Happy long weekend, folks. It's hard to believe that we're nearing Thanksgiving break, and then before we know it, it'll be 2020! It was great meeting so many families at our first day of parent/teacher conferences on Tuesday. On Thursday, I look forward to meeting with the remainder of the parents/guardians on my sign up sheet. We finished up our ELA test revisions and our personal narratives this week. Overall, I was super impressed with how well both classes did on our first test of the school year. The average was roughly 18/19 points out of 22 possible points, which is awesome. Our next unit (nonfiction) will start on Tuesday. We'll also begin our focus on expository writing.

This week, I did a compliment chain with both classes. The 15-minute activity goes like this: First we sit in a circle. Then we discuss the importance of kindness and compliments, and what makes a compliment genuine. This leads into my introduction of the compliment chain exercise. Students were asked to take one minute to think of something kind to say to the person to their left. They were asked to be specific, and go beyond things like, "I like your shoes" or "You're good at soccer". I started us off, and we went around the circle giving a compliment to the person to our left. THEN we repeated the same routine in the opposite direction. At the end, we reflected on how good it feels to not only receive compliments, but also how good it feels to give compliments. I love doing this activity with kids, and we'll continue to promote positivity and kindness as often as possible. 

Our Bucket Fillers this week were Makayla and Abdul. Makayla is the epitome of sweet. She continually shows patience and kindness to her classmates, and she's one of those kids I can count on to work well with anyone and everyone. Abdul blows me away with his creativity and artistic ability. He is so gifted at drawing! He also has worked hard recently to make good decisions in regards to where to work in the classroom and where to stand in line during transitions. I'm really proud of both Abdul and Makayla!