Today started out like a typical Wednesday but ended up anything but! Before leaving home this morning I looked out the window to see what we have been waiting for – SNOW! Though, as I shared at morning meeting, driving in snow is not my favorite thing to do, but seeing everyone’s excited faces while at door duty made it worth it.
When it snows the first time during school, the only thing to do is to go with it. Mrs. Clark, our photo historian, took each child out to our backyard to get their picture with the snow lined trees in the background while children completed morning work. The pictures came out very cute! Snow was the theme at morning meeting – first we did our snowball greeting (ask your child what this is) at morning meeting, then did a “whip share” of our favorite thing to do in the snow, and learned a new snow poem. Later in the morning, we worked on a writing piece entitled, “If I were a snowflake, I would…” We also read one of my favorite winter stories, Snow by Cynthia Rylant. Rylant’s words were a springboard to thinking about what children would do if they were a snowflake. The children are gaining more confidence in their inventive spelling skills. I have also seen a greater interest in drawing more detailed pictures since coming back from vacation. This week children made their January Self-Portraits and you see the change in their work since September.
Unfortunately, because of the snow, Mrs. Spencer was late to school and we missed our P.E. class. Mrs. Spencer if you are reading this, you owe us one! 🙂
This afternoon we continued our study of Dr. Martin Luther King. Obviously, his legacy is difficult to understand at a young child’s level, so we focus on showing kindness and treating everyone – no matter hair, skin, eye color – the same. We also read another favorite of mine by Mem Fox, Whoever You Are.
For math, we practiced interrupted counts, which is when you start at a number other than 1 and count on. Children should be able to rote count to 30 by this point in the year. The concept of addition and subtraction
I ended my un-typical day by going into Boston for my other job – I work for the Massachusetts Teachers’ Association as a Senate District Coordinator. Tonight was a MTA reception for newly elected state legislators. It was great to meet the new state reps and state senators. They always ask where I work. Whenever I say I work in Nahant the response is, “Oh it’s so beautiful there! Aren’t you lucky!” Of course, yes, I am!
Tonight was also the State of the State. Governor Patrick spoke about education as a key issue he wants to work on including more K-12 funding for our schools because “our [MA] lead in education is too important to lose.” Let’s hope some of this gets to Nahant! On the front page of our school website you can see the proposed FY 2014 budget.
In the end it was not a typical Wednesday…but a pretty eventful one! Tomorrow is another day – and I hope to see some of you at the Everyday Math Parent Info night tomorrow night. I will be out on Friday due to a minor preplanned dental procedure, so Mrs. Clark will be taking care of things. Whenever I have to be out, i am happy to know I have Mrs. Clark who always does a great job keeping the kids happy and entertained. Have a great weekend. 🙂
