Falling Back into First Grade

This month has been an incredible learning experience that has opened my eyes to many aspects of the classroom that I have not yet had the opportunity to see.  I have gotten to see just how much work students do outside of the classroom, how creative teachers must be when they are not given a plethora of resources, and how important it is for someone to take leadership among a group of teachers to get things accomplished. I was able to see just how much time and work my CE puts into facilitating learning for her students.  There have been multiple days when my CE and I have spent over two hours after school preparing for whatever stems activity or learning experience we had planned for the next day.  I was amazed to see just how much time and effort my CE puts into what she plans for he students every week.  I will say that her ability to use arts and crafts, acting, and stems activities to facilitate students' learning on a deeper level has been incredible for me ...

This past month has been absolutely crazy!  However, I have had many incredible learning experiences.  Just to give a "snipit" of our past month, I'll share our schedule for the week of Halloween a few weeks ago.  In one week, we had the day off on Monday for a teacher workday, on Tuesday, the Honors Society students from the high school came to our school to provide a trunk or treat for our students, and on this day students were allowed to wear their Halloween costumes for the event.  Wednesday, we had our Halloween rotations where every teacher hosted a different event, and every student went around the hallway to visit every single other teacher.  Thursday, we had our school's fun run fundraiser that every student in the school took part in.  This absorbed the entirety of the afternoon.  That week was by far the craziest of the month, but there were many more crazy weeks and days added on top of that one.  My largest takeaway from this crazy m...