Calming the Masses

First let me say, I did survive this week, although there were a couple of days that I wasn't sure I would (insert a HUGE grin here). Wednesday ended up being the worst day when a guardian decided to "show up" before school and demand a conference about a child. REALLY??? Twenty minutes before school and she just shows up!?! I now officially know the meaning of "irritating". Anyway, I did survive and I am thankful!

Okay, back to the fun! Since I did have a couple of days of disorder I added a few new activities. One was my new "Shape Book" made out of 1/4 sheets of poster board. It was a big hit!

We are lucky enough to have a large white erasable board in our classrooms. It is mounted too high for the children to use but the markers are so fun. Inside my "big" book I drew different shapes. I had the pages laminated

and now we have the perfect book to practice our shapes. The shapes started out simple with squares and rectangles then advance to hearts, ovals and circles. The children absolutely LOVE this. I did explain that there would be only one student working at a time with the book (again to calm the madness!).

Another fun activity we begin was during our circle time. It took a seriously "unpleasant" turn at the beginning of the week so I changed it. We have a tradition in our class of letting EVERYONE have a turn. Since I have an extremely small class, nine at the moment, (no aid and we are ONLY 3) no one feels left out. It seems at the beginning of the week no one wanted to listen but everyone wanted to talk. So, we started have a "stretch break" after everyone had their turn. Hmmmm . . . confused, well let me see if I can explain a little better. After everyone had a turn at saying their "M" word we ALL stood up and acted like monkeys (of course, "M" week!). Then we quickly settled down and moved to our second activity, the number 13. After we listened and discussed the number 13 we all stood up and acted like a moose! FUN, FUN, FUN! Now, we aren't sitting we are moving! So far, so good. Let's see what happens next week . . . .