Friday Funny

Our reading specialists showed up today with their RTI shirts on! What a riot!

More than a Number

Dear Blog Friends.....Amy Ludwig VanDerwater, a very talented writer and teacher that I have been honored to work with and learn from, has written a song that speaks to us all in education today.  I HAD to share it because when I watched it, it made me cry a little.  It also made me realize that I will NEVER refer to a child by their number.

After you watch it, if you are moved to do so, please share it with your fellow teachers.  You can also go to Amy's website here and read her letter to President Obama.  She shares stories about how this climate of testing is crushing the spirit of education. 

Leave me a comment and let me know what you think!!

Poetry Workstation

Today we worked on learning a new workstation.  I introduced the poetry workstation!  they had a great time!  First, we introduced the poem, I See Apples.  I read it, they read it together until we could read it independently.

Then the children had to build the poem with the sentence strips.  They used the original poem to double check the poem.

It was fantastic to see them working together to get the poem in order.

The children then cut out the poem strips and glued them in the correct order by themselves.  Only a few needed to double check the poem for accuracy.

The finished product turned out pretty well I think!!!

Kindness activity

I have mentioned in an earlier post that my school is participating in Rachel's Challenge.  The first character trait that we learned about was kindness.  The first and second grade teachers at my school decided that we wanted to do a "whole hallway" activity.  We all gathered in the hallway......

And each worked on designing a self-portrait.

It was a ton of fun to work with friends!

Some friends chose to work with friends inside the classroom!

There were about 150 kids in all!

We hung them up in the hallway and connected them with a string.  This shows that we are all connected together with kindness...

It was a great deal of fun and our hallway looks BEAUTIFUL!

Name Puzzles and a Linkback Fall Post

This year we are implementing the Fountas and Pinnell Phonics Program for the first time.  I am really enjoying this program although there is quite a bit of prep work to be done.  I spend so much time prepping the materials for the lessons that I want to make them last and give the children opportunities to practice the skills that they are learning.

This week we worked on a name puzzles activity.  It really is a very simple activity.

I made a little worksheet for them to do in workstations this week.  It is a freebie for you!

Name Puzzle Worksheet

Today we also did a Fall leaves activity that I did last year!  It was just that good that I decided to do it again!  Go check it out!

Fall Leaves @ Mrs. Faas' First Grade

Read Aloud

One of the things that I was unable to do last year that I really missed was chapter book read alouds. This year with all of the junk that we have to do and all of the new acronyms that are keeping us from actually teaching, I decided that I would bring back the read aloud.

My focus when I do my chapter book read alouds is to introduce the first book in a book series.  We talk about what makes a set of books a series.

We just finished the first book in the Jack Gets a Clue series and I pulled out 3 other books.  After I read them the back of the book as a preview, we voted on which book we wanted to read next.  As you  can see, Ready Freddy Tooth Trouble is our next book.

Later, I will let the class vote on which of our series books we would like to hear the second one of.  Hopefully our list will be VERY long by June!

Does anyone have a favorite series that would be appropriate for a class of first graders?????

Properties Scavenger Hunt

Our Elementary Science Program kit that we are working on now is an exploration of properties.  One of the lessons is a properties scavenger hunt.  I take a "property" word and secretly put it into a bag.  The teams then have to find 5 things that fit that particular property and put them in the bag. We then gather on the carpet and the teams put out their items and the class has to guess what the property owrd was based on the items.  They did a great job and had a really fun time!  If you study properties at all, give it a try!

First a bunch of pictures of cute kids while they were "on the hunt"!

And now some of the items in the property bags!