We are Thankful

I asked the students what they were thankful for today and I was so impressed with their responses I just had to share.

"I am thankful for..."

• all the people in the world.
• all of the teachers.
• all of my friends.
• all of my grandpas.
• all the stuff we do at school.
• the Earth that gives us a place to live and for trees that give us oxygen.
• everything that is in our village.
• our families.
• my brother.
• everything and everyone.

And I am thankful for all of the kindergarten families!  It was so nice to meet with all of you for conferences.  I know this is a busy time of year and I really appreciate the time you took.  Have a wonderful holiday.

This Week in Kindergarten (November 14-18)

Putting an ABC puzzle together in ABC order

This Week in Literacy: (Some things we worked on)

• This week we talked about how all of the strategies we have for reading are like superpowers.  So many concepts have to come together for children to decode and understand what they are reading.
• Readers look at the pictures and really think about what the book is about.  This includes making a movie in our minds about the book.
• Beginning readers point under each word and make sure the number of words said matches the number of words on the page.
• Readers read words we know by heart in a snap.
• Readers look at the first letter in words and get their mouths ready to say that sound.  
• Writers go back into their books to make a good book, great!  We add to the words and the pictures to help the reader read the book.
• Writers leave spaces between words.
• We studied the letters /Z,z/ and /Q,q/ and learned how to write them properly.
• Shared Reading this week was:

Apples,

Pears,

Peaches,

Plums,

Tell me when

your birthday comes.

This Week in Math: (some things we worked on)

Measuring using nonstandard measurement

• Developing and using strategies to find the sum of two dice rolls.
• Creating a graph of dice rolls.
• Making squares, rectangles and triangles using geobands and geoboards.
• Counting by 1s through 50 using different starting points.

This Week in Kindergarten (November 7-10)

Partner Reading

Taking turns as "Drill Leader"
during Fundations letter practice.

Reading in our Shared Reading Binders

This Week in Literacy (some things we worked on)

• We talked a lot about building our reading muscles and stamina by being engaged in our books.  We reviewed strategies for what to do if our minds start to wander.  
• Readers know that pointing helps you focus on the words.
• In writing we talked a lot about making plans for our writing by telling the story across the pages before putting the words down. 
• We can write about things we know about!!!  Students have been writing about: dresses, McDonald's, trucks, getting ready to go outside in snowy weather and so much more!!
• We read and colored a mini-book about Veteran's Day.
• We are almost through the Fundations lowercase alphabet.  This week we studied the formation, name and sound of /v/ and /w/.  
• We also worked on word awareness and ending punctuation of sentences.

This Week in Math (some things we worked on)

• Reading and comparing numbers.  
• Solving addition number stories using linking cubes.
• Recognizing "joining" situations as addition.
• Learning about the plus symbol.
• Creating and describing patterns with pattern blocks.
• Continuing pattern block patterns.
• Constructing a class bar graph of our favorite colors.
• Discussing information presented in a bar graph and answering questions.

Thank you Kindergarten Families for the great items in our Arts and Crafts Basket!!!  You are the best!!!  It was great to see many of you at our Thanksgiving Lunch on Thursday.  

This Week in Kindergarten (October 24-28)

Guest Reader, Ms Jane (my mom) reading a childhood favorite of mine, "Owl at Home"

This Week in Literacy: Some things we worked on.

• Readers can make plans for how to read emergent storybooks with a partner and what to talk about together.  We are using post-its to mark places in books to share with our partners.
• Readers can read emergent storybooks like storytellers.
• Readers point under the words, rather than on top of them.
• Readers notice words they know in text and practice reading those words with ease.
• Writers do their best and keep on going. When writing an unknown word writers: say the word, ask, "what do I hear?", then write it.
• Writers go back and read what they have written to help remember the story.
• Writers make stories come to life by adding what people are saying.

Partner Reading (Sharing a Funny Part in "Green Wilma" by Ted Arnold).

Counting and Comparing Lengths

This Week in Math: Some things we worked on.

• Reading and Writing numbers
• Creating simple graphs of dice rolls
• Comparing the weight of different objects
• Comparing and ordering numbers
• Measuring objects using  objects of uniform length
• Comparing lengths and arranging items by length
• Developing strategies for solving addition and subtraction problems using concrete objects

Reading our shared reading poem of the week to Mrs. Campbell.
I love you, I love you
I love you so well.
If I had a peanut, I'd give you the shell.

Partner Reading

This week we read many books about firefighters and fire safety. We identified which books were fiction and which were nonfiction.  On Friday, we made a special fire truck snack.  Yum!!!  

Website for Students

The following website has age-appropriate literacy activities:

http://www.uen.org/k-2interactives/abc.shtml

It has been said that the lobster ABC game has a lot of advertisements.

This Week in Kindergarten (October 17-21)

Rainbow Writing of Sight Words

This week in Literacy (some things we worked on):

• Determining if a book is fiction or non-fiction and thinking about author's purpose.
• Rainbow Writing...a  new way to practice sight words.
• Talking with each other about parts in books that give us strong feelings.  We practiced growing ideas by starting with, "This part made me feel ...because..."  Saying "because" helps us say more.
• Building our reading muscles by reading long and strong.
• Strategies for staying focused on reading when our minds start to wander.
• Finishing up vowel introduction, with E,e and U,u (We are only using the short sound of the vowels at this point)



Fancy-Up Friday
Adding Color to Books 

• Discussing why illustrators choose to draw the pictures in books the way they do and about color choice.  (Today was "Fancy Up Friday", where students can color the books they made this week)

Shared Reading was:

I Love You Little

I love you little.

I love you big.

I love you like

a little pig.

This Week in Math (some things we worked on):

Building and Reading Patterns

Favorite School Activity Graph

Matching Numerals to the Correct
Number of Objects

• Patterning
• Drawing and solving number stories
• Numeral writing
• Graphing our Favorite School Activity
• Matching numerals and number words with the correct number of objects

Bottle Redemption to Help build a Basket Ball Court at WCS

WCS has partnered with Bootleggers Beverage Warehouse to assist us with raising money to help build a new basketball court on the playground.  When you return your cans/bottles at Bootleggers just let them know you'd like the money to go to WCS.