Welcome 2013!

Happy New Year!

Tomorrow is back to school after a wonderful holiday vacation.  I always feel a renewed energy when returning back to school after the new year.  I'm not sure if it is because I was able to spend lots of time in my classroom over the break (I need a life, but it is so relaxing for me). Now when I walk in tomorrow morning, I can take a breath and feel prepared!

I also feel that January is a great time to reflect on my teaching and make necessary adjustments to guide instruction for the remainder of the year.  It is also a fantastic time to get students to work on the self reflection process (which is needed for APPR even for kindergarten!)

Another reason I am looking forward to going back to school tomorrow is that I know this vacation has been too long for some of my students and they need to come back to a smiling face and a comfortable routine. I too long for that routine when I have been home for too long. We will start the day off with a celebration of course! What a great way to come back!   We love to celebrate EVERYTHING so we will ring in the new year (because I certainly didn't make it up to see the new year and hopefully they didn't either!)

We will talk about making class resolutions and complete some adorable New Year's projects as we ease our way back into our routines that make us all comfortable and we  prepare to give 100 percent until our next vacation.

Hope you are just excited for the new year and all that it brings!

Prayers for Sandy Hook

Run, Run, As Fast as You Can! I Love the Gingerbread Man!

Gingerbread taste graph-
which body part did you bit first?

I soooo love the gingerbread man unit and all the activities that go along with it.  We just finished our week long gingerbread theme, which was not long enough, but there are too many other fabulous themes to squeeze in this short month!  Here's a quick peek at some of the fun things we did...

Student traced gingerbread people that
the kindergarten class did across the hall!!

Paper bag gingerbread houses - so cute!!

Applesauce Cinnamon Ornaments -   
made our classroom smell delicious!



Where in the United States is our Gingerbread Man?
Our postcards are starting to arrive!!

Gingerbread take-home
decoration project


 

Back to my Blog - Thanks to an Award!

I have been feeling so overwhelmed this year that I have not been on my blog since September :(. While I still have been following as many blogs as I can because they help me so much, I cannot find the time to contribute, and for this, I feel so disappointed. After teaching for 14 years, it doesn't seem that I should feel like this. Not sure if it is the Common Core Standards that I am trying to learn or if it is keeping up with the New Teacher Evaluation System that our school has implemented according to the Danileson model. All great changes, just lots of adjustments.

So enough complaining, today I received an award for having a fairly new blog with less than 200 followers from Lisa at Teaching Kindergarten Kiddos and I thought, Wow! I really miss blogging and what a great reason to make a post! So many thanks to Lisa who has a great blog!

The Rules:

~ You must post 11 random things about yourself.

~ Answer the questions that the nominator set for you.

~ Create 11 questions for the people you nominate.

~ Choose 11 blogs you love with less than 200 followers and link them in your post.

11 Random Things About Myself:

 

- I love the beach and warm weather.

- I lived on a marina for 5 years.

- I have two children.

- I just adopted a dog from a shelter.

- I love pasta.

- My dream is to love a marathon, but I am not a runner.

- I had a December wedding in the snow.

- I broke my foot running in my classroom.

- The 100th day of school is my favorite day of the year!

- I just recently opened a Face Book account.

- My daughter and I share the same birthday.

 

Here Are the Questions Asked by Lisa:

 

-What grade do you currently teach?

     Kindergarten

-If you could teach a different grade/subject what would it be?

     Probably pre-k

-How many years have you been teaching?

     This is my 14th year

-What is your teaching philosophy?

     Every child has the right to an eduction that teaches them at their own level and pace in the

     least restrictive environment where they can learn from all different types of peers in a classroom

     that embraces individual differences.

-Name one of your favorite children's books.

     I love the llama llama series!

-How many students are in your class?

     18 studetns in a co-teaching class

-What is your favorite candy?

     Reeses Peanut Butter Cups...yummy!

-Do you use Pinterest? Have you used it?

     Yes, I am often searching it for classroom ideas!

-Do you have a pet?

     A chocolate lab, just adopted from the shelter

-What do you like to do in your spare time?

     Be a great mommy to my 5 and 3 year old :)

 

To be continued.... I have to find some new amazing blogs!!  Thanks again to Lisa from Teaching Kindergarten Kiddos!

 

Benchmarks in Kindergarten? Oh My!!

(sung to the tune of On the Twelve Days of Christmas)

On the fourth day of kindergarten, my teacher gave to me
A number two pencil for a benchmark that really frightened me!

Now keep in mind that I am a week behind on all of my posts, so this was the fourth day of school and the first year that we had to give our sweet babies a benchmark in ELA and Math. It was so sad. The ELA was two parts, two days and the Math was one part and an individual part. Many people in the building did comment that they have never seen so many kindergarten students come in crying on the first full week of school before:( That is heartbreaking for me to hear.  Of course we told them that this was just something to help us learn what we need to teach and do your best, it doesn't matter if you don't know the answer and all that, but it didn't help. The look of horror on their faces said it all:(  This is due to the new APPR regulations that we are following at our school this year.

I would love to hear from other teachers who are going through similar experiences! Good luck to you if you are:)

A Pirate's Life for Me!!

There just isn't enough time! I can't keep up!!! I haven't even had a moment to post pictures of my classroom this year. Every year I change the theme of my classroom, which I use for back to school. I have to say that I am so in love with the pirate theme that I used this year, that it may be my theme for the next several year. Many thanks to all of the talented teachers who have posted products on TpT and Teachers Notebook. I know that I have mentioned some of you by name. Your products have made my pirate classroom so much fun!!
Here's a little tour...

A large pirate sits on the window of classroom greeting mateys as they enter (we have covered the sword with a book, just to be on the safe side)

Pirate Numbers to line up on:)

Love this hanging outside my classroom - it once was on my door
but due to the fire safety regulations, we are no longer able to put anything on
our classroom doors:(

Posing with pirate hats on the first day of school - we also used pirate eye patches to find gold in the sand table!!

Happy Birthday - Pirate Style!!

Pirate Numbers 1-30

A pirate letter chart and word wall