Every year in the spring, my mind is forced to think of kindergarten… day one. {It’s a slightly scary day}
Right, so we don’t yet know what a line is, where the kleenex is, and no you can’t use the bathroom yet, because I haven’t taught you how to use it in our room… oh my.
This is the time of year when we are hosting our ’round up’ of all the kindergarten students in our area and my mind is gently reminded of how far we have come in 120+ days of school.
I am reminded that I need to take time to enjoy that we successfully line up, use kleenex and use the restroom with little to no distraction to class instruction time…
In addition, we’ve learned to read, write and do lots of math. {Yes!}
Now, let’s put a little finesse into what we do before heading off to first grade, shall we? In preparation for day one, our building allows us to tweak the documents that we can include in the registration packet. They’ve graciously allowed us to add our cute student information form to the 15 others that parents fill out upon registration. And this is the one that matters. The others tell me nothing about the child, the most important piece of all. Here is the updated form that we will be using to gather some insight into the kinders that will be coming our way.
We have really consolidated our info to parents that comes from our building. Parents get two brochures: one from the office with the basic lunch, times, dismissal info., and one from us teachers with our essentials. We figure that if we can beautify the student information and make it as concise as possible, then perhaps, just maybe, it’ll be read with the vigor we’d love to see from our new families.
Student Information Sheet {Kindergarten}
Editable Student Information Sheet {All Grades}
The printable is titled:
GETTING TO KNOW YOUR CHILD (FROM THE TEACHERS)
What I’d rather title it instead:
WHAT I NEED TO KNOW (SINCE I’LL BE SPENDING A LOT OF TIME WITH YOUR CHILD)
But, if I could have it my way, I’d like to ask two more questions that would help me with classroom management and connecting with my kinders immediately. It would be a stretch, but have you ever read (affiliate) Personality Plus or the Five Love Languages? These two books have made such a huge impact on how I interact with people, including the 24 little people in my room and I’d like to know truly: how are they wired and how do they best receive love?
If you’ve never read those books, they will be the best professional development books you could ever dive into considering that all we do is work with people. Okay, so back to thinking of day one… here’s a tip I have learned.
So many brand new kinders don’t understand the concept of getting in a line. But, they all understand the concept of a drive-thru.
So many brand new kinders don’t understand the concept of getting in a line. But, they all understand the concept of a drive-thru. Anytime I want to explain how we are going to get somewhere (even getting materials in class along a shelf for example) I use that as part of the language, and it runs as smooth as butter. We may have to work on the speed to match that of the mighty double arches, but I’ll take “smooth” any way I can that first week of school!
What do you really want to know about your kinders on day one? If you like what I do here on KindergartenWorks, then be sure to subscribe today. I look forward to sharing ideas with you weekly.
More End of the Year
- Kindergarten Class Sorts {printable}
- End of the Year Kindergarten Memory Banner {printable}
- End of the Year Kindergarten Handprint Poem {printable}
What text do you use in this download? I’d love to create a ” How my child get’s to and from school” form, but with consistency.
Hi Naomi, the fonts are ABCPrint, Love Ya Like a Sister and Pea Emma.
I follow you on bloglovin and the link for the free gift is not working. What can I do? You are amazing by the way!
Hi Corey, thanks for your kind words. I’m not sure what to suggest… hmmm. I’m not familiar with bloglovin! Sorry – hopefully someone else will be able to chime in with a solution.
– Leslie
Hi Leslie,
I just found your blog through pinterest and can relate so much to this. I teach intermediate grades, but you know, class etiquette is introduced at the beginning of every year! I have read the Five Languages of Love and use it in my room too! Thanks for mentioning this book because it is worth the read! I will be following you!
Hi Tammy! Thanks for sharing your connection and welcome to KindergartenWorks! Love hearing that you use the book and lessons learned from it. I’m honored that you’d follow me despite our grade level separations. Thanks!
– Leslie
This looks really great and I would really like it, but when I click on the download it gives me an error message. Can you please tell me where I can go to download. I just looove your stuff. Thanks
Hi J.Jones, Thanks so for letting me know how much you appreciate what I make! I think the updated link should work now. Have a great day!
-Leslie
Thank you for the Getting to Know your child sheet. I downloaded it and look forward to sharing with my co-horts.
🙂 Thanks!
It’s amazing how come March we’ve along forgotten how we had to teach the children how to wash their hands properly and how to ask to use the bathroom! You’re so lucky that your school has a round up… I usually meet my students the first day of school. It always works out just fine, but it would be great to have some idea about the incoming students prior to day one… especially when you’re planning lessons for the first week!
You have such great ideas… that’s why I gave you the lovely blog award! Come by my blog to check it out:
http://aturntolearn.blogspot.com/
Ahhhhh….I just finished Round Up Week (You read that correctly. At my school, interested incoming kinders are invited to spend an entire day in my classroom.) Your post is so timely. All weekend, I have been pondering how much my kinders have grown, how independent they are, how proficiently they move through our routines. Thinking of starting all over again is daunting. But I know I will be truly excited when August rolls around!
Thanks for the form; I will definitely be using it.
ReadWriteSing
Great info form! Thanks for sharing. I am now following your blog!
I have to say I LOVE your blog…. I am +1ing you!!
I’d love for you to visit me too :0)
✿~jeannie~
Kindergarten Lifestyle
Kindergarten Lifestyle Facebook Fan Page
I love this! At my school too, its around that time to start tweaking our packets for next year. This will be very helpful, thanks a million!! and thank- you for the book recommendations, I’ve never read them but I am excited too now.
I hope that they can be as helpful to you as they have been to me. I use what I’ve learned in my marriage, knowing myself and with my entire family and in all of my work relationships too!
Thank you soooo much! We are getting ready for Kindergarten registration. I can’t wait to share this with my team and principal.
I am excited to use this! Looks great!
Super addition to my beginning of the year packet.
Tricia
Queen with Class
Just pinned it!
Can not wait to use this form next year….so would have helped me out this year. Thanks so much for sharing…SCORE!!!!
I do something similar with my 4 year old kindergarten class, but not as in depth. I think I am going to tweak yours and mine for next year. Thanks so much for sharing!
I do something similar to this on two forms. I like how organized yours is. Thanks for sharing.
I love the form you shared! I taught K for 7 years and the office collected most of that information, but it wasn’t shared with the teachers. Thanks for sharing it!
Kimberly
Funky First Grade Fun
LOVE, LOVE, LOVE this resource! We are getting ready to host our Kindergarten Round-Up program in April and have been talking about including something similar. Thank you soooo much for sharing!
Kaitlin
p.s. I apologize in advance if I’m totally overstepping … I noticed that under both the developmental and social skills sections “pretends to read by looking at pictures” appears — wasn’t sure if that was intentional or not:)
What? No, I so didn’t notice. Thanks! I’ll be sure to fix that and you can click the photo again to get the fixed copy. Thank you Kaitlin!
Thank you for this! I am currently a 4th grade teacher but am hoping to move to kindergarten next year. I honestly don’t have a clue what to expect from the kids those first few weeks, but I can’t wait to learn! =)
~Jada
Daisy Days for Learning
Thanks again for such an amazing resource! What a great help you are with all your ideas and items to buy!
I like this document. As a mommy, who has a little one entering kinder this fall it serves as a good reminder of some skills I can work with my child on more and what skills my child already comes into school with.
Very well thought out document. Thanks for sharing!
Oh thank you! I love this idea and it is so much better than the little things we have now. I bought your Parent Handbook also, it is going to help a lot!!!!
Thanks Andrea! I’m so glad you love the handbook!
Thanks for that – I wish I had it 6 wks ago at the start of our school year.
Timing is everything sometimes, isn’t it 😉
This is great! I have one similar, but yours is cuter and has a lot more questions (I don’t have a social skills section). I am definitely sharing this with my team to see if it’s something we could incorporate. I’m at a new school and don’t know how they do new kinder orientation.
Thanks for sharing!
Laura
Kinder Kraziness
Thanks Laura!
Isn’t that funny- I just posted about looking back at how far we have come in kindergarten also! 🙂 I teach struggling readers, so I want to know how much background knowledge about the world in general that they have. I like to just talk to them at first as some come to me very shy and not wanting to verbalize very much.
Lori
Conversations in Literacy
I bet knowing about them helps to draw on conversation! Thanks for commenting Lori!