The Fall Fiesta

     The Fall Festival at Rivesville Elementary was a fantastic event.  I am so proud of my kindergarten students and their wonderful performance at the festival.  During the festival, I observed the teachers at Rivesville, and it made me realize that these teachers go way beyond their call of duty as teachers.  These teachers worked many hours to organize, plan, and carry out a great community event.  I don't know of any other elementary school that puts on a such a festival to integrate school, family, and community.  

This was my fourth week of math workstations.  The stations focused on number-word recognition, tracing and writing numbers, and orally saying numbers.  I have learned to adjust each station based on the group ability level.  My goal is to be able to differintiate instruction to challenge each ability level.  I truly believe that each group is doing extremely well at the stations.  Mrs. Lemon, Mrs, Furguson, and I have observed that the students seem to enjoy the stations and are improving each week.  Mrs. Barnhart noticed that the students are writing their numbers a lot better compared to the first week of school.  This week I'm going to finish  my midterm evaluation.  I hope my students continue to improve throughout the rest of action research.  

BOYS, BOYS, and more BOYS

I am use to classrooms where the girls out number the boys by more than half. However, Mrs. Barnhart's classroom has sixteen boys and only seven girls. Having fewer girls in the classroom relieves me from lots of petty fights and drama. now I am dealing with pencil fights, pushing, backpack wrestling, and typical boy silliness. I am impressed that the class is so well behaved considering all of the boys in the classroom. I was honestly nervous and hesitant going into this school year considering the sixteen five year old boys.
This week was the second week of my math workstations for my action research. Each child was able to participate at each station twice during the two-week period. Overall, I believe that the students enjoy learning math concepts at these stations. The studetns are learning these math concepts through various hands on activities. I do not beleive that my action research would be a success without the help from Mrs. Barnhart, Mrs, Lemon, and Mrs. Furguson. I can not be at the three stations at one time. This week I made copies of the math results from the kindergarten inventory. I think that this data will be useful when looking at each child's improvement at the end of my research. My plan is to administer the kindergarten inventory to my focus group at teh end of teh eight weeks.
I am looking forward to the Fall Festival at the end of the school week on the 25th. The Fall Fiesta song will not get out of my head. Also, I am extremely excited to teach the fall unit this week. Oh and at the end of the week my kindergarten class and I are going to be celebrating Native Amercian Day.

Miss Flatt, Miss Black, Miss Blatt

Second day of math workstations!
 

I must say that my kindergarten class truly brightens my day.  I now answer to the names Miss Flatt, Miss Black, and Miss Blatt.  Honestly, I was concerned that I would not be able to handle twenty-three kindergarten students.  However, with Mrs. Barnhart and Mrs. Furguson we have a great time in kindergarten. 

This week I started my math workstations.  The three stations focused on shapes/colors, number patterns, and counting objects up to ten.  I am lucky to have three other teachers in the classroom to assist me with the workstations.  I noticed a big difference in content knowledge between the three ability levels.  Mrs. Barnhart suggested that I modify a couple of stations next week to challenge the higher group of students.  Next week these students will be working on numbers one through twenty instead of remaining on numbers one through ten.  My biggest challenge at my workstations was working with my lower level students.  Some of the students could not stay on task.  One student told me that he had a better idea and would like to tell the rest of the group his idea.  Another student  consistently looked off of her neighbor to get the answer.  A child started crying because a little boy moved her cards.  At one point I stepped back and took a deep breath and tried to regain control.  Overall, I believe that my workstations will be a success.  I feel as though the students enjoy being able to manipulate objects to find an answer.  

Where's the Kitchen?

I can now truly understand why Mrs. Barnhart, Mrs. Lemon, and Mrs. Furguson got a big laugh when somebody asked where our play kitchen was located.  Our kindergarten class barely has time for a recess at the end of the day.    I am impressed with the amount of work these five year olds do in kindergarten.  The students work from the moment they step in the classroom.  My kindergarten experience contained kitchen sets, blocks, naps, double sometimes triple recesses, etc.  I believe that our students have adjusted quite well to their new busy schedules.  

This week I have been administering my pretest for my action research.  Mrs. Barnhart, Mrs. Lemon, and I grouped the students into three math ability levels based on my pretests and the kindergarten inventory results.  My only concern is that I should have made my pretest a bit more difficult for my students.  Most of the students have higher mathematical abilities than I thought fourth day kindergarten students would have.  I believe that I am ready to begin my stations on Tuesday.  The stations are already setup and ready to go.  Tomorrow I am going to introduce my students to the math stations that they will be going to on Tuesday.  I think that my math stations will be successful as long as I am organized and that I communicate well with Mrs. Barnhart, Mrs. Furguson, and Mrs. Lemon.  I am so excited for my first week of research next week.  

I completely agree with Mrs. Morris in that my best resources are the teachers in my kindergarten classroom.  I have had a wonderful experience in kindergarten due to these teachers.  They have welcomed me into their classroom and are always willing to help me.  Of course the students are a joy. : )