Let the Decorating Begin!

I officially have two months until students walk into my classroom.  I have to wait a couple of weeks to move my belongings to my new school being that they are still waxing floors and getting my classroom prepared. With that said, my dining room has turned into a storage unit and I know my husband will be glad when all of this gets moved out!

However, since I have started a collection, why stop now! I have been working on and posting anchor charts on my anchor chart page but I made a poster tonight that I can not wait for my students to use. First, on the back of one of my bookshelves I am going to make this bulletin board:

Mine will be orange and purple to fit my color scheme!

With this bulletin board, the students each have a cup with their name on it and then when they read a book they put the book title and author on the paint strip and place it in their cup.  I am going to use red and green paint strips. If they like the book they will use a green paint strip and if they dislike the book then they will use a red.  I would like for my students to put a brief statement/review on the back of the strip. This way, the students can visually see all the books they have read and other students can get ideas of books that they may like to read.  To go along with this board, I made this poster that will be hung up in the reading center.

I plan to laminate the poster and use dry erase markers to write with so the poster can be reused. If a student reads a book and they think someone else in the class will like it, then they can use the poster to recommend the book to the other students.  A big part of why I want to do these things is to get the kids excited about reading. When I was in fifth grade, I did not like to read and it was not until college that I truly began to love reading. I want to be able to get my students excited and motivated about the books they read!