Room with a view

Not only do I work in a room with a view, but I work in a school that has a view that we need to start the year with accurate information to inform teaching and learning.
Today, tomorrow and Friday our school is engaged in using assessment tools to gauge where every child is at for Literacy and Numeracy. This wonderful opportunity will lead us into a differentiated program from Monday next week. In Victoria we are fortunate to have access to online assessment tools/interviews for Mathematics, English and also a tool called the Fractions and Decimals Online Interview. Our teachers are taking running records, recording sound and letter ID's, vocab test and some other items from the Observation Survey (Marie Clay). As we assess we also have an opportunity to talk to parents and start to forge relationships and connections between home and school.

Painting a wall

What are some of the unusual things you have done in your teaching life?

Do you ever wonder what our actual job description is? 

As you know we are preparing a new prep space for a shared space for not two but four prep grades. We had to remove some cupboards to make room for our expected smart board and whiteboards and when we removed cupboards to prepare we found a wall that was less than presentable, So I asked our very supportive Principal and our very handy dandy groundsmen, Michael for some paint. So I masking taped off a line, cut in the edges with a paint brush brush and than used a roller to paint the wall. BINGO a better presented wall. The OCD in me was not keen to not prepare the wall and patch it, sand paper etc - but here it is. The really funny thing is I wasn't dressed for painting - so I wore my outfit inside out  to protect from paint splatters - now that would have made an interesting photo. So the OCD bit of me needs to put a second coat on before we have people in our room in the morning...........

Getting ready

Yesterday our Prep Team made a massive start on re-organising our space. We have made some big decisions together already. These include - no teacher desks in the space and not enough desks for each student. Due to how we manage Daily 5, not all students need a table at the same time. We have so much floor space and our two must haves were a space in each end for a double grade to sit as well as an additional space for a single grade to sit. We have a designated art/craft space, two reading tents and two home corners. We cannot wait until our students start and we start displaying work in our space. This is when it will look like a learning classroom.

I set myself a task today and that was to reorganise the maths corner so that our children can access hands on maths resources as they need them. The small whiteboards at the top are for displaying our Learning Intentions and Success Criteria.