Teaching With Haley O'Connor

Let's build a better world together-one classroom at a time!

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Meet Haley

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Hi! I’m Haley!

In 2010, I entered my very first classroom. I had just graduated with my teacher certification and degree in English as a Second Language. I was ready to take on the world and make an impact! I covered the bulletin boards in fabric, set up our (tiny) classroom library and had a week of lesson plans ready to go. My students walked in and “the best year ever” began! I went home that evening and burst into tears.

Nothing went as expected. My students came with so many needs and I couldn’t possibly meet them all. Some were hungry, some were brand new to the country and many were significantly behind their peers in social and academic skills. I truly struggled that year. For every 100 things I tried, 10 were successful.

The summer after my first year, I discovered my very first teacher blog. A few days later, I started writing my own. And a week after that I created my first teacher resource…word wall words with boxes around the letters. I knew my incoming first graders needed help with visual discrimination and I figured other classrooms could use them too. I devoured books like The Comprehension Toolkit, Literacy Stations that Work, and Guided Math. I gained confidence, learned the importance of relationships and collaborated with amazing teacher colleagues.

As they say, “the rest is history.” This website…my little piece of the internet…it’s here because of you. I know where you are. I’ve been there and I want to provide you the tools and strategies I didn’t have. Here you’ll find blog posts about best practices, resources that will help you teach and activities that engage your students.

Here are a few truths that shape everything you’ll see at Teaching with Haley.

  1. Relationships come first. A student who feels understood and loved will always be more successful.
  2. Social and emotional skills need to be taught just like math and reading. Students don’t know what it means to “be kind” or “make good choices” unless we teach them.
  3. Learning is messy and loud. Our classrooms should be too.
  4. Healthy teachers make the best teachers. We need to be physically and mentally healthy and take care of ourselves so we can take care of our students.
  5. Empathy for others isn’t something we add on to our week when we have time. It’s part of our classroom fabric and shapes the way we teach and interact with students. Our students are entering a world that’s more diverse than it’s ever been, and our classrooms are where they learn to accept others and themselves.
  6. A little humor is good for the soul and the classroom.
  7. Mo Willems is the best.
  8. There’s no problem a little chips and queso can’t fix.

So that’s me! I hope you’ll spend some time exploring, drop me a message and subscribe to my mailing list.  I can’t wait to go on this teacher journey with you!

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  • Scholastic Readers
  • Social-Emotional Learning: Optimism Lesson Plans and Activities by Teaching With Haley. I developed these units to support teachers in teaching and a rewarding great character in the classroom! Building a classroom community is one of the most important things teachers can do and it greatly impacts our students academically! Great social-emotional learning activities, lesson plans, and printables for teaching kindergarten, first grade, and second grade students in the classroom
  • FREE printable resources for learning at home you can use today by Haley O'Connor. Listed in this blog post are free activities you can do with your kids at home. Kid's activities and resources to download include both handwriting activities and self-control resources. The handwriting activities are a great free resource for kids to practice handwriting at home and not regress. The Self-control resource is perfect if your kids are struggling with emotions, and patience. Download for free!
  • How to Find Great Classroom Library Books. By Haley O'Connor. In this blog post, I share with your great ways to get books and read-aloud for your primary classroom. Additionally, I’ll be sharing my favorite authors, series, and titles for your primary classroom library! From easy readers for littlies, Penguin Young Readers books, diverse biographies readers, diverse character books, and more! Great for reading lessons in the classroom with kindergarten, first-grade students, and up!
  • How to Teach Leadership in the Classroom. By Haley O'Connor. In this blog post, I share some ideas for teaching our students how to be leaders! Each day we hope that we teach our students how to be kind, how to have courage, and how to be a great friend. Teaching them to be LEADERS means that they show kindness and courage even when no one else will! A great social-emotional learning lesson your kindergarten and first-grade students will love. Learn more
  • Kindness lessons and activities by Teaching with Haley. Kindness is a great place to start your social-emotional curriculum and I’m excited to share some of my favorite ideas with you in this post. I cover my favorite kindness videos, kindness read alouds, and kindness activities. Including what kindness is, character education, what boundaries are, and more. Great social-emotional learning lessons for kindergarten, first grade, and second-grade students. Learn more
  • This editable binder is full of pages to send home, labels to use, and more to add to your take home binders. | student take home binder, elementary take home binder, take home binders for students, editable take home binder, take home binder for first grade, take home binder for 1st grade, student take home binder for parent communication, elementary parent communication
  • Vowel Team and Diphthong Printables and Activities
  • 12 digital activities for students to read and write words with vowel teams and diphthongs. 6 instructional videos to introduce, review and teach vowel teams and diphthongs. Free digital center to try out.
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