I'll be totally honest, I planned to blog way more in September about my return to the classroom. But you know how September goes, fast and furious and then all of a sudden it's October and you can't find your hat or mitts for the morning.
Wow, September. What a month.
I've been documenting my journey back into the classroom on my Instagram. I did this when I started in the library as a #100DayChallenge and I thought it would be good to do the same now. Most of the pictures are also making it to my Twitter. I do, however, use my IG for a different purpose than Twitter so it's locked on private mode. Sorry, not sorry.
As I tried to explain to my daughter yesterday, once the school year gets started it feels like a giant ball rolling down a hill and it's only going to get faster! I meant to write this blog (and others) throughout September... but here we are in October and I still feel like I'm trying to get my feet under me.
I started out with a Grade 3/4 class and while my class was in French I was responsible for covering Grade 1/2 Science. That's 16 strands of Science for anyone who is counting! The first few weeks were a whirlwind of planning. However, after re-org I am with a straight Grade 3 and no more coverage for other grades. Thank goodness.
We are slowly building our routines and slowly getting to know each other in our class. I won't say we have built a relationship yet because that takes time and work but we are adding small steps each day.
We have spent a lot of time talking about our classroom agreements from brainstorming, to goal setting, to listing actions that show accountability and making promises to ourselves. We refer back to our agreements everyday and very soon we will be starting a new routine where students will be able to recognize their classmates for how they have helped them, supported them and encouraged them in their learning activities.
We had many discussions leading up to Truth and Reconciliation Week and Orange Shirt Day. I'm sure some of it was over their heads and confusing, I know they still have many questions but this is not a one and done conversation and we will be returning to our learning throughout the year.
We started to unpack the land acknowledgement we hear each day and discovered many words we do not understand. Then I connected with Nicole Reynolds, the PDSB Indigenous Lead, and we learned of a new updated land acknowledgment written in community with Elders. We will unpack that one as well and add on to our learning as we start to talk more about Ontario in our Social Studies unit.
Finally, we got OUTSIDE! We have a huge yard and small "forest" area that the students love to explore. We spent some time gathering natural materials and combined them with loose parts to create transient art connected to Orange Shirt Day and our reading of Be A Good Ancestor by Gabrielle Prince and Leona Prince.
We also attempted our first painting project for art... stay tuned! I think they are going to look amazing when they are done.
Math. Oh how I missed teaching math. We have started building our daily/weekly routines with our morning math meeting, Which One Doesn't Belong, Number Talks and Estimation mysteries.
New to me this year is starting our day with a soft start. Students have free choice to explore an activity of their choosing for the first 20 minutes of the day. Many students choose to have a snack, play/trade Pokemon cards, build with Lego or create with playdoh. I am able to circulate through the room saying hello, checking in with students and observing their relationship and community building with each other.
You may have noticed there aren't any pictures of our literacy work yet... with the new learning connected to structure literacy, the science of reading, phonics, etc it really feels like the weakest area of my planning so far. I know I am making it up as I go everyday. We are working on routines to help us start centres so that I can meet students where they are and we have done quite a lot of work on practicing our read to self routines and writing simple sentences. I am working my way through assessing each student individually and building our vocabulary/spelling routines.
All in time.
I hope.
And so, welcome to October... lets get progress reports written, have Open House, Picture Day, Thanksgiving, a PD Day and hopefully, more blogs.
But no promises. Remember that ball rolling down the hill?
It's only going to go faster.
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