Our week has started back!  It was full of energy both yesterday and today!  The kids are excited to be back and it was sweet to hear their stories and see their faces after a week off!  My kids are always changing, so it was especially exciting to see some with missing teeth or new hair cuts.  They get so excited about those little things.

Today, our readers workshop lesson was on using expression with our voices when we read independently.  So our mini lesson had a clip from the cast of icarly doing a table read. https://youtu.be/Ld2HueWBoTc
This lesson started off simple enough... kids realizing that they have to know how to READ to do just about ANY job in this world!!  Then it turned into a sharing session of "What I want to be when I grow up!"  I didn't want to rip their dreams apart, so we took time and shared some of our dreams  and aspirations.   This kind of thing is so cute because we all have different ideas and aspirations in life!  After we figured out that Rhylee and Carolina want to be teachers, Ethan wants to be a farmer (or engineer maybe?),  Aunna wants to go to Maryville like her sister, Knox wants to be a football player, Keigen wants to be an auctioneer, Draven wants to be an astronaut (and many many more...), we talked about how each and every job they do will use reading of some kind in order to be successful. (!!!) Sometimes it's things that I don't plan that go the best, because at this point, they were all sold on the fact that they have to read to do anything in life - which made for a great readers workshop block!  I had kids using expression like CRAZY and trying to jot down information they were learning in their books!  Have I mentioned that I LOVE this class (seriously.. .best class ever).  Anyway, just another day in first grade! We ended the day with some animal habitat talk and some whole class yoga.  (Ask us about our downward dog!)

Some big news from our day:

• Our class got the big 3 flag this month! - That is a HUGE compliment!
• Ethan is definitely getting a hamster TONIGHT.
• Lillian lost a front tooth over break (it's adorable)
• Isabella, Vicky, Jack, and Aunna moved up reading levels!!!
• Knox wishes his dad would've made him wear athletic shorts today since it DID feel good outside at recess (HA!)
• Cristian's brother came home from Mexico over break and they got to hang out.
• Keigen was the super math friend of the day!