It has been many months since I last blogged about my classroom experiences. This has been an interesting year. Thankfully I have wonderful students who make me smile every day. This year has been a significant learning curve for me as it is my first year teaching first grade. First grade is significantly different than other grades I have taught. I think part of that is due to the age and developmental level of the students versus the high standards and curriculum demands. It is also the year in which students get the most (in my opinion) interventions outside of the classroom. This is the part that makes it complicated as students really need the interventions, but that means they are missing instruction in the classroom. The balance of trying to get students access to everything they miss when out of the room is one that I struggled with. In the end, I worked to do the best that I could with the time those students were with me.
What I have learned this year as a professional is that being flexible and creative in thinking about how to organize and plan for instruction is the key to success in the future. I think that as we move towards more standards-based instruction teachers will need to be flexible in how they think about grade levels and how they group students (and maybe mix their students with another class). It will involve some people getting out of their comfort zones. I think even though it can be stressful that it's also exciting.
Do you do any end of the year "fun" activities? I have a plan for this year that involves this book. 
Our two first grades are currently one happy family at some parts of the day (I told you it was an interesting year) so now I need 27 large boxes for my end of the year project. Wish me luck in finding this many boxes. Just thinking about this project makes me smile. So hopefully I will remember to blog again before seven more months have passed. I thank you for reading this. Have a great day!
~Erica
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