8.18.15 - Day ONE

Hello ALL and WELCOME BACK TO SCHOOL!  I am so excited to be with your babies this year! I think we have such a wonderful group of kiddos and I just cannot wait to see what this year has in store for us!

How many of you parents felt THIS way this morning?

We had a day much about getting to know you, getting reacquainted with school rules, and setting and getting to know 5th grade rules and expectations.  It is imperative for students to know that we are setting them up for a successful year not only this year, but for success in the years to come.  Next year, they are off to middle school, so we are here to push them to their highest capabilities and help them exceed beyond their greatest potential so that they may be at their very best in the coming years as a student.  We are learning to RESPECT ourselves through the way we dress, the way we complete our work, the way we speak of and to others, and the general way we conduct ourselves in life as 5th graders.  It is going to be one challenging year for these kiddos, but I can already tell that they are up to the challenge and the task at hand!

I must say, I am already so impressed with the work ethic of these kiddos.  So many already have their questions completed that I posted from Loser (which they did not have to do) AND so many already have journal entries complete that I posted as well!  WOWZA!  You guys are ON TOP of things and I L-O-V-E it!

NOW, onto our day...

Students took this "Take a Guess Activity" about me and again, I was so impressed because it was obvious that these kiddos had done their homework about me by reading about me here on this blog.

We took a tour of our classroom and discussed some important features...

This is something we use everyday for students to post a way in which they feel they were successful in some way.  It is very rewarding and warming seeing the ways they feel they succeeded each day.  Ask your student about this.

This is for connections.  I tell A LOT of stories in class relevant to instruction and students often have many comments or connections to them.  This is a place for them to "park" their connections so they can go back to them and tell me about them later!

Mrs. Simon (our 5th grade assistant), then did the same and it was wonderful for her to do because it really helped the students in getting to know her as they had NO background knowledge of her.  She is a HOOT!

Students then worked on an "I am..." collage where they thought of adjectives that described themselves.  This is the one I gave as an example.  It is not too great as I made it very quickly.  Theirs are farrrrrrrr better and I absolutely LOVED how they immediately asked me if they could use a thesaurus and knew that a thesaurus would provide them with synonyms for their adjectives so they wouldn't be so "boring." Precious.

We then had lunch, recess, walk, and then students had some time with the resource teachers before completing a narrative writing prompt for me.  This is for me to assess where they are in their writing abilities in the narrative form.

HOMEWORK: (yes, already) Students need to complete Simple Solutions #s 1, 2, and 3 by Friday, August 21, 2015.  Bring LOSER book with you TOMORROW.

It was a TERRIFIC first day and I cannot wait to see these babes again tomorrow!  That is, if they'll still have me :)

xoxo,
Mrs. Thomas