Mrs. Scherbak's Kindergarten Class

Classroom News

It was nice to see everyone at conference time and touch base.  I appreciate all the support you are giving to your children in their learning at home. Though this was our last scheduled conference time for this school year, please feel free to contact me at any time should have questions or concerns.

I hope you enjoyed the Kindergarten Expo on Monday.  The kids worked hard learning the songs and movements and spent much time practicing their performance over the past several weeks.  A fabulous performance, and very enthusiastic audience rewarded all their hard work!

Thank you for your continued support in your child’s learning.  It is wonderful to watch your children learn and grow!

Happy spring!

Pam Scherbak

Here are some updates in our classroom:

Reminders

-When your child is buying lunch please remember to discuss their lunch choice with them in the morning before school.  This helps your child to accomplish their morning routine confidently and independently when they arrive at school.

-Monday is library day.  Please remind your child to bring their library book.

-Wednesday is gym day so please remember sneakers. 

English Language Arts

In Language Arts/Reader’s Workshop we have been focusing on story telling.  Story elements and structure have been our lesson topics.  We have been exploring characters, sequence of events, problem and solution within a story, and identifying the beginning, middle and end in a story.

We began this month by finishing up work on our winter books. We were in the middle of reading and writing about The Snowy Day by Ezra jack Keats.  This was perfectly timed (by chance) with our late February snowfall.   Nature gave us an easy, and abrupt, transition into some of our spring books, as we went from snowfall to temps in the 70’s within a week it seems!  The children enjoyed our reading and writing themed around The Napping House by Audrey Wood. Some other books we are focusing on for our Reading and Writing Workshops are Caps For Sale by Esphyr Slobodkina, The Wind Blew by Pat Hutchins, and Like a Windy Day by Frank Asch.   Connecting to our science curriculum (Season of Spring and Animal Babies) we will also be working with Lost in the Woods by Carl Sams and Jean Stoick

Our literature selections springboard us into writing with purpose.  Each of our books has been chosen to exemplify the six traits of writing. We have used these books to understand “what good writers do” when they write, and to apply this knowledge of writing in every day work.

We are learning about the conventions of writing. When illustrating, the children are expected to use 6 or more realistic colors and to add rich details.  We are practicing letter and number formation and practicing using upper case and lower case letters, especially in name writing.  They now know that a sentence always starts with an upper case letter and ends with a period and that there are spaces between word when we read and write.  This is how we know when one word ends and new one has begun.

With our continued focus on our phonics program, the children are becoming increasingly skilled at letter sound correspondence and identifying the individual sounds that make up words.  We are continuously reviewing our short a vowel and are currently focusing on the short i vowel.  We will also be moving on to short o. 

 In our writing across the curriculum, I am delighted to see the children tapping out sounds, hear them saying the sounds out loud as they work, and watch them as they apply this knowledge by writing the sounds down on paper in a meaningful way!

 Math

We continue to work on developing number sense.  We have been focusing on the part-part-whole relationships of numbers.  Using dominoes is a great way to explore this concept as the children are recognizing dot patterns, counting the dots, and comparing them using math vocabulary such as more, less or same to describe relationships between the parts.

Using the books and songs such as Ten Little Monkeys and Ten in a bed, we have also been exploring different ways of partitioning the number 10.  For example, noticing that when there are 2 monkeys on the floor and 8 in the bed, there are still 10 in the room, develops the concept of the many different ways to make 10.  By using a data table to record the action in the story, the children were able to recognize patterns in the data and count back from ten.

In geometry we have been exploring two-dimensional shapes.  The children have been observing, sorting, comparing and describing 2-dimensional shapes.

They have been using shapes in representational form and creating designs with our pattern blocks, which helps them to develop spatial sense.  After creating a unique design with shapes, they will be counting the number of each pattern block used and recording that information in a data table.

Science

With the season of spring upon us, we are observing the changes that occur around us in nature with the change of the season.  Connecting to reading and writing, we created a class book, In Springtime I can see...  As springtime is a time of new life emerging all around us, we have been also been learning about animal babies and animal families. 

Another science topic that continues from last month is an exploration of matter.  The children are able to identify solids, liquids and gases and now we are exploring how the states of matter can change. For example, water is a liquid that changes to a solid when frozen then changes back to liquid when it exposed to heat which causes melting.

Please reinforce these concepts at home by becoming a scientific observer with your child.  Encourage careful and thoughtful observations of the world around us using our 5 senses. Go for nature hikes and search for signs of spring.  Find solids and liquids around your house or outside at play and help you child describe what they see, smell, touch hear, and when appropriate, taste.