A Year of Learning

I spent several hours the other day working on a year-long curriculum plan for this coming school year - one of the things that I failed to do during my first year of teaching. I browsed online to see if there were any viable templates that I could use and stumbled across this one. I liked how it was broken down into quarters (making it much more manageable), and that it included specific skills to be taught.

I took their general idea, and tweaked it to include the social studies, science, and health curriculum that my district uses. Granted, as a special education class, my projected year-long plan may take more than the allotted time given to learning certain skills. But it's always good to have a plan, something to go by.

Kindergarten Year Long Preview

If you'd like to download my year-long plan, you can click here. If you'd like the Excel workbook that I created the PDF in, contact me and I can email it to you. (This allows you to tweak the subject matter, skills, etc.)

Until next time!

Organization is Key

I spent most of last night laying in bed, excited about finally getting my teacher blog up and running (yes, I'm a nerd like that!) I woke up this morning, excited and ready to get started on my blog when I realized I needed something to get - and keep - me organized with my blogging.

I spent some time this morning browsing around and found a lovely little blog planner on Sew Tara but realized that despite it's cuteness, I wanted something I could add to the pages inside my DIY Lesson Plan Book (photos and entry of that to come soon!) So I took her general concept and created something of my own using Word. Here's a preview...

If you'd like to download it for your own personal use, click here. I hope you guys like it! 

UPDATE: I decided I also wanted to create an additional page for my weekly blog planner, so that it created a full page spread and would keep to the esthetic of my lesson plan book. If you'd like Page 2, click here. 

New School Year, New Blog

After browsing through countless education blogs that have been made popular through such sites as Pinterest, I decided earlier this summer to start a blog for my own classroom. I wondered how to make my blog unique and something that other teachers would want to read and follow. I decided that I would create and write a blog that not only catered to my fellow special education teachers, but that provided perspective (and some pretty cool freebies) for general education teachers as well. Thus, Kinders First was born.

To start...let me tell you a bit about myself. This September marks the start of my second year of teaching. I currently teach in a public school here in Southern California. I have worked for the same district since 2008, starting off as a special education instructional aide and then getting hired last summer as a special education teacher. I attended and graduated from CSU Long Beach with a bachelor's degree in liberal studies, and dual teaching credentials in both multiple subjects and special education. I am currently a part-time graduate student at CSULB, and will be finishing up coursework for my master's degree in education during the next year.

I teach a very unique classroom - the only one of its kind in my entire district, actually. I am privileged to not only teach an age group I absolutely adore (kindergarten!) but I also get to teach students with mild to moderate disabilities. As if that wasn't great enough, I work at a school with an amazing principal and other professionals who make my job so much more enjoyable! This may sound pretty naive, but I absolutely LOVE what I do. Each day in my classroom is unique and different.

My first year of teaching was amazing, challenging, unexpected, unforgettable...and I loved every second of it. Looking back, I kind of wish I had started this blog a lot sooner. But I figure that as a second year teacher, I'm still pretty "fresh" to the teaching profession, and could offer some pretty hilarious anecdotes, at the very least. I am also computer-savvy (minored in Educational Technology) and have a knack for creating delicious worksheets, progress monitoring pages, and data collection sheets...for those of you out there interested in *FREE* stuff like that.

So, here's to another wonderful school year. I hope y'all stick around and enjoy the ride with me...