Mother's Day

It was fun to mix science with Mother's Day this year. The students planted chives or basil depending on their preference. They've loved watching them grow. For a while, we kept track of the growth in our plant science journals. They turned out so cute! Today, the students took their plants home, yay! 

Chick Friends

They're so cute! These two are actually the other teachers (mine other two didn't make it - two of hers didn't make it either). Mine was wandering just a little bit out of range. Now they all get to be together. I think mine is happier having some friends. He was getting so mad at the kids when they weren't paying attention to him today! He got so upset during math class when he could see them, but they weren't talking to him that I picked him up and held him while teaching! He was much calmer after that. Thanks to my sister and family for keeping them all company this weekend.

Fluffy

His new house! It's so much nicer, and he loves having a window to look out.

Meet Fluffy!

the First Grade chick! We love him/her. :) The other two died right before coming completely out of their shells. It was sad.

Last night, two chicks seemed to be on their way, but sometime during the night, they died. We are all so sad! We do have one very cute chick that has been named fluffy.

When the students arrived this morning, before I said anything about the chicks, Fluffy let everyone know that (s)he had hatched. They all ran over to see our baby!

Back to the safety and warmth of the heating light.

Our chick house had some difficulty staying warm enough, so Fluffy stayed with Mrs. Smith's chicks during reading, but now we're all good! The incubator is turned upside down to provide heat for our chick house, but it wasn't warm enough, so with some teacher supplies (transparency sheets, a sheet protector, and a small garbage bag) all taped together with some of our paint shirts on top for insulation, we were finally at the required temp of 100* F.

We voted on a name after lunch.

The Impending Arrival

The babies are coming! :)  I decided to hatch baby chicks with my first graders! This afternoon, another teacher and I picked up the eggs at Thanksgiving Point. Two of them are already pecking at their shells (middle and right side)! Their ETA is Wednesday.

We bought them through an agriculture program at Thanksgiving Point. Once they're ready for pickup, the eggs are thought to hatch in three days! That's a great way to hatch chicks. When I was in elementary school, only one of our eggs actually had a baby chick, and the teacher took that one out early so we could see the development. It was so sad. :( No more chicks after that, although the other class had several that hatched.

Opinion Writing!

This week, we are working on opinion writing. We start with a topic sentence so that our reader knows what we're going to talk about. Then we write three reasons to support our topic. Finally, we write a concluding statement. Here are a few examples from today!

Time to Renew

This year is my third official year of teaching,* which means that it's time to not only renew, but I also need to upgrade to a Level 2 license. In order to do that, I have to create a teaching portfolio. Going through the relicensure teacher portfolio process is a lot of work! But it's also helping me figure out a few things as well. I didn't realize it was going to get quite so complicated, but that's probably more me than the actual process! It's taken a long time to figure out what to include in my portfolio, and I still don't have all of the answers, yet.

There are ten standards. So far, I've written a little more than three of them. The next one needs to include lesson plans, which luckily, even though I deleted a lot of them from my computer, I still had several paper copies that should work.

I also need to create a curriculum map. For quite awhile, I've wanted/needed a curriculum map! Over the summer, I was given one for math.  Reading, writing, and some social studies and science is included in the reading program we're piloting this year, as well as having Science Demo Team. However, I still didn't have a curriculum map that shows all of the pieces together over the course of the year along with the standards and objectives they cover. With a curriculum map, I can really see what I've taught, and what I need to teach and/or review. This morning, I finished up some more on my year long curriculum map. This has actually helped reduce some stress, even after a week of researching and stressing about it! Now I have a better plan for making sure that science and social studies are completely covered, yay!

Over the next few weeks, I'll bring the reading program books home and go through them a week at a time. My goal is to have the reading and writing sections of the curriculum map included by the end of January. At that point, I think that it'll be complete!

This whole process needs to be complete by the beginning of April so that it can get processed on time. Good thing I already took all the tests!

*Unofficially, this is my fifth year - the first three years were part-time.

Last Day of Christmas Break

It's kind of the last day of the break, not really since we do still have the weekend, but no more working on the classroom. This time, I mean it!

I wasn't going to go in today, but then I did. I finished filing the students' portfolio paperwork. Luckily, most of it was collected in alphabetical order, which made it much easier to file than I had anticipated. Also, the drawer is easier to file in due to having more space to move the files. They were getting pretty squished in the file box.

In addition, I put an anchor chart poster up that can be changed as needed. Right now, there's a little story (beginning, middle, end).

After all that, I put the homework pages out and gathered up the copying that needs to be done for next week. I'll make sure that I go in early on Monday so that I copy everything and put the homework folders together. Now I just need to get a week ahead with the copying so that I can have one of the aides work on it. One less thing to do will be great, especially since I just lost my homework volunteer :(

Day 4 of Organizing

This is how the phonics board turned into the writing board looks now. I'm thinking that I'll switch the topics and alphabet charts to the far right side instead. There was a bunch of stuff in the corner that I hadn't planned to move, but then I did move it and now it's so bare! The "How Did I Do" rubric is now where the reading strategies use to be.

The rubric use to be on the purple bordered board. I'm planning to use that as our anchor charts for writing.

I decided to move the center bins on the counter. I'm still not sure about their placement...

This is the board that use to have the writing labels, but now, as you can see, it's the reading strategy board. Some community helpers are lending their reading expertise :)

This adorable wreath that a parent made needs to find a happy place in the room too.

This idea popped into my mind a couple days ago in answer to a prayer about how to add in some extra assessment during math lessons. No matter what math center they're at, when I say "pop quiz" we'll take a one question quiz to see where everyone is in their understanding of the day's concept(s). Perhaps we'll use it for other subjects as well!

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