First Day 2013

Well, it has been exactly one year since I have written in this blog. The time and energy it takes to teach distracts me from even touching a blog. I would like to try again so that I can process and remember my thoughts throughout the year. I made the reflection today that God's plans are always bigger than our dreams. Where I am today from where I was last year is an amazing, new and completely different place and I love where my life is personally and professionally I still LOVE teaching Kindergarten. I decided to revisit the blog tonight because I know I had posted stuff about the Daily 5 and I am gearing up to introduce the Daily 5 tomorrow! Hopefully throughout the next few days I will be able to post some pictures of the new changes to my classroom this year and things I am excited about.

For now I will start with a reflection of the first two days of Kindergarten. At this moment I am blessed with 15 students and brand new and excited teaching assistant. As always I forget exactly how little they start out and how much they have to learn. This year at Young Scholars we started a school wide positive behavior system (hopefully another post soon on that.) Part of that included teaching the new school wide expectations for behavior. At 9:45am on the first day of Kindergarten my students were troopers and went to their first assembly! That was a little tough but otherwise it was a pretty good day! We read David Goes to School to learn our classroom rules, sang Rise and Shine and Freeze Dance and completed our first buzz message and tallied the number of boys and girls in our classroom (9 boys and 6 girls!) 

In the afternoon we read the Kissing Hand and graphed how we felt on the first day of Kindergarten and enjoyed a Hershey Kiss. We also completed a scavenger hunt in our classroom to find all the supplies in the room! In math we started our calendar routine and explored teddy bear counters.  We ended the day learning our packing up routine and I gave out Kindergarten is a Hoot! bags! I have an owl them in our classroom again this year! We also read Froggy books and used story wands to answer comprehension questions about the book. I definitely left tired on the first day but was glad to meet all the bright shining new faces!

On Day 2 we practiced our morning routine and sang and dance and completed a Buzz Message again. At 9:15 we started rotations with the Kindergarten and 1st Grade cluster to learn about different behaviors in the school. The students learned about indoor recess, computer cart, library, hallway, bathrooms, office and dismissal procedures. It was great to see my students from last year and see exactly how far the students will go this year and gave me some encouragement that this class too will get into a routine and be awesome! One of the first grade teachers said how much she loves her class and I told her "You're Welcome!" It felt good to know I had a part in helping those kids be successful! 

The rotations took all morning and we came back just in time to review rules and head to lunch. As I watched the kids in Chinese and Spanish today I could see the steps they were making already to get into the groove of being a Kindergartener! Thankfully we dodged the rain and made it outside to recess. We had a small talking to about how to line up and be ready to go inside from recess. In the afternoon we learned the different ways people might write to build confidence in Kidwriting and then explored pattern  blocks in math. By the end I could tell they were tired and started to get a little rowdy. I am sure soon enough they will be used to the long day! Tomorrow I am excited to start Daily 5 and hopefully keep establishing our routines and procedures!

First Day of School

Wow! What a busy first two days! It just flew by! I am excited to start the year with all my new Kindergarten friends! I think I have a good group with a lot of potential! I always forget how little they are and how much practice they need and  all the routines we need to establish! Highlights of the first day included a lunch box craftivity from teacherspayteachers. We cut and glued a lunch box together that had the expectations for eating lunch in the cafeteria. It did take longer than I anticipated so we actually had to finish it after lunch. The students LOVED the scavenger hunt of our classroom. I took pictures of the tissues, sink, markers, etc, all the things they need to know where to find. It was so cute to see them walking around the classroom and checking things off the list. 

Our afternoon was so long and they lost steam by the end of the day. I think what will be tough is having our reading block in the afternoon. I have tried out my Daily 5 lessons and it was hard for them to stay focused. I think what I had planned for the good fit lesson was well planned. It took a lot of redirecting to keep them focused on the lesson. They liked seeing all my different shoes and they liked the book Dog in Boots. 

One of the lessons that was not as effective was a Who Am I? activity page. Students needed to fill in their hair color, boy/girl and favorite color. I modeled and showed them where the words were but it got lost when it was time for them to complete the activity. Next time I will have us all complete each step together. I think I struggle with these types of activities. I find it hard to keep them all together and at the same pace. 

Goodie Bags

I decided I wanted to give out first day of school goodie bags to my students. I saw these super cute paper bag owls on pintrest ( trophyw.blogspot.com ). They were very simple to make and I think they turned out great. I used brown paper bags and trimmed the top to a point. I then raided my supply of scrapbook paper and found some cute prints for the belly. I then cut out the eyes and beak. It did take some trial and error to make it look cute and not mean. I think they turned out adorable. Of course to go with with my theme of not being able to finish a project I only had 12 of the 20 paper bags I needed. So I will have to finish them at a later date. I did cut out all the pieces so they will be easy to finish. 

Next I needed to decide what I would fill them with. I found this cute poem about the goodies in the bag ( ateacherstreasure.com ) I edited it to fit the treats that I am going to fill it with. I also called it Kindergarten is a Hoot to go with my owl theme! I am excited to finish them and get is all set and ready to go! I can't believe school is 3 weeks away!