Hello everyone! Welcome to Kindergarten in Room 110! We are so excited to meet all of you and begin an amazing year together :) We have been working hard over the summer to prepare for a brand new classroom and create fun-filled activities to start the year off with a bang :) As you know, this is Gatestone's first year having Full-Day Kindergarten (FDK). There are many new changes that come with the new program and we are excited to share those with you! The first and most noticeable change you will see is the classroom environment. We have aimed to create a classroom that is, in our opinion, visually similar to one's home. In order to ease the transition of being at home all day and now coming to school 5 days a week, we wanted the classroom to feel like a second home for students, full of warm and neutral colours, greenery, and natural materials. Not only will this help with the transition, but it will also help students remain calm, self-regulated, and focused. We tried to stay away from bright, primary colours and store-bought posters. Posters bought at Scholar's Choice or the Dollar Store really don't mean anything to children, especially at this age. However, if students look and see their creations on the wall to demonstrate the same things a poster would, it becomes much more meaningful. We'd like to share with you some pictures of the transition that took place over the summer. Many hours went into creating our new classroom so we hope you like it! Inspiration The use of natural materials was a must. We loved the idea of using things we could find in nature. We also loved the idea of using brown kraft paper instead of bright-coloured fadeless paper. The black really pops! The picture frames with student work is also a fantastic idea :) Dollarama here we come! We loved the idea of having a wooden vase so of course we had to make one of our own! Miss Pliura also saw this decoration on the right at Roots- the whole store was an inspiration, really! Loved this idea for a writing centre. We purchased mini clipboards instead. How neat is this?! Jars with craft supplies in them is a beautiful way to showcase different colours. Before Mrs. Nighswander had a lovely classroom that was functional for her students. We loved the flow of her classroom and the sectioned off areas for different types of play. We wanted to keep this functionality while changing up the colour scheme. We are so fortunate to have a SMARTboard iRover in our class. We can move it to wherever we want! During We stripped the classroom bare, cleaned it from top to bottom, and began to set it up using new furniture and plenty of new classroom materials. We had a vision in our mind of what we wanted the classroom to look like; neutral tones, lots of greenery, and a minimalistic feel. We had to decide which furniture to keep and which was still useable. We were also getting some brand new furniture as well, such as a library shelf, work bench, and a storage unit. There was bulletin board glued onto the wall and peeled all the paint of with it. We didn't have any green paint left, so a light coloured brown was used instead (that's just the primer!) We aren't too sure how we were denied a new kitchen set, seeing as how the doors to the fridge would barely shut, so Miss Pliura took it home and sanded it down, used a wooden stain, and fixed the hinges (with plenty of help!). You can see on the left all the scuff marks it had. The picture on the right is what it looked like after sanding. You'll see the difference it made soon! We wanted the cork board and the chalk boards to match. Our original plan was to cover it all with kraft paper, like in the inspiration picture above. However, we couldn't keep it from creasing and it just didn't meet our expectations (see picture below) :P We found bulletin board contact paper that matched the original cork board perfectly, so we decided to use that on the chalk board to make it all match. We used white bins to fill up the cubbies you see on the right and used a black border to frame the bulletin boards. After We loved the idea of having some home decor as soon as you walk in the door. The tree trunk vase turned out great! Scrapbook pages filled with pictures will soon fill the holder on the left. Can we just talk about how amazing this kitchen set turned out!? It's beautifully sanded and appealing to the eye. We received some adorable pots and pans that resemble real life cooking tools - We think Dramatic Play will be a big hit! How great is this workbench? (with a real-life mini vise!) Students can use blocks, tools, and other classroom materials to make anything their little hearts desire :) Blueprints for blocks, anyone? As you can see, we're still working on putting up our alphabet, but soon these bulletin boards will be filled with words, child's names, etc. In the middle of our bulletin boards we have our animal character Reading Strategies which we will learn about throughout the year. We are also super lucky to have a SMARTboard, which is where all of our Literacy and Math lessons take place. The kids also have the chance to play on it during Learning Centres :) Did you notice the curtains? Not only do they look nice, but they also prevent little hands from touching things on the shelves during our important lessons. We got these adorable little chairs from IKEA; they are perfect for a comfy Book Nook where kids can sit down and read/browse through some books. We also received an iPod stereo where we will connect our iPod and students can listen to audio MP3s to certain books (the ones with the red stickers!) Lots of cozy stuffed animals and pillows to make them feel at home :) This is the beginning of our Science centre. We started off with just some small, natural materials along with some mirrors and magnifying glasses! Who doesn't love sand! The sand table will be lots of fun :) In our long IKEA shelf, we have stored Playdoh and our train set. In our storage unit, we have plenty of fun manipulatives for students to use. And last but not least, our Creative centre. Here, students can make beautiful pictures, write a letter, or build a crazy creation using all of our craft supplies (thanks, parents!). We are still waiting on our Art easel, and when that arrives, students will be able to paint here :) We hope you enjoyed this LONG post about our classroom transformation. We are so very proud of our classroom and can't wait to begin using it to learn, explore, and play. Have a great night! ~ Miss Pliura & Mrs. Tortola :)