classroom helper

This week Amaya brought home an older weekend summary that feature her trip to see Frozen II. I love the representation of the movie and the 5 of them watching together.

As part of a school project, all of the kids need to share who their hero is, and why. As Steven, Sammy and Amaya demonstrated in their answers, simple kindergarten kindnesses have a big impact.

I think if we let her, Amaya would permanently move into our closet and appropriate it as her bedroom.

Steven has been asking for red pants. He likes to coordinate his clothing “blue day”, “orange day”, etc. and needed red pants for “red day”. He was a happy kid when these arrived.

I volunteered at the kids’ school three different times this past week. What a treat! First up was Amaya’s class on Tuesday morning. While Mrs. Shuart held small group reading workshops, I supervised and assisted the other kids at their activity stations. It was really cool to get a chance to see learning in action and get to know more of the kids in Amaya’s class. She was so happy to have me there.

At one point I was helping a girl who was distressed over a choice she made when illustrating her favorite part of Caps for Sale. As she started to cry, the boy sitting next to her said, “Try taking some deep breaths.” I know they’re working with the school social working on emotional regulation and it was neat to see one of the kids put that into action to help a classmate.

For a short time each day, everyone does independent reading of books they know well.

There’s even a computer station with interactive literacy games and follow-along digital books.

On Wednesday I visited Steven and Sammy’s classroom to do a lesson on Hanukkah. It started with an invite from Amaya’s teacher, Mrs. Shuart, and I was fortunate to be able to do the same lesson in both classes. Steven, Sammy and Amaya were so excited to have me join their class to talk about their holiday. I talked about the traditions we use to celebrate and then we did a craft that I prepared in advance. All three kids were so happy to know the answers to my questions and I was happy to hear how many other kids in the class also knew the answers! In Mrs. M’s class, some of their words of the week were things like “dreidel” and “menorah”.

Before I got started I snapped these two candid photos of Sammy engaged with his classmates. He was so comfortable in the classroom space and, while he was visibly happy I was there, it was also obvious that he didn’t need me.

Hard at work making menorahs!

Orderly and patterned, as I’d expect. 🙂

Full of color and variety, as expected. 🙂

When the craft was complete, Ms. M hung everyone’s work in the hall outside their classroom.

Four or five times/year the kids at Thornton Creek bring home artifacts from school for structured academic conversations. On Thursday Steven, Sammy and Amaya brought home binders of poems they’ve memorized along with their literacy notebooks. We spent time looking through the materials and giving the kids a chance to read to us and show us their work. I was particularly taken with this page in Steven’s book which says, “I am good at loving my mom.” (I am gud at love my mom.) <3

Reading together.

Friday I joined Amaya’s class for their Hanukkah lesson and activity and was met with equal enthusiasm. Mrs. Shuart even had a surprise for me prepared by the kids.

Straight from her class, Amaya and I hopped in the car and head to the airport for a weekend trip to NY! With all of the other travel I’ve done, it’s been 14 months since Amaya and I went away together! This was a quick in and out so we could go to our Goldstein cousin Hanukkah party and we were both so happy to get the time together.

This picture sums up my girl.

Waiting for our ride at LGA.

Charlie not only surprised Amaya by picking us up at the airport with Nana but she and Amaya had an amazing sleepover. They were so cute together. They did some art, played board games and then got comfy on the floor for bed. It reminded me of cousin sleepovers when I was a kid.

My favorite part was when I’d hear them making noise and I’d go upstairs and open the door to find them lying stiff as boards, trying not make a sound, only to hear them burst into giggles when I closed the door again.