Loving!

I was reading on of the many blogs that I follow and saw a song in this post and I am in love with it!

I may have played it on repeat too many times today. But I really think the message is a great one. I played it for my students on Friday and I'm thinking that I will be playing it again fairly often for them.

Here it is:

Have a listen, you'll love it.


On another note, this week in Grade 2 we talked a lot about Terry Fox. This very special man did something really amazing for this country. The Terry Fox Foundation has some really great lesson plans available for all age groups that really give students a feeling of who Terry Fox was and what his goals were. I think that every child can learn from this man and never give up on their goals.

Check out these lesson plans here.

This year more than ever this run is important for our school to participate in (we held our run yesterday). This past spring a student from our school passed away from cancer. This run was another great way for our school to connect in a positive way around the memory of this little boy.

Have a great weekend everyone!

From my principal.

I told my principal that I had started a teaching blog. He thought this was a good idea and that I should share something really important with you...

Question: How to get something you want from your principal?

Answer: ASK FOR IT!!!

Fun Quotes

So today I was working with a couple of kiddos individually and they said some things that I had to laugh at. I thought I'd share them with you in case you needed a laugh.

Me: What letter is this?
Kiddo #1 (comes in close and uses a whisper voice): I don't really need to know this I'll just do back to class!

Well a whisper voice from this kid is pretty much amazing and to have this be the thing that he wanted to whisper about made me smile!


Another smile for the day...

This kiddo and I had just finished reading a book together and I was going to get my ipad out and do some things with letters on it when...

Kiddo #2: Aren't we reading?

Me:You wanted to read another book?

Kiddo #2: Well, ya and this time I'm going to read it by myself!

This was coming from a kid who in grade 1 didn't really have a whole lot of interest in learning at all! Oh what time will do.

Good Things!

This week had a great ending!

Reading Recovery (RR) is coming along nicely. I have all my testing done and I'm just waiting to hear which students I should take. This coming week I should actually get to start teaching reading! I'm very excited for this.

On Thursday I again had to race off at 12:00 for a RR meeting. I let my kids know in the morning that I will be leaving for the afternoon. This time the reaction was heart warming. A few of the kids said, "Are you ever going to stay?" I felt sad and good at the same time about this comment. It was nice that they wanted me to stay but a bit sad as well because I feel as though I'm not making the same connections with my students as I have in the past. I will just have to make the most of the time that I have to spend with them!

Friday morning was our first monthly assembly. In the past we have only met together as a school for special occasions. This year to complement our house activities we have planned to get together for a monthly assembly to do some celebrating. This could be as simple as wishing everyone who has a birthday that month a "Happy Birthday", to having a class share something special that they have worked on.

This month we decided that we hadn't been in school long enough for anyone to really have things to share with others so we brought our house groups out for the assembly. During our first activity day we didn't really have time to make our team cheers so we had some time on Friday to do so. After each house had come up with their cheer we met together in the gym. The atmosphere in the gym was AMAZING! Each house was wearing their house colour and it was easy to see who was in which house. We took turns going around the gym and sharing our team cheers with the school. I loved seeing kids from different grades interacting together and really having fun!

After the assembly I heard a lot of positive things being said which makes me really happy. I'm feeling really positive about these activities and I really hope that it can continue on into the rest of the school year.

Lastly, I met with my principal on Friday about my professional growth plan. During this meeting I was encouraged by the positive comments he had to say about my teaching and involvement in our school. It was a really great way to end the week!

How full is your bucket?

Have you read this book?

Or this one?

While I have only read the second book I've heard that the first book is also great and my school has it in the library. I love "How full is your bucket?". It's a story that all students can relate to. Each student has had a day when they don't feel 100% happy. This could be because of something at home or something at school.

I read this book to my class last year and my current kiddos. I'm using this book as a way to check in with students on how their day is going. 

Last year I would check in with my kiddos as they were leaving for the day to see how their day had gone. They would tell me on a scale of 1 to 5 how their day had gone. If their day was anything other than a 5 I would check to see what had happened that made their day not perfect. After I checked in with them I would rate their day from my point of view. I feel as though this was a non competitive/ non judgemental way for kids to let me know how they are feeling and for me to let them know how their day was. Students were always really excited when they walked out the door with a 5 for the day.

This year because I'm only in the classroom in the morning I'm trying my best to check in with my kiddos before they go for lunch to see how their day has gone so far. On two separate days I had one of my kiddos tell me that her bucket was at a 1. This student has had a really rough time in the past few months at home. She felt that this was a non-threatening way to tell me that she was feeling sad. I liked that I could hear how she was feeling without me having to constantly interrupt her day with my questions of how things are going.

I really love this book and how I can hear about my kiddos days. I would recommend it to all early years teachers! 

Trying to get back into the swing of things

Wow, this working full time is for suckers! I'm finding that I am lacking energy by the end of the day! I'm really hoping that by the end of next week I'll feel like I'm back into my routine and will have a little bit more energy.

My attempt to use WBT in my class is still going well. My kiddos are really good at remembering our rules and I'm using them to make sure they are doing things correctly and quickly. All I need to do is say Follow Directions Quickly and they immediately speed up. So, so far, so good on that front.

I'm also trying to use Words Their Way as a different attempt at word work/ spelling work. So far I've done the assessment to place kids. I was going to use the online version of the placement data record sheet but the website decided not to work tonight and of course I didn't bring home enough paper copies for everyone so I guess that will be my job tomorrow morning before school. Just one more thing to add to my list!

I'm also having to change my way of thinking and what I'm used to because I'm only in the classroom in the morning. The day just seems so short and I feel kind of rushed. I guess it's just something I'll have to get used to.

Well, I'm very excited that tomorrow is Friday... seems my list is so long and maybe I'll  be able to cross some things off of it this weekend.

Enjoy! Keep Smiling!

Houses Begin

Wow! I forgot how hard it is to be at school all day with kids... I'm so tired right now! Hopefully next week I'll get back into the grove and not feel quite so tired.

Today was a great day! My kids were good in the morning. We were able to learn the other 4 WBT rules. They were so excited I couldn't stop teaching them! We also started Daily 5. Today the kiddos read for 3 minutes brilliantly! In grade 1 they had Daily 5 time as well but sometimes during the summer they can forget so we are starting slowly just as "the sisters" suggest.

A couple of colleagues and I wanted to try something new at school this year to build community in our grades K-8 school as we were seeing a real disconnect between the junior high and early years students. We decided to create house groups. Each house has at least one staff member and students from each grade in our school. This year we have given each house an animal as their team name and a colour to go with it.

Today was the first day we introduced this idea to our students and got together in our house groups. I thought that my group went well.The activities we have planned are fun activities so I'm hoping that things go smoothly. After talking with other staff members they also said that their groups went over really well which was great. The comments were that the older kids were helping the younger ones which is exactly what the purpose of the house groups were.

I'm really hoping that this goes well. I can see a whole bunch of potential in these activities in building community in our school and I'm really looking forward to the year.

I was also excited when another teacher told me that she used Class- Yes with her house group today and it went over really well! Sharing things that work is so great!

Have a great weekend everyone!

Survival!!

Yay! Day 1 is over and I'm still alive!

Actually I had a good day. I think my kids are going to be a really fun group. Of course I'm only in the classroom during the morning so we were only able to learn Rule 1, class- yes and teach- ok from Whole Brain Teaching. I think once the kids get used to something a bit different things will go smoothly. In fact I really liked incorporating the Daily 5 with WBT. When just starting off we talked about 3 ways to read a book and introducing teach- ok worked really well to reinforce that concept.

I had students colour Flat Stanley so we can use him in Social Studies and the classroom was amazingly quiet. I have a feeling that this class will be different than last year for sure! Although I did have to get after a couple of kids during our school assembly for talking... something might have to change for that!

Getting started with Reading Recovery also went well. We looked at the observation survey which I have had some experience with so it wasn't all bad. Tomorrow I will put it to the test though and attempt to test two grade 1 students. I will also have to make some time this weekend to do my reading homework.

All in all, a great day... and now off to boot camp. I'm going to be so tired when I get to bed!

Finally Ready

So it's the night before the first day of school and I guess I'm as ready as I can be. There are still things on my to do list but I'm pretty sure that as a teacher (or maybe anyone!) there will always be things to do but I just have to find a place to say that I am as ready as I can be and the things on the list will get done, just maybe not for tomorrow.
I personally prefer to head to school rather early so I still will have some time to get a couple more things done before school starts.

When I left school today I finally felt that my classroom was ready. Here are some pics of what it looks like.

View from the door.

Word Wall

Job Chart, Itinerary and colour wall

Whole Brain Teaching Rules

View from the teacher chair on the carpet

Mailboxes and coat hangers

View from the carpet

CAFE wall

Teacher area

Classroom library

Sign for when I'm working with students

Hand signs for students to use while I'm working with other students.

Not only is tomorrow the first day with students, it's also my first Reading Recovery meeting of the year. I'm looking forward to the challenges of Reading Recovery, just not so much looking forward to having to rush out of school right at lunch time nor the drive to get there.

Well here's to hoping that I will actually sleep tonight. I have a feeling tomorrow might feel like a very long day!