how incredible it is to see where my little ones start off and where they end up at the end of the year. I love to teach them Reading/Language Arts because well for one thing I'm all about singing and learning our letters and sounds. It's seriously one of my favorite things to do. But more important than that, is being able to help them learn how to read and become better readers. I know it sounds so cliche, but it's so exciting to see their face light up when they realize they know more letters than before or to see them smile when they sound out a word. It makes my heart melt!
{In my room}
I'm a silly teacher so if you popped into my classroom one day you would more than likely see a few things:
1. We are usually always singing. You want me to teach you something...you can bet your sweet biscuits I have a song to go with it. :)
2. If we are not singing, we are dancing our hearts out. Literally,I.... my kids love Youtube videos of Just Dance Kids. Every day Friday is "Fun Dance Friday" :)
3. You would walk into room filled with color and lots of Snoopy and Peanuts. You would quickly notice my obsession for all things snoopy. I mean heck one of my parents made Baby Grayson a Charlie Brown shirt blanket.
My room is filled with polka dots of every color and Snoopy. I'm a total dork and decorate it not just for my kids, but for myself. Heck...I'm going to be in that class more than my own house so why not love what it looks like.
4. Anchor Charts!!! OH MY WORD! I love anchor charts! I make anchor charts for anything that you can make an anchor chart for. You will more than likely see them throughout my room and all over the walls. It's an addiction- I'll admit it.
{One of "those" days}
Now I'll be the first to say that teaching is amazing, but we all have those days. And you can bet that on "those" days in order to keep this girl sane, I have to have my Large Sonic Dr. Pepper. For some reason that is beyond me {the ice...there's something about the ice} Sonic Dr. Peppers always taste so much better than a Dr. Pepper from the soda machine. I don't get it....I don't know why or how....but Good Lord! I love it! You wanna make this teacher smile? Bring me a Sonic Dr. Pepper! Sadly, another thing that has been known to cheer me up according to one of my students- is Hersey kisses. Apparently, Mrs. Tinez was being monitored by a cute little redhead in her class and he noticed and took notes that Mrs. Tinez ate through a entire basket of Hersey kisses in a week. The next week, cute little redhead student walked in with a bag of kisses for his teacher. <3 melted my heart.
{Can't live without}
One thing I can not live without is my technology. I love my Elmo more than I probably should. It makes it easy to model for my little ones, but they also love to get involved. There is nothing better than getting chosen to come up to the Elmo.
{Classroom Lessons}
One of my favorite things we teach in Kindergarten is Nursery Rhymes as part of our poetry unit. I have to be honest and tell you that it still surprises me how many little ones in my class have NEVER heard of many of the nursery rhymes. So I find so much excitement and fun teaching them for the first time. We spend half of our year learning and focusing on one nursery rhyme per week. We look for words that rhyme, identify our popcorn words (sight words), look for letter chunks we know, identify capital letters and create our own picture to go with our nursery rhyme. Each week the students will receive their own paper with the nursery rhyme- they "butter" their popcorn words and circle words that rhyme. Their favorite part is always creating their own picture to go with the nursery rhyme. It's my favorite part too! I love seeing their drawings and how they represent it.
At the end of our nursery rhyme unit, each student has their poetry folder filled with nursery rhymes. :) We celebrate our learning of the our nursery rhymes by having "Nursery Rhyme Olympics" in which the students participate in games that have fun themes to go with some of our nursery rhymes for example:
-Little Miss Muffet: Everyone hates a spider! Carry the spiders on your tummy while crab crawling from one end to the other without dropping them. The team who gets all members to complete the task wins! :)
-Jack be Nimble: Students race to jump over small cones "candles" to see who can be the most nimble student in the group.
The kids absolutely love this and love that they get a medal, certificate stating they participated in the Olympics and an ice cream party! :) It's definitely a fun time and so worth the smiles I see on my little ones faces.
{Blogging Goal}
I absolutely love blogging and I love sharing ideas and meeting such amazing teachers. It does always show in the amount I blog, but it's definitely something I'm working on. My goal(s) this year for blogging are:
1. Blog at least 2 to 3 times a week. I'll say it....I'd love to blog everyday, but with the school year and two little ones....It's cray! For those amazing ladies who do it....I totally bow down to you. So I have to real and set the goal to at least do it 2 to 3 times a week.
2. I would love to continue to develop the unique and fun friendships I've made through this blogging adventure. Who knows maybe I'll even attend a Texas blogger meet-up! :)
3. I'd love to get to 200 followers. That would be a dream at this point. I know that in order to do that I need to have something to keep you all excited. That would lead to my last goal...
4. I want to work on creating freebies for y'all to give you a reason to visit. Aside from my wonderful wit sarcasm and silly humor. Let's admit it...everyone loves a freebie. :)
So stop on by and come visit! I'd love to connect, read some of your blogs and make new friends. :) Happy Back to School y'all!
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