Thursday, February 26, 2015

This Giveaway Isn't Over Yet! Come Visit for Your FREE Clip Art!


Day 4 of my Milestone Giveaway is Here!

As a special surprise for visiting, I have a FREE clip art set for you to enjoy!  Keep scrolling down...

Here are today's prizes:


$40.00 TpT Store Credit 

from the Stores Above!



Easter Kids Design Kitfrom Creative Playground



Place Value Centers
from Creative Playground

And as a special surprise for visiting today...
Click here for this set of St. Patrick's Day Monsters!

 Don't forget to enter yesterday's giveaway!  

Winners of Day 1 and Day 2 are Sue Blankenship and Kayse Morris.


a Rafflecopter giveaway

Wednesday, February 25, 2015

Day 3 Giveaway! Come Win Some Awesome Prizes!


We're not done yet!  

Let's continue this Milestone Giveaway with Day 3!


Here are today's prizes:



$40.00 Store Credit from 

the Awesome Stores Above!


Blog Design Gift Certificate 

from Laugh, Eat, Learn



Newest Digital Paper Pack 

from Creative Playground


Thanks to all for helping me reach my personal milestone of 2,000 TpT followers!  I owe it all to you and I appreciate your continued support!

Make sure to enter Day 2's Giveaway here.

Don't forget today is TpT's Teachers are Heroes Sale.  
You can visit my store here.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Monday, February 23, 2015

Day 2 Giveaway! You Won't Want to Miss This One...


Yay!  

I've reached a personal milestone on TpT of having 2,000 Followers! 

Let's celebrate with Day 2 of this awesome giveaway!

Here are today's prizes:

 $10.00 TpT Store Credit from the stores above!




Butterfly Design Kit!



Black History Bundle of products from my TpT Store

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Also, make sure to enter in yesterday's giveaway here!

Thanks for celebrating with me friends.  It's all to you that I can celebrate this milestone and I truly appreciate your continued support! 

 
Make sure to visit for tomorrow's giveaway and good luck to you!

Sunday, February 22, 2015

A Week's Worth of Giveaways? What?


YAY!  

Thanks to all of my friends and followers, I've reached a personal milestone that I just need to celebrate with everyone!

Recently, I reached 2,000 followers of my Teachers Pay Teachers Store and I just wanted to thank everyone for their support!  So what better way to show my appreciation than to give back to you!


Each day this week, I'll be hosting a major giveaway that you won't want to miss!  I have over $200 in TpT Store Credits to giveaway, free clip art, and many more surprises I don't want to tell you yet... You'll just have to come back tomorrow and see what's being given away!

So let's get this party started...

Today's giveaway is for the following:


 $10.00 Store Credit from the above stores!



Easter Clip Art Design Kit shown above!


And a YEAR's worth of No Prep Printables from my store!


How can you pass up this giveaway?  Make sure to enter below and check back tomorrow for another giveaway.  

Thanks again for helping me reach my milestone and I truly appreciate all your continued support!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Until Tomorrow My Friends,

Friday, February 6, 2015

Shout It From the Mountain Tops!






 It's finally February and this is my absolute favorite teaching month of the year; yes, Valentine's Day is awesome.  Don't get me wrong.  But, to me Black History Month is so  important to also celebrate in our classrooms.  This is a topic I love talking about and I hope you do (will) too!

There are many, many wonderful stories to share in your classroom during Black History Month.  I honestly run out of time each February while teaching about this topic.  There seems like there's so much to teach in so little time!

So today, I'd like to share with you just a little about my favorite Black History Great with you, Henry "Box" Brown!



First of all, if you don't have this book, RUSH out and get it today!  It's entitled, Henry's Freedom Box and written by Ellen Levine.  The illustrator is the award winning artist, Kadir Nelson who has illustrated many books about African Americans.  I use this as a read-aloud, usually the first for Black History Month because it's such a wonderful story!  If you're unfamiliar with Henry's story, here it is in a nutshell...

Henry Brown had been a slave all his life.  When he was younger, he was separated from his family because of slavery.  When he grew older, he met another young slave woman and they married with permission of their Masters.  The couple eventually had two children and were very happy; as happy as slaves could possibly be.
And then something happened that would forever change Henry's life...

Henry was so very unhappy about losing his family and thought and thought about what he could do to make himself happy.  Suddenly he had an idea!  One thing that would make him happy was if he was finally free and no longer a slave.

So Henry bought a box with money he had saved up from working in a tobacco factory.  He climbed in the wooden box with a little bread and water.  His friends sealed him in the box by nailing down the top.  Then Henry was sent in the US Mail to Pennsylvania, where African Americans were free and not slaves.

Henry had friends in Pennsylvania that opened the box when he arrived there in the mail.  He stood up and declared, "I'm finally free!" after he said hello to the gentlemen opening the box.


And that is the story of the most famous slave, Henry "Box" Freedom (or Brown).  Is that not the most wonderful slave story you've ever heard?  I just LOVE it and the kids love it too.  They just can not believe that someone would do this all for freedom.  Honestly, it's hard for me to imagine too!

After doing some research for a product I created, I found out that later, Henry never did find his first wife.  Eventually he remarried and traveled around in Europe doing performances and talks about his adventure in the box.  Students always want to know what happened to him later on so now you can tell them!

The images you see above are in my product, 

The product is around 100-pages in length and has a gamut of activities to do with your students.  There are vocabulary cards perfect for a themed Word Wall and a vocabulary book for students to write down definitions.


There's a Powerpoint that you can show that describes a little about slavery in general and how it relates to Henry Box Brown.


I've also included games, assessments, projects, and printables:



If you're interested in this wonderful set of activities for your students to learn more about Henry Box Brown, you'll find more information here.

As a gift from the Primary Pack to all of its readers, I'm offering the Easy Reader, which I illustrated for the most part, for free!  Just click the picture below and the reader is yours!


I'd love to know your favorite book or topic you use during Black History Month!  Leave your suggestions in the comments below.

Have a wonderful Black History Month my friends and until next time,


Monday, December 15, 2014

Free Festive Fonts for Font Fanatics Like Me!


Hello friends!  I'm sure you are all getting ready for Christmas Break and can't wait for a little family time with your "own" kids!
You might have some Christmas projects you'll finally have time to make, like invitations, cards, and gifts.  I've found the perfect Festive Fonts to take you from now until the New Year!  The fonts are shown in the picture below and the links are also given.











Have fun with the fonts brought to you from Creative Playground!

Until Next Time,

Sunday, December 7, 2014

Top 3 Ways to Raise Facebook Engagement!

Ah!  You're Here!
Thanks to those visiting from my collaborative blog The Primary Pack!  And if you're just visiting to visit, a big hello to you too!
Ok, where were we?  Ah, yes!  

The Top 3 Ways to Increase Your Facebook Engagement

Tip Number 3 to increasing your Facebook engagement relates to taking pictures.  I mentioned that it's critical to include an image in each Facebook post that you make.  But what kind of pictures do you include?

Here are four characteristic of an A+ Image to include on your Facebook post!  Take a look at this photo I found on Pinterest:

The four characteristics you see above are the exact reasons this photo caught my eye.  It worked and drew me to this wonderful site! 
First of all, it's ORGANIZED.  The pictures aren't willy-nilly, all over the place.  The author chose to arrange them in an organized collage.  
Secondly, the photos are UNIQUE.  Personally, I think this arrangement of photos are unique because of the arrangement for one.  I like the collage lay out.  Next, I love all the bright colors and not one photo overpowers the others with their content.  
Make your Facebook photos and images unique and try to include ones that are not all over Facebook already!
The next characteristic of an A+ Image is RELEVANT.  I am a teacher as you know.  Each picture in the collage relate to me because they're all photos of a classroom.  Make your Facebook photos match what your talking about in your post!  
And lastly, REALISTIC  is the next thing you must make your Facebook images, especially if you're posting a "How-to" article.  I could make almost all of the things in the photos above.  I would bet that most teachers would relate to this picture and could make the majority of things shown.  Your Facebook photos must be realistic and not something impossible for your viewers.

So this photo caught my eye for all those reasons listed above.  I went even further and found this blog, Fancy Frugal Life.  And this is what I found.  
Check out these photos:

Isn't this reading room beautiful?  I was in awe of the photo when I saw it, but then I realized where this room is!  It's actually a spot under a set of stairs in this woman's home!  That makes this reading room rock even more, in my opinion.  If I was a child, I would love to have a room like this!
Each of these photos follow the A+ Image Characteristics above!  They are relevant, realistic, organized, and unique.  Perfect images to make my point.  Try to include photos that will draw in your readers just like I did with these.



OK, now for the Number 2 way to increase your Facebook engagement!  You have to literally ask people to come to your Facebook page or blog site.
I know it might sound corny, but yes, you really do have to ask people to like you.  It doesn't have to be in the words, "Please Like Me!" but something that gives the reader a directive after reading your post.  If you want the person to click the like button, put that in your directive.  If you want them to share your post, mention that in your directive.  Tell the reader what you want them do to increase your engagement!

And now the Number 1 Way to Increase Your Facebook Engagement...

Drum roll please....

Number 1:  CTA


First I want to draw your attention to the left side of the image.  The letters CTA stand for Call to Action, which means you have to give your reader a direction of what to do with your site.  How do you want them to engage with your Facebook page?  Like?  Share?  Go to Your Blog?  This relates perfectly with Number 2 above.  However, this tip includes ways to get the reader there.  People have actually done research on the best ways to get people to engage with your facebook page!  If you look on the right side of the notebook image, there are the reasons you might want people to visit your site.
For example, if you wanted to gain sales to your TpT Store, give your reader the link to your store in your Facebook post.  That CTA is a good way to gain sales.  If you want to Increase your Signups on Facebook, as listed above, give your readers the CTA of liking your page.  Actually tell them where the like button is on your facebook page.  I've even seen some Facebookers include an image of their Like button on their Facebook page, to get the reader to like their page.

If you are visiting me from my initial post at The Primary Pack, I want you to think of the CTA I used at the end of my post...  If you are here from that post, then my CTA worked!  I purposely gave you reasons to come here to my blog, kind of like a teaser.  I promised you I would give you the Top 3 Ways to Increase Your Facebook Engagement.  So my CTA of urging you to my site worked if you're here from the Primary Pack post and I might use that CTA again in the future.
So when posting on Facebook, first think of the type of CTA you want to use, or the purpose of your readers engaging with your post.  Then come up with a way to do that...a contest?  a interview?  a poll?  
Remember these three words CALL TO ACTION!  Every Facebook or blog post must have a CTA to increase your engagement.  It's a must!

Friends, I hope I shed a little light on this topic and you got some useful tips to increasing your engagement!  I know there are a lot more ways to increase engagement, especially CTA's.  
I would really love to hear your ways to getting people to your blog post or Facebook post!  How do you get your readers to come back?  What CTA's do you use?  Leave your comments below!

Until Later Friends,

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...

Printfriendly