Today, I took over some more of the morning literacy routine - vocabulary! Since I'm basically teaching straight from the basal all morning, I don't have much to reflect on as far as "lesson planning" goes...but I think I am gradually becoming better at picking through the things I think are worthwhile to teach and the things I think I can throw out the window. Thankfully, my CT is completely on board with that plan - so it's nice to be in agreement on that in addition to a ton of other things.
Classroom management has been a slow but steady process upwards...I honestly feel like at this point it's too easy, with how well-behaved my class is. It's like they know I'm just practicing so they try to go easy on me or something. Of course I come across my share of management issues, like dealing with name-calling at recess and arguments between table mates. But by and large, managing the class and keeping my strategies consistent (and clear, hopefully) has been somewhat of a breeze. I know I'm speaking too soon, of course. I know.
One interesting tidbit that happened today was a boy who shared with me that his mother had a baby on Saturday. He was so excited to tell me, but as all kindergartners go, he told me about two seconds before I was starting up our literacy routine after the kids got back in from recess. So I did the first thing that popped into my head, what felt natural to me: I told him he could have a few minutes to share with the class before the lesson - not during. I told him the types of things he might want to share (the baby's name, where it was born, etc.). And something amazing happened. Not only did he share the most intricate details of his brother's birth, he spoke with confidence and his classmates listened. He told us about how his mother had a water birth at home, how he was involved in the process and got to read books about that kind of birth, how his brother didn't have a name yet...
And everyone was engaged. After the boy sharing told us he got to help cut the umbilical cord (wow!), another boy raised his hand and said "Another thing comes out - it's called the placenta. And some people eat it." Nobody judged anyone for their information or lack thereof. And such mature topics for five- and six-year olds to be talking about! I was blown away. I commended each person for sharing what they knew and explained that we needed to focus on our story now. I went back to my lesson and that was that. Nobody felt the need to raise their hand or talk out of turn about what we had just spent a few minutes talking about. It was...weird. But in a good way.
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