Surfin' Through Second: Global Teacher Connect

I made it through the first week and what a time we had! I have 22 students this year, but 5 of them were out on the first day! The second day I had 5 students out again, but I had a student come who had been sick the first day, and one was gone for a dental appointment. The third day I had 5 out again and on Thursday the one who had a dental appointment for two days came back and another student who just got back from vacation showed up!

So by Friday I had 19 students with 3 that are still on vacation! Our state went to the year round system two years ago and it has not been a good schedule. We have many families that travel in the summer and don't come back until September!! So needless to say as I was trying to train all the rest and had students trickling in not knowing what to do and having to repeat myself many, many times!

But overall it was a great week. This is a cute lively bunch who seem really happy to be back in school. They laugh at my goofy jokes and give me hugs all day long:)

Things that I loved this week.

My new clip chart! The kids loved this!! Over half the kids in my class are surfers and they thought this was the greatest thing ever!! It helped me focus on the positive and they all wanted to get to Cowabunga soo bad!!

My dolphin magic wand!!

I used this to get attention and we practiced alot!! It's such a soft, nice sound and they were quiet instantly when they heard it! Click on the wand to go to their site:)

My New Rug

What a time saver!! I love how they come sit down in their spot and there is no arguing about where to sit!

My new book bags

I feel so organized and they look so nice with matching numbers where they should hang.

My word wall

We added a few important words and I love that I can just write it on the board.

My new students:)

They really are cute and such pleasers this year:))

Things That Didn't Go So Well

Our new schedule

The whole school is implementing RTI and we have an intervention block the last

half hour of school. We have also been given a new daily schedule after 7 years of the same one.

I was off the whole week and running late for everything. Every night I went home exhausted and felt like I hadn't accomplished anything!!

My classroom printer

I am lucky to have a laser printer in my room and have depended on it for two years now. Well it is not connecting to my laptop and I have not been able to print anything from it, so all my parent letters will be a week late:(

And I still have not found my Bulletin board letters!!!???I just don't know where to look?? I ordered new sets in May with my classroom money, but guess what?? The order was never placed because the money was just released!!! So many of the items I was depending on I do not have:(

Okay I will stop whining now and end with our fun Friday activity.

I love to have cooking projects in my class. I call it cooking but we never use heat. I have done this since I began teaching in Kindergarten 20 years ago!!

Since our first science unit is life cycles of plants and animals I start off the year making fruit salad.

Homework on Thursday night was to bring in a piece of fruit.

I can't believe the spread we had this year!! I have Never gotten a pineapple before, lol!

I have a recipe that we read together, then I call 3 kids back at a time to cut up their fruit and place it in the bowl. We go over rules of washing hands, not licking the knives, no sneezing on the food and no licking our fingers. I cut up the apples and core them and they do the rest with a plastic knife.

The rest of the class decorates their recipe page, and then works together on a fruit word search. I usually do a graph of "What is Your Favorite Fruit", but I just didn't have it together this year!! I keep their recipe page and we place it into our cookbooks (that I will have a parent make later).

After everyone cuts up the fruit we mix it up, talk about good manners, serve everyone, and all eat together.

Even the teacher eats some:)

The kids love it and always look forward to the next project:)

Here is the recipe page and the cover I use for our cookbooks.
Just click on the picture to grab it in Google Docs.

Aloha everyone!! I have been a busy bee over on this little island. Lots has been happening behind the scenes here and I am so flattered and amazed at the connections I am making in the blogging world!!

First off have you heard there will be a Daily 5 Bookstudy for grades 1-3?! I was so excited when I found out. I was getting jealous of the Kindergarten and the upper grades. Well Mel D. from Seusstastic Classroom Inspirations has graciously headed this up. I was also fortunate enough to be a part of this and I will be covering a chapter and presenting some ideas!! Thank you so much to Mel for giving me this opportunity!

I was also contacted by Heidi from Global Teacher Connect to be part of their collaborative blog of teacher's from around the world!! So I will be working on some more cultural posts for that blog as well!! If you haven't checked them out head on over there!!

Here at home I have been trying to entertain my little sweeties along with everything else and we have been having fun going around the island on little adventures.

Today we tour our neighboring town of Hale'iwa.

This is the famous Hale'iwa sign. We see hundreds of people stopping here to take their picture, but we have never done it, til now!! Hale'iwa (hah-leh-ee-vah) is two words hale meaning house and iwa meaning frigate bird. So basically this is the home of the frigate bird.

The road that runs through this town is called Kamehameha Highway. We just call it Kam Highway.

This little town works hard to keep its historic charm.

This is the Community Center. They have all kinds of events that happen her from school car washes to Zumba classes.

This is the nearest Health Food store when I need some organic goodies or holistic medicine.

Post Office

Surf Shops Galore

One of the very few chain restaurants

The hubs gets his hair cut here

I think most residents of the North Shore own this shirt or bumpersticker

Wyland lives and works here in Hale'iwa. The hubs works for him and the gallery owners:)

Cholo's is one of our favorite places to hang out. The food is okay, but the atmoshpere is fun and the margaritas are tasty:) I hope I don't get in trouble for the review, but I am very critical of mexican food!

This is a fun place to eat too, my kids love it!

Lots of art galleries

No Jamba Juice here!

This is a great little place to eat! The decor inside is so cute!

We often stop to have a pizza slice at Spaghettini, but I've never tried any of the other food

Typical Surfer Mobile!!

It's a lot of fun just to stroll through the town and stop into all the shops. Prices are high in the local food markets because they cater to tourists. But we have to shop here because its the closest store to home. I hate paying $5 for a loaf of bread!! I usually buy just a few things and am always shocked when my bill is $50!!

That's why I was so happy when this place opened up last year

Omg, you would have thought it was the circus coming to town!! We were all so excited and the store was packed for the grand opening, lol!!

This is the old court house, which is now used for community meetings, hula lessons, ukulele classes and other cultural events.

This is one of our favorite places

Sadly it was closed on our early morning walk

This is where most of the locals go to get their Shave Ice, which is a fancy word for a snow cone.

Just down the street though is where the tourists go.

Matsumoto's Shave Ice is always busy!! The tourist buses always stop here. There is lots to see in this little store though.

I love Shave Ice with Ice Cream and Azuki beans, it is soo yummy:)

The Ice Machine, shaves the ice into a very fine ice powder

Then you pick up to 3 flavors of your choice. We usually get a rainbow

At Matsumotos they have excellent marketing and you will eventually walk away with some cute souvenir

We are almost through the whole town

Another Shave Ice shop. Can you see the water?

This store has the cutest things for kids, but it is pricey

Keiki means children (Kay-kee)

Haleiwa Joes is my favorite restaurant. It is more expensive, but they have great food. This is where the hubs and I usually go for date night.

Once you go past Haleiwa Joes you get to the Anahulu bridge. In the hot afternoons kids jump from the bridge into the river. If you cross the bridge it takes you to the last few shops which are all surf shops. This is where some of the best surf spots in the world begin.