Monday, May 30, 2011
Tuesday, May 24, 2011
Check out this Giveaway!
Check out this great new blog from The Lesson Diva - follow her blog and blog about her giveaway for today only, and you will receive a great package from her TpT store! How awesome! And I love the blog name :o)
Sunday, May 15, 2011
Spring Addition
Well, life around here has been life as usual - INSANE and CHAOTIC! You gotta love being a new teacher... and having two little kids of your own... and a husband in the military who is always deployed or away training. School is busy too - May means its time to start preparing for final report cards and making sure that we get everything done that needs to be done by the end of the year and you all know how it is. On other notes, my husband has been transferred, and as of July, we will be moving to Ontario. I love kindergarten, and would love to get a job there teaching K, but any job would be nice. Moving is so nerve wracking, but I hope it all goes okay!
Anyway, in class, we have started adding. I have a few kids who are really struggling with the concept still, but most picked it up super fast. Here are two activities that we did to practice our adding... The first was inspired by the wonderful Fran over at Kindergarten Crayons. We drew flowers in the flower pots and added them together. This was an easy way to differentiate, because I simply told them to impress me with their best. Some kids did huge two digit numbers while others did 2 + 2 and I thought it was super for them. The ladybug sheet also allowed them to use different strategies, depending on where they were at - some had to count each spot individually still, some used counting on, and some used their subitizing skills and mental math. I am impressed at how great they are getting! Grab the sheets here if you want, and let me know if you grab a copy for your class :o)
Anyway, in class, we have started adding. I have a few kids who are really struggling with the concept still, but most picked it up super fast. Here are two activities that we did to practice our adding... The first was inspired by the wonderful Fran over at Kindergarten Crayons. We drew flowers in the flower pots and added them together. This was an easy way to differentiate, because I simply told them to impress me with their best. Some kids did huge two digit numbers while others did 2 + 2 and I thought it was super for them. The ladybug sheet also allowed them to use different strategies, depending on where they were at - some had to count each spot individually still, some used counting on, and some used their subitizing skills and mental math. I am impressed at how great they are getting! Grab the sheets here if you want, and let me know if you grab a copy for your class :o)
Wednesday, April 27, 2011
Behaviour Management Chart
When I started teaching K, I felt like I was in a completely different world when it came to time and behaviour management. I came from Grade 6 after all, that practically is a continuum away! I tried several systems before I found one that really works for us. I read somewhere that you should have an individual goal and a group goal, so that's what I tried.
We have a behaviour management system called Jumping for Good Behaviour. I think I got the idea somewhere online, and then adapted it and twisted it to fit me and my class. We have a part of a bulletin board with three lines - green, yellow, and red. Everyone has a frog with their name on it, and it starts on green everyday, regardless of what happened the previous day. I think its important for kids to know everyday is a fresh start.
Whenever someone breaks one of our rules (the basic respect each other, be nice, keep your hands to yourself, etc) they get a warning first. Then, if they continue to break rules, their frog moves down a line. Yellow is 5 minutes missed of centre playtime, and if you break a rule again and land on red, its 10 minutes. If it happens again, you get to have a visit with our principal. I have only had a couple of students ever get to yellow and no one has ever got to red. (And to move them around, I enlisted the help of my very best friend, Mr. Velcro!)
As an extra incentive, this chart is on the board next to my desk:
Each student has an index card with their name on it, and for everyday that they stay on green, they get a sticker. Once they reach 30 stickers on their index card, they get to pick a treat from the treasure box, which is filled with stuff like colored pens, bubbles, or little sticker books. They are so excited once they get near 30. (I make rows of 10 as well, and they gain a number sense, since they know three full rows make 30).
Our group goal is a daily process. Each day we pick one goal not to break. If everyone works together as a team, everyone gets a small prize - a sticker or a candy from the candy jar. This one is actually much harder to reach than the individual goal, because it usually involves everyone working together. But we are getting there! Our class goal is written on a piece of froggy paper that I laminated so I could use white erase markers on it. You will see it in the corner of the picture with our frogs.
Anyway, thats how my Kinders and I work our classroom management, and it seems to be working great. I'm sure that every year it will be adjusted to fit the new group of kiddos that I have, but I'm glad I found something that works this year!
We have a behaviour management system called Jumping for Good Behaviour. I think I got the idea somewhere online, and then adapted it and twisted it to fit me and my class. We have a part of a bulletin board with three lines - green, yellow, and red. Everyone has a frog with their name on it, and it starts on green everyday, regardless of what happened the previous day. I think its important for kids to know everyday is a fresh start.
Whenever someone breaks one of our rules (the basic respect each other, be nice, keep your hands to yourself, etc) they get a warning first. Then, if they continue to break rules, their frog moves down a line. Yellow is 5 minutes missed of centre playtime, and if you break a rule again and land on red, its 10 minutes. If it happens again, you get to have a visit with our principal. I have only had a couple of students ever get to yellow and no one has ever got to red. (And to move them around, I enlisted the help of my very best friend, Mr. Velcro!)
As an extra incentive, this chart is on the board next to my desk:
Our group goal is a daily process. Each day we pick one goal not to break. If everyone works together as a team, everyone gets a small prize - a sticker or a candy from the candy jar. This one is actually much harder to reach than the individual goal, because it usually involves everyone working together. But we are getting there! Our class goal is written on a piece of froggy paper that I laminated so I could use white erase markers on it. You will see it in the corner of the picture with our frogs.
Anyway, thats how my Kinders and I work our classroom management, and it seems to be working great. I'm sure that every year it will be adjusted to fit the new group of kiddos that I have, but I'm glad I found something that works this year!
Friday, April 22, 2011
Our Class Monster Book
As part of our Monster unit, we wrote a class book! It was actually the first class book that we have written, so the kiddo's are super excited to see the finished product. I have one more student to finish with, since he has been away all week, and then we are ready for binding! I think I am excited to see the final product too.
We started off by reading What's Under The Bed? by Joe Fenton.
It's about a little boy who imagines all sorts of crazy creatures hiding under his bed, until he finally gets the courage to look and finds it is only his teddy bear - or is it? The kiddos loved the ending of this one, and it gave them a lot to imagine when designing a monster, They came up with their own monster, and then finished this sentence "I see a _________, __________ monster." with two describing words. They didn't spell the words themselves, they needed a lot of help but they were able to sound out most of the constanants. We are slowly but surely getting there!
Check out a few pages from our monster book:
We started off by reading What's Under The Bed? by Joe Fenton.
Check out a few pages from our monster book:
Monday, April 18, 2011
A Great Fundraising Idea
I don't know about your school, but myself and everyone I know, hates fundraising. The whole idea of going door to door lugging a big box of chocolates just isn't appealing, especially in this digital age when very few people carry cash. Well, here may be an alternative...
Our school is named after a famous football player, who was very involved in the community. He also appreciated the value of education, and became a principal after retiring from football. Therefore the three pillars of our schoola re academics, athletics, and citizenship. When the disaster struck Japan, we knew it was an opportunity to teach our students about the true value of citizenship. We held a fundraiser that went off so well!
Our fundraiser was a Break The Rules Day. I will start by saying it was not an effective teaching day in the sense that we addressed a lot of curriculum. However, we did raise a LOT of money for Japan, and we learned about how important it is to help others. The idea behind break the rules day is that you can pay a pre-set amount of money to break certain rules or do things that you normally couldn't in school. The favorite? For $5, you could cut a piece off the tie of pour principal or vice principal. They thought this was the best thing ever. I also had a lot of kids change their name, sit wherever they wanted, and wear pajamas. It was a fun day, and it was a great lesson.
Feel free to click on the picture and save a copy if you would like to try this out at your school. Let me know how it goes!
Our school is named after a famous football player, who was very involved in the community. He also appreciated the value of education, and became a principal after retiring from football. Therefore the three pillars of our schoola re academics, athletics, and citizenship. When the disaster struck Japan, we knew it was an opportunity to teach our students about the true value of citizenship. We held a fundraiser that went off so well!
Our fundraiser was a Break The Rules Day. I will start by saying it was not an effective teaching day in the sense that we addressed a lot of curriculum. However, we did raise a LOT of money for Japan, and we learned about how important it is to help others. The idea behind break the rules day is that you can pay a pre-set amount of money to break certain rules or do things that you normally couldn't in school. The favorite? For $5, you could cut a piece off the tie of pour principal or vice principal. They thought this was the best thing ever. I also had a lot of kids change their name, sit wherever they wanted, and wear pajamas. It was a fun day, and it was a great lesson.
Feel free to click on the picture and save a copy if you would like to try this out at your school. Let me know how it goes!
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| A student cutting a piece off the principal's tie |
Monstrous Five Senses!
We are working on our five senses unit, and our theme for the month is Monsters! I think this has been the kids favorite so far. They just go nuts for everything monsters! To start the unit, I drew traced a big outline of a monster from Monsters Inc and then decorated him in fun colors and gave him some bingo dabber polka dots. The students named him (Pokey was a derivitive of Polka Dots). Then we talked about our five senses, what part of the body is responsible for the sense, and what kinds of things we experience with that sense. Together, we wrote about what our monster might use his senses for. Here are the results, they are quite funny!
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