The New Semester

The new semester started yesterday with a bang. Much like an explosion there was lots of noise, panic, running around and chaos and classes started up. We each got a slew of new students, some old ones, and we paired it all with new books, new subjects, new classrooms and new partners in crime.


Nick and I now both teach kindergarten, but not with each other. There are four kindergarten classes and they divide them up so two teachers work together and switch classes to teach different subjects to only two classes. I teach in Holly Class now, and I also teach some Willow classes (remember, all of our classrooms are named after trees) while Nick teaches in Maple Class down the hall and switches into (my old) Pine Class. Our schedules are much more similar and it does make prep work easy because any supplements I make up Nick can use on his classes as well. We each teach Reading, Writing, Art, Speaking and Computer classes to our homerooms. Nick teaches Science to his two kindergarten classes while I teach Phonics to my two kinder classes. We are actually very happy with the set up.


Our "new" morning kids are pretty good. Nick has taught all of these children before so he already knows how they act and what they enjoy. I am just learning - but I am happy to report that I am quickly warming up to my homeroom class. I have 12 students this time around (last semester I had 9) and I have 7 boys and 5 girls. 2 of my girls will be absent the first few weeks of school so I only have 10 kids right now though. My new homeroom class is the "lowest" level out of all of the kindergarten classes, but they are still exceptionally bright. My kids are rambunctious and wiggly, eager and excited. They have good intentions though and lots of potential. I think I will help them a lot and we will all have fun getting them to learn.


The girls are already latching onto me, holding my hand or asking me to pick them up when we are playing during break times. The boys are cute and sassy. They all LOVE it when I pick them up and flip them upside down, so I had my new Korean teacher (who I adore) take "first day" pictures of me holding them upside down to put up in the photo section of our classroom.


This morning we had library class and I picked a book to read aloud to them that was about a mix up. Instead of a new teacher, a class got a GORILLA for a teacher! My students were in fits of giggles. The gorilla teaches the students in the story how to count with their toes, swing from trees and draw on the floor. The book gave me a great idea. After lunch we pushed all the desks to one side of the classroom and we covered the floor in butcher paper. I drew big circles on the butcher paper and gave each kid a set of markers. We talked about how nouns are people, places and things. Then we talked about some of our favorite things/animals/etc. They got to draw their favorite things on the floor, just like the children in the book. Afterward we posted up the giant pictures on the walls of our classroom. I also had each child tell me a noun that they love and I drew a big poster while they colored with all their favorite nouns. We have a gorilla, a monkey, a rocket ship, a jet, a tiger, a butterfly, a robot, a dragon, a race car and a dinosaur. I put "Welcome to Holly Class" around the giant group of creatures and we put it up on the wall outside of our class. The kids loved it.

The afternoon classes are also great. Nick and I are overjoyed with the children we have this semester. I now teach first grade, third grade, one fifth grade class and sixth grade. Nick teaches first grade, second grade, and fourth grade. We got some of the same kids and some new ones. We are so happy with our schedules, we feel we got great classes and great kids. We are really looking forward to the rest of this semester!