¿A dónde se van las semanas?

Another week down and one more to go until the end of the six-weeks period.That means it's report card time! Woo-hooo!!! One thing that I underestimated about my old district was the fact that we did report cards on a computer program. So all the basic fields - name, ID, school, teacher, etc. were already filled in. We just filled in grades from a drop-down menu. Here, we get these long BLANK report cards that we have to fill in by hand. I think I'm getting lazier. Well, I think it's just that when you realize that there is an easier way and you've done it that way before, it's more daunting to have to switch now and do it a longer way. I'll just do it this weekend and get it over with so it's not hanging over my head the rest of the week.

¡Felicidades Mexicanos y Centro Americanos por el día de la independencia! Some teachers had papel picado decorations in the hall way and my kids were all ooooing and aaaawing, so I told them we'd be making our own. I didn't buy tissue paper (I was planning on it but I didn't go to the store, so I improvised, but I think it turned out more original this way) I asked them to color pieces of newsprint paper and I showed them how to fold it and cut it and we put it out in the hallway. I have a girl from Honduras and a boy from El Salvador, so we looked at a map to find these countries b/c they're celebrating independence as well. We looked up their flags and read a book about the celebrations and traditions, etc. Anyways, it was fun.

I woke up so late today (I'm sure if you knew me, you'd be shocked :p). We went out last night (like on a real date, not just to the movies.) There was mariachis, folklórico and Latin jazz at the Latino cultural center. Después no fuimos a echar unos tacos and they had folklórico there too. For only $20 (for the food) we had a really good night.

Happy Friday...bueno en lo que cabe con el desastre y lo demás

First graders are not too young to look at the newspapers, right? We're going to talk about Katrina today and how we can help (our unit for social studies is citizenship, so I figured this ties in). Of course I'm going to pick what we look at and not just give them the entire newspaper.

Where do the weeks go? No sé, pero ya se me fue otra :) We got into a pretty good groove this week. I think for the most part, the kids have the center rotation down. It's been trial and error trying to group the kids. I've tried putting the more "challenging" kids with some who are pretty dependable. We've been doing science every day (go 1B!). I like the experiments and observations and we do plenty of reading, writing, measuring, etc. while we're at it.

Now I'm going to put together my reading groups and hope that we can get that going next week. I desperately need small groups b/c my kids are at all sorts of levels and I'm noticing where certain ones need more attention. I've realized I'm not the direct teach teacher. It's cool if you are and it works for you and your kids, but in first grade the kids are all over the place. Small groups is definitely the way to go for me.

I hate doing inventory!!! I have to look through all the stuff and check to see if I got the things passed down from the last teacher, what's missing, what's damaged...blah, blah, blah.

Have a good LONG weekend.