Beginning of the Year Writing Inspiration

Hello Everyone!
Well, starting my 33rd year as an educator of young children has been inspiring.  I gain strength from these kids every year.  They rejuvenate, exhilarate, substantiate,(and just about any "ate" word you might think of...or make up!! :) me to no end!  We also have an amazing first grade team this year and I anticipate nothing but "awesomeness" happening this year.  
We began the year with our Super Hero theme and the kids love it!!  A huge thank you to our wonderful moms for helping with the hallway vision!! And the kids' little projects to start the year came out so cute!!


Our shirts say "I Teach 1st...What's Your Superpower?"   (I'm in the red skirt)

We will put kid's pics on the stars.  Can't wait!!! 

Thanks to the moms who took all the pics!!!

One of my roles this year is to help plan the written expression lessons.  I am in love with helping kids write!! On tap this past week was showing kids where to get inspiration for their writing.  Many of you have your kids create a map of the heart.  That is exactly what we worked on this week.  The idea comes from 

Georgia Heard's book, Awakening the Heart.

For this activity we focus on the "heart that feels. " The heart holds so many memories, loves, places, etc.  I created my heart for the kids to get an idea of what inspires me and then let them get busy with their own!

Mini poster of heart questions

My "Map of the Heart"

These became a part of the kids' writer's tool box.  

One of my sweet teammates shared what she loves to do with her kids to help them look inside and feel special.   Will. I. Am. created a song for Sesame Street called "What I Am."  Oh Yeah!!  We pulled it up on You Tube and sang and danced away!!  The words are so powerful!!  We created a large I chart including the fun words and then the kids created their own showing "what they are."  This will go into their tool box as inspiration as well!!

If you are inspired, CLICK HERE!!! :)

I'll be back soon to share some of the "name" activities we did to get to know each other and learn about letters and sounds. Stay tuned.  I hope your beginning of the year has been just as SUPER as mine!! 

Ready or not...here we go!!

Joyfully!

Nancy

First Graders are Soaring!

Hello Everyone!!
What a wonderful first day we all had! I love my new littles and can't wait to see what this year has in store for us!!  I know we will all be going places!! I want to share just a couple pics of our hot air balloon theme. Each of our classrooms has a big balloon in the hallway with the words, "Come soar with us in first grade" and "Imagine the places we'll go!" Very simple and quick...as well as "fire marshal approved."
 Today, as a way of goal setting, we brainstormed ways that we could "soar" this year. I love all their ideas!! We then made large clouds with our ideas on them and put them up around our hot air balloons.

 

 

 

 

 
 We will get some more of our first grade soaring clouds up tomorrow. I hope all my little sweeties want to come back tomorrow!!
Stay tuned!! Much more to come!!
Thanks for stopping by our little window for a peek!
Joyfully!
Nancy

Welcome to Our Fishbowl!

Hello Everyone!
What a great turnout we had at our annual open house.  The kids got to show off all their hard work, and family and friends got to see where their little loves learn and grow during the school day.  I wanted to share a few pics of a couple of the displays we did to help welcome the community. I've already shown you the aquatic habitat learning that we have done over the past couple of weeks.  Enjoy the rest of the pics!

Our fish mask pictures!

 

First grade is "fin"tastic!

 

What's in YOUR fishbowl?

 

Welcome to our fishbowl!!

 

All five of our first grade classrooms had a

 "fishbowl surround."

 

OH! And here's our inspiration!!  Let me introduce Lollipop and Bob. 

Our sweet little guppies!!

I want to send a huge thank you to the moms who came to help with our hallways!  I also want to thank my team for their hard work and dedication!!  You gals ROCK!!

 

I can't wait to share with you an amazing opportunity our kids had with respect to an art program we had available tonight.  But ...another time.  this girl is exhausted.  Good Night!!

 

Joyfully!

Nancy

 

 

Camping Unit

Hello Everyone!
Thanks for stopping by for a peek into the wonderfilled world of first grade!  I want to share some highlights of our Camping Theme.  We had so much fun studying the animals you would find while camping, researching through Pebble Go, reading poetry, writing poetry, reading books, both fiction and nonfiction, writing our own nonfiction pieces, celebrating reading with camping day, and doing firefly science experiments. We got to show it all off at our annual Open House! Enjoy the view!!

Our favorite "camping" books!

Fishing Day! Fishing for Facts

Caught One!

Hiking Day!! Writing Acrostic Poems

I went hiking and saw...

Sight word stars on the ceiling! Can you see them?

Stargazing for sight words

I'm Sleeping in my sleeping bag...poetry

Reading to Flashlight

Reading to firefly light

Paper bag backpacks to hold some of our work!

Our very own little pup tent!!  Can't wait to read in here!!

Welcome to Camp VandenBerge!

hallway display of our animals

Happy Campers

Fireflies and Glowsticks Science!!

Put glowsticks in ice and hot water.  Look at the difference!!!

 Our Sci Fri experience was to ask questions about the effects of temperature on the brightness of glow sticks (fireflies). (Thanks to the sweet mom who supplied us with glowsticks for each kiddo!!!) We discovered that the warmer the environment, the brighter the glow!!!  The chemical reactions release more energy more quickly in a warm environment. Is that why we see more fireflies in the summer months???
firefly printables are here! :)

Fireflies and Glowsticks printable

Sleeping Bag Poem Printable

I can't wait to catch some fireflies this summer!!!

Thanks for taking a peek into our world!!
Hope your tomorrow is just as bright!!
Joyfully!
Nancy