8:30
After being greeted at carpool by a teacher, Emma, a 5th year from Upper Elementary, walks me to my classroom.
Kindergarten
A Day in the Life
8:35
I hang my coat and backpack, and notice a 3 year old struggling to unzip his coat. My teacher asks if I can help and I do. Zipping is WAY easy now!
8:45
I see my favorite bubble making work is out again, I don my apron and get to work!
9:15
After cleaning up the table (and chairs, and floor) I am ready to choose something else from the shelves. Janice, my teacher, invites me to the sound table to review my sound booklet. I know almost all my letter sounds!
9:45
After writing my most challenging letters in three different colors of chalk, I put my work in my drawer to take home to my family. I notice my friend Sam is reading with one of the big kids - I think a third year! I go over and ask him if he wants to work with me when he's done.
10:00
Sam and I do a color matching work and then we decide to do a banker's game addition together. Sam brings all the thousand cubes, it's not fair! Sam ALWAYS gets to get the thousands, I go and get them too. Sam is mad. Nora asks if we need help to work things out by using the peace rose. We do.
10:30
I need a break from Sam so I go paint at the easel. I love to paint and my favorite color is blue. I make my Grandpa a picture.
10:45
The lights go out, it's time to clean up and come to circle. Nora sings the song about the old man in the rain. Then she reads us a story while we get ready to go outside.
11:00
We play on the playground. I love to swing on the monkey bars. I can't get across yet but I practice every day. Rose, the gym teacher, says I can practice climbing on the new climbing wall when I go to gym!
11:45
Yay! Today Ben and Ember are here from middle school to eat lunch with us. These are the REALLY big kids.
12:30
Now it's rest time, the lights are dim and I curl up in a bean bag chair to read books. The little kids go to nap, but not me anymore!
1:15
Today Nora is going to bring us to the music and movement room to play instruments and do a little dancing. I love watching myself in the mirror! And we get to see the kinders from room 202!
2:00
We head back to the classroom but tomorrow is my library day and I get to hear Libby read stories to us and the room 204 kinders and then I get to check out my own book!
2:45
We have line time and Nora has us sing this song about a cabin in the woods, I've been to a cabin in the woods once, my dad said that the spiders were not scary. He does not understand scary!
3:00
I go home now but some of my friends go to After School. Once my dad couldn't pick me up and I got to stay there. I built a rocketship out of paper towel rolls, and did chalk outside and built a huge Lego house with Ella. And Mary Beth brought her guitar that day to sing. I hope my dad has to work late again.
As told by Clare Heath, Educational Director
“Mom, he’s a Kinder…” This phrase of awe is uttered by 3 and 4 year olds all over our building, every day. Kinders are the leaders of the early childhood classrooms. Their time spent over the past two years has made them into peacemakers, time tellers, code crackers, and story writers. They are teachers, reinforcing their own knowledge and inspiring their younger peers.
The third year of the cycle in Early Childhood is a time of intense pride, a sense of completion. Kinders work in these mixed-age classrooms in the morning. They take the skills of letter sounds and shapes and build words and stories. They build and carry numbers in the thousands! Kinders take pride in their “big works,” that sometimes won’t get finished until the afternoon.
The afternoon offers more opportunities to discover in the classroom but Kinders see their community expand. Kinders move from more independent work to small group lessons. They work on projects together. They travel around the building to meet with other Kinders in the Library or the Gym. They begin to expand their community outside of their classroom walls. They visit other classrooms, take trips to the North Wing and go on field trips. They are nearly ready for Elementary!