7 Aussie Teachers You Should Follow On Instagram

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Instagram is chock full of exciting teachers doing wonderful things with their classrooms. I know we all love to have a peek inside other teacher's classrooms and see how they set their rooms up, what decor they are using and what resources their students love.

In particular, Australian teachers are starting to make their presence felt on Instagram with some wonderful looks at #teacherlife. You can find Aussie teachers by using the #aussieteacher but I've compiled some of my favourite up and coming Aussie teachers taking off on Instagram.

Click each link below to follow them or leave them a comment to let them know you came over from #techteacherpto3

7 Aussie Teachers You Should Follow. Australian teachers, here are some fantastic Australian educators and teacher authors you can follow today. Keep up-to-date an all the exciting new Aussie teaching resources.


A Queensland early years teacher, TechTeacherPto3 shares ideas and products from not only her own store but also useful teaching items she finds around the place. One thing that sets TechTeacherPto3 apart from other Teachers Pay Teachers sellers is that all of her products are aligned to the Australian curriculum so the hard work has been done for you.



7 Aussie Teachers You Should Follow. Australian teachers, here are some fantastic Australian educators and teacher authors you can follow today. Keep up-to-date an all the exciting new Aussie teaching resources.
Rainbow Sky Creations is run by two Aussie teachers that met teaching in the middle east and who share a love of colour and creativity in education. On their Instagram account they share learning ideas, resources and inspiration for the classroom and at home.



7 Aussie Teachers You Should Follow. Australian teachers, here are some fantastic Australian educators and teacher authors you can follow today. Keep up-to-date an all the exciting new Aussie teaching resources.
A passionate mother, teacher and creator from W.A, this Aussie teacher loves to design and create bright and engaging classroom resources for teachers around the world.

7 Aussie Teachers You Should Follow. Australian teachers, here are some fantastic Australian educators and teacher authors you can follow today. Keep up-to-date an all the exciting new Aussie teaching resources.

At Little Library Learners Instagram you will find library ideas, inspiration and general teacher life. This Aussie Instagrammer is a teacher from Qld who has taught in both Australian and American schools and is passionate about encouraging students to love reading and to feel motivated to visit the library.



7 Aussie Teachers You Should Follow. Australian teachers, here are some fantastic Australian educators and teacher authors you can follow today. Keep up-to-date an all the exciting new Aussie teaching resources.
Lauren from Love Laughter Learning is a former Prep teacher from Queensland who now spends time at home with her 7 and 4 year old girls. Pop on over to her Instagram page and you'll find a colourful collection of classroom ideas, crafty projects and teacher humour. Lauren loves to share and create hands-on resources for little learners - games, sorting activities, playdough mats and fine motor tasks and is a huge advocate for FUN in the classroom! Follow her for lots of inspiration and a laugh or two.



7 Aussie Teachers You Should Follow. Australian teachers, here are some fantastic Australian educators and teacher authors you can follow today. Keep up-to-date an all the exciting new Aussie teaching resources.
At Miss Smartie Pants you will find fun and bright ideas for your classroom. As a Year 1-2 teacher from NSW, Miss Smartie Pants shares fun DIY projects as well as amazing teacher hacks. This Aussie teacher creates cute teaching printables - you'll love her bright ideas!



7 Aussie Teachers You Should Follow. Australian teachers, here are some fantastic Australian educators and teacher authors you can follow today. Keep up-to-date an all the exciting new Aussie teaching resources.

Aussie Star Resources is a teacher from SA and she's all about Upper Primary - believing that the big kids are fun too! She created Aussie Star to provide resources that make life easier and save time for Upper Primary Teachers because she knows what it's like to try and juggle life and teach. If she can make life easier for teachers by providing high quality resources then she's achieved her number one goal.



7 Aussie Teachers You Should Follow. Australian teachers, here are some fantastic Australian educators and teacher authors you can follow today. Keep up-to-date an all the exciting new Aussie teaching resources.




Celebrating Chinese New Year in the Classroom


Chinese New Year is the perfect opportunity to bring a cultural celebration from another country into the classroom.  

There is so much you can unpack with this celebration and I'd like to take you through the Chinese New Year Activity Pack to give you some ideas and demonstrate how you can align this celebration with some of the outcomes in the Australian curriculum.

Maps and Flags

Exploring other country's maps and flags forms part of both the Geography and History curriculum (now called HASS) for all year levels. Inside this pack you will find some cute wall decorations students can put together and explore the Chinese flag and national dress.

The image below shows the wall display printed in colour but a black and white version ready for students to cut and paste together then colour in included inside.


Symbols and Traditions

From Foundation Year (exploring celebrations) through to Year 6 (exploration of Asia) all year levels require students to examine how celebrations take place both within Australia and the rest of the world, then draw comparisons. 

Creating hands-on resources always engages students and cements learning which is why these easy to make paper lanterns are such a big hit with students. Instruction and the template is included in this pack and allows students to consider the symbolism involved with this tradition.


The Red Pack is also another fun craft activity where students can make the envelope up with the template and decorate it then insert the paper coins and give to their friends.


Cultural Significance of Symbols

Included in this pack are several reading comprehension sheets on Chinese New Year, with each one exploring the symbolism of a traditional element that is an essential part of the celebration.

There are also mapping worksheets and maths activities so you can bring the Chinese New Year focus to all subject areas.


To view this pack in more detail click here.


Why not download the free Chinese New Year Poster for 2017. 
Don't forget to leave feedback if you enjoyed this freebie!




Setting up your classroom - 8 quick ideas you can pin today.



Setting up your classroom, even if you're an experienced teacher, can be fun but overwhelming. Pinning on Pinterest is a great way to pass the time and procrastinate about setting up your room, however, there are some wonderful pins out there to give you ideas - and I've placed a few pins below, 8 to be exact, that cover some of the basics of classroom organisation. 


All of these pins can be found on my Pinterest board Classroom Organisation where you can go to re-pin these ideas or you can click the image to go directly to that pin and re-pin from there.

1. Bulletin Boards

Crafty Morning has some great suggestions for creating bulletin board borders with scraps you might have easy access to at home.

2. Word Walls

Also an essential component of any classroom is a fantastic word wall and Buzzfeed has some exciting photos from classrooms to inspire you.




3. Displaying Student Work



Putting student work on display is essential to create a sense of ownership within the classroom. It's important to give student work some dedicated space to keep your room organised. I love the bright use of colours here by Live Laugh and Learn in Second Grade.

If you're stuck for space try this clever window idea by KB Konnected.



4. Classroom Library


You're going to have to give a small space over to your classroom library. It might contain your own books, a selection of books from the school library or a combination of the two. Either way, an organised classroom is one where everything has a home and Blossoming in First Grade has some great examples on her Instagram account.

5. Desk Arrangements

There are so many different classroom desk arrangements but which one is the most effective? 
Top Notch Teaching has the ideal classroom layout for you.




The Classroom Key has some great little visuals about how to set up your students' desks - always a difficult dilemma at the start of the year...

or perhaps you need your students sitting on the floor - we can organise that as well thanks to Blooming in First!


6. Equipment Storage

In lower school there is a constant issue with the 'right sort of container' for pencils and pens on a shared table (yes Early Years teachers spend time thinking of such things). Controlling My Chaos has some nifty ideas for pen and pencil caddies in shared spaces.


7. Classroom Rules Posters

I've always found it useful to place rules posters in key places around the classroom, at eye level, just to serve as reminder but I really love using this Classroom Rules Pack because with every poster comes with a worksheet so you can explicitly teach each rule with students.


8. Setting up Classroom Jobs

Another way to help students claim ownership of their classroom is to give them Classroom Jobs to do. I usually change the jobs once a week with lower school students and with upper school students I select new monitors once a term. It saves me a lot of stress and helps me keep the classroom organised as well!





Focus on a Freebie - December


What is sequencing?

Sequencing is the process of putting things into some sort of logical order, for example sequencing the order in which tasks are done. 

Why is sequencing important?

We divide our time into tasks and understanding the order that tasks are undertaken first, second and third etc. which helps young children develop conceptual understanding of how processes work.

In which subjects can students use these sequencing skills?

All subjects! Early years maths begins with ordinal number understanding and moves towards order of operations in upper primary. English early years curriculum requires students to sequence story events as firstly, then, next and lastly. History requires students to understand the order of life events such as baby, child, teenager and adult. The Science curriculum covers concepts such as how living things grow (seed to plant) and even the movement of objects (if I push this first, it will then roll). Sequencing is the cornerstone of most foundation year subjects and mastery of this skill is essential in the early years. 

So, now we've established what sequencing is and why it is so important - let me introduce you to this month's Focus on a Freebie the Sequencing Activity Cut and Paste Worksheet.


Students read the story and then cut and paste the sequence into the correct order.

What have other teachers said about this freebie...
"Thank you so much for this resource, My ESOL students and I love it!" Elly D.
"Cute and colourful resource that links directly into two topics I will cover." Corrina M.
"Wonderful opportunity to practice with great example." Peacock Projects
"Absolutely gorgeous, this is just perfect for teaching time sequences and what happens next. Thank you so much." Buyer A

This freebie is a sample page from the full pack available here Sequencing Sheets which includes 10 cut and paste worksheets with different reading comprehension passages.

You may also enjoy these Sequencing Picture Cards in full colour complete with sorting mat.


"We used these cards for so many cooperative activites! Thanks!" First Grade Charm
"Perfect for my student struggling with comprehension to use when the rest of the class is working on something else." Buyer A

Sequencing Events in our classroom - is a fun way to discuss daily events and practice scheduling them on a simple calendar. 
"Great tool for helping with sequencing in the class with Prep" Buyer A
"These have helped my special students with learning sequencing." Laura D
"Love this idea. This is our first activity every Monday to talk about our plans for the week." Sheryl B.

All of these products are also available in the Sequencing Activities Bundle to save you money. 


4 Easy ideas for bringing Christmas into the classroom


It’s getting to the most wonderful stressful time of the year.
Yes, Christmas and all the excitement that goes with it in the classroom can be a special, yet stressful, time. However, one of the things I try to do with Christmas in the classroom is weave fun activities in with learning that is aligned to the curriculum. Listed below are some of my favourite products and how I use them in my Early Years classroom.


There are so many packs available to download for Christmas Around the World but most of them have no real cultural or historical knowledge listed in them.
This pack will take your students to 10 different countries and provides an information sheet on how each country celebrates Christmas. Also included in this pack is a very useful passport which can be used as a writing prompt by getting students to shade the country visited on the map, write the tradition and place a passport stamp in their booklet to say they have visited that country. This pack is versatile for K-6 because you can use the colouring sheets and full colour information slides with lower grades or extend students with the information sheets with higher grades. The Venn diagram also provides a useful comparison tool which can be used individually or as a whole class activity.

All of these products are also available individually (see links inside this listing) and are aligned to the Australian curriculum.
“Share our similarities, celebrate our differences” M. Scott Peck
#Resourcesthatgive




If you’re studying Then and Now with your students this little pack is a MUST at Christmas time. In this pack you will find 6 pieces of text about the history of Christmas traditions in the past as compared to now. Each sheet also comes with two comprehension questions for students and are easy to complete independently in reading groups.

You will also find two differentiated activities with the cut and paste then and now images discussed in the reading comprehension sheets. These can be used with the Venn diagram or in the flip book which can be used to extend higher level students as a writing prompt.





A fun whole-class activity is Christmas cookie making. If you’re lucky enough to have access to an oven somewhere in your school you can make these with real ingredients or alternatively discuss and work through the method so students can make them at home.
The beauty of cooking activities is they involve so much real-world, hands-on, curriculum based learning experiences; English vocabulary (ingredient names and method terminology) and Maths (sequencing the method, measuring the ingredients) just to name a few.
The sequencing pictures are in colour and in black and white so they can be used to cut and paste/colour and on the whiteboard to model how to sequence for younger students. The flip book makes a handy writing prompt to lead students through the method process and make a nice take-home activity for students.

I’ve always found the part, part whole maths problem solving strategy the quickest for students in the early years to work through. Part, part whole is a simple way of exploring missing addends in word problems. Read through the maths word problem and highlight the key words, then complete the part, part, whole table and colour in the sheet. Putting a Christmas spin on maths problem solving is always a sure-fire winner for high student engagement!




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