Surviving First Grade

Wow, surprisingly for my first year in 1st grade things are going so well! Timing was my biggest concern and it turned out that my pacing is just perfect. There have been a few other hang ups that I have adjusted to... LOTS of bathroom breaks and of course is easier as a class. I am also adjusting to the inability to sit still and/or sit correctly. We made this poster and I refer to it EVERY time we sit down. It is a great visual reminder and they came up with all the ideas around the little boy.

*This is not a photo of ours, as my camera went through the washing machine :( Click on the photo to go the blog that came up with the original idea.

Today, we started the first day of Daily 5. No one in our building has ever done Daily 5, so this is a brand new concept. Read to self... well let's say it was a stretch when I told them they lasted a minute ;) At first, they made it 40 sec. after reflecting we made it closer to one minute. But there were a still a few that had a hard time reading the "whole" time. So it's a slow start but we are starting and that's what counts. Maybe some more modeling tomorrow and continue talking about the 3rd way to read to self.

We also read Chrysanthemum today and the kids really enjoyed the graph we did as a class.

Tomorrow I plan on doing the activity which is a part of the Wonderful Names unit here. It's free and has a Alice in Wonderland theme.