A new school year is upon us!! The first week of school always sneaks up on me, and this year was no different. Despite being one of the longer summer breaks we've had in a while, it definitely felt quick. But if the first day and a half are any indication of how this fourth grade school year will go, then it will undoubtedly be a great one. 

Rules and routines. Rules and routines. More rules and routines. As not-so-thrilling as these talking points are, we can't kick off our school year without going over them. Fortunately, students were patient and engaged as we took part in various back-to-school conversations and activities together. We decided on our classroom expectations together (Kindness, Respect, Effort, Safety, Positivity), we made our own 'License to Make Mistakes', we explored the room via a classroom scavenger hunt, and we gathered the whole grade together to make a 'time capsule' booklet that we'll take back out at the end of the school year. One other activity we did involved banning certain words and mindsets from our vocabulary. First, the children made a list of all the things they felt they could not do. They sat quietly as they jotted down anything school-related that is hard for them or that they think they're bad at, and I did the same. Then, each of us ripped up our list into tiny pieces. We put the pieces into a bucket, walked outside, and dug a hole to bury these “Can’t Lists”. We talked about shifting our thinking from I can't do this to What can I do to help me do this? Last year, I noticed how often kids would jump to negative self-talk when encountering difficult tasks. So this year, I wanted to address and break this habit from the very beginning. This activity symbolizes our "burial" of the word can't, and holds us all accountable to remove it from our vocabulary...and as I told the kids, I'll surely need reminders at times too!