Grade Level Fingerprint Trees

At the beginning of the year, the students added their fingerprints to a large tree to create a grade level piece of artwork. We did this in connection to building our social contract of class expectations. We talked about how we are going to often work as a team to create artwork.

A Rainbow of Friends: First Grade

First Grade read A Rainbow of Friends by P.K. Hallinan as a connection to creating our class Social Contract and as an introduction to the color wheel, primary colors, and secondary colors. Each student used various shaped foam stamps to paint shapes in color wheel order. The next week, once the paint was dry, they used multicultural markers to add heads, arms, and legs to the shapes. They then added basic facial features, hair, and shoes to match the shapes.

The Constitution

For Constitution Day, we used the website www.pebblego.com to learn about the history of the constitution. We then created a Double Bubble Map together to compare The Constitution to our class Social Contract. The Social Contract is a part of our discipline plan through the Capturing Kids' Hearts process. We discussed that The Constitution gives us freedom and rights. The students then wrote at least one thing that freedom means to them.

Social Contract

Our district uses the Capturing Kids' Hearts process to promote positive behavior. One aspect of this process is building a Social Contract. The students brainstorm in small groups how they want to be treated by their peers, how they want to treat their peers, how they want to treat the teacher, and how they want the teacher to treat them. The groups then share those ideas and we add them to the contract. The ones with check marks were said by more than one group. This shows that those words are most important to our class. Each student then signed the contract to show that they agree to follow it. In our class the students also make happy faces of themselves to show that positive behavior is happier behavior.

David Goes to School

We read Dvid Goes to School by David Shannon to practice following directions and to identify finding the parts of a book. After reading, the students created their own book with a title and author on the cover. On the inside, they wrote at least one rule they could follow from our class Social Contract.

Assembly Line

In Social Studies the students learned about working together as a team to accomplish a job. They learned how certain jobs are specialized to do a certain job or task. That certain job or task is then joined with someone else's specialized job to complete a whole. They learned about the concept of an assembly line. They then worked in small groups, an assembly line fashion, to create bracelets out of yarn and cereal. Each student had a specialized task including measuring the yarn, cutting the yarn, stringing the cereal, and tying the bracelet. When some of the groups did not complete the tasks and not each group member received a bracelet, we had a brief character education lesson related to our Social Contract. We discussed that when we don't all follow the rules or do our jobs it can affect other people doing their jobs.

David Goes to School

As we learned the classroom and school rules, we read David Goes to School by David Shannon. As we read, we also reviewed the parts of a book. To help them remember the parts of a book, they created their own book. On the inside, they wrote at least two ways they could follow rules at school.

If I Were President...

In honor of Presidents' Day, the students wrote why they would be a good president. I was proud that they used our Capturing Kids' Social Contract as a frame of reference for what good character should look like. I was also proud that they understood that a president should have good character. After writing, the students created a picture of themselves to go along with the writing on a campaign poster.

Reindeer Application Placemats

The students filled out reindeer applications today in writing. I got the application from The First Grade Teaching blog. As the students filled out their job applications we talked about appropriate behavior and what makes a good employee. I connected this characteristics back to our class Social Contract. After completing the application, the students glued them on half of a large piece of construction paper. On the other side of the mat, they glued down a picture of themselves that I had taken and printed the day before. They then traced their hands on brown paper for the antlers. With paint, they added a red thumprint nose. We will be using these as our placemats at our festive holiday party on Friday.

David Goes to School

To help elaborate on our Social Contract  and to learn the parts of a book, we read No, David! and David Goes to School by David Shannon. Before reading, we talked about the parts of a book. We discussed the purpose of the title and the need to stay on topic. We also discussed the role of the author and the illustrator. To help us remember their roles, we sing these songs to the tune of "The Farmer in the Dell":

The author writes the words,

The author writes the words,

Hi-ho, the derry-o,

The author writes the words.

The illustrator draws the pictures,

The illustrator draws the pictures,

Hi-ho, the derry-o,

The illustrator draws the pictures.

After reading, we discussed the things that David did in the book as non-examples of how to behave at school. We discussed how David would have been different if he had a Social Contract to follow. The students then created their own book cover about them going to school. On the inside of their book, they wrote at least two things they can do at school to follow the Social Contract.

Capturing Kids' Hearts: Social Contract

In our class we follow a Social Contract to help the students and me work together to achieve positive behavior. A Social Contract is part of the guidance procedures we use at Moseley through the program Capturing Kids' Hearts. To create the Social Contract, the students divided into four groups and brainstormed on a Circle Map how they thought they should treat their friends, how they wanted to be treated by their friends, how they thought they should treat the teacher, and how they wanted to be treated by the teacher. After creating the Social Contract, the students each signed it. They also created faces of themselves to hang with the Social Contract. As a part of the program, the students are taught to "check" their classmates behavior in a positive, constructive manner. They are also taught how to affirm one another both verbally and in writing. Below is the Social Contract that our class created together.