Bulletin Boards and Class Tour Pt. 1

 Outside my classroom - looking down the hall.  The green represents 3rd grade.  It's our color.

 Amy Lemons Black History Month

The above bulletin board was created by my student teacher and I.  The resources and ideas come from Amy Lemons.  We have it up for Black History Month.  We read George Washington Carver: Peanut Wizard during shared reading.  After talking about George Washington Carver for a week, the students wrote biographies about him (peanut men).  The peanut butter and jelly sandwiches are How To's.  On the peanuts we wrote titles that GWC had: teacher, inventor, etc.  There are also a few peanuts that have quotes from GWC.  My staff has given us so many compliments ~ so thanks Amy!

 Source - Pinspiration

 This was pinspired.  We changed it a little bit.  Our school is an IB School and we have corresponding Learner attitudes and profiles that we incorporate into daily routine.  The attitudes I wrote on the snowflakes: tolerance, responsibility, etc.

The snowmen (see below) have the learner profiles: risk-taker, knowledgeable, thinker, etc.   

 I used this bulletin board for Kindergarten registration and visiting families to our school.

Part of becoming an IB school means that we need to take our curriculum and from it develop 6 transdisciplinary themes over the next 3 years.  So we have a social studies unit that we teach in government.  We took that unit and per IB made it more inquiry based, etc.  Our students this week have been researching different types of governments around the world.  These are the posters they made and used during their presentations.

 Door to my classroom:  CAUTION!!  THIS ROOM HAS BEEN "LIVED IN" FOR 5 MONTHS NOW.  IT IS NOT CLEAN.  DON'T JUDGE.

 View of my classroom from the door.  My students are in groups - for the most part.  I have two big groups of 7 (one here to your immediate right and the other one across the room).  Then I have a small group of 3 in the middle.  My student teacher likes to have those little darlings close to her.  Then (you can't see them now) there are two students who get to sit off by themselves.  I have 19 kiddos. 

Lunch Count Spot

Magnetic Bathroom Passes are from Beyond the Blackboard in Colorado.  The magnetic pockets are from Lake Shore Learning.  The star sticks inside of them are from Beyond the Blackboard.  Anyway, each student has a stick and a pocket.  If they would like hot lunch, they move their stick out of their pocket into the boys or girls pocket down at the bottom.  I have a lunch counter job that does lunch count for me.  

Inquiry Center

So like I said earlier, we are an IB school.  All those attitudes and learner profiles are on the bulletin board.  We refer to them all of the time.  The trifold is for students to put stickies on if they ever want to inquire anything.  The wicker basket has the books that we receive to teach the learner profiles.  For example this month's learner profile is Risk-Taker.  We read Jackie Robinson-Testing the Ice.  The books is about Jackie's father who couldn't swim...and well I won't spoil it, but we talk about how the characters were risk takers.  Then in the beautiful green basket from Target - I ended up using it for the PYP reflection journals.  After we read Jackie Robinson and talked about how the characters were risk-takers, then the students had a journal prompt about how they could be risk-takers in their own lives.  We reflect about the learner attitudes and profiles every month.  The students take this reflection journal with them throughout the course of their time with us.  In fifth grade-they have a pretty cool journal.  

I will put up the rest of the pictures tomorrow.  It is now bed time.  Good night blogging world.