My Last Day in Kindergarten

My last day in Kindergarten was bittersweet. As I'm excited to be moving closer to graduation and have my own classroom, I'm also sad that I will no longer be teaching this wonder group of students. During the past seven weeks, I have learned so much from them and my wonderful mentor. I can feel huge improvements in my teaching already. I am surprised at how fast I was able to grow and develop my craft since seven weeks does not seem that long to me. Several parents came up to me on Friday after the school assembly to wish me luck in fourth grade and to mention how much their child is going to miss me. Never would I have thought that I would have made an impact on these students within the short time I was their teacher. To make the day even more emotional, the parents, my mentor, and the students put together a basket filled with office supplies for my future classroom.

The students also created a class book where they wrote and illustrated why they loved me.

The students were so excited about giving me a present. They crowded around me and went through the box telling me what was from them and their family. This was the best end to a wonderful first rotation of student teaching. I am so excited to see what the next seven weeks in fourth grade will teach me!

*Check the Kinder Videos tab for videos of me teaching a writing mini lesson and several one-on-one interactions.

Kinder ELAR

Word Families

 

The students come up with words they have heard making the specified sound. Using the document camera I write each word on a note card. These words are strung together and hung up in the classroom for them to use a resource during writing.

Questions

Together the students and I created a chart about questions. They are learning what questions are, when they are used, and the correct punctuation that's at the end. 

   I used a Harry Kindergarten song about questions and gave them a hand gesture to reinforce their learning.

100 Days of Learning

The Hundredth Day of School

The hundredth day of school was so much fun to experience in kindergarten, both for myself and for the students. All week the students had been painting their shirts. They had to put 100 paint stamps onto their shirt in groups of ten. 

I had the priviledge of working with the parent volunteers during the two days of shirt prep. The shirts came out great and the students were so proud of their work.

On the hundredth day of school we were visited by Zero the Hero. They screamed when they saw him they were so excited! The entire day was wonderful. The students created several different crafts stemmed around the number 100. There were snacks made, glasses, watercolors, and fruit loop necklaces. It was my favorite day in kindergarten, hands down!

 

Valentine's Day

"Owl" Be Your Valentine

For Valentine's day I created a box for the students to put any valentines addressed to me in. The students LOVED my Owl. Some of them named her "Mr. Owl" which created a hilarious discussion between students. 

Making this Owl was so much messier then I expected! I had to to put a towel on my work table so the paper mache wouldn't ruin it.

Almost finished!

All done! She came out so adorable! There is a slot to put in valentines behind her bow. There is also a removable bottom to get all of the valentines out.

These are the valentines that I made for all of my little kindergarteners (super hero tootsie pops and multicolored heart crayons). I was very pleased with how they came out!

Kinder Science

Soil

This was a fun week for the students! They loved talking about soil and what lives in it. We created an anchor chart in the middle of the week of everything that they can find within soil. The students then chose what they wanted to draw from our list and we glued it into the soil portion of the anchor chart. 

 

The next day, the students brought a bag filled with soil from home. They had the opportunity to explore and sift through their soil and a friend's. They recorded what they found in their science journals. It was so fun to watch them explore and find worms and spiders dead and alive. 

Properties of Water

The students came up with a list to describe water. At the end of the week, the students looked at four water bottles filled with different kinds of water (lake, river, tap, and ocean water). They had to guess what kind they thought it was by looking at the clarity. The next week we discussed ways to conserve water.

  

 

Kinder Math

2D Shape Webs
My first week of student teaching in Kindergarten has gone great! I've started off with teaching Math in the mornings. This week we are creating 2D shape webs.

We explored one shape a day (with one day completing two webs) for a week.

I was surprised by the depth of the answers that students gave me.

The oval was difficult for the students to come up with examples. Therefore, I used a book of shapes and we did a picture walk. This helped them come up with some examples to place on our web.

3D Shapes Lesson

 The next week, I introduced 3D shapes. This was more complex for the students to grasp. There was a lot of confusion at the beginning of the week because a 3D shape is not flat but when you see the shape on paper it is. At the beginning of the week we filled out a chart. 

We explored one shape a day. I introduced each shape by showing them a wooden shape and asking them questions about it. I then introduced the new vocabulary words like face and base. I also brought items from home to show them that they have seen this shape many times. Together we came up with a definition to describe the shape. I then asked the students to close their eyes and picture their house, the park, and the school and to look for items they have seen that look like that shape. We then came up with examples of the different 3D shapes. For the next 5 weeks, I referred back to this chart when talking about shapes.

Number Webs 

I enjoyed creating these webs with the students. In order to create it, the students tell me all the ways to make the number 13 that they can think of.

 Once a week a number web is created during number talks. This part of the day the students learn about creating numbers using ten frames, twenty frames, rek n reks, and mental math.

 Graphs

The students greatly enjoyed creating graphs. I suspect it's because they enjoy taking surveys and asking each other silly questions. 

The students brought a 3D object from home and we sorted them together. After that, I gave each student an object and they were instructed to draw them onto a post-it note. When they were finished they placed them onto the graph themselves. When all the post-its were placed onto the graph we discussed what conclusions they could draw from looking at this graph.

 The students loved creating this graph! I used my cricut to cut several circles. The students were able to choose which color circle they wanted to draw their face and hair on. When they were finished we glued their face onto the graph and discussed what conclusions we could draw from this graph.