Positive Fridays - Week of Dec. 2nd, 2013

Wow, it's Friday again, this year is flying by!  It will be Christmas before we all know it.  We had another busy, but fun week in Kindergarten!  I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving break!  I sure did, I bought an mini Ipad for my classroom, waiting on it to come in so if you have any great apps for Kindergarten post them in the comments!

This week was a busy one for me as I had my preobservation conference, a meeting for a child going into speech, a training on Common Core for Language Arts, and a quick how to for doing the FAIR test with my Kindergarten students.  I end the week today with my observation, which will be the last hour of the school day as I teach sorting and counting in Math with the independent part having my students sort and count goldfish crackers.  More information on this lesson will be coming soon!

• At my preobservation conference I was praised for how well I answered the questions about my lesson.  I was told I did better than some teachers who have done it before!  Then my amazing administrators gave me tips on how to make it even better.  I love how supportive they are of me and the other teachers at my amazing school.  
• I continue to receive amazing help from 3rd/4th graders in the morning.  They are hard working sweet children.
• At the speech meeting, I was praised by a mother, father, and grandma who all 3 stated their child absolutely loves my class and has made a terrific turn around since joining my class.  This child acted out before constantly and rarely does anything other than typical 5 year old behavior in my class.  He may have just needed a male teacher.  I am thrilled that they are happy and that I am able to help him.
• My students made super cute snowmen with word families on them.  I found the idea somewhere on Pinterest.  I will have to take some pictures and share them soon!
• My students are also starting to take control of their own learning.  We are working super hard on blending words as the majority of my students know most of their sounds and almost half know all their letters.  When we are done blending my students raise their hands before I move to the next lesson.  They start telling me words that rhyme, if they notice that all the letters have the same short vowel sound, or how many have short a, how many have short i, etc.  It's amazing to see them take control of their learning like that!  That has been a huge highlight of my week as they have done it without me encouraging it or mentioning it to them.
• I also completed the FAIR part that I was told to do in just 2 days with my students.  My assistant principal was so pleased that I completed it so quickly!  When children are quiet enough for me to concentrate and their classmates to concentrate, I can get through a lot quickly!  They did well with the sounds and letters!

Don't forget to leave me some kind comments in the comment section about positives that you are having in your classroom or even in life!  Maybe you have something amazing to share about your child or grandchild!  Also, send me those Ipad App ideas!

Thanks for hoppin' by Hopkins' Hoppin' Happenings.  Keep on smiling!