First Day of Kindergarten!!

Today is our first day of kindergarten!! So far our day is off to a smooth start :) I love watching the parents bring their kids to the classrooms in the morning - it seems much harder for the parents than the kids to adjust to this big change!!

On the first day of kindergarten I spend most of the day in the classrooms observing and getting to know the new kindergarteners. Usually I help dry a few tears, but so far today has been pretty smooth!! The rest of the day today I will spend introducing myself to the kindergarten students and maki g a few phone calls to new students in our district. Loving the first day of kindergarten!!

Angry Arlene, The Grumpy Red Jellybean

Well now that we have been in school for about a week now, it is time to get some new groups started up! One group that I am starting for some of my Prep and Kindergarten students is an Anger Management group.

We are using this great curriculum that I picked up at the ISCA State Conference this year, it is called Jellybean Jamboree! I knew this curriculum would be fun when I saw that each unit features a different jellybean. The anger management unit jellybean is called Angry Arlene, The Grumpy Red Jellybean! I have made a Angry Arlene puppet out of cone of the puppet templates for the unit. I am thinking about letting the students make Angry Arlene puppets as well to take home.

The first group lesson is about finding a quiet place to calm down. Our Prep teacher has a teepee in her room, so we may even take a "field trip" to her room to practice calming down in the teepee! After practicing going to a quiet place to calm down, we will come back to the guidance to work on the worksheets included in the curriculum. One is a connect-the-dot of Angry Arlene, and in another they will draw a picture of their quiet place. The curriculum is for PreK-2, and it is right on their level. I love how there is an emphasis on colors, letters, and rhyming.

I am keeping this group very small, right now I have three boys in the group but could open it to four. Because of the anger issues and social development of the students I have chosen, I want to keep this group as small as possible. I feel confident thought that I have picked a great group of boys, and I am looking forward to starting our group!