Some classroom photos from the end of last year

I found these on my camera - enjoy!

A new year at school!

Welcome back!
Yes, it's been a long time since I've posted - how slack!
School has started back here in Australia and the first week was wonderful. I have a lovely class - such wonderful children!

I will start blogging regularly again, I promise.

How do you plan?

Planning.

"Fail to plan and plan to fail," said my last principal. He was right - if you don't have plans then you aren't accountable and can't cover the curriculum in time. This year it's been particularly important in Australia with the roll-out of the new national curriculum.

I have lots of different proformas for different purposes. I have Term Overviews, IEPs, Weekly Plans, Guided Reading Plans, Guided Maths Plans, and Unit Plans for Science, History, Health and Literature.

I would love to hear from other bloggers. Later I will post some of my other plans. For now, here is a photo of my Term Overview. It's full of scribbles as I make sure that everything is taught before the end of November ready for end of year reports in the second week of December.

Mathletics - online maths program

Does anyone use Mathletics as part of their math teaching? Our school subscribes to it and I admit that I was a bit overwhelmed by it at the beginning of the year. Plus, my preps (kinder) were no where near ready to be using such a word-filled computer program. I am not really keen on 5 year olds having too much screen time either.

Anyway, after being shown by another teacher how to set tasks and view reports I am now loving it.

Go here for more information:
www.mathletics.com

I am not endorsing this website at all, I am blogging about it because I think it looks helpful. It correlates directly to the curriculum standards too.

Jelly Bean Maths! FREEBIE

I need to get cracking with end of year assessments already. I thought Jelly Beans might be a fun way to check their understanding of numbers. For my Preps, this means up to 20. For my Grade 1s  it means up to 100. So here is a little package of activities for you to use if you with. I have written it with reference to the Australian Curriculum performance indicators.

Jelly Bean Printable

Term 3 is underway - and the rush is on!

Well, this term is flying by! Only 9 more weeks of school left - assessments and reports are creeping up, not to mention organising end of year activities, Christmas, stationary orders for next year. Oh yeah, and my son just got chickenpox! Eek! So a week at home whilst he recovers! (Yes, he is vaccinated but he still caught it!)

Yes, I am starting to feel a little frantic. BUT, on the positive side, everything is going well in the class. Daily 5 is loved by all the kids. I am about to start Guided Math (thought I would have a trial run before starting it fully next year) AND the kids are LOVING the Science Dictionary! We've done Astronomy, Bubbles and Chromotography (Colour) so far.

So to make up for my slack blogging, here are a few photos ... Enjoy! x

 Chromotography is so easy! Strips of paper towel, draw a line with texta (we used the secondary colours so I could explain that concept at the same time - so purple separated into red and blue, etc)  and then dip the paper towel in water. Kids loved this task!

 Odds and Evens Houses

 An easy number matching job for my ESL student.

 Reading Strategies for Daily 5. A work in progress! Didn't want to use the CAFE language because we are working towards a whole school approach, which is currently Fountas and Pinnell based.

 Science Dictionary.

 Daily 5 - 3 ways to read a book

 Working on Stamina (yes they can read longer than this but I was very strict - as soon as the Barometer child got distracted I stopped the timer)

When a child reads aloud to the class or to me they get a sticker on their Read Aloud Rainbow. Helps be to listen to them regularly (because they nag me for their stickers LOL).

Science Vocabulary Freebie!

I've been trying to think of ways to fit more science into my teaching. The new curriculum expects us to a lot more than previously. I quite like science and have a scientist hubby who helps me understand the concepts. He is my walking encyclopedia!

I find that even though I do inquiry based units for science, sometimes there is still a need for stand alone lessons where the student can just have a quick play with a science concept. For example, they always LOVE anything that involves bicarb and vinegar, but I can not stretch it out for an entire unit.

So I decided to make a Science Alphabet Book. I am still deciding if I will make it into a bulletin board and add to it as we cover each topic or make it into a shared big book. I will also make miniature versions for the children to write in.

Feel free to print it out! Some of the letters were a bit of a struggle to come up with a matching science word, but science is everywhere! (Eg. J is for Jewellery... you can talk about gems, minerals, metals, mining, melting)


Click here to download Science A-Z