According to my calendar wall, tomorrow is the 10th day of school. Already?! What?! I know I’ll be singing a different tune in, say, February, but I feel like the year is already flying. I’ve been over planned every day, and my new kiddos are wonderful, so I’m sure that helps 🙂 Of course, much of the past 10 days have been spent drilling routine. Then I throw in a little procedure for good measure. And then I drill some more. Despite the monotonous repetition, I really think it’s worth the investment. I’m constantly reminding my firsties to train their minds to think like a first grader and their bodies to act like a first grader. I’m glad most of them choose not to model themselves after Junie B. when thinking of the ideal first grader, though! Our first day together, I introduced the three main rules of our classroom, adopted from a teaching partner of mine. I painted these three simple phrases on long paper (from IKEA) and let the students work in groups to decorate them with markers and stickers. A fun BBB (brain and body break), and a good way to facilitate new friendships. We also made Jitter Juice !(The same unit that includes Jitter Juice adapted for second grade can be found HERE) It was twelve kinds of fun and I received a few sweet notes from parents telling me how much their children enjoyed it. Always a good feeling for a teacher :) While it pleased the 6-year-old palette quite well, it didn’t look the prettiest! Also, I had to use a pointer finger to stir it because, naturally, I left the wooden stirring stick at home! Oops! We also bedazzled our poetry journals with lots and lots of stickers. The first grade mindset = the more stickers, the better! Our first addition was Jitter Juice! We still can’t get it out of our heads! Our major focus last week was launching the Daily 5/CAFÉ. Which is a post for an entirely different day. I’ve been taking lots of pictures, and plan to share about our launch soon. In the meantime, I’m celebrating the fact that my kids read for 9 minutes and 52 seconds today, and admitting that I was totally embarrassed of my feet today during the I-PICK lesson since my tootsies have been all kinds of neglected since school started! {FYI: The I-PICK lesson compares choosing a book to choosing appropriate shoes, and required me to change shoes in front of my students.} The good news, fellow Treasurers, is that I feel that I’ve successfully incorporated Treasures into Daily 5/CAFÉ so far…and that Deanna’s Pete the Cat unit is an *excellent* addition to your first unit of study (short a/a/ family)! We loooooooooved it! I hope your first week of school goes/went well, too! And, just remember… Keep walking along, singing your song…because it’s all good 🙂
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