First Week of Kindergarten Ideas

The first week of Kindergarten is exciting but it can also be very tiring! I've been asked many times for some ideas on what to do during the first week to get students settled and into the routine of school. Here are some of my favourite things to do during that first week (or even couple of weeks).

Stories

Read lots and lots of books! Use it as a way to settle students in the morning, after break and just before hometime. Students love hearing stories and as numerous studies have shown, exposure to literature is vital for students' literacy and language development. 

I also like to use stories as a way of teaching students how to listen to and engage with a book. I know this might seem obvious and that students should already come to school knowing how to listen, but it's important that we set up our expectations on what listening to a story looks like. I like to do this in a simple manner by telling students that when I read a story, I have a job and they have a job too. My job is to read the story and the students' job is to listen. I then read the story with no additional commentary and any hand raises or interruptions are stopped. BUT WAIT?! What about the questioning and discussion? That all comes later once the listening and engagement has been taught explicitly.

Nursery Rhymes

Nursery Rhymes are another great way to start literacy in the classroom. They help students develop their ability to hear rhyme, syllables and sounds. I like to do a variety of activities which come in my Nursery Rhyme packs. These activities include sequencing, listening for rhyming words, looking for letters and making mini books. YouTube is a great source for video versions of the Rhyme.

Lining Up Game

The Lining Up Game is a fun way to teach students how to line up in two lines after break times. I take my students out to our lining up area to play this to make it as authentic as possible. How does it work? I get the kids to start by sitting in two perfect lines and explain that this is how they need to be sitting at the end of each break. For the game they just need to know two commands "play" and "bell's gone!". Play means they run around as if it's break time. "Bell's gone!" means they need to find a partner and make two lines. We play this over and over again until they consistently make two, straight lines with no pushing in/dramas. Positive feedback is a must and the more cheesy the better! e.g "YOU are the CHAMPIONS of lining up!", "You're going to make all the other teachers jealous!". Play this before each break for two days and you WILL have the best class at making two lines!

Number Crafts

I love doing craft activities, even during the first week of school! It's a great way to build a sense of fun and get students to start developing all the important fine motor skills they will need for the rest of the school year. These Number Crafts focus on numbers and colours. They're super cute and are perfect for decorating your classroom during the first few weeks.

Name Activities

Not every student in your class will come to school knowing how to write, spell or recognise their name so it's important to get ontop of that during the first term. I have name activities as part of rotations and students work on their names every day. I have two hands-on activities which can be found here and here. I also use magnetic letters and cut and paste activities. Changing it up keeps it interesting and engaging for students.

Pre-Number Skills

Pre-Number skills are essential in building the foundations for a deep understanding of numbers and how they work. I start off with Pre-Number activities from day one by incorporating these into rotations. Pre-Number skills include sorting, matching, ordering and comparing. I use a range of resources from math manipulatives in the classroom to games and activities that I've cut and laminated. 

Sorting games, more or less? and matching can be found by clicking on their names.

Rules and Expectations

Explicit teaching of rules and expectations is a must. Get these sorted in the first few weeks and your year will run smoothly. I have an in-depth post about that which you can read here.

Developmental Play

During the first week, the afternoon sessions are dedicated to Developmental Play. This is a great way for students to make friends with their classmates and to relax - remember they're probably just as tired as you! A new scene, routine, and people can be quite exhausting for the little ones. Play allows for social skills to be tested and developed while using imagination. I like to have unstructured play during the first week, so I can sit back and watch students interact with each other while making notes on what social skills need to be explicitly taught and which students might need some extra support socially.

These ideas will keep you going for the first week and help students settle into the routine of school. I hope you have found these ideas inspiring and have helped you plan for your first week of Kindergarten. Keep up with my teaching adventures by following my Social Media accounts: Facebook and Instagram.

Using Goals in the Classroom

I'm so excited to share this post! I've had the photos for ages all ready to go, but haven't really had the time to put this together...until now :)

"Student Goals", "Student Targets" you've probably heard these two terms thrown around a lot. It can be overwhelming having to incorporate this into everything else that we need to do as teachers. Maybe you're thinking "I don't have time for that!" or "Where on earth do I start?! HELP!". Guess what? It's super easy and will help keep you on track of your data and reporting requirements. Win!

Here is how I have successfully incorporated Student Goals in my classroom for the past two years.

#1 Bump it Up/Data/Goal Wall
These walls have multiple names but pretty much run on the same idea with minor variations. I have a wall for Numeracy, Reading and Writing.

The goals are all written in child-friendly language while still using the technical terms from the syllabus/continuum. Reading and Writing Goals are self-paced, meaning students move to different goals based on their needs and progression. There is no one set path that students progress in.

My Numeracy wall follows the same concept, however, there is a set progression.

I love my Goal Walls as it means that when I'm working with students I can simply look at the goals to see what they are specifically working on. These walls also come in handy during data and reporting time as I can refer to them to help me plot where my students are as these walls are constantly updated.

Added bonus; Students love moving their names from goal to goal!

You can find my Reading, Writing and Numeracy goals by clicking on their names :)

#2 Goal Cards
When working with students in Numeracy, I used to send home their target numbers on a post-it note in the hopes of their parents seeing it and then asking them to identify and count to the number. Only I realised that it wasn't very effective as my students are constantly taking home random pieces of paper and it was getting lost amongst all those. So I decided I needed something a bit more "official".

Goal cards to the rescue!

I had positive feedback from parents about these cards. They were happy be constantly informed about their child's progress and they used the cards to work with their child on what they were working on in class. I noticed a quicker progression as students were going home and working on what we had worked on in class. Yay!

Based on the success of the Numeracy Goal cards, I decided to branch out into other areas.

These cards are not just limited to sending home, you can stick them on desks, use them at rotational activities and clip in books!

With the letters and sounds cards, I stuck them on student desks and turned it into a game. If they can read or identify any one of their target letters they get a point for their table. This has become one of my class' favourite games and it's something so simple! It's also a great way of dismissing students to recess and lunch.

Another way of using goal cards is to clip them to workbooks. This serves as a visual reminder while students are working and eliminates the problem of having to flick through pages to find student work!

Goal cards are not just limited to academics, they can also be used for classroom etiquette. I use them for desk tidiness, chairs and following instructions.

Goal Cards are easy to use and set up. The numeracy, sounds and sight word cards are done in large batches and are updated as the need arises. The writing and etiquette goals are laminated and re-used.

My Individual Goals Card pack can be found here.

#3 Behaviour Goals
My school follows a PBIS/PBL System. So rules and behaviours are defined as being Safe, Respectful and Responsible.

I incorporated Behaviour Goals into my morning routine. These goals are based on the school expectations and use language that is used across the whole school. I change these once most of my class has demonstrated these behaviours on multiple occasions.

My Behaviour Goals can be found here.

Having goals displayed to and referred to on a daily basis has definitely strengthened my abilities as a teacher and helps drive my program so that it targets individual needs. Students are more aware of their learning and what they need to do in order to be able to progress.

I hope this post has inspired you and given you some ideas to try out in your classroom. For all things goal related click here.

Setting Up Classroom Rules and Expectations

Setting up classroom rules and expectations is an essential part of everyone's 'Back to School' routine. A classroom environment with clear expectations will help your year run smoothly and save you a lot of headaches!

For the past two years, I have set up my expectations in an explicit way which teaches students the expected behaviours for each. I love this system because I find it's very easy to slip into the trap of throwing phrases around such as 'Please work safely', but do students really know what that means? Unless we teach students how they can demonstrate this behaviour, then we can't expect a change or expect them to demonstrate it.

Here are 3 tips for setting up your classroom expectations;

1. Positively Worded Expectations
Expectations are set up in a positive way in an affirmation format. Positively worded phrases help establish and maintain a positive classroom environment. Rule reminders are easy; "Remember, in our class we listen to each other". I have these hung up on my 'Super Students Wall' for easy reference.

Find this here

2. Explicit Teaching - Teach expected behaviours
For each expectation, I made up a social story, which explicitly explained the ways in which students can demonstrate these expectations. Here's an example from 'We listen to each other'.

Find this here.

Students are given examples of what they need to be doing in order to be listening; they need to wait until someone has finished speaking, look at the person, keep their body still and think about what is being said. While we might think these are basic skills that they should already come to school with, we cannot assume that this is true. Each student is different and comes to school with different experiences. Teach what you want to see!

Here are some examples from the other expectations;

Find the bundle, here.

When introducing these, I focus on one expectation a day. It becomes our behaviour goal and I remind students that I am looking for students who can do it. When I see students demonstrating the behaviour, I give specific feedback e.g. "I like the way you are moving safely by walking to the floor" or "I like the way you are taking turns by giving the toy to _____". Children love praise/acknowledgment and you'll find that other students will start doing the same in order to receive the praise too.

3. Ownership
Giving students ownership is important too. An activity which builds ownership is student booklets.

Students can colour and decorate to make the booklet their own. They can be kept in chair bags, tote trays or book boxes for when they need to be referred back to. Alternatively, they can be taken home to be read and discussed with parents.

I like using these books during reflection time. Ask students "What do you need to be doing?" "What can you do next time?".

These three things should help ensure your classroom runs smoothly. Remember, expectations shouldn't just be a start of the year thing. They should be referred to as often as the need arises. If you want to see something, teach it!

I hope this post has inspired you in setting up your classroom expectations.

If you are interested in the bundle, you can find it here. It includes 7 expectation booklets and 7 student booklets.

Keeping Centers Under Control

Center work happens in my classroom every day. Together, my students and I have been working pretty hard on our routine since the beginning of the year. At this stage of the year, most of my students have grasped the concept of working independently. Though, there are still a few students who need extra guidance. I'm going to share my top 3 tips that have had results :)

#1 - Noise Meter

These have been around for a while but they are very effective!

Here are my two favourites;

Calm Counter - ICT Tools

Bouncy Balls

These tools both work the same way, they use your computer's microphone to pick up on the noise level and the graphics on the screen move depending on how noisy the students are.

I have been using Calm Counter. Students must keep the arrow out of the red zone. This has been a major help in keeping the noise level down during center time. As it is real time, students are provided with instant feedback on how noisy they are. It also means that they can monitor the level themselves rather than have me tell them to work quietly. Win!

There are also apps for iPads and smartphones which can be Air Played but I have not used them yet.

#2 - Good Choices and Poor Choices Sort

 Setting up expected behaviour choices is a must. I created a 'Good Choices' and 'Poor Choices' sorting activity with behaviours I had seen. As a class, we sat down and sorted these behaviours. I then stuck them on a coloured card to make a chart that is now displayed at the front of the room during center time.

I refer to this chart when needed. "What choice were you making? what choice should you be making?"

Check this out at my TPT store by clicking here or clicking on the image below.

#3 - Clip Chart

I know this has become a 'controversial' issue but I still have a clip chart in my room. I use this as a motivational tool.

Before we start our centers, I remind students that I am looking for students who are working hard, making good choices, working quietly, sharing and trying their best. At the end of the session, I go through and praise students and move them up the chart. When praising, I make sure I give specific feedback e.g. "I like the way x, was turning the pages carefully at the reading table". By giving specific feedback, it shows the students that I am watching what they are up to even though it appears that I am busy with my group. At the end of the day, students at the top of the chart are rewarded with Dojo Points. I also make sure to emphasise that those students who didn't move up or moved down still have a chance to move up in the next session. Positivity is key!

You can check out my Clip Chart by clicking here, or by clicking on the image below.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

Five for Friday!

Once again I am linking up with Doodle Bugs for Five for Friday! 

I really need to get back in the habit of doing weekly blogs, but I never have the time! So here are 5 things that have been happening since I last posted :)

The prize box in my room has been introduced. This works in two ways; raffle and Student of the Week. On Friday afternoon, I pull a name out of the box and the student gets to pick a prize (10 dojo points = 1 ticket). I also have Student of the Week, where the student gets a fancy award and gets to pick a prize and I make a little speech about why the student earned the title.

The things in my box are just simple party nick-nacks that can be picked up for a couple of dollars. I always have; mini trophies, medals, bracelets, wants, dinosaurs and ball animals.

We have been working a lot on our letters and sounds. My alphabet packs have come in handy. The best part about these is that the activities are the same so that once students are familiar with the activity, they build confidence in completing it by themselves.

That is my hand and my example sheets :)

We are still working on our numbers. The most popular games are Roll & Build and Number Fishing.

We also created Number Dalmatians!

This week was senses week. We learnt about our five senses by doing various sensory activities and discussion about each.

I am super excited because next week we are learning about animal senses and linking it to our senses. Have spent the past couple of hours researching and making Glogsters with lots of pictures and videos. I think animals are very interesting to learn about.

I don't have a picture for this one, but this week we have been focusing on the sight words; I, am, a. We have a box of guided reading books in our room so I picked out the ones that follow the structure "I am ...". I told the students that they would be able to read it now that they know two of the words. They were skeptical at first, but then once they actually read a page they were quite proud of themselves. Seeing their faces light up in excitement when they realised that they had read the book by themselves was awesome! Proud teacher over here :D

That's it from me, have a great weekend! Check out the other blogs in the linky!

Week 3!

This was our 2nd full week of school, and my 1st full week on class. Last week, I was on half days so I could complete the literacy and numeracy assessments. It was a pretty good week...until Friday afternoon. My cat passed away and so understandably, I was pretty upset. I'd had him for 7 years. He was a rescue cat, I adopted him from the storm water drain when he was half kitten/cat. So my plans of blogging and sharing what we had gotten up to, went out the window. I spent the weekend grieving and planning for the week ahead.

So here we go, here is a summary of what happened in Term 1, Week 3!

On Monday, I introduced our behaviour system. Here is what my behaviour wall looks like. You can find the rules and tablet posters in my TPT store.

There are 3 apples; Super Students, Think About It and Teacher's Choice (yes, it's basically a simplified version of the clip chart). Students start the day on "Super Students". I will give a verbal warning. After the warning comes the "Think About It" level. At this point, the student's caterpillar is moved down. I remind them to think about their actions, The next level is "Teacher's Choice". At this point it can go different ways; time in the thinking corner, sent to the supervisor or parent contact. Obviously this depends on what has actually happened. Students can move back up the apples if behaviour improves.

In terms of rewards I have student punch cards.

These cards have 6 boxes. They align with the class rules. If I see students following the class rules, they get a tick. At the moment, 3 ticks = reward card, which aligns with the whole school rewards system.

I also use Class Dojo. 10 points = a raffle ticket. At the end of the week, a name is picked and the student gets to pick from the prize box.

So far this system is going well :)

We continued with our activity rotations. Can already see how settled the students are in working in their groups. The only thing that we need to work on is moving to the next table. Transitions can be pretty tricky!

We also had a discussion about playground rules. I whipped up this 'Playground Rules' reader to help teach safe play in the playground.

This week, we learnt about green, blue, purple and brown. I varied the techniques. We did crayon rubbing, paper chipping, painting and sponge painting.

Monday afternoon was our first whole school assembly. So before we went, I read them my 'Assembly Rules' reader.

I probably seem a little bit obsessed with readers, but I feel that students are more likely to listen and understand if the information is presented to them in a book with visuals rather than me just talking at them. With each page, we stop and discuss WHY.

I was quite proud of my students, they sat up nice and straight and did not talk the whole time, even though it was kind of hot in the hall.

This week, we also did nursery rhymes. We looked at Humpty Dumpty and Jack and Jill. We covered where to start reading from, directionality and full stops. Now all my students can tell me the name and purpose of a full stop. Almost all of them can now tell me where to start reading from. Yay! for progress!

We did some sequencing as well as word matching. I used these fabulous resources. Click on the pictures to find them on TPT!

In Math, we started learning about 2D shapes. We sorted shapes using multi-attribute blocks. Sorted shapes on the IWB and played Crocodile Hop (which I absolutely love!).

We also started talking about finding shapes in the environment. I found this amazing song on YouTube to introduce the concept. It was a big hit. I had a squiz at their other videos too. This channel is fabulous. A must subscribe for any teacher!

Next week will be a busy week too! We are starting our numbers, letters and sounds programs as well as our 'Me' unit. Now that we are fully settled, it's time to get down to business! I asked my students what they wanted to learn about and they all named a bunch of wild cats. I am thrilled, not just because I am a cat person, but because animals are really interesting to learn about. Have found a nifty way to link it into the 'Me' unit.

That's about it for now :)

Enjoy the week ahead. Happy teaching!

Casual Teaching on Years 3 & 4

So far this week, I have been working with Stage 2 (years 3 & 4). It has been a fairly good week so far.

On Monday, I had a year 4 class. It was a really great day, everyone was well behaved and enthusiastic about the tasks. That made the day go by smoothly and quickly. Sometimes, with the older grades you get the few students who like to test you by acting up and complaining about everything. Not the case with this class :)

Here is what we got up to;

* Literacy - Point of View with Dear, Mrs. LaRue.

Okay, I admit that I recycled the lesson I did with year 5 a few weeks back. However, when the text is this good can you really blame me? :P My favourite part of the lesson is the part where students have a discussion about why the illustrator has divided each page into two parts; b&w pictures and colour pictures. Some of the great responses were;
* the b&w shows the sad parts and the colour shows the happy parts
* the b&w shows what the dog is thinking about because you can see the thinking bubble
* the b&w shows what the dog is writing about

I'm always amazed with what responses students come up with!

We did not get time to do the reading response part as we had library at 10am. I had something really awesome planned with the iPads, but I can always do that next Monday :D

* Maths - Coordinates
 I introduced this lesson with the question; What are coordinates and why do we use them? The most common answer? Minecraft! To help introduce this topic, I showed a map with no grid on it and asked students to find a street. They struggled. Then I put up the same map with a grid on it, and asked if they could find it by going to the grid reference. They found it within seconds. We then went through how to read coordinates and played a game on the IWB.

After that it was time to play Treasure Battleship! This is a fun game that allows both students to get some practice in using coordinates. One player places their game pieces on the grid and other player (who can't see the grid) asks "Do you have a piece on ________?". The student with the board, then checks that coordinate. If they have a piece, they must remove it off the board. Players swap when all the pieces have been discovered.

We finished off the lesson with a worksheet and marked it as a group afterwards. I like group marking because you can always clarify anything students are still unsure of :)

* Art - 3D Hands
I have seen this on Pinterest for a while now and have been dying to try it out!
If you have no idea what I am talking about, check out this YouTube Video;

The students were impressed with the images I showed and were trying to work out how to do it. Some of them couldn't believe that the paper was completely flat!

A few of the students finished and theirs looked great! The rest who didn't finish kept asking me if we could finish it next Monday when I have them again. I will have to find another awesome art activity for those who finished.

On Tuesday, I was called in last minute to cover year 3. I was thankful that I had had year 4 the day before, so I recycled the same lessons. I only had 30 minutes to eat breakfast, make lunch, get ready and pack my bag! It was an interesting day, with some challenging behaviours at some points.

When I first started teaching, I used to take these days rather personally and as a reflection on my ability to teach. Now I have a more positive take on it and I chalk it up as experience. I think it's good to have to handle challenging behaviours because you learn pretty quickly as to what works and what does not.

Yesterday, I covered two classes. The same year 4 class and a year 5 class. For year 4, they did genius hour. I had read about it online, but never seen it in action. I ended up sitting with a group who were working on their drawing skills. We found a cool website that showed how to draw cars, step by step. I had a go at it too :P

Year 5 involved playing Multiplication bingo and taking them to the library.

Today I have a day off. Will spend it relaxing, scootering and swimming :D

Enjoy the rest of your week!

Freebie: Behaviour Management

Today I am sharing an idea that made my year a whole lot easier.

Click on the picture to get you own FREE copy on TPT :)

Or click here to get it on TN!

I had a student that did not respond to the management system I already had in place (clip chart). I tried lots and lots of different strategies and sought advice from my colleagues. Nothing seemed to be working, until I tried this chart that my supervisor and I came up with.

There are two columns. On the left, the day is divided into sessions.On the right there are the warnings.

When the student worked well throughout the session (without any incidents), they earned a tick. At the end of the day if they earned 3 ticks, they received a sticker for their sticker chart.

If they received a warning, they had to strike out a box in the right hand column. If they reached 3 warnings they were sent to my supervisor for time out. At the end of each session the warnings were wiped clean.

This chart actually worked. Within a few weeks of implementation I found that we were no longer reaching the point where the student was getting up to the 3rd warning. By the end of the term the student was rarely reaching the 1st warning.

I'm guessing this worked out because the student didn't like the typical clip chart and seeing their name near the bottom while the other students were at the top. Having an individual card on their desk meant that it was more private and not on show for everyone to see.

It definitely made the classroom run a lot smoother :)