elements of a kindergarten classroom

It's been awhile since I've posted about school.

What follows are a few photos from my classroom this year.  Most were taken in early October.

Enjoy!

A crew of engineers and architects this year!

they started with a PLAN

leaf collection for our yearlong study of trees

I HEART the '2 sisters' and their Daily 5 & Cafe!!!

Responsive Classroom approach - kindergarten dreams vary from learning to tie shoes, to doing lots of sensory tables and 'doing hard math' all the way to 'archeology'.   Oh my!

a small, perfect height mirror over the sink is a comfortable new addition



I love the art corner in my room this year!



self portraits - w/ the book "The Colors of Us"

accessible, ready for work

button sort!

with Reggio inspired documentation - layers of thinking

artistic arrangements of nature collection - the kids decided how to arrange their findings & which color of paper to mount their work on





sign in - box, circle, underline, trace the capital letter.... various skills practice every day





cushions waiting for 'Read to Self'

more stashed cushions

love this organizer!

school pictures - nursery

Guess who happened to be first in line on picture day?  It turns out that the first in line of each grade holds the sign for the 'test' photo and 'label' photo to organize the prints.  Isn't this absolutely hilarious? 

She's pretty comfortable in front of a camera, then.  huh.

Kindergarten - well under way

 

We are now nearly six weeks into our year, and the class is buzzing with activity!  It is no longer empty and waiting.  Check it out!

I'm trying out "work time" (aka 'academic choice') for 15 minutes following Morning Meeting.  It gets the kids up, around the room, and busy with their hands after being seated on the rug and attentive to each other.  They choose a work job related to math, science, letter work, writing or art (same specific options all week).  It also frees me to check in with individual students.

Opening Science lesson... what is a scientist?  This is the what the kids came up with at first... (Yes, that's Einstein on the 'no' side.  The kids laughed out loud when I pulled out that photo and said, "That's a Grandpa! Not a scientist!")

created by the kids (through a series of lessons)

Sort letters in different fonts, sizes, colors, textures.  What makes a 'b' a 'b'?

Kids put the alphabet in order during a lesson, and it's ready for words! (Beneath that... you see magnets of each child's name - we used them when learning names, now they are also our bathroom pass... you just stick it on the metal doorframe when you go to the bathroom.  No hall passes used here...)

Pep Talk as we settle on the bus for our first field trip!