This time of year is very busy in Kindergarten and DK. Around now is when everyone starts to think about next year's incoming littles. Each school in the district has both a Kindergarten Round Up night and Kindergarten Screening dates. Let me briefly explain both. Kindergarten Round Up is basically an hour long meeting for all parents of incoming Kindergarteners for the 2013-2014 school year. They hear from the Principal, K teachers, and a DK teacher. They receive some paper, listen to some powerpoints, and sign up for Kindergarten screening. Now screening is an assessment based event. This is when the parents come back to school with their student and the staff assesses their letter knowledge, gross motor capabilities, number recognition, etc. After this is complete, they staff determines if the child is ready for Kindergarten or if the child would benefit from a year of DK.
Long story long, here we are in the middle of it. The rest of this story will be hard to tell without using names. I will try my best to be clear, but just work with me. I was signed up to give a Round Up presentation and do screening at another school (let's call this school A) in the district. No problem. I found a sub early and am all set for the night presentation that is later this week and the two days I will have to miss next week to screen. Then, I volunteered to do Round Up for another school (school B) who needed the help. Last week, I quickly pulled myself together for the presentation that was on Thursday. I left when I was done and all was great.....until Friday when I was asked to help them (school B) with screening too....only they are screening for THREE days this coming week. That's three days I will need to find a sub. My sub for the other dates (two dates for screening for school A) can only do Thursday, so now I am hunting for someone to cover my room on Tuesday and Wednesday so that I can help school B with K screening. Yikes!!!!!!!!! I am in no surprise that I am in this situation, because anyone that knows me knows that I literally CANNOT say "No" to anything. CANNOT. CAN'T. Won't. Will not. Can't.
I am pretty excited for all of the days of screening to see how it all goes down and the GOOD NEWS is, that it all works out. I'm not worried. What is meant to happen will find a way. HOWEVER, if you want to be my substitute...call me. ;) Just kidding!
Sunday, April 14, 2013
The Return from SB2013
I am so glad last week is officially over. What a wacko week. Yuck. My students just weren't themselves. I don't think they were quite ready to come back, but neither was I! They seemed super tired some of the time, but other times they were just not thinking! This could be from one of two things: having indoor recess 9 times out of 10 OR the fact that they were away from school and my classroom for over 11 days. I'm not sure which is worse. We spend a few days reviewing literally everything we have learned this year in regards to behavior. No, you can't hit. No, you can't run inside. No, you can't scream at the top of your lungs. Being away from the structure of school and the schedule of our day really impacted them. They kind of forgot what we do and how we act. In the long run, it isn't a big deal, because I know that deep down they know what is expected. I'm sure this week will be better than last. Well, or I should say, I HOPE this week is better than last.
Monday, April 8, 2013
Spring Break!
My first Spring Break as a real life teacher was a relaxing, refreshing success!
It was a great week off filled with sleeping in, good food, and good company. I went home to Mom & Dad's for an extra long Easter weekend, was in Grand Rapids for a few days, and then took the train to Chicago! Although I spent some money on hotel, train, and possibly a shopping trip or two, I tried to not go crazy with a big vacation like the cruise over New Years.
My biggest accomplishment over break was applying to Graduate School. It wasn't really hard, just a few clicks online, but it's the "commiting to more school" that is the accomplishment. I fear that if I don't do it now, I never will!
Only NINE weeks left of my first year! CRAZY!
Counting by 10's
We had a worm day right before Spring Break. We talked about worms and how they are CLEARLY made from Cheerios. Ten of them in fact. We made worms with pipe cleaners until our fingers fell off...or until we wanted to stop. Now we use them daily to count by 10s!
Thanks, Laura!
Spring is Here!
TaCkY TuEsDaY
There is a book called Wacky Wednesday which is written by Dr. Seuss. In the book, everything sense to go wrong. Everything is backwards and overall, just wrong. My students were asking for a wacky hair day for months, so here was our perfect opportunity. Unfortunately, we had Spring Picture Day on the only Wednesday that we had left (the last Wednesday before break was already named PJ Day), so we had to go with Tuesday instead. It was wacky hair day and wacky clothes day just like that. That is how Tacky Tuesday was born...it was from a complete and TOTAL lack of planning ahead. WHOOPS.
I moved just about everything backwards, around, or relocated it in general. My students thought it was awesome, I actually HATED it. I couldn't stand that things weren't where they were suppose to be. I had a totally new view of my classroom from my rocking chair and that just isn't right. I've always said that I like change and it's okay to mix things up. NO. It is OFFICIALLY not okay. My classroom is NOT okay to change.
OH, the things we do for our children (biological or not!)!
I wrote the morning message upside down. I struggled. It was really difficult to do!
Like you thought I WOULDN'T dress the part. You know I went all out.. don't kid yourself...
Dr. Seuss
March is Reading Month and what better way to celebrate than with DR. SEUSS!!
I actually had way more Dr. Seuss books that I thought! So we found plenty to do over the course of the month.
We fingerpainted Dr. Seuss hats (whatever color we wanted!!)...
What would YOU do if Thing 1 and Thing 2 were loose in your house!?!?!
I am so bummed that the first one turned out so blurry. I really need to invest in a better camera. (Can I tell you that I currently have more megapixels on my iPhone camera than my actual camera??...Just putting it out there...)
And I quote... "..eat green beans with them, during morning, evening, and anytime."
Yes, this is real. Welcome to my world.
Letter Animals
Each week, we focus on a different letter of the alphabet. We talk about the formation of the letter, the sound that that the letter makes, different words that start with that letter, etc. Erika found these adorable letter animals. I try to do these every few weeks. Some of the letters are hard to manipulate into creatures and some weeks we just have too much on our plates to do it. My students really enjoy them and I think they are SUPER cute. :)
Here are some examples....
Sickness
I have been so lucky this year in so many ways, but I have to admit that I find great happiness in the fact that I was only sick THREE times this year. Before the year started, everyone kept warning me that I was going to "build up" my immune system. I was so fearful that I was going to catch every sickness there was. I mean, let's be honest, the bodily fluids of my five year olds are secretly all over my room. They can't help themselves. Thank goodness I was on top of it. I wash my tables with Clorox numerous times week and I wash my hands with soap and water (not hand sanitizer!! or as my students call it..."hanitizer"). I was sick the second week of school, over Christmas break, and the last week of February.
Here's to NINE more weeks of being sickfree! :)
(Just incase....'knock on wood'.)
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