President's Day

I do a question of the day each morning at our calendar time.  Usually, it goes along with something that we are talking about or that is coming up or honestly, it is random because I forgot to think ahead. So my question of the day yesterday was, “Can you name a President of the United States?”

Silence (this does not happen often in my class).

I gently prodded them along (teacher speak: activated their background knowledge).  “Think about some of the faces on our money…”

Oh good, I see some hands! “Washington?” (there’s one!) “Roosevelt?” (there’s two) one little smarty gave me a “JFK!” (there’s three!) I had several church leaders mentioned and a “Broccoli Obama”…uh, close, but not exactly. I don’t know if I’m failing as a teacher or really it’s the curriculum departments fault that our country’s leaders are a new concept to first graders!  Anyway, I had a good laugh and carried on.  I read this story:

Then I told my kiddos that they were going to run for “The President of the United States of America!” - -yes, I often use a booming announcer voice while teaching, a girl has gotta keep the pony show rocking!  They did such a great job with their “campaign poster” and their “If I were the President…” I have been using Rachelle’s  President’s Day Unit (What The Teacher Wants) and I just love it!  

Oh and seriously, look how cute my bulletin board turned out!  Love awesome parent volunteers who can make teacher "vision" a reality!

I apologize for the OVERUSE of quotation marks in this post, okay, I don't really, but WOW I used a lot of them! 

Keep on teachin' on folks!