My first week...

Well ladies and gents, I completed my first week as a Kindergarten teacher. Can you believe it? It was definitely a little bit crazy. The week before school started I set up my classroom, the theme of my classroom is "Reach for the Stars", so everything is space themed. I have a bulletin board with an Alien and UFO. There are rockets, stars, and planets EVERYWHERE! (Sorry there's only two not so great pictures, I'll add more later- my camera died) In the picture on the right you can see my library, math and dramatic play center. Below is the guided reading area. This week was a little bit stressful, there was A LOT to get done. But it all got completed and I'm happy with the finished product. I have an amazing paraprofessional whose a fantastic worker and has helped me so much. I literally don't know what I would do in the classroom without her. She's a 6ft tall African American woman and I'm a little white girl, so we look pretty hilarious next to each other. She's awesome.

Than the kids came, I was so excited. A little nervous but definitely excited. After some adding and losing of students, I now have 19 kids (YAY!! Hurray for small class sizes) and they're wonderful. I have a really shy sweet girl in my class who has a hard time asking for anything, she waited too long to ask to go to the bathroom and while waiting in line she...had an accident. Poor thing, she was so embarrassed. We fixed it pretty quick and none of the other students figured out what was going on so no harm done there. I had another student throw up on the playground (I think it was from the heat?) anyways, a different boy saw what happened and thought it'd be funny to make himself throw up in front of the class. It wasn't. He got in big trouble. In addition to these incidents I have two students who have meltdowns once or twice a day...sometimes three times. They're both having a hard time adjusting to being in Kindergarten and being in school in general I think.

Best moment of the week,  when we talked about our hopes and dreams for the future and one of my kids said "I hoped that I'd get the best Kindergarten teacher in the world, and I got it!". Yup, that's right- best kindergarten teacher EVER right here. Oh and also, when I asked my kids at the end of our math lesson what we had learned and they answered "We learned how to sort using size, shape and color". I almost cried I was so happy. The first day I taught sorting and I asked that question I was met with silence and a lot of stares.

Biggest lesson learned, follow my gut. It's good to listen to advice but if you foresee problems with that suggested plan, they'll probably become a reality.

Another lesson learned Kindergarten is WAYYYYYYYYYY different than 1st grade. The students are young, they're emotions are more raw, their developmental level is totally different. Everything's new for them. For example, you can't just tell them to turn and talk to the person next to them about what they did that summer- you'll be met with complete silence. Trust me. You have to explain what to do, model it with a student, have a couple students model it, draw a picture to remind them and THAN most of them will at least try. I'm also learning that explaining with just words is not nearly as effective as drawing out exactly what you want them to do. Physically seeing it, helps A LOT!





I have an amazing class, I really do. They are a great group of kids, I've got some challenging ones but I wouldn't change any of them out for the world.