After a wonderful day to end the quarter I was more than excited for my first day back. I spent 4 hours before break in the classroom moving things around and countless hours of thinking about new things I wanted to try. After all the planning I felt confident as the children walked into the classroom yesterday.
I changed around the seating arrangements for the quarter. We have two "normal" tables, a standing table, and a table that is on the floor where they sit on a rug. The children were eager to try out the new tables!
We also introduced Reading and Writing Workshop, where children have an opportunity to read literature and work on their writing skills.
I had expectations for Writing workshop which I feel now may be a bit high. When I envisioned it I saw the children really sitting down and writing about something. But the children have had no real experience selecting their own topic and formulating ideas (first, then, finally) so there was a lot of confusion. Today we went step by step starting with the date and title then determining what to write. I am still not satisfied but it is only day 2 so we are going to keep trying.
I am both excited and nervous to become lead teacher next week. I am lucky to have a mentor teacher who will let me try new things!!!
-A Hopeful Miss Hansen
One of the things we did when beginning WW was to brainstorm a list of things we liked to do, food we liked to eat, our favorite books, animals etc. Each child keeps their list and when they are study, they can look for it. It helps a lot.
ReplyDeleteI am so excited to hear how your changes go!