Week 2: Making friends

It was a fun and busy week in K1!  The students are a very sociable group, and enjoy chatting with each other.  It also seems they are keen to try everything and happy to give many different activities a go.  This week we discussed some classroom expectations in order to create some guidelines during playtime, to help it all run smoothly.  The students had some suggestions for possible essential agreements; here are their ideas:

• "No pushing"
• "Don't take things that don't belong to you"
• "Don't take toys that someone is using.  You must share"
• "No snatching"
• "No painting someone else"
• "Don't break anything someone else makes"
• "No shouting"
• "No hitting or punching"
• "Be a good listener"
• "Don't be mean"
• "You must clean up your toys"

I used their ideas to form our classroom agreements (with perhaps a more positive spin on the suggestions).  It would be helpful if you could reinforce and talk about the following ideas:

• "Hands are for helping others"
• "Listen to others"
• "Be caring"
• "Be helpful at tidy up time"
• "Remember your manners"

Overall the students have been cooperative with each other and are beginning to plan and collaborate when playing. Just look at them in action in this video! Over the next weeks I will share more images and moments from the classroom through this blog, so watch this space.

REMINDERS:

We will have our class photo on Thursday, September 3.  The students wear their regular school uniforms.

Parent-Teacher Interview time slips went home in the blue folders today, along with our "Helper of the day/Show and Tell" Roster.  You will also find a large A3 paper with "What is Your World?" written on it -yes, you have homework!  In K1!  I'm only joking, but I would like you to help me launch the Metaproject by sharing an insight into "What is your world..." There is no right or wrong way to go about this, and it is open to wide interpretation!  You and your child are asked to work on this together, and you can draw, write, use photos, make a collage, whatever you'd like to do to help us learn more about your world.

On Wednesdays, Mrs. Elizabeth Saez covers my class until lunchtime, while I am released to work in my role as Grade Curriculum Coordinator.  Beth brings a wealth of wonderful experience to the classroom, and I am sure you will hear your children talking about her very soon.

The Head of Grade has also updated her blog -apologies for my wordy one (I'll try to be more concise next time!) but please do click on the link and read all the info she has for you.