Mom guess what? I have a job!

In our school/classroom family each child is given a job to do each and everyday! This has taken some getting used to even for me! I used to just pull a child's name from my choosing bucket and that would be the helper for whatever needed doing (calendar, weather, paper passer etc). Not this year!
For the last few years I have been studying Conscious Discipline and I really love the philosophy and ideas behind it. Every year I have been adding to my classroom to reflect the Conscious Discipline way. So this year I added in a number of things. Classroom jobs is one thing I have added. I have had jobs in the past, but never a job for each and every child. Every child in the classroom has a job to do and they do the same job for the entire week. Then they get a new job the following week. I had no idea the impact that this little thing has! One day a little person in my class "missed" doing her daily job because we had to go to a school wide assembly, so her job was "skipped" for that day. Well, for the entire day, that child reminded me that she did not get to do her job. I learned that we can not "skip" anyone's job, it is just far too meaningful for the children! So now I try to make sure everyone gets to do their job, no matter what comes up in our day! Below is a picture of our job board. I move the children's names every Monday, so they start a new job at the beginning of the week. If I forget, the children certainly do not and I get a reminder from my little friends! I made the job board on a foam core board and plastic sticky backed pockets. It is portable and easy! I found the clipart online for free! 
There are 20 jobs and I left 4 blank pockets incase one year I have a larger class (hope not!). Some of the jobs came right from the kids and some are reflective of my practise of Conscious Discipline.

 

A New Friend!

A few days ago I introduced a new friend to my classroom. He is very funny! Everywhere he goes in the classroom he likes to make the music from JAWS! 
Yes, he is a shark and his name is Clark, but the kids like to call him "Sharky". 
Clark has decided he's okay with the nickname. 

He is the most motivating puppet I have in the classroom right now! The kids have suddenly become much more interested in making their printing a priority! It is much neater and they are trying harder to remember to start their letters at the top!

When he sees someone who had made a great effort, he tells them and then asks them to "Gimme some fin!" and the child gives him a high five on his fin. He also notices pencil grip, printing posture, letter formation, spaces and more! He is the best "off the cuff" puppet I have pulled out in a long time! The children are HOOKED! They ask for him everyday and I have to remind them he only comes out at printing time.

The kids often stick their fingers out and want "Sharky" to bite them. I solved that problem by having "Sharky" tell the kids, "Pleck! I do not eat fingers! Gross! Too dirty!" He tells them that he learned from his uncle that people taste terrible! He only eats vegetables! His favourite is kohlrabi! 

This made me think, hmmm, I bet lots of kids have not tasted kohlrabi! We could have that as a "treat" from "Sharky"! This puppet is so much FUN! Best 25 bucks I have ever spent on my classroom! 

We are reading on our MACbook Laptops!

We have been learning how to log in to the school MACbook Laptops. 
Each child has a large log in card with their log in codes. They are learning the steps to log on and then reading on RAZ-Kids. The kids really enjoy it and are getting better at logging in. 
It is a really hard lesson for them to learn that the computers need their names to be spelled EXACTLY right, no invented spelling and no forgetting letters! 
It is quite funny when a child says "My computer won't work"
When I go over the first thing I check is how they spelled their name and that's usually what the problem is! They have left out a letter or two! 
Computers can be so fun and so frustrating too! LOL!

Groovy Rainbows!

Honestly, who doesn't LOVE a rainbow? 

In our class we have been learning all about Colours, so it seemed natural to paint rainbows! 
I came up with this little art project! It took two art classes to complete.
I had each child paint a rainbow of colours in wiggly stripes on watercolour paper. Then I had the kids draw circles on another paper and colour them with crayons. 

We then used cut up sponges glued to the circles to make them pop off the page! 
The results look really cool! 
The bonus is most of my kids can name all the colours of the rainbow! 

Puppet friends help me teach!

I like puppets. They are so fun and make learning much more "magical"! My students really enjoy the puppets in my classroom. My puppet friends help me to teach many different concepts. This week, my class will be meeting Eagle Eye, he's one of my reading strategy puppets. Next to Eagle Eye is Tryin Lion, Lips the Fish and Stretchy the Snake. I have many more, like Flippy the Dolphin to flip the vowel sound from long to short, Skippy the Frog to skip over the hard word and keep reading to figure out what the word may be and then skip back and reread. I have many more! 

Each week I introduce the puppet and what strategy he or she teaches us and then the children make their own paper bag puppet version with the reading strategy on the puppet's tummy. The children LOVE doing this and it really helps to make the reading strategies stick!

 This is Wizard of Words and the King of "ing". I use the Wizard of words to help with the words on the word wall. The King of "ing" helps with teaching about adding "ing" to words.

 My Punctuation Pals are below. They are so funny! When I use them, they speak like the punctuation that is on their shirts. Pete speaks in statements. Ella is super excited...about everything! Quinn always has a question or sometimes more...Do you think this is a good idea? They sit up above the word wall in the classroom and the kids can see them from anywhere in the room. When the children are writing and need to add punctuation, I just use my pointer or my hand and show them which puppet friend is watching their writing and hoping they add the correct symbol to the end of their sentence.

Pattern Centers!

We have been learning all about patterns! 

So I made up 5 different pattern centres and put them into plastic bins. To keep it simple, I rotate the bins through each table group. The kids are also very good at helping me remember which bin they have not had at their table yet. The kids LOVE having pattern centres! I kept the centres fairly simple. 

Bin one has daubers of different colours and long strips of paper. 
Bin two has foam happy faces, markers and long paper strips.
Bin three has foamie stickers of fall leaves and long strips of paper.
Bin four has play dough and number cards. (I love the smell of play dough!) 
This bin actually has more to do with numbers than patterns, but it is good fun and good practise!)
Bin five is totally hands on building patterns with Unifix cubes.
I also have an "extra bin" for fast finishers that has smelly markers and blank "Elmer the elephant" papers. The children make patterns all over the elephants! Super cute! 

Soon the kids will have visited ALL the bins and I will need to change them up to match our next unit, numbers! 

I LOVE Science!

Well, not ALL science, just the super fun experiments! I do A Lot of experiments at the beginning of the year, because I find that it really motivates and excites the children about school! 
I always wear my rainbow lab coat, which I think just adds to the magical quality (plus it just looks cool and I love it!) I got it a few years ago from when I went to a conference and Steve Spangler Science was there. 
I also made a class set of lab coats for my students! On the back of each lab coat I wrote the name of a famous scientist or the name of a scientific theory. I have Dr. Schrodinger with a picture of a cat, Professor Bunson Burner, Dr. Jeckyl, Dr. Atom, Professor Beaker, Dr. Einstein and many more! Every time we put the coats on the children spend the first five minutes reading the coats to find out who they are! It is wonderful and fun! 

All my students in their lab coats and me in my Rainbow lab coat! Preparing to do the mentos and coke experiment!

One of my faves!

This shows the back of one of the kids lab coats. This one says: Professor Saturation! 

Little Scientist at work making "Mini- Explosions!"