Both teachers have a Special Student Of The Day bulletin board, which not only follows the suggested routine in Pat Cunningham's terrific Month-By-Month Reading And Writing For Kindergarten book, but also goes along with Unit 1 Look At Us! in the newly adopted Houghton Mifflin reading series.

Each day a new Student Of The Day is highlighted.  All of the students draw a picture of the Student Of The Day ... those photos are stapled into a book and given to the Student Of The Day to tak home.  The Student Of The Day has their photo taken, and that photo is added to the bulletin board along with their self portrait.

This is Mrs. Swaim's Name Train bulletin board, located above the buiilt-in painting easels.  As soon as each student can write their own name, they will get to write their name on a train car and add it to The Name Train.

This is one part of Mrs. DeShane's teaching wall in the whole group instruction area.  This is where her class does opening activities, including days of the week, months of the year, and Math Their Way calendar activities.

The small pocket chart contains coins attached to Velcro, which are placed on Velcro lines on the chart, in combinations that equal the current date.  For example, today's date is September 7 ... to show that on the coin chart, there would be two rows of coins:  one row with seven pennies, and another row with a nickel and two pennies.

These are large flashcards in the pocket chart in Mrs. DeShane's room.  This picture was taken on the fourth day of school, and Mrs. DeShane was introducing the letter D.

Although many textbooks suggest teaching a letter a day or a letter a week, it's important to spend time on ALL of the letters each day, and to have many different alphabets on display at child-friendly heights throughout the classroom.

Current research says there should be a minimum of five alphabets on display in your room, though it's very easy to double or triple that amount by creating Literacy Centers that contain laminated alphabet posters and charts.

One of my personal favorite Literacy Centers is called The Placemat Center, and it contains many types of children's placemats, including more than a dozen different placemats with alphabets, alphabet activities, and alphabet games on both sides.

Placemats are very inexpensive (usually less than $1.00) and they're coated with heavy plastic, which means you don't have to laminate them.  They make great work mats for messy activities like PlayDo® and fingerpainting, and the kids love to use them for reading the alphabet as well as for reference when writing the alphabet.

This is the teaching wall in Mrs. Landucci's room, adjacent to her story floor.  It's easy to see the many types of activities that take place here.  The yellow smiley face pocket chart holds each student's name (written on sentence strips) ... as students arrive they find their name on a table, use it as a model for signing in on a daily page in the class Sign In Book, and then they put their name in the pocket chart.  The laminated strips with alphabet letters will become Mrs. Landucci's Word Wall.

This is Mrs. Landucci's classroom library.  Books are kept in many types of storage containers ... step-up shelves, plastic basket and tubs, and large cardboard boxes that will hold Big Books throughout the year.  Two alphabets are on display here, for student reference as well as for Read The Room/Read The Walls activities.  Both alphabets are illustrated with color photographic pictures, which are very appealing to the children.

First week of school graph, of student ages.  Graphs like this help the students to recognize and read each others' names.

Another first week of school graph.  Both of these graphs will be added to each time a new student enrolls in the class.  Students will count the names on each graph to be certain that everyone is represented.

Display of TLC Traffic Light directed art project by Mrs. Landucci's class.

TLC projects have been an integral part of the kindergarten curriculum at Pauly School for the past four years, which is when I began teaching there.  TLC projects teach colors, shapes, positional words, math concepts, and listening to directions.  Because they are multi-sensory projects, they're terrific for language acquisition by all students, and are well suited to second language learners.  For more information on TLC directed art projects, please visit the TLC Website at www.tlcart.com.

The reading table in Mrs. Blackburn's room.  This was my classroom for the previous three years, and few things feel as strange as seeing how someone else sets up "your" room. 

The wall with the big clock on it is the wall I used for my "big" thematic displays:  Pumpkin Patch, G Is For Gingerbread, Under The Sea, and other units throughout the year.

Mrs. Blackburn is much tidier and more organized than I could ever hope to be, and she has lots of wide open spaces that will fill in as the year goes on.  Because the portable classrooms don't have much storage, tables are used as counter space and boxes are stored below. 

As mentioned above, the walls are bulletin boards from floor to ceiling ... I left my paper and borders up when I moved out of the room in June, and it made sense to keep them rather than spend several hours repapering the entire classroom.

This is the lefthand side of the other large teaching wall, where I used to display our monthly quilts.  Mrs. Blackburn has a large cardboard box on the floor, holding Song & Poetry cards used as a Literacy Center.

One more large wall in Mrs. B's room.  The Pauly K teachers use the "Apple Annie" alphabet books, and this is the large alphabet set that goes with the books.  I have the same alphabet, laminated and cut into two letter sections, then bound into a Big Book.

High Frequency Words:
we, like, our

~ 6 Titles ~

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Say good morning to the hot sun,
Good morning to the swimming pool.
Good morning watermelon.
Good morning choocolate ice cream.
Good morning to the barbecue!

Reproducible songs and clipart for each month of the year.

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Reproducible songs and clipart for each month of the year.

Buy Online Now Through PayPal ~ only $19