Camera Center

Today we started our normal center rotation. The kids were very excited! One of the new centers this year is the camera center which has the flip video camera and a digital camera. The student that is in this center gets to walk around and take pictures and/or videos of what he/she wants! So, here are some of the highlights that were taken today! Remember, these were taken by one of the students! :-) She did a great job!

Class Recycle Center

Recycling is an important issue I want all my students to participate in! Every year our school recycles paper and this year we are adding plastic also. Our school is involved in a grant through Lowe's to improve our baseball fields with a concession stand, bathrooms, and some lights. I'm very excited to teach my students all about recycling, so what better way than to set up a Recycling Center in our classroom! I spent a few hours getting it all ready this morning. I glued some examples above each bin to show what type of items can go in! I hope my students get excited and involved in our project! We need to remember that Earth Day is everyday!!!

First Day

The first day of Kindergarten was a GREAT SUCCESS!!! I am loving all of my students and I know that we are going to have a super year! We had a long day learning about the rules, policies, and procedures of our everyday activities. This morning we learned all about the SMARTboard and the wonderful things it can do. This is how we will have our Morning Calendar Time. Morning calendar will include the actual calendar for each month, days of the week, months of the year, the weather, telling time, reading sight words, counting to the number of the day, counting by 2's, 5's, and 10's, and singing some really COOL alphabet songs! They loved all the songs and even learned the counting by 10's song!!! It was great to see them learning while having so much fun!

We also had to learn some procedures that aren't as much fun but still good to know: Pushing our chairs in, standing and walking in a straight line, how to sit in the cafeteria, raising our hand before talking, my name is Miss Austin not Teacher, and a BIG one - saying yes/no ma'am and yes/no sir!!! I believe RESPECT is a great place to start!

On top of all that the students were able to let out energy during 2 recesses! By the time 2:00 hit they were wore out and it was nap time! They were all out like lights!

It was such a wonderful day! I CANNOT WAIT FOR TOMORROW!!!

Kindergarten Supplies

I love shopping, and more than that I love shopping for classroom supplies! Yesterday was a blast for me! I spent 3 hours in the Learning Oasis! Here are some of the things I bought . . . 3 very large floor puzzles; an Alphabet Train, Safari, and Bugs AND they were buy 2 get 1 free! Woo Hoo! Some new posters: Birthdays, Class Rules, Opposites, 5 Senses, AR Map, USA Map, Geometric Shapes, Community Helpers, and How We Go Home. Magnet Set, Telling Time flash cards, play set of Geometric Shapes, an Inflatable Globe for kiddos, big bulletin board set for the Rainforest (I do a big unit where I decorate even with vines), Wikki Stix sets, and a couple teacher books with some great printables. I always feel like I need new centers so I got some new things especially just for that: Addition/Subtraction Mats that have a problem and you put the answer on top, Big Box of Sight Words which is kind of like a puzzle because there is a picture and the sight word that matches connects to it, Matching Game that has 6 different games: Rhyming, Where is my Mother, How I Feel, Colorful Toy Box, Shapes in our World, and People in Our Community. I also got a Positions Game that is a matching game with positional words: above, below, beside, under, etc. On top of the fun things I still needed to get regular supplies such as name tags, bookmarks, monkey & banana cutouts, desk name tags, and postcards that say Welcome to Kindergarten. I mail the postcards to the students a week before school starts and it tells them the date for Open House and 1st Day of School. Overall I had a great trip! Here is a pic that shows mostly everything I believe!


Also, just in case I haven't said it before or you haven't yet figured it out, I love Monkeys and my class theme is Monkey Around With Miss Austin's class! This is a picture of a cute stuffed animal I got at the St. Louis Zoo!

Oh Yeah! I mentioned that I have a huge unit of the Rainforest so I thought I'd share a picture of this previous year! The students are actually dressed for our Beach Party we were having!

Some New Websites

I'm adding some new websites to my online resources page!

Kids Front: http://kidsfront.com/
On this site your children can color, draw, listen to stories, work with rhymes, words and sentences, math, and activities/puzzles.

Gamequarium: http://gamequarium.org/
This site has games and activites for Kindergarten - 6th grade.

Kindersite: http://www.kindersite.org/directory/directoryframe.htm
This site is geared towards Kindergarten and includes games, music and songs, stories, and lullabies.

Kindergarten Reading: http://mrswilkieswebsites.wikispaces.com/Kdg+Reading+Websites
This site has MANY different sites to go to for Reading Programs on a Kindergarten level. It includes many resources for your child to work on his/her alphabet and letters & sounds.