Wrapping Up another BUSY week...

Our week started with Parent Information Night where our parents sat in our seats for a bit to learn what we do during the day.  Thank you, parents, for coming and joining us for this night!  You, too, are an amazing bunch!

Then, on Tuesday, a great thing happened for me as a teacher...I got to share my sweet class with two of my FAVORITE teachers: my Mother-in-law and Father-in-law.  These two spent many years working here in Sarasota County Schools with many many students and families.  Now they will be spending time in our classroom from time to time!  If the kids tell you "Grandma and Grandpa Nations came to visit"...you'll know who they are talking about.  It was a pleasure for me to have them come meet all the young K friends I've been telling them about this year.
We finally started Literacy Centers this week.  These centers help us have meaningful activities from which to choose when I'm teaching small reading groups.  This week, we practiced moving to, and staying in, our centers.  We also practiced using materials the right way and knowing what to do while we are there.  We have sixteen literacy centers in our room.  Each day, students visit four centers.  They will be required to complete one activity in each center group weekly (in the near future).  For now, it's all about exploring them and getting to know what's what. Below is our center rotation board.

As the week closed down, we culminated (sort of) our Eric Carle exploration by looking at seven of the books we read by this author/illustrator.  Each child picked their favorite, wrote about it in their reading response journal and then created their very own book cover using some of our art supplies.  I'm going to close this blog post with a gallery of pictures from our sweet artists!  I am so proud of how they incorporated mixed medium into their artwork.  These are now proudly displayed in our classroom and may just be coming to a home near you very soon!