InstaBlog

I have been using Instagram for awhile now in "real life" and am so excited to have made one for my teacher life!  You can follow me at AdventuresInKindergarten or check it out {here} to get fun glimpses into life in kindergarten.
 

Here are a few favorites:

I foolishly bravely let my little ones use my phone camera.  They took some really funny pictures, and it was so cool for me to see things from their perspective.  I loved this one which is our writing center through the fishtank.

The unit we are working on now is Shadows and Reflections.  Here we set up a shadow puppet theater {it's really super fancy: a white blanket draped over a chart stand and an old overhead projector that I rescued from the trash pile}.  The kids made animal puppets using stencils, construction paper and popsicle sticks.  They LOVE acting out dramatic scenarios {today I overheard "Oh please don't eat me, Mr. Alligator.  I'm just a young cat trying to take care of my kittens!"  haha}.  They throw in some dinosaurs and other animals I have in the block area, too.

We are learning the concept of symmetry.  A quick and easy introduction was to fold a piece of paper in half, have students paint on that half, then flip the folded side onto the top.  Just rub, rub, rub and voila!  A symmetrical painting.

Last but not least, here is how I have been introducing my little ones to the animals we will have in our classroom soon.  I start out with one clue, and then sneakily add more clues throughout the day.  They can't get enough!  And I can't get enough of their crazy guesses.  "A monkey? A baby?  Babies are hairy.  My baby is REALLY hairy!"  When I got to the last clue for caterpillars, some of them guessed correctly.  I took that poor caterpillar out of it's hiding spot, and they went WILD.  There is nothing like building up anticipation, while sneaking in some reasoning skills too :)