The Script

Last night I pulled out my The First Days of School book, determined to finally finish reading it.  There's lots of free online content that goes along with the book, and every time I'd settle in to read (on an airplane, in the car, at the orthodontist's office), I'd stumble over the fact that I didn't have my computer with me to look at the additional content while I was reading.  I had only managed to work my way through about 2/3 of the book so far.

I didn't finish reading last night, but I did get to the root of what was bugging me the most: the script.  I wanted to see some examples of effective first-day scripts, and I found a couple with great ideas on the Wong's free website!  I've started building a fun and informative PowerPoint with basic rules and classroom procedures.

Yes, in spite of myself, I did write some procedures, even without knowing exactly how my room will be set up!  I decided to just force it, and I did leave some blank bullet points.

You may think that 5th graders are too young for a PP presentation.  Rest assured, I'm keeping it simple.  And this is a novelty to them at this age!  They are not like the PowerPointed-to-death college students who would rather pull out their eyelashes with duct tape than sit through another booooring slideshow.  Most of these kiddos have probably never seen a PowerPoint at all.  I have the luxury of making it fun and adding animation.  :)  And I'm designing it as an outline to remind me to hit all the important points, rather than typing out all of the information, so the information will be coming from me, not a succession of slides.

I was up until 1:30 working on my script.  I still need to brainstorm on it a little more, but I feel so much more settled since I have the framework started!  My stomach still feels like a rocking boat, but today it's more like a canoe and less like a cruise ship.