Ch-Ch-Ch-Ch Changes

I've had that David Bowie song stuck in my head since last night. You see, we had a "potluck supper" at school last night, we were told that a local church was hosting it for the staff. Turns out it was the Vacation Bible School commencement so there were tons of people, a band and lots of prayer. They even had the staff come up so they could lay hands on us and pray for the new school year. All of that kind of made little Catholic me uncomfortable, but I was given to understand that it would not look good if we didn't come/participate.

Anyways, down to the changes. We finally got to have a quick meeting with the new principal. We brought up a few subjects such as what her dress code would be. My school is usually super casual - jeans every day, t-shirts, shorts and capris etc. New principal says "Dress to impress." and "Sandals are okay but flip flops are out." I never wear flip flops, but I do wear sandals so that is good! Not sure how fancy I need to be "to impress" though - should I run out and buy dress pants and blouses?? Our school is Title I and I always felt like dressing too nicely was kind of a barrier between teachers and parents. Of course we have to look nice, but wearing really nice clothes kind of emphasizes the economic differences imo. Not to mention that kindergarten teachers are stain magnets between all the arts and crafts and small children hugging us!

The big worry though is that right now we only have 39 kindergarten students. Enrollment is the 8th and 9th so we might still get more, but as it stands now we would need at least 30 more students to justify keeping all 3 kindergarten teachers. I'm not sure how they're going to decide who gets to stay in Kindergarten and who moves to a different grade level. I have spent all summer working on adopting the core curriculum standards for kindergarten, I would hate to have to change grade levels with so little notice!

So, please cross your fingers for me that we pick up more kindergarten students - I love my team and I really want all of us to stay in kindergarten together! If anyone has any advice on the dress code I am open to it! I hate to sound like a Negative Nancy, so I hope this post is not coming off that way, I am thankful I still have a job in this economy!

Just for fun, here are the pictures of my classroom, before I set anything up. I can get into school starting on the 2nd!

My back wall (and Joshua).

my front wall w/my Smartboard

my side wall - all windows up top and 2 shelves underneath down the whole wall.

My other side wall, this is my cubby area.

The sink area on the cubby side wall.

The door to the bathroom off my back wall.

My rear door, my son Robbie, and my magnet board.

As you can see, I still need to move all my stuff in and decorate, I will post more pictures when I get it done!