First Day: Done!

Today was the first day of my first year of teaching!!!

Overall, I'd say it went well. Not perfect, but good enough considering that it is only my first year!

We started the day off with magic playdough, courtesy of Jodi at The Clutter-Free Classroom. I was sure that my second-graders would see through the "magic" part, but they were convinced it was legit. My favorite quote of the day: "Will the magic ever die??" Haha! The playdough really came in handy for early finishers. I think they probably would have played quietly with it for the entire 3 hours that we were there today! Here it is, pre-magic.

We also made name mosaics (thanks, Fabulous Firsties, for the idea!). I combined this with a different name graphing idea I saw somewhere else. We read Chrysanthemum and talked about our different names and then did the activity. I'm not done with the display yet, so I will just show you my sample! If you choose to do this, and it was actually pretty easy to manage (so I'd recommend it), I suggest tearing paper into pieces instead of cutting it. Cutting tiny squares was taking me FOREVER, so I tore instead and I think they looked nice!

Then I took some more random pictures of my room. Here is my desk!

And here's a closeup of our class pets - African dwarf frogs! The kids are obsessed. One of these days we'll have to name them... no one asked today was their names were so I'm in the clear for a bit, haha.

These are our rules. I copied them straight from First Grader ... At Last, which was one of the first blogs I ever read! The kids really liked them although I think they might be too abstract for my students. We'll see how it goes.

 So overall, pretty good day. I need to work on a couple things with the kids, like not talking when I'm talking and staying in their spots while I'm teaching. But I have a good feeling. :) Thanks, blog-world, for all of your ideas and inspirations!! More pictures maybe tomorrow!