Kindergarten Newbies!

Well, our school still isn't ready to move in! Gah! I'm going crazy! I've been trying my best to stay busy though. Last night I met with a friend of mine who just found out she's being moved from First Grade to Kindergarten... dun dun dun!!! ;)

Naturally, she had a lot of questions. There is SO much more to think about than you realize! We talked for nearly 3 hours and I still didn't feel like I did anything but overwhelm her... Sooooo I came home and decided to make a "shortcut" type document that tells those "Kindergarten Newbies" the basics of setting up a Kindergarten Classroom! I tried to not go over three pages, and to make it not look too scary. :)
Soooo here ya go... Your New Kindergarten Classroom!

Keep in mind, our district kind of "spoils" us and we are blessed with furniture, and a plethora (that's the word I use to make myself sound smart) of manipulatives, resources, etc. But at least you get an idea of what you're getting into. :) I remember my first year of teaching, I just stood in the middle of my empty classroom thinking, "Where in the world do I start?"

Veteran teachers, if you have a "newbie" on your team, give this to them! They'll love you FOREVER! ;)

Happy planning!

Goal Setting

You all know as much as I do how important it is to motivate your kiddies and get them to "own" their learning. (That's half the battle right there!) If they don't have a drive to learn, or understand where they are now and where they are going, it's a lot more difficult to get them where they need to be! ;) I've tried a lot of things in the past in terms of goal-setting and I've come to a few conclusions:

A. Yes. Kindergartners understand goal setting and benefit highly from it. 

B. You should have more than one way for the kids to see their goal and record progress. 

C. Guide your little ones in goal setting. Don't simply do it for them. ;)

OK, so the third one seems pretty obvious but it's crazy how many people are surprised when I tell them that! Kindergartners can do it, you just have to model and guide them to be realistic and give them a visual to help them see progress! Once they reach their first goal, they get SO excited and can't wait to set the next one, and they get better each time. 

The second point makes sense because, as we all know, no two children are exactly alike and they don't all learn and understand things the exact same way. (One of the many reasons why teachers are AMAZING! ;))

Here are the 3 reading goal setting methods I use in my classroom:

1. The "Goal Trail"

The goal trail is up in my room on meet the teacher night and stays up all year. My room is western-themed, but you could of course tweak this idea to fit your own room theme! :) I get these cute little Western Stick Kids from Teacher Tools to move along the trail; and I take pictures of each of the kids at the beginning of the year and glue a picture of their face to make it more "personal". (I've done it with numbers before and I swear they get so much more motivated just seeing their little faces!) 

I divide the trail into sections, ending the trail at the grade-level EOY expectation. I also leave a spot just above the EOY level for those who exceed the EOY expectations. Those friends can look at the dot chart (see #2) for their actual level! :) As they reach independence with the next level, they get to move their little "trail rider" up to the next level! They LOVE it!! :)

2. The Dot Chart

So, it's not "western" but I didn't have any luck finding a western one, so I figured dots... dot chart... ya know. ;) Basically, the idea here is that not only do the kids have a visual of where they are now, they have a visual of their progress and where they've come from. I use rainbow smiley stickers to track their progress: Red-BOY, Orange-January, and so on. (Hey, why not review Science at the same time? Can't get enough rainbows! Haha!) This is also where my more "advanced" friends can see their current levels. (Can't leave out those sweet babies!) Be sure to have a "key" at the bottom like I do for parent conferences; and it's also great practice for the little ones on how to use a key!

I mark the MOY grade-level expectation column with yellow, and the EOY grade-level expectation column with green so that they can easily see how close they are to their next goal! :)

 3. Student Goal Folders

 These are my individual goal setting tools. The kids LOVE these because they get to COLOR! Woo hoo! :) I splurge 'cause I love my kiddies and buy the multi-colored file folders...ooooooh! (The set I buy comes with blue, green, red, and yellow, and they LOVE getting to pick a color!) Each kid decorates and labels their own folder with whatever they want, and inside they have this little progress recording graph. 

Get excited now, cause they get to use their favorite color to record their progress! Wooo! But these folders are truly the best because this is where we set INDIVIDUAL goals together. I help "guide" each friend to their goal based on where they are at the beginning of the year, and how much progress they make in the first two months. Then we put a "yellow" line for their individual MOY goal, and a "green" line for their individual EOY goal. Sometimes we get to draw another line because they reach their green goal early and they get SUPER pumped about that! :)

And there you have it! Not too much work on your part, and it makes a WORLD of difference! :) These are just my goal-setting tools for reading. There are more to come I promise!

These tools are also a great thing for parent-teacher conferences. You've got the visual right there for them in 3 different ways, so they not only understand their child's goal, they also understand the importance. ;) Aaaaannnnd if the student comes with, you can have THEM tell their parents about it! And that, my friends, is a powerful tool.

-Kinderella

Classroom Snapshots

The clock is a'ticking! At one of my training's this week I found out that all that has been finished of the new wing of our school (where the kinder rooms will be) is the frame... yikes! I'm getting kinda nervous, so I've been jotting down ideas and looking at old pictures of my room. I thought I'd share a few snapshots with y'all, so heeerrreee you go!

Seasonal Book Display
(this was spring!)

Student Library and "Reading Corral"
(organized by genre and level)

4-Way Word Wall
(Science, Math, Social Studies and monthly words)

Calendar Corner (aka "Cowboy Calendar")

"Tacks"- My Individual Class Incentives

Lunch Count Center and Class Jobs ("Ranch Hands")

"A Pocket Full of Words"
This is my interactive word wall. (used in addition to the traditional word wall.)
Students simply come up, grab the word they need, and take it to their desk to help them spell! :)
Encourages initial sound knowledge and of course sight word practice!

More Organization...
(Pictures are good for Kinder babies)

Desk Group Organization
(Minimizes the amount of time we take
passing out journals, notebooks, etc.)

Browsing Baskets

Read to Self "Hub"
This isn't my best work, I'll improve on it next year... but the basic idea is that students have easy access to the IPICK chart, reading response journal pieces and book recommendation cards.

Readin' Buddies Chart and Pictures

Student of the Week Board
(Our school mascot was the "Trailblazers" so I played on that...)

New sight words and word family easy access
The kids loved coming in on Monday to see our new words and word family!

I thought I had more pictures, but you get the idea: Western theme, literacy everywhere, kid-friendly organization... it's down-home kindergarten! :) I will post more pics as I find them!

-Kinderella

a NEW chapter

OK, so I have finally decided to try this "blogging" thing. I have seen SO many great ideas on blogs my past 4 years of teaching, and I figured it's time to get my own "space" to house great ideas, write down those little "gems" you generally hear when you teach five-year-olds, and... well, whatever else comes to me!

I'm still SUPER new at this, so bear with me these first few months. That's why I decided to start during the summer--so I could have plenty of time to "play", since that's how I learn. :)

I'll be starting a NEW chapter this year! I am leaving my teaching job in Haslet (I've been there the last 4 years!) and moving East to Trophy Club so I can be closer to my new home and kinda-new hubby! (We were married 11 months ago today!) I would love to be setting up my classroom already and envisioning my next-year classroom (Yes, I'm a dork!), but my new school is undergoing huge renovations this summer and we may not be able to get in until right before school starts... yikes!

So, for now I just have to sit back and relax, which is really hard for me to do. Luckily we just moved into our first house and let's just say it's a bit of a fixer-upper. ;) I've been keeping myself busy with projects and organizing (my favorite!). We're just chipping away a little at a time. Being a first-time homeowner really has it's adventures. I went into the kitchen yesterday to find a nice-sized pool of water in the kitchen... lovely. I always try to keep my phone nearby in case we need to google something... or call dad... :)

We're kind of at a stand-still right now though until we get a little more money saved up. Who knew everything cost so much? It's going to be a while before we grow-into this big house. But, we're having fun and of course I love "pretending" to be the little stay-at-home wifey during the summer! My hubby does too because the house is immaculate, I have time to cook big yummy meals, and I'm always in a great mood! :)

That about wraps things up for my first post. I've got a sweet hubby coming home soon and I know he'll be wanting to celebrate the weekend! :)