Two Hoots and A Holler: Collaborative Classrooms

Hoot #1

This year our school is incorporating Collaborative Classroom into our ELA curriculum.  The Collaborative Classroom includes the programs Making Meaning, Being A Writer, and SIPPS.  We began this program with our kinders on the first full week of school.  It is a learning process for students, as well as teachers.  During our Making Meaning lesson, we talked about things we can do after our read aloud, My Friends.  We carried it over to a shared/interactive writing lesson.  The students got to write and share that they can write their name.  This chart is hanging in the classroom for students to revisit and read.  

As some of you may remember from last school year, our classrooms under went some renovations over the summer.  They are still in the process of putting the final touches on our rooms.  While we are waiting for everything to get done, these beauties got delivered to us!!  You have never seen teachers so excited over an easel!  These easels are like the Cadillac of easels!  They have everything you could possibly need or want!  These really help us out when we are making anchor charts or interactive writing with our students during our ELA lessons!   These easels hold all of our materials we need to incorporate Collaborative Classrooms curriculum!  And for that, we are in LOVE with these! 

Hoot #2
We have already begun our center, workstations, or whatever you decide to call them!  We are kind of old school, and we still call them centers.  Our students look forward to this time each day.  They are so excited and engaged, that most of the time we do not even realize we missed our rest/quiet time!  Students actually cheer when they know its time for centers! Take a look at what our kids are doing during center time...

Students use playdough to make 2D shapes.  

 

Students are matching letters using these letter mats and letter tiles. 

 

Students are using pattern blocks to form letters.  They are also making sets on ten frames with number mats and unifix cubes.  

Students are sorting buttons by color.  

This Week's Holler...

This week's holler goes out to Tales of the Sassy Teacher! Melinda's blog is too cute! We love the lemons! She is a sassy teacher that has taught K-2. Her children actually change classes!! We did this for a short time ourselves! We really loved the learning experience that we gained from trying it. We really enjoyed the reading Melinda post about field trip prep. We have been busy this week planning all sorts of trips and will take any tips we can get! Melinda has a ton of topics for you to choose from! Be sure to check her out!! Happy teaching everyone!