Elf Antics: Day 3

This morning when we came in we didn't see Dash at first. Upon a closer inspection of the room we found him camped out by our book boxes on a little table. It appears he had some fun coloring Christmas pictures last night and left a bit of a mess with the crayons!

We talked about what he was doing and everyone agreed that he must have borrowed the crayons from me, but the pictures must have come from the North Pole. One of the students wondered aloud if he could bring us some fun coloring pictures like these ... guess we'll have to wait and see!

A Package from Santa!

Today was a VERY exciting day in first grade! This morning, while we were completing our morning work, Ms. Coburn stopped by our room with a large package wrapped in paper! She said she was up at the office checking her box and saw it had been delivered to us so she brought it back.

We gathered around on the carpet and read the tag.

Can you believe it?!? We got a package from SANTA! There were cheers of excitement all around! :)

Upon opening the package, we found a letter from Santa himself on his official Santa letterhead.

The letter told us that we were going to have one of his special elves joining us starting tomorrow. It told us our elf's name is Dash, and he got his name because he is in charge of taking care of the reindeer Dasher at the North Pole. Also in the package was a book for us to read explaining a little more about the elf.

In his letter Santa told us that our elf, Dash, wanted to send each student a gift before he arrived. Inside the box we found a package of Elf Kisses for each student!

Also in the box was a stack of Elf Journals, one for each student. This will be our morning work each day and help us record everything our elf does from now until winter break. We got right to work designing our cover and filling out the first page about our elf.

Everyone is VERY excited to see our elf in our room tomorrow. He will be here watching over us each day, and at night will fly back to the North Pole to report to Santa. Santa told us that each day we will have to look for him, as he will be hiding somewhere new in our classroom. Elves are known to be a little mischievous, so check back soon to see some of our elf's crazy classroom antics!

Camping Read-In

Friday was SUCH a fun day in our class! We finished off our two week unit on camping by having a camping read-in. Each of the students was allowed to bring a flashlight and a special book or two from home. I moved all the desks and set up two tents (one big and one small), as well as a camp fire made from tissue paper. We spent the entire morning sharing our books with our friends. I divided the class in half and they took turns reading inside the big tent. When you were not reading in the big tent it was your turn to do campfire reading and "read under the stars". Everyone LOVED it! We turned off one of the classroom lights to dim the room a bit (but still leave plenty of light for reading). However, every 15 minutes the kids had to get with someone who had a flashlight and we turned off both lights for 5 minutes of "flashlight reading". What a super fun day!

I took a bunch of pictures of everyone during our read-in, but unfortunately I cannot share them on the blog. You'll just have to settle for a picture of our set up and imagine it with 19 giggling faces poking out from inside of the tent:

Classroom Setup

I know it's a little early, but I spent some time a few weeks ago in my classroom getting things ready. I absolutely LOVE setting up my classroom every year! I just love that fresh start feeling you get going through all your things, organizing, and decorating (I'm a nerd, I know!).

Every teacher knows the feeling: walking into your room at the start of the year and feeling completely overwhelmed at the thought of how much there is to do. Looking at all the furniture stacked in the corner and all the blank walls can be a little stressful. I always worry it's going to take forever, but every year I surprise myself.

the "before picture"

I spent about 4 hours working the first day, and about the same amount of time the second day. I am happy to say that I am DONE! Until I get a list of student names, there is nothing else to do. Everything is organized and ready, I just need add name tags to the desks and the front door and I'll officially be ready for the year.

Here's a peek of the after:

 View of the room from the doorway

 My classroom library. So organized ... I LOVE it! :)

 Something new this year: my writing wall. Found this idea on Pinterest and LOVED it. It says, "Use your writer's eyeglasses" and then each of those posters has a convention the kids need to make sure they check for while editing their work. I made bookmarks to go with those posters for the kids to bring to their desk as they are working as a reminder.

 The back side of the room ... The cubbies are still full of stuff I need to move to my new reading recovery room so that will be cleaned up a bit before school starts. 

 The word wall, which currently has just the words the kids are expected to have learned in kindergarten.

Word work and Work on Writing center materials

 The Daily Cafe. I am SUPER excited to have this in my reading corner this year. In the past this area was reserved for Every Day Counts (calendar), but since I am not teaching math this year I was able to move my Daily Cafe board over. I think we'll be able to use it much more efficiently this year since I can reference it as I read stories to the class.

 Entry table: This is where students turn in their work and their daily folders. 

This is also new this year and I cannot wait to use it! This is our writing VOICES wall. Just like the Daily Cafe, we will add strategy cards to the wall as a reference as we learn them. I think this is going to help me be more intentional in my writing instruction.

I really love how it turned out. Since I am not teaching math or science this year, I had some extra wall space to work with. I had a lot of fun coming up with some new bulletin boards to fill the space. Now, we just wait for the kids! Only a few more weeks. It's going to be a great year. :)