New to this blogging thing...

Hello all…

Well this blogging experience may be new to many of you but I just want you all to know that this is new to me also.  I have tried a few times to create a blog for my own use and found it just didn’t work for me.  Mostly it was due to my lack of understanding of how the technology part of it worked… thankfully Jennine is around to help with that!!

So I think we need to consider our school blog as a way to reflect on what is working for us in our classrooms and to share those things with each other.   We could also ask for advice from each other regarding specific problems or concerns.

I know when I was teaching kindergarten last year, I thought no one else would be interested in things we were doing, but why not?  Even if it isn’t transferrable to other grades it can help to make us more of a community within the school.  Some of the comments that came up at staff meetings was how there seems to be a divide between staff and this could go a long way to bridging some of those gaps.  I know I certainly haven’t had time this year yet to get beyond my classroom or little section of hallway to see what is happening in other classrooms but I would love to hear from everyone here.  

This year has been a big adjustment for me and some days I feel like NOTHING is going well… J  BUT I also can say that I have loved incorporating Google Classroom into my class and using it to share work with my students.  It is shocking to me how I can create an assignment (or let’s be honest, adapt one of Jennine’s from last year) and see the students working immediately on it while I circulate and help individuals with their questions.  It allows for differentiation as some students can research more thoroughly or add extra facts and others can research at a level that works for them.  They definitely are more advanced on this working solo thing than kindergarteners! 

I hope you will all share your thoughts, successes, and concerns on our blog as the year progresses.  I know I would like to read them!  And if anyone would like to come see some of the Google Classroom work in progress feel free to chat with me about a time to come watch what’s going on in 5A!