Teaching Students to Track Learning Goals

My professional practice goal this year was to teach my students how to track their own progress towards student learning goals. When students are able to track their own progress they develop a deeper awareness of their learning, how much they have learned, and how much more they need to learn. I have witnessed how this can be very motivating for my students. For example, one of our main learning goals is to learn all letter names and sounds. Students are given a chart and are able to highlight the letter once they have learned the name and sound. I have a similar chart for counting to 100. Students love to highlight their progress on these charts. I have even seen some students showing others saying “I only have two more letters to learn!” When student reach their learning goals, we celebrate their success by having them announce it to the class saying “I know all of my letter names and sounds.” I also add their name to a poster that is hung on the wall and they get a certificate and a metal. It is so satisfying to see my students grow.

Easter Art

My students just LOVE doing art projects. Here is a project that we did for the Easter season. I had them color designs on the eggs with crayon and then paint over the eggs with watercolor. This makes the colors pop out. Lastly, students glued their eggs into Easter baskets.

Writing: What I Want to Be When I Grow Up

We did a guided writing lesson on “what I want to be when I grow up.” At this point in kindergarten we are not concerned with perfect spelling. I encourage students to sound out the word and write down the sound that they hear. This really helps develop their phonemic awareness. It was really fun to see what they wish to become. One student even wrote “I want to be a mushen(musician) of art.” I also had careers such as fashion designer and monster truck driver. The most popular profession was a cop.

Dr. Suess’s Birthday

For Dr. Suess’s birthday I introduced my class to many different Dr. Suess books. I did a focused study of There’s a Wocket in My Pocket to teach my students about rhyming. I taught an art lesson on how to draw a Dr. Suess character and then had my student come up with a tagline for their characters. Their taglines had to rhyme and, just like Dr. Suess, they were allowed to use nonsense words. I was amazed by their creativity.

100th Day of School

Today was the 100th day of school! For homework, I had my students bring in 100 small objects from home. At school my students glued their 100 objects to a piece of paper. This helps them see what 100 looks like. We also celebrate this day by making crowns with 100 stars and necklaces with 100 Fruit Loops.

Halloween

On Halloween at Orchard Hill students are invited to come to school in costume. We have a Halloween parade and the kindergarten classes even walk down to the retirement center to bring some holiday cheer to the elderly. My students were very excited about being dressed up at school. We had everything from a cowgirl, a ninja, skeletons, to a doctor. At the end of the day, I showed my class how dry ice can be added to apple juice to make it look like a magic potion!

Pumpkin Patch Field Trip

I took my class on our annual field trip to Pheasant Farms. Students got to take a hay ride, learn about corn, walk through a corn maze, pick out a pumpkin, and meet many farm animals. It was a day filled with memorable fun. Thank you to my many parent volunteers who made this field trip a success!

Patterns

I have been teaching my kindergarten students about patterns. Today I gave them different math manipulatives to explore and create their own patterns. Look at what they came up with! I am so proud of how quickly they are leaning:)

Becoming an Orchard Hill Hawk

I have been rehired by the Phoenix Talent School District to teach kindergarten at Orchard Hill Elementary! I am really excited for this opportunity to continue working in this community. I have heard great things about Orchard Hill and look forward to becoming a part of their staff.

 

SOU Field Trip

Because of the No Excuses University program, my class has been learning about Southern Oregon University. This year I decided to organize a field trip to SOU so that students could get a first hand experience of college. Students had the opportunity to tour the campus and explore the place where adults go to school to prepare for a career. We met “Rocky” the red-tailed hawk who is SOU’s mascot. We sang the SOU alma mater to the president of the alumni association. We visited the library where there is a sculpture named “Swampy” who was designed by a college student. We looked at art exhibits displayed in the art building. We even got to see a college classroom and meet a college professor. I believe that this was a life changing experience for my students. They have a deeper understanding of college and they know that they are college bound!