September.

The bell rings.

And a new group of kindergarten kids are mine for the next 10 months.

Mine to get to know;  to build connections, and create community.

Lora from Adventures in Teaching Grade One posted her intention to connect more this school year - be a connected educator, connect with her students, their families, her school colleagues and her district colleagues.   Couldn't express it better, so I won't.

Without connections, there cannot be community.

Here are some of my random thoughts about connecting and creating a classroom community.

I need to let my kidlets to know that they are safe and loved (in an appropriate teacher sort of way) in the classroom and in the school.

That means more listening than talking.  I need to listen to  each child every day.  Hear what they are wondering and thinking and feeling.



Share who I am with my kidlets and their families.

Matt Gomez of My Hullaballo posted about his classroom theme - relationships.  He is putting family pictures in a digital frame.

I love that idea and will be going through some ancient photo albums and scanning some pictures for our class digital frame.  Kidlet family pictures will be added to the photo play list.  



In Designs for Living and Learning by Deb Curtis and Margie Carter (my main go to book for creating a classroom environment) suggests posting an "about the teacher" poster where the kids and parents can see it.  Might do that this year, or might do the "All about Me" family project collage that the kids do at home before school starts.  

Sharing experiences builds community.  

We need to have fun and laugh together. 

Singing songs, old favourites and soon-to-be favourites, reading class participation stories (We Share Everything by Robert Munsch is a beginning of the year favourite of mine), exploring the school forest, our first fire drill ....  all our shared experiences build our class story.  We talk about what we did, what we liked. what we will do differently next time.  That gives our community a past, a present and a future.

Creating our class rhythm and ritual defines our days, weeks, months and seasons. How do we start our day. How do we close our day. Busier times, Quieter times.  Inside.  Outside.  Lunch. Fine Dining Fridays.  Lost teeth.  Birthdays. Special days.  

Nothing brings people together like food.  The creating and sharing of food gives the kidlets the opportunity to act as both host and guest - to offer and be served.  

We make bread (in the breadmaker) every Monday.  Kids who want to, help me measure the ingredients at the beginning of the day.  As we move through the morning, our class smells incredible.  At the end of the morning, we break bread together - literally.  We celebrate that we get to spend another week together.  


During the year, we go fishing, make applesauce, muffins, cookies, Chinese food, pizza, ice cream.  We like to eat together. 

Shannon Weibe (Madame Belle Feuille) posted about creating classroom mission statements.  I love the idea.  At her school, all the classes create their own mission statement for the year and post them outside the classroom. brilliant.  We will be creating our class mission statement this year (and I will be inviting/harassing/cajoling the other teachers to join me). 




Creating our classroom community is a year long endeavour.  At the end of our year together, I know that our connection will change.  The kidlets will move on. It's always happy-sad to see them head off to another classroom.   

And I will open my heart for the next crew.  

That's where we are now. 

Getting everything ready and preparing to love the new crew.

less is more

I have been spending time in my classroom getting it ready for the new crew of kidlets to take it over and make it their own.

I have been teaching for a good long time.  It is easy to amass treasures. Or what I think is treasure. Or what used to be treasure.

This year my mantra is "reduce-simplify-declutter",  Everything that stays in the room has to be useful, beautiful and to have been used in the last couple of years.  If not, it goes to the garbage, the Thrift Shop pile or the giveaway box outside my door.

I putter about, sorting out dress up clothes, organizing puzzles, emptying out cupboards and generally making the room messier than it was when I walked in.

Progress is measured in the amount of stuff in the piles to leave the classroom, not the mess in the classroom!

I want more space in between items on the shelves.  Fewer shelves in the shelving unit.  Empty counter tops and window sills.  More space for the learning and creativity that will take place.

I deliberately say "space" instead of "room".  I have no more "room" in my classroom than I did when I walked in.  I have not moved out any furniture.  The footprint is the same as it was before.

The infrastructure is there. The tables, the chairs, the shelving units, the house set up. The alphabet charts are up.  Numbers are on the wall.  Books are everywhere (in neatly labelled baskets).   A beach sensory bin invites investigation.  Puzzles, and manipulatives and montessori style trays are waiting on the shelves.

As I reduce the space taken up by "stuff" (requiring me to be more intentional and selective) I leave more space.

Space for investigating, creating, questioning, imagining, laughing, helping, trying, trying again, discovering ...

The room is in waiting.

Waiting for its purpose in being.

Waiting for its children.



My thanks to Miss Night Mutters who posted about creating a sense of place for her kidlets.  
reading is one of our super powers

I like my new batch of kidlets to see themselves as readers from the get go.


So, if they were not convinced of their reading ability before coming in the door, it's my job to let them know that reading is one of their super powers.




We start with a bag.  A nice soft red treasure bag from Ikea when  had it's castle kids' stuff.  Love that store.


Inside that bag is a red apple, a yellow bus and some white felt.  

It does not take long before one of my new kidlets with the superpower of observation, notices that there is a picture of an apple and a bus in the pocket chart.  

A kidlet with a making connections super power will figure out that the white felt is clouds for a blue sky.  We will find some blue paper.  

Then we can " read" our objects.  First literal, then symbolic.  

Pretty soon (like a couple of minutes) the reading superpower is very apparent.  The kids want to read the pocket chart. 


The lucky helper of the day gets to hold the magic reading stick (even those with super powers can use a little magic) and points to each word as we read it.  

The next day there is a new treasure bag - blue this time. 



Inside this one are some fall leaves, some crayons and a bunch of question marks.  

And some more words and pictures in the pocket chart. 


Those superpowers come into play again; observation and connections.

We can read the objects, mix them all up, put them back in the correct order, read the words, and own our super powers.  

Here's the full poem.  We only read the first two verses.  But I really like all of them.  Click the image for a free one page download.

Here's a colour copy of the poem to print out for your kidlets.


And, a black and white version for photocopying. 


enjoy the rest of August before "It's September!"


My kidlets have spent a fair bit of the summer at the beach.

So, I am bringing the beach to kindergarten.  In a rubber maid container.  


step one
Sand.  
From the beach. Raid a sandbox, Construction sand.  It's all good.  But beach is best.



step two
Plastic aquarium plants.
Shells.  From the beach.  Or if that's not possible, Walmart sells packages of shells.


step three
Rocks.  Anyone can find rocks. Beach glass.  Walmart (believe it or not!)


step four
Stuff that catches the light and the imagination - glass gems - blue, green, clear, big, little ...


step five
Beach critters. Plastic ones.  I seem to have a lot of turtles.  And some sea lions.  Want  starfish and sand dollars.

step six
Children.  

They add the magic.

the two girls worked together for about 40 minutes and created this beautiful tableau

It's Monday.

And I made it.

Go see what other people made with Tara at Fourth Grade Frolics.








I am in denial.

It's a nice place to be.

It's not really just over 2 weeks until school starts again.

Summer is just going to keep on going and going and going ....

As a result, I don't really have the back to school jitters yet.

All that really goes through my head when I think the word "jitters" is Wake Me Up Before you Go Go by WHAM.



But if I did have the jitters, they might look something like this.


Thanks for throwing a jitter party, Jessica.  Are you playing WHAM?

A Turn To Learn

I seem to have a thing for rocks this summer.


First it was strawberries.


Then the alphabet.


A rock family adopted me.


And now monsters.

I found these little fanged beauties on Pinterest, pinned from Coastal Inspired Creations.

And I just HAD to make them.

First job was to spray paint.  I took over a corner of the driveway.  Lots of light coats. Both sides.  Patience was not my strong point.


They already looked pretty good.



Black sharpie.  Mouth on.



White paint pen.  Teeth.  I suppose that the mouths and teeth could be painted on.  But I already had the paint pen from making these cute little waddlers, and I don't think my hand is steady enough for a paintbrush (barely made it with the pens!)


And we are waiting for eyes.



I'm loving them.



Now to pack them away until Go Away Big Green Monster time.  I'll have to leave a couple in "my office" to keep me company until then.

I have linked up with Tara at Fourth Grade Frolics for Made It Monday.  Check it out!




a boy: noise with dirt on it



I have 2 kids - a boy and a girl.  Before they were born, I figured that the difference between boys and girls was primarily a nurture thing.  And I was going to treat my kids the same.  I loved them both the same, but found that love was shown differently, 'cause they had different needs.

When they were wee, I spent hours admiring my daughter's twirling (outfits were rated on their twirl-ability), and playing dressing up, and creating things.  With my son, I learned the names of countless diggers and spent many hours sitting by the side of the road watching big machines at work.



my family a few years ago with wee kids
I am glad that I had the opportunity to raise a son.  Boys are cool.

I figure that every year roughly half my class will be boys.  Give or take a kidlet or two.


It's August - time to set up the classroom for the year. I need to make sure that my room is and feels like a place that my boys can call their own.




I believe that it is important to consciously make our classrooms boy-friendly.

• Most early-learning teachers are women. We think like girls.
• Boys' brains development sequence is different than than girls.  The verbal-linguistic learning style that most classrooms are based on, favours girls' brain development.
• Boys, on average, have a higher rate of discipline issues and a higher drop out rate than girls.  More girls than boys attend post secondary education.

If my boy was still wee and about to start his school career, I would be looking for a classroom that allowed him to be a boy.


Boys need room to move.

That does not mean that I need a wrestling mat in the middle of my classroom.  It does mean that there needs to be the space and opportunity to be able to learn through activity.  Kidlets need to be able to move (reasonably so) without constantly asking permission.

Boy need to get outside - preferably in a natural setting.  They need a legitimate opportunity to use large muscle movements - running, jumping, rolling, crashing into things. The need for rough and tumble play and schools' unwillingness to allow for it, is hard on our boys.  Spending time in a natural setting outside improved focus when returning to structured learning in the classroom.


Boys' learning strength lies in doing, touching and figuring out. I need to make sure that my environment invites and allows my kidlets to touch, explore and discover.

Young boys' brains designed for activity and doing, not for relationship and reflecting.  (That's why boys typically choose an activity rather than choose a friend, and then decide what to do.)

Boys need to be allowed to explore a fascination with guns, blood, and death in their play.   While this type of play has been around longer than toy guns and violent movies, many schools have zero tolerance of "violent" behaviour. But if it is play, is it violent?  I don't have any toy guns in my classroom, and I never will.  But the kidlets are allowed to make guns.


Inside is a shooting-free zone.  But outside, kidlets can shoot, capture, rescue and die ... just so long as it is play.  In play, we don't mean to hurt or scare anyone.  In play, we don't inflict our game on anyone who is not playing (no shooting anyone who is not playing the game).  And play is not real.

Read more about (mostly) boys' fascination with violent play.


My boys need to see that our classroom reflects them and their interests.


I want all my kidlets to love books and enjoy reading for pleasure.  So, I need books that my boys like to read - typically non-fiction.  In my classroom, my snake, shark, mega trucks and big machines books get a lot of air time with my boys.  Space, animals and dinosaurs books are also popular.


There are hard hats, tool belts, tutus and superhero capes are in the dress up bins.  Blocks, sticks, toy firefighters and police officers, stuffies, rocks and dolls are available to play with.




My boys like to feel comfortable in the classroom, but are no good at tiptoeing around so that they do not break or disturb anything.  I have noticed many of my boys connect with an uncluttered environment and can become overstimulated by too much "stuff".



All kidlets, and especially boys, thrive on being independent and self-directed, within understood boundaries.


I tell my kidlets that they are old enough to know when they need to use the washroom or use a tissue.  They do not need to tell me or ask permission to do either.  (We are fortunate to have a washroom in the classroom.)  Anything that is out on the shelves is available to use - they don't need to ask.  If they make a mess, they know how to clean it up and are expected to do so.  At reading time, they can choose their own books to read. Without the opportunity to make good choices, how will my kidlets learn self-regulation.  I figure - as much freedom as possible, boundaries that are necessary.

The most important ingredient in a classroom is the teacher.  I would want to know that my wee boy was going to be liked by his teacher.  With all his boy-ness - his wiggles, the siren noises that he insists on making when playing with cars, the lack of interest in colouring (especially within the lines), his humour which often involves the words "diaper" and "fart", and his need to feel capable and competent.  Will the teacher see all that, and see the wee boy underneath who needs to learn so many skills and wants so desperately to be accepted and loved.




We need to "fall in love" (in an appropriate teacher sort of way) with all the boys that we are blessed with - noise and dirt included.

boy-friendly resources

Getting Boys to Read - elementary classroom strategies
Boys in the Classroom
Boys Project
Raise a Boy blog
Males in Early Childhood blog
Boys Adrift by Leonard Sax - an excellent and thought provoking read

disclaimer:  All boys are individual, and have their own individual, unique characteristics.  I am generalizing about typical boy behaviours. I live with a man, I have raised a son, but I have a girl brain and think like a girl.


Here is me and my "wee" boy (he's 6'4") this May.





            

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