Travis Snyder
9/11/12 7:00-11:30am
Exploration 1
7:00 a.m. – Morning briefing with other kindergarten teachers if
need be. They discuss plans for the day ahead.
7:30 a.m. – Students are first allowed to enter classroom. As
students arrive their morning routine moves like clockwork. Only after a couple
of weeks students remember to say good morning to the teacher, hand her their
folders, move milk card, wash hands, see what the smart board says, and then
free time if the teacher doesn’t have a classroom activity. Most of the time if
I’m there she will have me do it with them. Today I helped them paint their
hands and make a “helping hands rainbow”. Once they finished they have choice
time with their friends until all the students show up or 8:15 a.m. this is a
great time for parents to bring up any concerns or inform the teacher of any
new issue that may show a problem for the classroom.
This shows a wonderful time for children to
ease into school without too much commotion so early in the morning. Many children
have a blank face walking into school as if they just awoke. The smart board has
a way of jumping the small brains by giving them a question they can read with
their parents and answer. For example one question asked how many pieces of
candy they received for Halloween. The answer isn’t relevant it’s more to wake
them up slowly.
8:15 a.m. – Students are asked to clean their messes up and meet on
the alphabet rug. Once everyone is settled and bodies are still. They read the
morning message together which is very important. Reading similar
messages everyday helps students recognize simple words called “muscle words”
for example is, a, the, me….. Today a student noticed that “this” had the chunk
word “is” in it because “is” was one of the students muscle words that they
learned, this is one way they integrated “talk”. The morning message read “Good
morning, this afternoon you will be going to P.E. today”. After they read the
morning message they learn a greeting game where every student places one of their
shoes in the center of the rug. Once every student has a shoe in the center one
student starts by picking up a shoe and asking the owner of the shoe if it is
theirs. The receiver says “yes” and “thank you”. Once they received their shoe
they pick up a new shoe and repeat the same process until everyone has their
shoe back. This becomes very humoring because there are many small shoes and
one extra large shoe which belongs to me. I joined the game late but once the
students saw my shoe being dropped into the middle many of them began to laugh
and my shoe was the very next one to be picked.
8:30 a.m. The students have a story read to them for an
introduction to Reader’s Workshop. Today they were read Knuffle Bunny and then
the Scholastic DVD was played for them. They really enjoyed it. I believed it
helped different students because they first heard the story from the teacher
for the verbal learners then for the visual learners they saw the movie. The
Reader’s Workshop or Literacy Stations as the children call it was as follows
(see back page labeled ‘Our Literacy Stations”) the stations change every day
until each colored table has done every station. Once the students finish one
station they move on to the station below.
9:15 a.m. SNACK!!! A wonderful time for students to interact with
each other and share war stories from the night. My teacher does a great job
with including every student each day. Since there are five tables each day she
sits with another table. On Monday she sits with the red table, on Tuesday see
sits with the blue table and so on and so on. This is one plan I plan on using
when I become a teacher. Surprisingly enough the classroom is very quite during
this time I’m very impressed.
9:30 a.m. – Writer’s Workshop is opened with a story about a Hermit
Crab and losing his home. The students are very intrigued by the story and
comment how someone they know has a sister, who knows a friend that has a
hermit crab. The teacher was very patient after every story without getting to far
off task. The students were then asked to draw a story of something they enjoy
doing. The teacher opened with a drawing of her two kids and made them stick
figures. The students mostly drew their parents playing with them. One line
below the image was expected to have words describing their picture. The
teacher and I walked around helping students sound out words and reminded them
to pinch their pencils when writing.
10:20 a.m. -RECESS!!!!!!!! Children were not allowed outside until
a quite, still, and single filed line was formed. The students were counted off
learning new numbers as they were tapped softly on the head. Student were
expected to answer an “exist card” before enjoying their outside time. Spell
“yes” was the mission today.
10:45 a.m. -The children line up for lunch, the quietest line/class
leaves first for lunch. This proves to be difficult after just going mad for 25
minutes straight.
10:50 a.m. –Lunch. The students are told many times to quiet down
and eat their lunch. The children are read a story to quiet them down. When a
student has too many reminders at lunch they sit alone for the reminding lunch
period and will “practice” quiet bodies the next day during recess period for
ten minutes.
11:30 a.m. - I left as an introduction to the first day.
The teacher I would talk to in the
text is Linda Zeck. I like her organization tactics/techniques. I would ask her
how long it took her to create the perfect chart to categorize her students
learning.
1. Do
all the students know each other’s names?
-Yes, greeting games work well.
2. Is
good readers modeled?
-Yes, “good readers point to the words as they read
stories”
3. Do
the students feel safe?
-Yes, student conflicts are handled on a one on one
basis with all involved.
4. How
is order brought back to the classroom?
-Lights being turned off, chime, clapping, chants…..
5. Do
all students know their Alphabet?
-No, but consistent practice every day. Many children
come from different homes.