Five for Friday: November 21

It was Anti-Bullying Week in our board this week.

First we defined bullying and talked about how bullying is not just when someone is mean to you once or when a friend makes a bad choice a couple of times but it is when someone is hurting you with words or actions on purpose and it happens multiple times.

Then we watched a readaloud of Chrysanthemum by Kevin Henkes on YouTube.

Click here for the link.

I showed them the heart and told them that I would crumple up the heart every time someone said something mean to Chrysanthemum because that is how her heart would feel.

At the end we talked I asked students to come say something kind to Chrysanthemum and smooth the heart out.  We talked about how even though it looked a little better, it does not look like the same as before.  We also said more kind things to Chrysanthemum’s heart and added bandaids.

I explained what the poem meant and emphasized how important it is to think before you say something mean.  The kids really “got it” and were super engaged the whole time!

I got the lesson idea from The First Grade Parade.

Another favourite for this topic is One by Kathryn Otoshi.

This is a good one to talk about sticking up for a friend who is being bullied

and what being a by-stander means.

The kids have been really into building their reading stamina during independent reading time.

It’s so great when they buy into something!

This was our first stamina chart that we finished this week.

We started with 2 minutes and increased the timer 1 minute every day.

At the end they were reading 14 minutes silently!

Kinders can do it too!

During this time my ECE and I can both pull guided groups or do assessments 🙂

I copied this stamina chart from Mrs. Jone’s Kindergarten.

This week since we compleated our first chart so we started on this new one below.

Their new goal is to read silently 10 minutes 100 times!

To be honest, 14 minutes was a little too long.

A big goal, but I’m hoping this stamina chart will last us until the end of the year!
I will set the timer for 10 minutes and we will colour in a box each time they read silently for ten minutes.  It also serves a double purpose as a hundreds chart for reference during math!

Progress Reports went home on Wednesday and we had Parent-Teacher Interviews on Thursday night and Friday.  I have really lovely parents this year who are all eager to work with their kids at home which I am so grateful for!

Here is the form I use to prepare for interviews.

I fill one out for each child and have it on my desk during interview time so that I can refer to it if needed and don’t forget to pass along any important information. I know for most teachers it’s all up in their heads but I get very nervous at interview time so I like to have it all there just in case my mind goes blank!

We also send home these handouts to give parents suggestions on how to practice the alphabet and sight words at home.  I give them one or the other depending on where their child is and what they need practice with most.

I copy a ABC linking chart on the the back of the alphabet one.

You can find a great free one at The First Grade Parade.

 For the sight word handout I copy the dolch sight word list that the student is working on on the back.

If you would like the conference form or the alphabet/sight word parent hand out

click here to download them for free!

For the first time in weeks I have very little planned for the weekend!

I’m super excited, mostly because I’m a huge homebody but also because I just found out we have the Lucy  Calkin’s Writer’s Workshop resource at our school and I brought the first few books home to read! I love to teach writing and am always looking for new ideas for mini lessons so I’m looking forward to diving in with a big mug of coffee tomorrow morning!

I ran out of printer paper last night and am running super low on card stock so I ran to Staples today after school to pick them up.  While I was there I saw these adorable holiday Mr. Sketch markers and just had to have them! I resisted for the Movie Theatre themed one that was out in the summer but I couldn’t with these.. I mean.. look at the packaging! 😉

The colours are nothing spectacular but I’m always running out of black and red first so those will come in handy! They have cute snowflake prints on the actual markers too 🙂

They don’t beat my favourite scent, Blue Raspberry Slushie though!!

That’s it from me! I hope you have a great weekend!

Thanks for reading 🙂