My First Day in the First Grade!

My first day in the first day was fantastic! I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE my kiddos, and LOOOOOOVE the first grade in general. Yes, I am still sad about leaving my team in Kinder. (they are/were the VERY best team you could ever imagine) However, I am adjusting to my new team, and am very happy with both of my new teammates. They have both welcomed me to the first grade with open arms, and always have an encouraging hug for me and great advice! I think this is going to be a fantastic year getting to know a new grade and 2 new friends.

I started my day actually waking up on time (first day jitters) and making it out the door by 6:50 am. I get half way to school and realize I have left my school keys in the office at my house. Since I live half way to nowhere, it is not an option to turn around. My next realization is that flashy flash drive with the way cool PowerPoint I was going to show that morning was attached to the keys that are at home. :(. What a way to start the first day!!!!
But no worries, I found someone to let me into my classroom and made do without my cool PowerPoint. My kiddos arrived at 7:50 and although it was a little crazy the first 15 minutes, it was no where near as crazy as the first day of Kindergarten. The kids sat down in their desk and were being GREAT!
I can't tell you what a difference one year makes! I am sure it helps that 12 of the little guys were mine from last year, and they know me, my expectations, and our routines. My kids were almost perfect today. We read books, laughed, practiced routines and even implemented our discipline program as if we were 6 weeks into the school year. I started out going over the program (called Make Your Day) as if none of them knew anything about it. When 12 of the kids were looking at me like I was the one who had forgotten everything over the summer I decided to just pull the new ones in a small group to fully explain, and then do whole group review. The kids from last year liked that much better!
I know this is going to be a FANTASTIC year! I have a group of kiddos who are really excited about learning. At the end of the day I let the kids explore some math manipulitives and 5 of the kids asked if they could read books instead. When I agreed, I watched as ALL 5 actually sat down and "read" independently without disturbing their neighbor, or getting up and down to play in the library center. They are going to do really, really well when we introduce the Daily 5 tomorrow.
I will keep you posted on how First grade is going, I know we will have our challenging days, but I can just tell that we are going to have a great year!

After school I was able to take a kiddo from my first Kindergarten class 3 years ago out to Sonic to celebrate his first day as a big 3rd grader. I am so proud of him! It is very encouraging to see the little guys grow up into big kids, and to know that I played a very small part of shaping him into this really incredible kid.