Hi everyone, Last school year I taught kinder and then I got a job at another school district. They originally told me that I would be teaching 2nd, however, they called yesterday and said I will most likely be teaching 5th (however it could still change). I'm a little nervous about this grade b/c I feel like I'm a stronger primary teacher. I'm definitely ready to give it a shot and excited about the new challenge. I was wondering if any of you would be willing to share your behavior management plans and what type of activities you will do with your students the first day/couple of days of school. Also, what can I expect from this age group? Any other helpful information you are willing to share will be appreciated. Thanks!
First Day of School Math- We do whole class graphing-How long have have you been at ____Elementary School? Who has brother/sister? I bought thegigantic graphying paper from Lakeshore. I also give them math assessments to determine who knows their basic facts. Reading/Lang Arts I do the Unit Opener in Open Court and we browse the stories we will be reading during the unit. Trend has gigantic KWL charts and we do a kwl about our first unit The kids also write a letter to themselves about what they think their year will be like, their goals, etc. This gives me a good idea of the kinds of writersI have. (I save the letters for the last day of school) I also have the kids fill out a multiple intelligence survey and an interest survey. I plan to play a little game that I read on here where you tell the kids 3 things about you and then they try to guess which two are true and which one is false. I show them a powerpoint that tells them about me, tells them the classroom rules, and gives an outline to what we will be studying this year. I go into more detail about my behavior management system and how to get "good time tickets" I show them my procedures movie and then we begin practicing some of the procedures We pick classroom jobs WE make our reading strategies notebooks (they already are put together, but the kids design the cover and put sticky tabs on the pages I tell them to. We assign books, they write their name in them, cover them, and arrange them in their desks. I go over homework expectations and how to fill out their reading logs, fluency logs, and homework chart. Hope that helps!
I use a token system....it is VERY easy to set up and the kids love it. I love it because it rewards positive behavior. I got the idea from a great website......check it out. http://www.mspowell.com/tokensystem.html
I use a classroom economic system i got from beth Newingham's site and from Rafe E. My behavior management, which the whole fifth grade is using this year, came from one of our fourth grade teachers who has used it for 17 years. It sounds simple but she raves about it. She has a xhart with A+,A, B, C, D, F. All the children start off on A. When they misbehave they get warned for another letter, but always a warning before they move. When they have to move all she says is move to B or C etc. Children can move up again through the day, which allows them to improve their behavior. They can also move to A+ for outstanding behavior. At the end of the day they write teo sentences about why they moved and take it home to sign. If they don't bring it back the next morning they automatically move a letter. All the forms are filed and at conference time they just have to be pulled out. Parents can't act suprised either because they should have already seen them. I'm a primary teacher to...I even worked with infants before fifth. But new challeneges are always fun.
