February 7, 2010
What a fun filled week we had talking about 100! I hope your child shared with you some of the fun activities that went on in the classroom. We are well on our way to being ready for first grade!!
Fern Bluff is having a garage sale on Feb. 13th from 7am-10am in the school cafeteria to benefit the people of Haiti. All proceeds will go to the American Red Cross. The student council is asking you to clean out your closets and donate things for the garage sale. You can drop off your donations to the boxes in the front hallway. A bake sale will also be held on the same day. You can bring your baked good donations to school on Feb. 12th. Student council thanks you in advance for helping people who are in such great need.
Here are a few reminder for the week:
*Wednesday is an early release day. Please remember to pick up your child at 12:45
*Book Orders are due on Wed. the 10th
*Decorated Valentines box and cards are due on Wed. the 10th
*Our class Valentine's Day party will be on Feb. 12th from 11:15-12:15. Parents are welcome!! Please make arrangements for younger siblings.
I want to say a big THANK YOU to all of you who donated supplies for our 100's day activities. Also, thanks to everyone that sent in baby wipes! I so appreciate all of your willingness to help out!
Units of Study this week:
Reading Workshop:
1. Text-to-self connections
2. Media Literacy
Writing Workshop:
1. Word Choice continued: Nouns
2. Introduction to story elements
Phonological Awareness:
1. Word Family: -ake
2. Compound words
Word Wall Word(s):
1. was
Handwriting:
1. Lowercase: p
2. Lowercase: r
3. Lowercase: m
4. Lowercase: n
Mathematics:
1. Estimation
2. Graphing
3. Tallying
Please remember to check your child's backpack for their reading envelope each night. Listen to them read their story and then return it the next school day.
The weathermen weren't very accurate with the daily temperatures last week, so please send a jacket with your child each day. If it is at least 40 degrees and not raining we will go outside for recess and PE on Tuesday and Thursday.
I am looking forward to another fabulous week of fun and learning! As always, let me know if you need anything or have any questions!!
January 31, 2010
My goodness it's cold outside again! Please remember to send your child with a jacket each day. With crazy Texas weather, you never know when you might need one and many of us were cold sitting on the porch waiting to get picked up on Friday.
Can you believe it's February? The time is flying by! We are working so hard to get ready to be first graders. One of the things you will be seeing much more of is your child's reading envelope. Be checking their backpacks everyday. Please spend time listening to your child read their book to you. When they are finished, ask them some questions about what they read. Some of the books they will be bringing home are at their independent reading level. These will be books they should be able to read all by themselves. Other times they will have a book from a guided reading group. This book will be from their instructional reading level and you might see them working harder to decode words and re-reading to make sure what they read makes sense. Some of your children will be bringing home a reader response page to complete after they read their book. This will be in addition to the weekly homework. You can return the reader response page in their book envelope.
Tomorrow begins one of the most fun weeks in kindergarten. It's 100's week! Wednesday is the 100th day of school. We have an entire week of activities planned, however Wednesday is the day we will need all of the requested supplies for our exciting learning activities. If you have not done so, please send in your requested item by Tuesday. This will allow me to take inventory and go out and get what we still need. We will also be eating cake at the end of the day. If your child has a food allergy that will not allow them to eat a piece of cake, please send in an alternate treat for them to enjoy with us.
We will be going to the computer lab on Tuesday, the counselor will visit to talk about friendship on Wednesday and as always, we will go to the library on Thursday. Friday we will be entertained by Lucas Miller the singing zoologist.
We are in need of some classroom supplies. If anyone could pick up some baby wipes while they are doing their weekly grocery shopping that would be great. Just the generic brand is fine.
Units of Study this week:
Reading Workshop:
1. Responding to Literature
Writing Workshop:
1. Word Choice continued: Reviewing verbs and adjectives
2. Sticking to your topic; getting rid of "bed-to-bed" stories
Phonological Awareness:
1. Word Family: -un
2. Manipulating beg. sounds to create new words
3. Reviewing past word families
Word Wall Word(s):
1. at
2. dog
3. cat
Handwriting:
1. Lowercase: y
2. Lowercase: j
3. Writing words and sentences
Mathematics:
1. Using a hundreds chart to count to 100; seeing patterns in numbers
2. Making predictions about contents in jars- 100 or not
3. Using many different objects to count to 100
4. Writing the numbers 1-100
5. Skip counting by 2's, 5's and 10's
Homework this week will be to create a collection of 100 objects. Please make sure it fits in your child's backpack. Some ideas of things that I have seen in past years: matchbox cars, polly pocket accessories, beans, pennies, noodles, buttons, paper clips, barrettes, birthday candles, and pony tail holders. Try to stay away from anything that will roll as the desks in the classroom aren't very level and when we are grouping the objects, it's frustrating when the item won't stay in the designated area. You can send in your child's collection any time this week. You will also see homework for the Valentine's box and cards. This will not need to be turned in until Feb. 10th.
Mark your calendar:
Tues., Feb. 2nd - PTA meeting 7pm cafeteria
Wed., Feb. 10th - Early Release at 12:45
Kindergarten Pre registration for siblings of current registered students
Fri., Feb. 12th - Valentine's Party at 11:15
Enjoy your week. I can't wait to get those Monday morning hugs!!!!!!
January 28, 2010
Just wanted to send out a quick reminder to return the skittles homework tomorrow. We will be spending math time using our individual graph results to create a class graph and I would like everyone to be able to participate. Thanks!
January 24, 2010
Wow! Last week flew by before I realized I had not updated my website. We packed in a whole lot of learning in 4 short days. We moved from the Antarctic ,where the penguins, live to the Arctic, where the polar bears live. We learned about many of the animals that live in the arctic as well as the people. Many knew that the people of the Arctic were called Eskimos, but we also learned the modern day Eskimos would rather be called Inuits.
During Math, we were introduced to the concept of subtraction and worked through some math stories where we used our manipulatives to "take away" some of the group we started with. We will be returning to addition and subtraction later in the year to go deeper into strategy thinking.
During Writing time we began discussing how a writer can make their stories go from good to GREAT by the words they choose. We created a Word Choice chart beginning with vivid verbs and read several examples of books where the author uses verbs. We acted out several of the stories and I believe the students understand that a verb is the action/part they can do in a sentence. We created a Vivid Verb chart as well that we will be referring back to often that will help us replace the good words in our sentences with GREAT words. We worked on the lowercase letters u and i and made words in the -ing word family. We also reviewed syllables and talked about the reading strategy-Does it make sense? While learning about the Arctic, we reviewed ABC order by creating an Arctic Picture Dictionary. We are continuing to talk about the vowels and looked at words to decide if we hear the long or short vowel sound. We finished the week watching An Arctic Tale.
State and district reading assessments are finished. Everyone is doing such a wonderful job reading and I would like to encourage you to continue to read either with or to your child some every night. Don't forget to talk about the story when finished, as being a reader is more than just reading the words on the page, but also understanding what you are reading.
Units of Study this week:
Reading Workshop:
1. Strategy: Reading ahead to the end of the sentence and then rereading to make sure it makes sense
2. Sentence Structure
Writing Workshop:
1. Word Choice continued
2. Adjectives
Phonological Awareness:
1. Rhyming
2. Decoding/Segmenting CVC words
3. Word Family: -ap
Word Wall Word(s):
1. are
2. where
Handwriting:
1. Lowercase: e
2. Lowercase: l
3. Lowercase: k
4. Writing words and sentences
Mathematics:
1. Graphing (picture, bar, tally, pie)
Science / Social Studies:
1. Maps
2. "Birds eye view
Please don't forget to send your child with a jacket each day as they will go out to recess and PE.
That's all for now! I can't wait to see those sweet, smiling faces in the morning!! Have a great week, I know we will!!!
January 11, 2010
The timing of this winter weather is perfect. We will be researching and learning all about Penguins this week. We will visit the library to learn about research and hear Ms. Dalton's presentation on Penguins. We will finish up the week making a brochure full of the information we learned from our research.
We are learning all about our new workstation choices this week. This will be a time during our language arts block where they will be working independently on skill specific tasks. Once the workstations are functioning smoothly, guided reading groups will begin.
Report cards will come home in tomorrows Tuesday folder. The report card copy is yours to keep. Please sign and return the report card envelope and return as soon as possible.
The state and district testing for mid year is underway and I am thrilled with the growth I have seen! As soon as reading levels are updated, independent readers will be coming home. Please check your child's backpack nightly and if you find their reading envelope, please have them read the book to you and then send it back the next day.
The January book orders will also be in the Tuesday folder tomorrow. They will be due on Tuesday, Jan. 19th. Our class earns free books each time you place an order online and it is super easy to do so!
Don't forget that next Monday, Jan. 18th is a school holiday. Enjoy the 3 day weekend!
Units of Study this week:
Reading Workshop:
1. Responding to literature: drawing / writing about books we read continued
2. Connecting with text: text-to-text, text-to-self, text-to-world
3. Introduction to fairytales
Writing Workshop:
1. Organization continued: Titles that grab the reader's attention
2. Writing sentences in order so they make sense when you read them.
3. Moving into new writing journals
Phonological Awareness:
1. Sight word activities
2. Word Family: -ell
Word Wall Word(s):
1. have
Handwriting:
1. Lowercase: t
2. Lowercase: a
3. Lowercase: d
4. Lowercase: g
Mathematics:
1. Introduction to joining sets (addition)
Science / Social Studies:
1. Penguins / Research
2. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Lastly, one of our classmates will be having surgery again the end of this week, this time on his hip. Please keep him and his family in your thoughts.
I hope you have a wonderful week and be prepared to hear all about Penguins!!
January 4, 2010
Happy New Year and Welcome Back!! I can't believe how fast this school year is moving. I hope everyone had a super holiday break. I want to thank all of the parents who coordinated and helped out at our Winter holiday party. It was so much fun! I missed your sweet children and can't wait to see their smiling faces in the morning.
We will be starting off the week going to the computer lab in the morning. Nothing like jumping right in! We will be learning about a program, Tux Paint, and then creating a winter scene. Be looking for those hanging outside the classroom soon! We will also be talking about resolutions and setting personal goals for the rest of the school year. They will be so proud of their progress thus far when we look back in our writing journals to the first few entries. I love to hear them say things like: I didn't write that! and Who wrote in my folder?. We will also go to the library on Thursday, so look for those library books and send in your reading slips!
The district assessment window opens this week so we will be busy with our mid-year reading and phonemic awareness testing. Report cards will be coming home soon!
Units of Study this week:
Reading Workshop:
1. Long and Short Vowels
2. Responding to literature: drawing / writing about books we read
3. Making text to text connections
Writing Workshop:
1. Organization continued: Writing X's on every other line for clearer writing (and room to edit & revise later), 3 part picture plans, checking off your plan
2. Writing a new year's resolution
Phonological Awareness:
1. Blending words
2. Word Family: -ay
Word Wall Word(s):
1. here
2. he
3. she
4. on
Handwriting:
1. Lowercase: s
2. Lowercase: v
3. Lowercase: w
Mathematics:
1. Reading a Calendar
2. Days of the Week
3. Months of the Year
Science / Social Studies:
1. New Year's
2. Season of Winter
Please take the time to switch out your child's OOPS bag of clothes in their backpack to more cold weather appropriate. Also, since we are in the season of winter now, please remember to send your child with a coat/jacket everyday. We will be going outside for recess and Tuesday and Thursdays for PE.
Can't wait to see everyone tomorrow!! Happy 2010!