The Rookery

    Yesterday the Herons began a new read-aloud book: Flush, by Carl Hiassen.  Today we encountered a new character, named Lice ("for obvious reasons"), who smokes despite his promise to quit.  Hiassen's description of Lice inspired a storm of questions from the Herons. While everyone agreed that smoking was "gross"…

    The Herons began their study of geometry last week.  We started by creating and testing our definition of polygons and exploring the properties of squares.  On Thursday we took our knowledge of sides, angles, and parallel lines into an exploration with the pattern blocks. I asked students to complete…

At Prairie Creek, each class spends some time during the first six weeks of school in discussions about how we want to be together as a classroom community. At the younger grades, this often involves creating a set of classroom expectations (rules) and/or a class constitution. The expectations can often…

At the 4/5 level, we use a mental tool that I'm calling (for lack of a better, more concise name) the five point competency scale. We ask students to use it to check in on their own understanding of a concept, strategy or skill. If you're a 1 on the…

      During recess today the Herons played "never-ending tag" with the Doves, a K/1 class.  As we circled up outside, I looked around at the Herons who had spread themselves out amongst the Doves.  Most were holding hands with a younger child, and several were quietly re-explaining the rules.  I…

Today we handed out our "Blue Books."  They're the books we record all of our work in from themes, math, and literacy.  They're beautifully bound and a cheer went up when we showed them to the classes (combined together for the first time).  One fourth grader came up to me…

The Herons had a very successful first day.  The first few hours of a new year always seem horribly quiet as students get a feel for each other and their new teachers.  I always find myself filling the quiet with nervous check ins, "How are you?"  "Doing O.K.?"  Elizabeth and…

Tomorrow we're off.   Last week, Caroline shared a poem with us, "The Woodcarver" by Chuang Tsu, that has a line that for me captures the nervous anticipation of all Prairie Creek teachers on the night before school, "All I had to do was put forth my hand, and begin."…

I was out at school today with my son James (age 5) when he looked up at the windows between Caroline's office and Laura's and asked, "Are those mirrors or windows?  I can sort of see through them but they're reflecting, too."  Without thinking too much about it, I asked…

Three years ago, I started to share stories about our classroom on a blog.  Since then, I've found it a wonderful way to reflect upon our work in the classroom and give parents the chance to get behind the scenes.  Some blog entries simply share anecdotes.  Others are more like…