The other day, we were reviewing shapes.  For some reason, most of the shape names aren’t too tricky.  Circle – well we all know that.  Square and Triangle too. Rectangle can be challenging, but a little explanation of the two short and two long sides usually does the trick. It’s the darn Rhombus that gets us every [...]

Well, it really doesn’t get much better than the 100th day in kindergarten. It’s kind of like Christmas, Valentine’s Day (coming Thursday!), and the Fourth of July wrapped into one.  Well, it is in my class anyway.   I used an entire bottle of glitter to make this for the doorway: We sang our hearts [...]

This week, I was fortunate enough to have a visit from the STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) Coordinator for my district.  She is leading a book group I’m partaking in on the book Number Talks and volunteered to come in and demonstrate with my class. It’s always eye opening for me to sit with [...]

As any of you know who have taken over a room from someone else, there is often hidden treasure lurking around every corner.  The room I took over at my new school was from a teacher moving schools and changing grades.  She took most of her belongings, but left quite a bit too.  I tried [...]

Yesterday we took our field trip to the beach.  Wow – as if on cue, after a cool and rainy week, the sun came out and warmed us to the point of leaving our jackets and sweatshirts in our backbacks. On the bus ride I sat with Billy.  Never one to shy away from difficult [...]

Oh shapes.  We’ve been really trying to master our shape identification, especially the harder ones – Rhombus, Trapezoid, and Hexagon.  Most kids get the good old Circle, Triangle, Square, Oval, and Rectangle, but the other three are just plain hard.  In order to meet the end of year benchmark for shape identification, they need at [...]

As we head into the Spring, our assessments are showing a few sprouts really struggling with number identification (especially teen numbers) and certain sight words.  After vacation, Mrs. D. came in with a new game – one I’d never seen used in kindergarten, cup stacking. Now I’ve seen cups stacked as a game, but this [...]

I've written about it before. My dear friend, Mrs. F. teaches third grade. I see those big, almost gangly, third graders limbering down the hallway and I know there is a universe between them and my tiny sprouts. Sometimes I forget how challenging the academics can be as the children grow. Yesterday in the teacher's room, I ran into Mrs. F. ...

Well it's been raining all week long here... we haven't been able to go outside at all and I swear I can see the skin literally crawling on some sprouts... as I drove home today, thankful for a respite for a few days, a math formula popped into my head. Now I teach kindergarten.  We don't do much algebra, so I have no clue how accurate this ...

I forgot this funny tidbit from our one-hundredth day… Audra had brought in her collection of marbles to count. She diligently counted and recounted them with no issue. We even gave her a tray to use so they wouldn’t roll around the room. At the end of the day, Audra raised her hand, I walked over and she showed me four loose marbles. ...