 Good morning my friends welcome to my very first official day back to school. It is 6 18 in the morning I'm sitting in my car, and I'm ordering Starbucks because one of my lovely followers on Instagram sent me Five bucks on Ben Mo and was like enjoy your Starbucks on me. So thank you so much Anna I appreciate that you like made my whole day So for those of you that are new here My name is Charlotte, and I am a fourth grade science and social studies teacher in central, Arizona I am departmental eyes, and I teach at a year-round school so we get out may 24th ish around and We have a few longer breaks in our school year We have two two week breaks and one three week break And so we are more of a year-round school. We get out in May We go back late July, and I really enjoy that it's kind of My favorite so far. I would much rather have longer breaks throughout the year than have a longer summer That's just how I prefer it. It's hot here in Arizona. It's already 90 degrees this morning It's humid and I would just prefer to spend two weeks in the fall two weeks in the spring and two weeks Three weeks in the winter Traveling rather than during the summer because it is so hot. So That's a little bit of a background I am departmentalized and so normally I would see three different blocks of students every day But today is the first day of school And so we are keeping our own home rooms today and just doing some community building School procedures basic classroom procedures, and then tomorrow will be our first day of rotations So technically I'm saving a lot of what I usually would do on the first day of school for tomorrow technically not saving all of it but like my classroom procedures and Supplies and stuff like that because I'm gonna have to repeat it Again tomorrow, and I don't want my home room to be a step ahead of the rest of the classes So that's the plan so when I get to school you guys I'm gonna share with you all of the things that I plan to do today. That's why I'm leaving a little bit early and I'm gonna try to make this more of like a First week of school vlog rather than the first day because I can guarantee you once I put this camera down After this morning, I will probably not pick it up again. Just because it's going to be a very busy day All right, you guys I got my Starbucks So I just got a Trenta iced coffee with vanilla and cream and this has sugar in it Which I have not really been consuming in the last few months. So but it's the first day of school I'm gonna treat myself. It's gonna be real good. You watch. Oh my gosh. It's like heaven Yeah, I've been on a sugar-free kick since like The end of March, so I've been doing really good and then I also ordered myself some bacon greer egg bites They're my all-time favorite. So I'm gonna get to school I should probably be there in about five minutes and then I'll update you guys on the plan for today Well, you want to see what that is you interested in the camera You saying hello We should change this channel to be called apples and the rats I'm just killing all the vibes right here. Oh geez. There goes the marker. Oh my gosh, you guys. She's so sweet If this face greeting you every morning isn't enough to get you here Hi, babe Yes, I kiss my rat. This is temple Tina any of you who are new here Her sister peach is somewhere in this cage. I Love you, but I have to close this and we can hang out when I'm done getting everything ready. Okay Where's peachy There you are. Hi sweet girl. She's a little more shy than teeny. I know but she's nice She doesn't bite you sweet She just sigh You just shy, huh? Yeah, you just shy. Oh look at Oh he says he's Okay, I'll see you guys in a minute Okay, enough with the rats So I am here in my fourth grade science social studies classroom It is done and set up. It looks like my disco ball fell last night though So that's depressing. It's like the second time it's fallen. So it's probably toast Disaster has striked stricken stroke We'll see if it can be repaired Fix that later Okay So let's talk about the first day of school our students will be coming on campus at 740 and At that time all teachers are to report to a duty. So at 740 I will be going downstairs to the gate where students who are walking enter and We are to direct them out to the playground because this year is Normal as our district would call it so our students will be going out to the Playground at 755 the bell rings and at 8 o'clock. We bring them upstairs So once they get up here, there will be a message on the TV which I need to turn that on and just Start getting things rolling here Let's turn on the TV Okay Also gonna turn all my lights on so this little contraption I got from Amazon I think it's in my Amazon storefront if it isn't I will add it But essentially what it is is it's a bunch of plugs around the room that can be turned on by one remote and It's lovely because I don't have to run around the room and plug things in which is a total pain in the butt So I love it Amazon look for like remote control Plugs or something and it will definitely pop up the only one that I have to turn on manually is the one behind my TV But I can also turn that on from my phone So I'm technically choosing to walk over here and then my disco ball. I got a fix Okay, so what are the kids doing the second they walk through the door as soon as they come in? I'm going to instruct them to have a seat Anywhere that they would like and I like to do this on the first day of school because I like for kids to tell me Who their friends are without them telling me who their friends are? So That would have been a funny thing to put on my slide Tell me who your friends are without telling me who your friends are because it's like tick-tock get it Anyway, once they sit down, they're going to start drawing themselves on this little selfie Cell phone. This is a tpt product All you got to do is look up back to school selfie or all about me selfie So they're going to start drawing a picture of their face or their body in the middle of the cell phone And that's what they're going to be working on while I get my morning chores done My morning chores include taking attendance doing lunch count and doing a warm body count to send down to the principal and then There will be some morning announcements Once morning announcements are over I will probably give the kids a few minutes to keep working on this I'm sure there's going to be kids that have questions There's going to be kids that come in that I haven't met yet So I have some paperwork that I need to give those students who are not here at meet the teacher night Make sure that that information gets in their backpack and gets on its way home so that there's no issues Then I'm going to go open up my Google slides so that you guys can see exactly what the kids are going to see Okay, so this is the slide that the kids are going to see when they walk in Says please sit anywhere you would like today and follow these steps Be seated quietly place your backpack on the floor next to your stool Please try to keep it out of the walking space begin drawing a picture of yourself on the phone handout If you finish just sit quietly, we will begin shortly so then the next thing that they're gonna see is my Agenda slide that I always always have in Google classroom and it always begins with this page because on this page I link a few things for them like my virtual classroom and dojo store are linked on the laptop Near pod is linked here. We've got a virtual dictionary and the source up here at the top and encyclopedia And so this is kind of like the front page that they always see on my agenda slides, and I'll just explain That today is Wednesday Okay, so the first day is of school Here's our to-do list for the entire day So we will begin with kind of like a welcome and meet the teacher slides So I'll just explain a little bit about myself today And then I will give them a room tour So I will literally walk around the classroom and show the kids where everything in this room is What they're allowed to touch what they're not allowed to touch where to find things Etc. Then we will do introductions. I will have all of the students Go to The back of the room and we will circle up and I will teach them the how to get to the circle Procedures, which are very simple stand up push in your chairs And go to the back circle. I don't know yet if I'm gonna have them bring their stools I might have them bring their stools just because there's no carpet and they might complain about sitting on the hard floor Maybe I'll let them decide I'll let them choose would you guys rather sit on the stools or would you rather sit on the floor sitting on the floor is so much more like Intimate I guess like it's just kind of more like cozy and then we will do the get to know you web Which if you don't know what the get to know you web is oh by the way once we get over there We're doing a name circle activity, which is the old as heck Activity where you sit in a circle you start with one person you say all the names and that person has to say The names that came before them try to go all the way around the circle and then I have to try to remember everyone's name and Then we're gonna do the get to know you web, which is really fun. You start with a Bit of yarn you start by holding it and telling a fact about yourself It could be anything like I have two dogs at home then Everybody who has two dogs raises their hand and then we throw the yarn across to them They give a fact about themselves like my favorite food is pizza whoever's food favorite food is pizza raises their hand You pick someone you throw it across and it continues until there's a giant messy web in The whole classroom so at this point for this activity all have the kids actually sit on top of the tables and We'll do the get to know you web that way. This is a favorite It's so simple, but last year at the end of the year a bunch of my students said that this was their favorite thing to do so We're gonna do the get to know you web then We'll be doing procedure walk-throughs throughout the day So like in between each of these activities there are procedures that I'm teaching so like even before the meet the teacher slides I'm explaining what to do if they want my attention What I do when I want theirs how to go to the bathroom things like that Which I will show you guys in my procedures video that I'm planning on filming Probably sometime this week just while it's fresh in my mind And then we're gonna do a sort of like a center's mock center situation Moment where we will do the first day task cards. Those are by miss fifth and you can see that they're kind of spread Around the room. There's they're just on white paper. I thought I had colored but I didn't and at this point I don't really care about the color So they have little white Task cards around the room. What I'll do is I'll dismiss two tables at a time I'll say okay table one and table two you guys are going to begin working on your task cards Please take your binder your pencil and your first day of school task cards thing with you I'll explain the procedures for task cards and then those two tables will begin The rest of you are gonna continue working on your selfie activity, which this isn't just a picture of them on the back. There's Some writing activities if I can get the thing open It talks about how was your summer so they give a brief description of what they did over summer break and then a little bit about them So like how old they are their favorite food their birthday and what makes them special so they can continue working on this While they're doing that I'm gonna be going from table to table with my supply bucket and I'll be collecting things like crayons markers colored pencils flashcards sticky notes all of the things that are going to become community supplies and this was communicated with families on the Supply list so they do know that when they get here Their box of crayons is going to be collected and it will be used in the community tubs and to refresh the tubs throughout the year So each of our home rooms we are all collecting all of these items so like The glue sticks the glue bottles the crayons the highlighters unless it's something that's like really special to them I won't collect that they'll keep their notebooks their binder their folders all of that kind of stuff But I'll just kind of collect the bulk items that way I can continue to replenish The bins throughout the year and same thing with Mandy She'll be collecting all of hers so she can replenish her bins and same with Rob He'll collect his so that he can have Everything he needs for all of his three classes And then at the end of the day which this should take us to the end of the day Hopefully we're gonna be making these cootie catchers, which I also found on teachers pay teachers And it's really cute. So it comes with a couple different versions of the cootie catcher They're going to fold these and make them they can color them if they would like Once I collect all the crayons and stuff I can distribute them And then they can start coloring and then what I will do is I will get them back to the circle And we will do our first musical chair formation basically if you know Kagan strategies It's an inside outside circle, but I call it musical chairs So I do an inner circle with their stools and then an outer circle with their stools It honestly just helps them to track who their partners are So then I play music the inside circle goes left the outside circle goes right when I hit the stop button Whoever they're sitting across from is their partner They will do the cootie catcher and then they will record what their friends said so they'll actually use their stools as their desks for this so they'll put like Joe Schmoe Something knew you learned about them Maybe it was this question if your favorite toy could talk what would it say so they would write that there and then I have Two grades for this week already done So hopefully this will take us to the end of the day if it does not and we run out of things to do I always always grab these from the dark dollar spot And I've had this for like four years and I still haven't used it So I've never ever run out of things to do on the first day of school I find that it takes way longer than we think it does just because we you know Kids like to share and if they're gonna share their whole summer story It may take you know 20 minutes for that story to be done So this is a leftover activity just in case and then I also have Some read-alouds that I pulled over there that I can totally read if we also run out of things to do So anyway, that is our day. Sorry. I know I just talked like a thousand miles an hour I already have some supplies building up here. This is from meet the teacher night also I have this sign out and ready. I'll push it back, but I'm not going to allow any students to deal with the rats today They're gonna be very overwhelmed having 27 bodies in here that I really just don't want to expose them to That much in one day. So I'll probably leave them completely in their cage for the day I might take teeny out and keep her with me And just talk about them Possibly during circle time, but I really just don't want to overwhelm them So I will be putting this sign in front of the cage. It just says please do not come up to the cage yet We don't want to like put the rats in shock. So But teeny looks like she is like ready to party look at her. She's like Let me out Hi, baby So, okay, so that is everything that we're going to be doing today Obviously, there's a lot of procedures that are going to be taught throughout the middle of all those activities And I try to create my slideshow in order and I put procedures in between each one so like I have the slide for What to do if you need to go to the bathroom Right before meet the teacher so that Before I even start talking they know how to deal with that And so procedures are really super important. Um, in fact, our principal has asked us do not even start doing content until Like we have these three days and we have next week and then that next week Like the technically the third week of school is when we're supposed to start content We're supposed to be doing SEL, um community building, procedure practice, all of that for these first One and a half weeks. Um, I will start doing a little bit of content I will be doing the scientific method next week probably Wednesday, thursday, friday and dip into that other week It's not a standard, but I think that it's an important practice for them to understand and plus learn vocabulary things like observe hypothesis questioning things like that even though it's not Some people don't think that it's important But I really like it and it also gives me a chance to do some really fun like hands-on labs in the first week That aren't standards related and can help teach procedures So that's the plan I'm going to stop talking now because it's like 20 minutes in and I'm sure you guys are sleeping So this will probably not be a first week of school vlog That will probably be the first day and I'll have to vlog again tomorrow Um, but I'm gonna eat my breakfast and do my little to-do list this morning which I need to change my voicemail And copy my glee club forms Because I am the glee club coach this year And I'm founding the club. So I have to do a lot of paperwork And so I'm gonna work on that and then at 740 which is in 35 minutes I will head outside to start greeting students. So wish me luck guys. I will check in Later if I get a moment and yeah, so hopefully I'll see you guys in a minute Hey, you guys so it is now four o'clock end of the school day You guys today was so amazing. We made so much magic had so much fun It was pure chaos, but it was great Um, my home room is going to be such an amazing group of kids I can't wait to meet the kids tomorrow tomorrow's our first day of rotation So I'll get to meet everybody tomorrow. I have so much supplies to sort through I need to go through these buckets And just make sure the things the things that are in them are actually needed in them And that they're clean and organized papers everywhere supplies everywhere But overall it was a great day. We had a lot of fun and we stayed busy the whole time I didn't have to like add anything in last minute. It all went great. So overall A great first day of school I'm exhausted though. I haven't eaten much today And I'm not leaving school until five because tonight is caches meet the teacher night. So It's four right now. I'm just going to stay and make sure that I have everything prepared for tomorrow Including getting my plans done. I only have the kids for an hour and a half each tomorrow 90 minutes And so I don't have to plan for as much like I just do the same thing three times Which is lovely. So I think what I'm going to do is end the vlog here so that I can really get to work I pretty much have everything ready for tomorrow. I just need to go through it and Double check everything. I did realize though for inside outside circle. We need a little bit more space back here So I think what I might do is just move the tables up a little bit more Than they were today just move them up a smidge like even just a few inches would give us more space And then I am going to move my library seats back from over here I think I'm going to put them over here up against this But for right now until they're being used Honestly, I'm just going to store them Because kids know they can use them at this point But they were severely in the way for inside outside circle or I guess musical chairs today So I'm going to move them so that they're out of the way. And then like I said, I would just going to move Um The tables up a little bit and then Tomorrow when we practice inside outside circle, we just need to spread out in which the kids realize today like oh, we can't be that Circular like we need to be more like oval or a rectangle. So it's all a learning curve. They did so amazing though. Seriously, I have The best group of kids already I can tell so Anyway, I'm going to end this vlog here. Thank you guys for keeping up with me Hopefully today's video was helpful if you're struggling to figure out what to do Most of the stuff I used today was on teachers pay teachers. So just search up what it was you're looking for I will try to link as much as possible in the description If you're not already, don't forget to subscribe so you can see more from me in the next few weeks And follow me on instagram and I will see you all in the next video. Bye