Teachers working together

As the science lead teacher for my grade level, it is my goal to make sure my team learns everything tey can about Science instruction. This week, we had a Science TDE (temporary duty elsewhere). On these days, we get subs for our classroom so that we can meet as a team for professional development. Our day began with a great demo lesson from one of our fellow teachers. The lesson included just the engage and explore phase of the 5 E's for Science.












Then we went back to the conference room and debriefed the lesson. Then as a team, we wrote the rest of the lesson plan for that benchmark. Our next step was to review the components of the 5E's and discuss how that fits into a workshop model. We spent the rest of our time, taking the 2nd 9 weeks Essential Questions and writing 5E plans to go with them. The best part of the day was that the teachers were able to spend time collaborating with each other creating lessons that each of them had ownership in. What more could we ask for!

Teachable Moments

Have you ever had a time when something just happened by chance and you realize that WOW...that would be great for the kids to learn. Well that has been my experience this week. On Friday, I adopted a new stray kitten found outside my classroom. He had a sister but a friend took her. Our new addition is about 4 weeks old and his name is Rafiki. When I shared this with the kids they were ecstatic. I realized that documenting his life cycle would be a great learning experience for all of them. Many kids don't have kittens or have ever seen a kitten this young. Each week or so I will post new information on our class blog about how Rafiki is growing and changing and taking pictures all the while. I think the kids will learn more from this real life experience than any book could teach them.

Each month we complete a board outside our classroom. This is our Standards Based Bulletin Board. A standards board is where work that meets the "standard" is displayed. The teacher includes what standard the work meets, a task to explain what the work entails, work samples, and commentary. Our first standards board was a math board that included Patterns as our work sample. Here are some pictures of our board. (If you click on the individual picture it will enlarge).

Have you ever done a glog?

Last year our technology specialist at Chets introduced me to a glog. You may be asking the same thing I did at that time - What is a glog? If you haven't ever seen one - they have a wide range of uses. One of the best things I have learned is how to use it as a teaching tool. On a glog you can use pictures that you have downloaded personally, add text, link to other websites, add video, and just about any other thing you can think of. My goal this year is to create a glog for each Science Big Idea we will be studying in Kindergarten. Feel free to check out our class glogs. Once on the glog, any area that becomes circled in red is a link to another site. Each glog will be posted on our class blog so that parents will be able to access it with their children at home. Try something new and create a glog for your class - I promise the kids will love it.

Plants All Around
What is a Scientist?
5 Senses

In the Swing of Things...

Yes, the first crazy couple weeks are behind us and we are getting into a good routine. The students have learned all about the different workshops and the different parts of our day. It is always hard to come back to Kindergarten after looping a class to 1st grade. They are so grown up by the time they leave us to go to 2nd grade that we forget how young those little ones are when they began.

This last week was busy as we began Star Names, Star Book Vocabulary, and our nursery rhyme unit in our Skills Block. In Reader's Workshop we are beginning to learn how to retell stories we have been listening to. This week our focus was on Caps for Sale (one of our favorites). In Writer's Workshop we are learning how to tell stories to each other about all the great things we have done (such as going to the beach). In Math we finished our diagnostic testing and learned all about different manipulative's. Science has been great as we learned that science is the world around us. We also learned about Scientists through out What is a Scientist glog. We have been learning about each other's families in Social Studies which we have enjoyed sharing with new friends.

As you can see, our Kindergartners are busy learning every day. Day #11 - here we come!

The First Day is Here!

The summer is over and our rooms are once again transformed into a new and exciting place to learn. We had a great orientation on Friday with many parents and children showing up. The kids are excited and nervous of course. Tomorrow we will have a busy day as we get to know one another, practice all those expectations for class, work on fire/tornado drills, and are treated to a performance from a band. The first day at Chets Creek is always a great beginning for teachers and students.

Here are some pictures of our classroom this year. I hope that you stay in touch with our blog as we journey through another year.

Back to Work

The start of school is always an exciting time. This year our theme is a Orchestrating a Symphony of Success. Each grade level is a different genre of music with Kindergarten as Country Music. As I go into school this week (even though we don't officially start until the 17th) you can tell that the teachers at our school are motivated and ready to transform our school into a magical place. Some of them having been working prior to this week getting their rooms in order. Some, such as myself, have tried to squeeze every last minute of summer in with the kids.

Each year we are welcomed back from our principal with a letter. I am always excited to see what the presentation of the letter will look like and how it will be based around the direction and theme of our school for the year. Yesterday we received our welcome back in the form of an invitation to a new wiki. Our principal has set up a school based wiki that has a video clip to welcome us along with all the important paperwork that is usually given to us on the first day (this falls right into line with our school trying to decrease the amount of paper and keep as much as possible electronic). What a fabulous way to house all important information for the year. I am already excited to think about how easy it will be to find and access important links, schedules, faculty info, etc.

This year I am back to being a single teacher. Although I love co-teaching it is nice to be by myself again. I look forward to an great year with a new group of children. I hope you enjoy our new journey with us this year.