Purple Hand Pledge - Part II

Our kindergarten class took The Purple Hand Pledge last week.  We read Amanda Haan's, I Call My Hand Gentle, along with Hands Are Not For Hitting by Martine Agassi.  I am so lucky to work with such a wonderful kindergarten team!  They are so supportive and love to participate in my Guidance lessons.  We will display our Purple Hand Pledges for everyone to see!

Dream Plans - Part II

Students had a lot of fun reflecting on and creating their Dream Plans.  Every student could put his/her own creative spin on this project.  Here are some of our finished products:

Bullying: Small Group

Piggy-Back Bullying Small Group Idea:

Using the Purple Hand Pledge, brainstorm a list of appropriate ways to use our hands. Put these ideas into wordle.net and create word art for the students to display in their classroom. Tips: The more times you type the word, the larger it appears. If you want the words to appear together, you have to leave out the space between words.

Purple Hand Pledge

Seems like each month has 5 things that are "celebrated" during that time period and I can not keep up. Red Ribbon Week and Bullying Prevention are two things that I feel need a significant amount of time in the Elementary School, and both are October topics, so I focused on Drug Prevention for October and just began my Stop Bullying Now! lessons and school wide Purple Hand Pledge.

For the primary grades, we read the book, "Hands are Not for Hitting" by Martine Agassi and really focused on appropriate uses for our hands. Then each students raises their hand, repeats the Purple Hand Pledge (I will not use my hands or my words for hurting myself or others), and then their favorite part, dip their hand in purple paint and put their mark on their class paper. When the project is finished, the entire wall will be covered with the classroom posters.

 The intermediate grades also get to say the pledge and make their mark, but we focus more on what the pledge means in regards to ourselves. I think as we get older, we tend to beat ourselves up when we are not as successful as we would like or compared with others. So, I pose the question, "What does it mean to be a bully to yourself?," allow the students time to journal, and then share and discuss.

The picture is the bulletin board, which is just black butcher paper and drawn on with chalk. I used to love making, changing, creating exciting bulletin boards in my classroom, so I am thankful to be in an elementary school where I still get to do some of this :) 

 

Parent Contact

Striving to connect with parents more frequently, I put up a giant bulletin board right outside my office, in a high traffic area. After covering the board with butcher paper and decorating it fun for easy visibility, I cut out letters (bc the school ones are boring) to define my sections, "Parent Resources" and "Inspiration." With all the awesome quotes on Pinterest, I thought it would be fun to print some out and rotate them. In the resources section, I put up info that involves holiday help, parenting classes, fun stuff to do with the family, local agencies, etc. I am updating it a couple of times a week as there are always new things going on. The table in front says, "Parent Info, Please help yourself!" I put out copies of the flyers that are on the board and also parenting magazines. (Blessed to have a friend that owns a daycare and gives me all her leftovers)!

Dream Plans

Time for an October post!  I am always looking for fun projects to do with our 6th graders.  We started our year talking about dreams, specifically focusing on Susan V. Bosak's book Dreams - A Tale of Wonder, Wisdom & Wishes.  My 6th graders really enjoyed this book and it prompted a lot of thoughtful discussion.

This will be a 2 part post, as we are still working on this project.  I wanted to share some of the journals our students wrote after reading and discussing Bosak's book.  They focused on the 3 dreams that were the most important to them, and how they were going to make each dream happen.

Using this, students will create a Dream Plan using magazines and their own artwork & writing.  Those are still in production.  Another post to come soon!

I am extremely grateful to have a pretty large office considering what I've heard and seen of others, so I try and utilize all my space. I have a "living room" area where I do most individual counseling sessions and some small groups. The students also have the choice to forgo to the dining table and sit with TV trays during lunch bunch. This is a super fun alternative that the students really enjoy. When I was trying to think of wall decor for this area, I was troubled by a giant old school green chalk board on my only wall. So, I bought a large frame on the clearance aisle at Hobby Lobby for $8.00 and a fun piece of fabric to put behind it. Then, I used magnets to hang up students work and make it more like a showcase. They LOVE to come in and see their work on display.

The particular drawings I have in there for this picture is a fun Friendship/Teamwork small group lesson. The students first brainstorm a list of what skills are necessary to work together. After, I allow the students to select one marker they would like to use. Then I explain the directions. 1. Students are only allowed to draw one straight line per turn 2. Students will take turns going around the circle 3. We will all complete a picture together. After each students gets about 10 turns, I call for final line and have them put their markers away. We discuss what skills we used in order to complete the project together. Then, we talk about what we drew. The students are always very creative to make something out of the drawing. Then we decide how much better it would be if we talked about what we wanted to draw as a team before we started the picture. The take away is: Communication is key to teamwork and friendships.

Mary and I are set to present at our curriculum day on Eric Jensen's Teaching with Poverty in Mind. We went to his conferences this summer and were just simply impressed by his work! Its fascinating the way the brain works and how different people are affected by similar events so differently. If you need a good quick read, I would highly recommend snagging this one.

During my first two years I have tried many things to help me drag my numerous items from class to class to class. I bought an expensive wheelie storage box with pockets, but it was too big, so I would lose things easily, and too heavy to carry up and down the stairs. Over the summer while goodwill shopping, I found an awesome magazine rack that has been working wonderfully this year. It fits my laptop perfectly along with all my knick knacks necessary for each lesson. Excellent $3.00 find!

I was blessed enough to be given a mentor 2 years ago that matches my personality and also shares my name :) Together, we decided to start a blog! We are "The Marys!" Hope you can enjoy our experiences as we create our first blog.