Feeling Lucky? Our 400 follower giveaway!

We {yes, even my sister who is on a blogging hiatus because of blossoming LOVE} are so excited that we are celebrating another milestone! It seems like just yesterday we were celebrating 300 friends and now 110 new, very awesome, and wonderful new friends have joined our blogging lives. We are overjoyed! To celebrate, we're throwing a giveaway, rafflecopter and all! We are also putting all of the items in our store up for a 15% off sale for the next three days! This giveaway will last until Midnight Sunday 3/10/13! Enter today for your chance to win prizes from 8 AMAZING bloggers and a $10 gift certificate and 4 different winner's choice items from our store! We'll have 11 winners in all! Check out the cool prizes you can win!

 First up is Beach Sand and Lesson plans! Gina is a fellow Florida blogger and third grade teacher who is extremely sweet and extremely generous! She helped us with our 300 follower giveaway and she's back to help us some more! One lucky winner will win her Text Features Pack! Thank you, Gina!! 

 Next up is Jenny from Sun Tans and Lesson Plans! Jenny is also a fellow Florida gal and third grade teacher! Check out her super cute blog.! She has lots of very awesome products in her TPT store as well!! Our lucky winner will win 2 of her items!! Thanks, Jenny!!

 Amanda and Stacia are collaboration cuties and adorable Georgia girls who teach 4th grade together! These girls are as sweet as two Georgia Peaches {said with my best southern accent}... and their blog is super cute too! They are also helping us out a second time with our giveaway!! Guess what? They have a 300 follower giveaway going on starting today as well!! When you're done with this one, head on over there to enter theirs too! Thanks Amanda and Stacia!!

Aimee from Pencils, Books, and Dirty looks is so awesome and is giving one winner 2 items from her store! She is a 3rd grade teacher from Indiana who has LOTS of different hands on activities in her TPT store. I love her new "Eggcellent Math and Literacy Centers"... they look like so much fun! Check her out! Thanks, Aimee!! 

Next, is Tania, a North Carolina 2nd grade teacher from My Second Sense. She has an amazing life story! When you get a chance, stop by her blog, and read her "About Me".  Tania is giving a winner one item from her fantastic TPT store! I think her "Tweet Arrays" look really cute and they will definitely help 2nd graders with repeated addition and beginning to understand multiplication. Thanks, Tania!!

Christina and Kathy are Krazy in Love With Kindergarten! These two fantastic ladies are super sweet and their blog is cute too! 1 winner is going to receive their word family puzzles! I should grab them for Makenzie! I'd like lots of things to do over the Summer to get ready for Kindergarten! =) Thanks Christina and Kathy!!

Our next lovely blogger is Terri from 1st grade Princess! Her blog name is perfect!! I LOVE it! We're all royalty in our classrooms!! I also love the tropical vibe of her blog! Be very jealous... Terri has a WHOLE MONTH OFF and she's awaiting the birth of her twin grandaughters!! She's one lucky lady! We're wishing your daughter in law and those sweet princesses well, Terri! 

Next up is Joanne from Head Over Heels for Teaching! I love EVERY thing about Joanne's blog... polka dots, zebra print, and heels! LOVE, LOVE, LOVE! She's giving a winner her citing evidence posters... perfect for those Common Core response questions!! Joanne is also having a giveaway!! She's celebrating 100 fabulous followers!! Check out her blog and enter her giveaway too!! Thanks, Joanne!!

Last and hopefully not least is...Us! We are so appreciative of all of your sweet words, comments, and never ending support! We are giving prizes away to 3 winners. Two different winners will win 2 items {winner's choice} from our TPT store and one winner will win a $10 gift certificate to TPT! Don't forget to check out our TPT store for 15% off for the next three days! 

Now the fun begins! Use this rafflecopter for 34 entries plus 10 for every extra day that you blog about it! We are asking that you truly follow our friends and that you don't enter without actually following them. Please be honest... it is the best policy.  Winners will not be chosen until all entries are checked and validated. Thanks in advance for your support! Good luck!! 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

-Jackie and Danielle-

Our 300 Follower Giveaway!

Hi Friends!! Thank you so much for being a part of our blogging lives! We can't believe we have 311 great friends who love teaching as much as we do.
To celebrate this very awesome milestone, we've teamed up with 11 amazing bloggers and Troy from Classroom Friendly Supplies for this exciting giveaway. There are two chances to win through rafflecopter!

For the first raffelcopter giveaway, Danielle and I, along with these fabulous bloggers will be giving the winner an item or two {winner's choice} from our TPT stores.

Danielle and I would like to give our winner 2 items {winner's choice} from our TPT store!

Holly from Fourth Grade Flipper would like to give our winner 2 items {winner's choice} from her TPT store!


Jayme from Trendy in Third would like to give our winner 1 item {winner's choice} from her TPT store!


Heather from The Busy Beehive would like to give our winner 2 items {winner's choice} from her TPT store!
The Busy Beehive

Jessica from Ideas by Jivey would like to give our winner 2 items {winner's choice} from her TPT store!

Stacia and Amanda from Collaboration Cuties would like to give our winner 1 item {winner's choice} from their TPT store!

Beth Ann from Taming My Flock of Firsties would like to give our winner 2 items {winner's choice} from her TPT store!
Taming My Flock of Firsties

Finally, my very own terrific former intern, Brittany at Salt Life Teacher would like to give our winner 1 item {winner's choice} from her TPT store! She is a brand new blogger! Go check her out!




For our second rafflecopter giveaway, Danielle, myself, and these fantastic bloggers will be giving items away from our TPT stores that we think you will really LOVE! Troy from Classroom Friendly Supplies is also in on this giveaway!

I would like to give our winner my newest Magic Tree House Polar Bear unit! I am going to begin working on it with my kids this week! They can't wait!

I would also like to give our winner my Magic Tree House Christmas in Camelot book study unit. Although "Christmas" is in the title, it's not really a Christmasy book. =)

Danielle would like to give our winner her So You Want to Be President? Exemplar Text unit, just in time for President's Day!

Danielle is also going to give our winner her Magic Tree House Night of the New Magicians book study unit. It's fantastic!! She's working on it right now with her class, and they LOVE it!!

Karen from Mrs. Jones's Kindergarten is giving our winner Sight Word Construction mats! They look awesome!! I'd like to buy them for my daughter. =)

Njat from Mrs. Murillo's Class is giving our winner her Martin Luther King day pack. This is perfect for MLK day!

Gina from Beach, Sand, and Lesson Plans is giving our winner her Common Noun and Proper Noun Practice Pack. Gina is so talented and super sweet too!

Melissa from Don't Let the Teacher Stay Up Late is giving our winner her Winter Literacy Centers. They look like fun!!

Last, but certainly NOT LEAST, Troy from Classroom Friendly Supplies would like to give away 1 of his absolutely amazing, Quietest Classroom Pencil Sharpeners to our winner in his/her choice of colors {green, blue, red, or black}. This is a $24.99 value for FREE! Wow!!

WOW!!What a giveaway! We wish we could win!! Just kidding!! OK... so how do you enter?? Follow the directions on these two rafflecopters for lots of chances to win... that's it!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Thank you to all of our followers, old and new!! You mean so much to us! Thank you, thank you, thank you, to our amazing fellow blog friends who participated in this giveaway! We truly appreciate your generosity!!! 


If you'd like to blog about this giveaway in your own blog, and you want to include the flier at the top of this post, here's the code:

<div align="center"><a href="http://sisterteachers.blogspot.com/2013/01/our-300-follower-giveaway.html" title="Sister Teachers"><img src="http://i1343.photobucket.com/albums/o787/teachersisters/300_zps8adbfafb.png" alt="Sister Teachers" style="border:none;" /></a></div>

 Happy Blogging!
-Jackie and Danielle-

Casey Rocks!!!

Happy Tuesday!! Every month at our school, a teacher or staff member is chosen to be "Teacher of the Month". We nominate each other based on our district's 5 goals. I can recite them from memory, but won't bore you with the details. =) When our principal called us all down to the lobby for a short little impromptu meeting one morning in early December, we didn't think much of it. Since Mr. D. started at our school in September, we've had a few of them. He started the meeting saying that he didn't really want to wait until his next "official" staff meeting to announce December's teacher of the month since it was a relatively short month. Once he started talking about the teacher of the month and describing the different things that the teacher has done to earn this award and help our school, I thought to myself, "hmmm... I've done that too, or my sister did that a few weeks ago". To our very excited and extremely humbled surprise, WE, The Sister Teachers, were chosen as Co-Teachers of the Month of December!! We were so happy and honored to be chosen by such an amazing staff!! We're just a small representation of the talent in our school. A few years ago, our former Principal, Dr. B. started the tradition of giving the Teacher of the Month a huge rock with our mascot (Casey the Dragon) on it. The rock is now known as "Casey Rocks!!". Each month we pass the rock along to its newest recipient. Here's a pic of Danielle and I with our "Casey Rocks!!". It was kind of hard to get a self pic with the rock since it was pretty heavy, but it's not too bad. We have to give our rock up tomorrow, so we wanted to share it with you tonight!

Happy Blogging!

-Jackie-

Happy Thanksgiving and Cyber Monday TPT Sale!

Happy Belated Thanksgiving, Friends!! We hope you all had an enjoyable day with family and friends! We had a wonderful day with our family... lots of yummy food, drinks, lots of laughs and of course Football! We all relaxed today since we're not black Friday shoppers. I even got a cuddle and a nap with my daughter Makenzie... she hasn't napped in almost two years, so it was a treat!I guess the trick is to keep her up late. Probably not... her teacher may not be too happy about that!

This is Makenzie... she's attends the afternoon voluntary pre-k program in our school. Her teacher is fabulous!! She does tons of awesome activities with her kiddos and they are learning so much!

I HAD to take a pic of this adorable turkey leg hat... I couldn't resist! Silly Aunt Danielle aka "Auntie Yellie" couldn't resist the turkey hat either! She looks cute too!

Danielle and I were even able to take a new picture together... we took it ourselves of course... instagram is so much fun! Overall, it was a lovely Thanksgiving. The quality time we spent with our parents was great and much needed! We're very lucky to be able to spend our holidays together as a family.
I'm sure many of you will be checking out the amazing deals TPT will be offering on Monday! Everything in our store will be 20% off plus TPT will also take an extra percentage off so everything purchased on Monday and Tuesday will be up to 28% off!! What an unbelievable sale! I can't wait to see what my favorite teacher stores are offering... i'll have to stock up! The amazingly talented Michelle at 3 AM Teacher created this fantastic button and super fun linky party! Check out all of the fabulous stores holding Cyber Monday and bonus Tuesday sales!

Here are some things up for sale in our TPT store...

Happy shopping and enjoy the last few days of this amazing Thanksgiving weekend!! -Jackie-

My sister inspires me!

Sounds like Jackie has a real good plan to begin the new school year, unlike Jackie's procrastinating sister! :) Just kidding :)

This upcoming school year will be vastly different than any other school year for me. I will be entering into a co-teaching adventure in 3rd grade with another amazing teacher from our school, Mrs. Robbins. We just made arrangements to meet up tomorrow to discuss "back to school logistics". We decided to meet at Jackie's house so their little girls can play together!

I'll probably bring fruit salad to snack on.. I'm a big believer in "brain food to get you in the mood to learn". I'm excited to see Mrs. Robbins and ask her how summer has treated her! Mrs. Robbins and a few other teachers from our school run an amazing extra curricular program called "Dramatic Learning"... More to come.... In the meantime, check them out on the Web. http://www.dramaticlearningorlando.com/index2.html


Tonight will be devoted to making a list of back to school things to discuss tomorrow. I can't wait to share all of the neat things I have discovered off of pinterest and other teacher blogs. The point of this list is to not overwhelm Robbins, instead, I want to get her excited for our new class together!

I would love to hear about co teaching experiences you have had. Some things to think about:
1) How did you make it work?
2)What apprehensions did you have?
3)How did you overcome the obstacle of sharing a classroom?
4)If you could give one piece of advice to someone sharing a classroom, what would it be?

Back to School Logistics (8/1/11) Meeting with Mrs. Robbins:

1) Decide on a color scheme/theme for our classroom. (I like the zebra print that my sister is using, but I might try and find something different. Perhaps a music/band theme since I am in a rock band in my spare time. I love the colors green, white, and black. I love when my students create their own work to display on my walls, so I am going to look into that further.)

2)Marsha my co teacher has never used Daily 5 and Cafe system before, so I want to discuss what she knows, what I know, how we can use it in our classroom.

3)Talk about a classroom behavior system. I rely heavily on my "Smith Bucks" classroom economy. I reward students for appropriate behavior with these bucks. My sister Jackie has it saved on her computer so hopefully she can add the template. If Marsha and I decide to do this, we will have to think of a new name. "smithrobbins bucks" is one I have thought of. My face can be on the 1$ and Mrs. Robbins can be on the 5$, and I was thinking administrator(s) could be on the $20, $50 and $100.

4)Discuss procedures and guidelines that we have used at the beginning of the year. I am going to tell Mrs. Robbins about "anchor charts" and how they facilitate knowledge and ownership of expectations.

5)Decide what copies we will need for back to school. (Dragon Books-for organized Castle Creek students... more later)

6)Set up a time to go in and figure out classroom design....(more later)

7)Talk about expectations of the classroom and each other.

8)Talk about any professional development we did this summer. (I'll tell her about the ESOL class I took, books I read, and blogs I have visited. I'm sure this will be the time that Mrs. Robbins head will never be the same. Blogs are addicting.

I figured 8 things to check off on a Back to School list would be a good start! I'm sure 8 will be increased many many more times before our classroom looks "Meet the Teacher Ready", but hey, that's the fun and excitement of BACK TO SCHOOL time!

-Danielle