4 Great Ideas

This post is really about you. I need 4 great ideas for the last four days of school.

Please post what you consider to be great lessons.

Here are the guidelines.

1. Must be able to complete in one day.

2. 23 children should be able to do the activity in about 1.5 hours.

3. Must be creative, fun and simple.

Please add all of your wonderful ideas in the comment section of this post.

Thank you and have fun!

Reflecting

When I was in college, the word "reflect" would have sent me screaming from the room. The teacher education program I was in only allowed 35 students per semester. This created a tight group of students who navigated our last few months of college together. At the end of that year, a few students got together and a sweatshirt made for everyone, the front said "Reflect This." So I guess that pretty much sums up how we felt about reflecting!

I have learned years later, that being able to reflect about your work is a gift. I was taught to do it so often, that it is now ingrained in my everyday classroom life. Sometimes I probably reflect a little too much...thank you Mrs. Shelton. I tend to especially reflect on those lovely parent survey results I get back each May. I try to stay positive an not get annoyed at comments that are less then perfect. This is my own fault, and although some things are out of my control, like the location of our classroom??? I do reflect a lot about it. It is funny how the positive comments, which is really most of them - I forget as soon as I have read them. But, what sticks are the other "little" things. Like a parent who wanted more detailed e-mails...really? What does that mean? Especially when this was the first year I started sending e-mails on a regular basis for just about everything. It really makes me dream about things like standing up in front of everyone at graduation and demanding to know who wrote that! Ahhh...moving on though...reflection is a good thing.

After I have gotten over the "little things". I am reminded that there is a bit of truth in everything, and it is my job to find it, reflect, and redo. When we start to feel like there isn't anything we can do better, then we have a problem. A classroom and education is an ever evolving subject. I do not want to become stagnant, convincing myself that there is nothing that I can improve on or learn about.

So as I enter the last few days of the school year, here are a few of my reflections from this year. Kindness can sometimes be difficult, but is always beautiful. Friendship takes patience, acceptance, and forgiveness. If you are four, it is okay to use the bathroom with the door open. Dead bugs in a windowsill is a organic science lesson. Counting with buttons is cool. You can never have too many boxes of kleenex. Dancing with abandon is a gift of the very young, and it is a blessing to watch. Small hugs with messy hands is always welcomed. It's okay to play in the sink. Paint on your face adds character. The red tricycle is the fastest. Love like a child, purely, simply and unconditionally.

Not really my birthday.

Today was my "school birthday". Every year I am given a surprise school birthday. In a preschool class, birthdays are an especially big deal. Even if it isn't your own! Since my birthday falls during the summer, it comes a little earlier then expected. I never know when it will happen...but the closer we get to the end of the year I know it is upon me.
So yesterday, my two aides were acting very suspicious. It was a dead giveaway when they wanted me to go look at our messy storage shed, for no reason at all. Then the locked me outside by myself.
I thought to myself, "Hmmm...maybe I should go to Starbucks?!" Not really...I opened the door to 23 little voices yelling "Happy Birthday!" And I even got the birthday song...twice.
By the way, they didn't know my birthday was months away, they thought it was the real deal.
For the next hour I received bits of paper with sweet drawings of birthday love. What more could you want?
My aides, those two rascals...lovingly gave me a stuffed zebra and a matching picture book. Some lovely papers and gift card to get a new Cricuit cartridge...and lunch out.
Sometimes we all need to be remind that the simplest messages of love are the best.
Happy Thursday.

Classroom Tour

I wanted to post something today that was witty and insightful. But those two things seem to have escaped me. I also have two field trips to go on...maybe that is what caused it. Two, you say? Yes...more on that tomorrow.

So for now, here are some pictures from my libraries. A little Tuesday classroom tour.

Grooved craft sticks to make homes or pens for little animals. I use mats in my classroom a lot. A concept I "borrowed" from Montessori. I love defining space and giving the children an area that is all theirs. These mats, a combination of straw(or something like it) and fabric.

Most place mats I find at Ross or Marshall's. Great price and it doesn't really matter what the color or design. I look for the ones that are a bit unusual. Right now I am on the hunt for bamboo.


Several years back, I wrote a grant and received funding to supply all the centers in my classroom with books. These are books found in the Art Center. I have quite a few, but some are put away. Some are for older children and have paintings that depict battles and such. Those books we use to show the children only specific paintings.


Nothing special here...craft buckets, books, and a drying rack.
By the way, these pictures are a few years old...we now have a sunny yellow floor to replace that white one!


Ahh...chocolate play dough!
I love using unique items at the sensory/play dough table. Here you see a vintage jello mold and a tin plate. Wonderful sensory experience and deepens the play.

Entire view of the Sensory Table. I also like to use a lot of baskets, as you can see here. This one is holding plastic and metal cookie cutters. Most baskets I pick up at Dollar Tree or other discount stores.

Yikes...too much flash! Science Center shelf, with a variety of items. Natural collections in baskets, shells, pine cones, etc. Other baskets contain magnifying glasses, kaleidoscopes, and prisms. Those wonderful blocks on the top shelf were purchased from Discount School Supply. You take them apart and fill them with whatever materials or items you like. Here they are holding beans, pasta, and seeds. I have to say that I don't like to use food items in my classroom for art or the like. In this case, I had a parent take these home while I was out for the day. He filled them all for us...how can you say no? Besides, they were very beautiful.

View of the Science Center. Love the storage shelf/baskets on the right. Those are filled with manipulative's. You are also looking at a Light Table, braided rug, rain stick, tornado tube, oh and a very hardy plant hiding in the right corner.

We do quite a lot of fine motor activities in my classroom. I have been noticing that the fine motor skills of the children are becoming less and less refined. I am not sure of the direct cause, perhaps the increase in video games and the such. Not so much coloring, drawing and so forth going on these days. This would be beading with a variety of plastic beads and pipe cleaners. Pipe cleaners are great to use and the beginning of the year or for younger children.

Oh, back to Science! As you can see the Light Table with a variety of items for observation. Above it is a few simple pages of documentation. If I remember correctly it was about eating a fresh pineapple. I found out one of my children had never eaten pineapple. So forget the canned stuff...we bought a whole one. Cut it up...at ate it all! It was delicious.

I hope you have enjoyed this little mini-tour. Have a great day.

Wednesday will be all about my day of double field trips!

One more thing...I don't personally endorse products or retailers listed in this post. I in no way receive products from mentioning them. Just the places I like to go to find new items.

PlayDough Baby!

This is "PlayDough Baby" and is the most wonderfully soft and silky dough ever.

Made with baby oil, it smells just like a baby's ....well you know.
Natural ingredients and no articial coloring produces this beautiful light brown.

It is extremely soft and leaves your hands soft and conditioned. Great in the classroom especially for little ones who need a softer alternative to standard playdough or clay.



I will be selling it in my Etsy shop. Actually, it is the only thing in my Etsy shop! But more deliciousness is coming soon...

http://www.onehundred80days.etsy.com/

Welcome

I have been trying to decide why I am working on this new blog. Besides the practical aspects. I have another, it includes family life, photos, that kind of thing. Practically speaking, my teaching life is bigger then just one static page. Maybe I want to be able to share and connect. I don't know much about other types of jobs, even when I was young I volunteered in classrooms.

I do know that this job is more then something I do to buy a loaf of bread. It is part of who I am. 24 little people wait to see me every morning. Sometimes, especially this time of the year, they don't always want to see me. I can understand that. We are all a bit tired and ready for summer. Yet, when I am presented with a crayon drawing made lovingly at home. I realize that they take me home with them, just like I take them home with me each day. Actually, they go to the grocery store, hardware store, library, church, everywhere. I take them with me everywhere I go. They are always in my thoughts. Not disconnected or seperate from my other life. That of grocery lists, laundry, and the needs of my family.
I think of their struggles, successes, disappointments, wishes and dreams. Mostly they want to be a princess or superman. I am okay with that. They are lovely. They are a blessing. Even when they think it is appropriate to do somersaults across the classroom floor...

So perhaps this blog is for me as well. To remind me about how lucky I am.
I hope you join me on this journey. I would like to get to know you. If you leave a comment for me, I promise I will respond.
Some days are filled with fun and some with frustration. Some are sad and some joyful. I promise to let you see it all. Because it is life. Life in a classroom.
Welcome