Saturday, August 25, 2012

Seating Chart with One Click

Thanks to a friend and colleague, this past summer I was introduced to not only Pinterest but the addicting world of Teacher Blogs.  Wow!  What a wonderful way to collaborate with teachers around the world.  Stacey, thank you for opening my eyes to this new way to discover and collaborate.

For this first post, I want to share an "ah-ha" moment I had during our first week of school.  To help with classroom management, I assign seats on our carpet area.  Kindergarten students have such a short attention span that first week--or any given week.  I wanted to be able to quickly record their assigned "carpet spots" but did not want to take up time writing down their names for fear of losing their attention for the lesson that was going to happen as soon as I had their spots recorded.

This idea hit my brain so quickly...I could take a picture with my iPhone!

I was able to have them sit in their most perfect criss-cross apple sauce positions by telling them that I would share their picture with our principal.  With one click I had an instant seating chart and their attention to start our "I Chart" for Read to Self for Daily 5.

Our principal enjoyed seeing their wonderful picture perfect pose when she visited our room later that morning.  My students loved the compliment!