Thursday

     What a wonderful first week it has been. We have met lots of new people and familiarized ourselves with the Community School campus. Yesterday, we met our Drama teacher, Louise. We danced and learned about our personal space. We also buddied up with our friends next door in Andrea's classroom for some science fun. We made playdough and mixed in shells and glitter for a little sparkle. One of the children said it looked like a beach, so beach playdough it was!
     This morning, Lily moved us through our morning meeting and we each shared our favorite thing about school so far. Lunch and recess were popular! We then discovered our art caddies and did some drawing and coloring. I used this time to do some one-on-one assessments with the children to figure out where everyone is and how I can best meet their needs for growth and development this year. We had buddies again today, but this time we buddied up with Betsy's class (one of the 8-11 year old classes) and made a craft that will make it's way home tomorrow after a little drying time. We will have buddies with Betsy's class every Thursday.We then came back to our room and used TAG Readers with our Technology teacher, Karen. She will come in once a week and work with the class. Some children brought a copy of our class schedule home yesterday, the rest will today. Some parents like to have a copy tucked under their visor in the car and they just glance at it before picking their child up. That way they can ask specific questions like "What did you do in music class today?" and "Did you play with your big buddy today?" Be prepared for most of the answers from your child sounding something like "nothing" and "we played." We aren't strictly sticking to our schedule the first couple of weeks, but will getting into the routine soon.
     I am working on setting up photo albums through Photobucket for our blog. I'm not a huge fan of children's photos floating around on the internet. They are currently password protected and as soon as I have it all set up, I will share the password with you all. Feel free to share the password with family that also look at the class blog.

That's all I have for now - everyone is doing awesome and adjusting well. It is going to be a great year!

Please make sure you've checked out this week's edition of Quick Notes. Let me know if you have any questions. :)