First Day of Kindergarten

I always have BIG plans for the first day of Kindergarten. I want it to memorable and special, but I know we also have learn our way around the classroom and school. First, think about what you want kids to do when they come into your classroom. We have a 20 minute period of time when students come into our classroom. I like to stand at the door and greet students as they come into my classroom. I like to have something on the tables for students to do when they walk in that involves no explanation. I put math manipulatives out, like shapes, cubes, colored bears, etc. Students can play and get to know each other, while I greet students.

Once everyone is in the classroom, I will bring the kids to the carpet to read a book. I do go over carpet expectations. In my room, everyone picks a smiley face to sit on. We are facing the front, looking at whoever is speaking. I go over different ways to sit and we talk about voice levels. I DO NOT expect perfection. I might give gentle reminders, especially if a student is laying down or yelling.You can find a list of my favorite back to school books HERE. I like to start with The Kissing hand so we can talk about first day feelings. We make this anchor chart where students can share how they are feeling and draw a picture. If you don’t want to do the kissing Hand, I have a plain first day feelings sheet too. These activities can be found in my First Week of Kindergarten Lesson Plans.

After about an hour, students are ready to take a bathroom break. I go over procedure for lining up, walking in the hallway and going to the bathroom. In my First Week of Kindergarten activities, I have included the sheets with procedures and a place to write in procedures. I know our school has specific procedures that we go over. Plus, I will add notes as we visit places and I notice students don’t understand the expectations. After we visit the bathroom, we visit the playground and the cafeteria. I go over expectations and try to give students a few minutes to play while we are on the playground, if our schedule allows. This takes us about 40 minutes, leaving us enough time to go read another book before lunch.

After lunch and recess, we come back into the classroom and have quiet time. For the first month of school, we do allow students to lay down for up to 30 minutes. This is based on the class and how long they actually rest for. We always have one that will sleep for an hour, if we let him/her. I go by the majority of the class. Some years, we only rest for 10 minutes, while I read a book. After our quiet time, I like to do a get to know you BINGO. If you have extra time in the morning, this would be a good one to shift to the morning. I typically save the scavenger hunt for later in the week. These are FREE HERE. there are multiple scavenger Hunts to choose from so that hopefully one matches your classroom. If not, you can always white one out. Get these cards FREE HERE.

Then, it time for a craft. I love making a Chick Chicka Boom Boom hat. We read the story. YouTube has really cute version of this song you can find HERE. After we watch the video, it is time to teach students how to use scissors. I have heard of teachers who do not let students use supplies on the first day. I really don’t agree with this. I think students should have the opportunity to use supplies on day 1. I have a data sheet in my Kindergarten First Week activities where I record if students can use scissors on not. I do have scissor cutting activities that are just for practicing cutting various lines, but i think that is really boring on the first day. We talk about to hold scissors the right way. I model small bites and big bites. Then, I cut out my example under the document camera so students can see how to do it. Now students have a special hat to wear and take home on the first day of school.

Honestly, that is usually all we have time for, but I always print out extra activities, just in case. I love doing first day/last day for names, but they are usually first week last week names. It’s okay. No one will ever know if you wait until day 3. I also like to do a first day portrait, but again, it is typically a first week portrait. My best advice is spends a lot of time going over procedures and expectations. Give students time to practice those expectations. It is okay if they do not get it on day 1 or even day 5. It takes time. Take your time, but make sure you don’t have downtime where students get crazy. I hope you all have an amazing year!

I do have detailed lesson plans, with expectations in my First Week of Kindergarten activities. You can get those HERE.