First Week of School Activities

The first week of school came and gone so quickly!  I had a fabulous time hanging out with students, getting to know them better, and letting them know my teaching expectations.  On the first day of school, I was busy putting away school supplies and only had time to focus primarily on explaining class rules, homework expectations, and hand signals.  Here are the activities that they did as part of the class orientation program.

After I spoke to students about the Bucket Filler program, I let them read a pledge together as a class.  They colored their own copy of the pledge while socializing with their table partners.  Students also shared and wrote down what kind of people are bucket fillers and bucket dippers.

On the second day of school, I explained how I expect students to keep their desks throughout the school year. (See the two top pieces of paper.)  Last year, I realized that some students were quite disorganized that left their desks messy all the time.  This year, I will post these signs inside the classroom as a constant reminder.

Students were allowed to work with a friend to create a Science Lab Safety Poster.  This year, I hope to incorporate more lab experiments in science to reinforce the concept of scientific method.  Before working on the posters, students had lots of fun demonstrating what NOT to do during science classes.

Although next week is still orientation week, I will plan for some form of assessment to check students' level of understanding in math and science.  I also plan to start them on setting up their math and science journals.  I am going to make use of their journals more often this year as part of the interactive notebook program.