I just found this article that talks about setting up your classroom management and expectations from the first day that your student enter the classroom. I think this is something really important in establishing those procedures that students will learn how to follow if you are consistent. In this article by Bonnie Murray, she gives a list of important things you as a teacher need to remember. I will definitely look back at this list when we are closer to beginning the nest school year. Click here for the link.

During my student teaching I enforced Reader's and Writer's Workshop in which students were able to interchangeably work on similar ideas. One of the biggest projects during my student teacher was the Thematic Unit on the History of Chicago. During this unit students worked on multiple assignments in Reading, Writing, Social Studies and Math. Something that I found very helpful was collecting most of the necessary information students needed to know or research during the Reader's Workshop. Then, students were able to base their Writer''s Workshop on the information they previously researched and they spent most of the time on just writing. Their final product were Diary Entries or Letters that included actual events that happened in the past, around The Great Chicago Fire. I was so proud of my students' progress throughout the assignment and couldn't believe how much they accomplished. Overall, it was a great success and I will continue to use these workshops interchangeably. 

Here is a link to something I found very helpful. It just relates to Reader's Workshop and Assessing your students' progress.