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Teachers
provide a social and intellectual |
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To view a larger size image
simply click on the thumbnail of the picture. |
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When children enter the room in the morning they hang their belongings up in the cubby area, remove pertinent papers from their S.T.A.R. Books, put their S.T.A.R. Books back in the crates, and read the Morning Message. I made the curtain to give the room a "home away from home" look!
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Every two
weeks we change classroom jobs. The jobs that we have can be found in the
Class Handbook. By the end of the year each child will have done every job
at least once, if not more. It is my philosophy that, "We Get By With a
Little Help From Our Friends!" You have to see their faces when I talk about
the Beatles song, or better yet, when I try to sing it! |
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Every
Monday the children write about their weekend in their Weekend News Journal.
This is simply a journal put together by us. It contains 10 pages, one for
Monday in the marking period. Each marking period the cover changes. There
is a space on each page for the students to draw an illustration. What a
great way to get to know your kids. Sometimes I sit and read them and just
laugh out loud! They write in their own true voice! |
Each Friday we write in our Friday Journal telling parents about our
classroom happenings during the week. Parents are welcome to write back to
their children each week. The kids just love this! I'm hoping parents do
too! Parents are expected to sign the journal each week-end. I also try to
write to the children every few weeks. |
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Books, books, and more books!
The children are expected to read every night. They may choose books from
our classroom library, the school library, the public library, or their home
collection of books. We read A LOT and keep track of what we read. The
children have already filled the front and back of their
Daily Reading Logs and are amazed at the
visual representation of their accomplishments. We take every chance we get
to talk this up!
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Our STAR
bulletin board helps us to get to know each other. As a fun first week of
school activity I display pictures that tell about me. Each has a caption
with questions that the children have to
answer. Throughout the school year each child will have the opportunity to
be the STAR! They take home the STAR folder, choose pictures, and write a
caption for each. They have a day to present and be the STAR!
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It's important for the
children to know our daily routine. This bulletin board shows the schedule
each day, calendar, and math center groups. It also has some important
information that I can look at quickly. |
We add words to our Word Wall
on a weekly basis. Words are chosen based on what I see in the daily
writing. We try to work with the words before putting them up on the word
wall.
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At the end of each day the children are responsible for getting their mail and putting it in the appropriate section of their S.T.A.R. Book. This becomes a very routine task by the end of the first full week of school.
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We are very fortunate to have four computers in each classroom, as well as a laser printer. Children can work at the computer doing Compass Learning, typing reports, or doing research. We also have a Computer Lab that we go to as part of our specials.
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We are using the Steck-Vaughn Elements of Reading Vocabulary program and the children and teachers love it! The lessons are easy to utilize and are focused around the book Bringing Words to Life by Beck, McKeown, and Kucan. The chart pictured shows our vocabulary words for the week. Each time a child uses a word, their parent uses a word, or they find it in print a tally is added to the chart. Each day there is a different activity for the words. The addition of a SmartBoard has made our vocabulary come to life! The words are posted in the classroom, as can be seen in the second picture. An added bonus is when the children use the words in their Friday Journals or daily writing.
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One of our projects for the first week of school is coloring these little people to look like each one of us. On the shirt of each character there is a word written in funky print. The child's name is on the belt. When the artsy part is complete we generate what the sentence says and then post "all of us" in the classroom. The students holding hands are saying...Let's work together to make our classroom a place where we can learn, work, play, and cooperate each and every day. The sentence changes from year to year and is dependent upon how many students are in the class.
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We spent some time at the beginning weeks of school brainstorming STAR Choices for when tasks are completed. I was impressed that this year's students chose educational things to do. I usually have at least one or two who suggest toy time!
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Writing workshop is a time that the children work at different stages at different times. Though I keep a list of where the children are on my clipboard, this is a great visual for me, as well as for the children, as they progress through the stages of the writing process. The children are responsible for moving their own clothespin through the stages. This is explained in more detail on the Writer's Workshop page.
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The greatest addition to our
classroom this year is that of a SmartBoard. Smart technology coming to
Cuyler has enhanced the teaching of many teachers, and the learning of many
students. I can't even imagine my classroom without it! |
We
meet at the rocker and STAR chair each morning and afternoon for a group
story. In the morning I read a picture book to the children. Our beginning
of the year theme is friendship. In the afternoon I read from a chapter
book. We begin the year with Muggie Maggie, since we are all learning
to write in cursive!
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Each day we work to keep our 20 points worth of behavior stars. At the end of each week we total our stars and have our parents sign our behavior log. When we earn a designated amount of points we earn a reward voted on by the class. This could be eating in the room, extra playtime, a pick from the prize box, or...whatever we can think of! This is explained in more detail on the Parent Communication page.
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