Morning Work

This is the first post in the 10 week series from Kelli's Linky Party! If you haven't visited her blog before you need to stop by...she's ahhh-mazing! Okay, now onto my morning routine.

The first bell rings at 7:30 and the kiddos can come down the hall and sit outside our classrooms. We have 10 classrooms on our hall so 2 teachers monitor the hall each morning. (we all take turns). The students read books from baskets that we each put outside our doors. They can whisper but they have to stay seated. The second bell rings at 7:45 and the kids can come into our classrooms. Umm can I take a time out to say most working adults I know are barely up at 7:45 and I have 18 bright eyed and bushy tailed babies bouncing into my room!!! I mean when that bell rings I have to be "on"...hallelujah for venti starbucks or my beloved Kurig ;) and usually I'm shoveling my last bite of a Special K bar into my mouth....

I am blessed with an awesome closet that has backpack and coat hooks for each child!  When they go into the closet they hang up their backpacks and bring me their binders. *Small tangent to explain* I use 1inch binders instead of folders for each student. I have B.EAC.H binders to go with my theme. (Bring Everyday; Assignments, Communication, and Homework) I got the idea from this website. Inside the binders I have a zippered pouch for lunch, field trip, or fundraiser money. The front pocket is labeled Important Papers (anything that I or a parent needs to see goes here). I have a section labeled communication for parents and me to write notes back and forth if needed. Their behavior chart is in another section and the last part is our monthly calendar. The back pocket is labeled Keep At Home (graded papers or flyers from the office that I do not want back). The students are responsible for keeping this clean and organized.

Moving on... After the students unpack and bring me their binder they go to their seats and start on one of a few things depending on the time of year. While they are working broadcast comes on at 7:55 after the tardy bell rings. Broadcast usually lasts 5-7 minutes depending on the "news". At the beginning of the year they complete a literacy journal. "Over the weekend I..." "If I had $100 dollars I would..." Simple things they can do independently. Around the 4th week of school I introduce Mountain Math. (You can learn more about that here.) I ADORE mountain math!! There are 24 problems and the students complete 5 a day (except on Friday they do 4). When I first introduce it, we do everything together whole group and then it slowly moves into independent work.

Once we have been in school for 9 weeks, they start doing 2 things in the morning. First they complete their daily mountain math problems  and then they complete a literacy or math journal. If it is a math journal they have a small strip of paper with the problem at their seats and they glue it into their math journal and complete the problem. If it is a literacy journal the prompt is written on the board. If they finish both of those things before I call them to the carpet they read their "bag of books" (their read to self book pouches we use during Daily 5). We are finished with morning work around 8:15. Then I call the students to the carpet to start calendar and morning meeting.


WHEW!! That is our morning every.single.day. Stayed tuned next week for how we do calendar!