And that's all for this week,
Ms. Brookes
In a recent discussion with my collaborating teacher, we decided that we're going to start doing themes each week when it comes to our read alouds and what we use for connections to other subjects. This week we choose to use the theme of puppies, we used fiction and non-fiction texts to give students a variety of different books to build background knowledge. After we do read alouds, we always put them into a special area for students to choose when they get new books in there book boxes each week. Then on Friday, which was Johnny Appleseed day, we used Brain Pop videos to learn about Johnny Appleseed, who he was and what he did. During Science that day we used our sense of taste to taste three different types of apples, yellow, green, and red, we used a graphic organizer to help our kids organize their thoughts. After the apple lesson on Friday morning, we decided to use a apple theme for the next week for reading as well as science for a long term investigation. I'm excited to see what goes next week with our new theme.
And that's all for this week, Ms. Brookes
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The countdown to graduation as it stands it 223 days, but whose really counting? (I am, but that doesn't mean I'm not enjoying this semester!) This week was busy, busy, busy. Along with the usual amount of school work, internship, and life thrown in, the class of 2015 became Kelly Substitute Certified on Wednesday afternoon. (Middle picture)
This week in Kindergarten, we've been busy reading "Pete the Cat: I Love My White Shoes" by Eric Litwin and making our very own Pete the Cats! (Picture on the right) Something I've noticed in Kindergarten is the read alouds and the amount of them we have in a typical day. On a normal day, our kids hear about 3-6 read alouds from varying authors and genre types. In Emerging Literacy, we discussed how children should be having books read aloud for them or more times a day. I think that as our kindergartners become completely independent readers, the time they spend listening to fluent reading and watching what readers do will be crucial for their success. As we continue our learning on Conscious Discipline, we keep implementing more parts and watching as our classroom changes and our students adapt to the new parts of our day. We've been introducing new greetings and having the children choose how they want to be greeted as well as stressing that we (the teachers) are there to keep them safe and they help by keeping that way. And that's all for this week, Ms. Brookes At my internship school, we've begun a school wide behavior system overhaul. The school has and is investing in Conscious Discipline (CD). In CD, there are a few basic elements such as the seven skills on disciple and the school family. My current collaborating teacher and I have been attending the trainings in order to start implementing this system into our classroom. A few things we've started doing with our Kindergarteners is to emphasize our school family and how we all care about each other and want our classroom to be a safe and happy place. Everyone in our classroom helps make our classroom run and work the right way, if we all aren't on board then we aren't being a school family. One way we facilitated this with our kids is using the energy stick, (pictured above) the energy stick lights up when students are making a circle or are all connect in some way. If one of them lets go, the energy is disrupted and everyone loses out. I'm still interested to see how this is going to look in out classroom and how it prevents negative behaviors while creating a safe and happy community. (I'm so interested that my next inquiry is going to be on CD and if it works.)
STEM or otherwise known as Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics. We talked about what STEM looks like in a Kindergarten classroom and how those of us in K-town are going to go about creating those lessons. Lately in my classroom we've been doing a lot with Science and Mathematics such as our long term investigation with our grow shark or using a tens frame and M&M's to show our learning on the number 0-5. Food is such a wonderful motivator for kids to work, especially candy. Another activity we did in math was using ten frames and painting the number of dots that go into the tens frame, paint is also a great motivator for kids to work with. At the moment, we haven't started much inquiry with the kindergarteners and won't until early November/late October so for now we keep working on process skills and the basics for science. On another note, I've been taking the lead on more and more lessons in my classroom. While I found this to be intimidating at first, I've discovered my natural rhythm for it, and have been enjoying the process of planning and implementing lessons with my collaborating teacher. My collaborating teacher has made interning wonderful by making it clear that the classroom isn't hers or mine, its ours. I know that all the skills I'm honing and working on are going to make my first year so much easier and I'm thankful for all my learning right now. And that's all for this week, Ms. Brookes Pictured above is my home away from home or otherwise known as my internship classroom where I spend 8 or so hours Monday through Wednesday and then again on Friday. Kindergarten is a whole new world, literally and figuratively. I'm both amazed by my collaborating teachers ability to teach in this foreign place and my students for surprising me at every moment.
The only way I can describe my experiences so far would be to relate it to standing on wet sand, where you know you're sinking but you can't feel that you're sinking and by the time you look down your feet are completely hidden. Just when I'm beginning to feel like I have some grasp at this whole teaching piece, I start a lesson and remember that I'm still learning, I will get better, and I shouldn't compare myself to my CT. And that's all for this week, Ms. Brookes |
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