Our Classroom Calendar & Circle Time

I've been excited to share our classroom calendar with all of you! I created this about a month ago during my break and I'm really happy with how it turned out. I cross referenced several company made calendars and a couple I've seen on blogs (see here and here) and I included a few of my own ideas to come up with our own version that works for us...

Of course there's the basics - the days of the week, months of the year, the seasons and the calendar itself. The number cards for the calendar will be changed monthly to represent a different theme (e.g. October's cards have a pumpkin, November's have a turkey). As to the number cards, I plan on making most of them (because I guess I like to create more work for myself!) using clip art (found on Google or abcteach.com) and a Word template I created. There are, however, some good and free number cards online - see here and here.

One little annoying thing about this calendar is that it's preset with only five rows of weeks, which means if the beginning of the month falls at the end of one of the rows and if it happens to be a long month, as is the case with October, that last day won't actually make it onto the calendar - notice how the 31st is missing? As the month moves along I'll shift the calendar up and remove the first week. Wish I didn't have to do that though.

In order to make note of the current date, I'm using a little key ring that will dangle on the corresponding day's tack. James moves the ring each day. It has a little star and moon on it, perfect for my astronomy loving boy. :)

I'm teaching James about the passage of time and so I created little pockets for each day of the week with 3 place markers, one for 'today', 'tomorrow', and 'yesterday'. We move them each day and review the days and terminology.

We had no need for a "Color (or letter/number/shape) of the Day" type situation since James already knows all of that, but I did create a "Question of the Day" and "Prayer of the Day" pocket. I'm excited about the questions because they've really encouraged James to vocalize his own opinions on things. The questions are things like: 'If you could be any animal, what would you be?' and 'What's your favorite...' As for the prayers, they came from this beautiful little board book given to James by his Godparents.

James is really into the moon and so I created a little section where we can track the phases of the moon. I purchased the cards from Montessori For Everyone. Of course we had to have a weather section. James LOVES going to the window to look outside and determine which weather card(s) match the day. I downloaded the cards from abcteach.com.

Circle Time
This calendar is just one aspect of our circle time. As I mentioned here, we actually have two circle times - one at the beginning of school and one at the end. Our first circle time starts with a greeting and a good morning song, the Pledge of Allegiance (there's a little US flag on top of one of our bookcases) and then we look to the calendar where we discuss the days of the week, the current day, the passage of time, the season and the months of the year and then we'll do a little fingerplay song (to warm up our hands for work). :) I ask him to think of which work he wants to do first and then I dismiss him to roll out his mat and have fun!
During the 2nd circle time we'll sing another song, talk about the phase of the moon, I ask our question of the day (which we both answer), read a story, sing another song and then end with our prayer of the day.
I know it all sounds like a lot, but it takes no more than 10-15 minutes per circle time and it moves along nicely. Most importantly, James enjoys every minute of it!

Songs
A reader asked me which songs we sing during our circle time. We sing a lot of the basic ones you all know (such as, Itsy Bitsy Spider, If You're Happy, Wheels on the Bus, etc.), and I have a tendency to make up songs quite often. :) I also create a set of songs based on whatever theme we're working on. I take the time to search and find these all over the internet (i.e. I have no specific sites to recommend) and I occasionally make them available to you when/if I have the time to create a PDF document.

Here are a few key circle time songs we sing that you might not know...
::Good Morning - I sing this song, but I changed the last verse to say, "Good morning, good morning, it's nice to see you."
::Days of the Week - this version is really nice and has a easy flow to it (I just couldn't get into the Addams Family version!). I did change the end to say, "...and Saturday, then we start again". The original wording makes it sound like there are two Sundays.
::Months of the Year - this version is sung by the same artist as the Days of the Week song.

~Thank you for your comments!~