Weekly News (Nov. 12-16)

All About Me
Check out the beautiful box Olivia brought in this week!  We all enjoyed learning a little more about her.  Can you tell which holiday is her favorite?  You guessed it....Halloween!  Olivia also loves to draw, play with her My Little Ponies, and make crafts.  She loves her dog too!

Math
We continued to work in our number books this week, as we worked on some of our tricky teens!  The students also practiced using their critical thinking skills and had a chance to use our MimioVote system when solving some turkey riddles.  For each riddle, students had to sort through a series of clues and then choose the one turkey that fit all the clues.  Students used individual remotes to select their answers, and then their responses were shown in a graph.

Jolly Phonics
We took a break again this week from Jolly Phonics to review the sounds that have already been introduced, especially the double vowel sounds.  Please continue to take time to review the sounds in your child's notebook.  We will begin introducing new sounds the week we come back after Thanksgiving break.

Literacy
This week we read a funny story called Duck on a Bike about a duck who gets a crazy idea to ride a bike.  He has so much fun riding around the barnyard, that all the other animals decide they want to ride bikes too!  After listening to the story, the students practiced sequencing the events in the story by gluing four scenes from the story in order.  

I met with all students in guided reading groups again this week, and students received new books for their book bags.  Please continue to encourage your child to read the books in their book bags and to practice their sight words as often as you can.  

In honor of Thanksgiving, the students made aromatic poems using the word THANKFUL to write about all the things they are thankful for.  They did such an amazing job with their Thankful poems that we made acrostic poems using our first names too.  Both sets of poems will be on display in the hallway at conferences!

iPads
We introduced a new app on the iPads this week called Montessori Crosswords, which is an interactive app that helps students strengthen their phonics and spelling skills.  It's an engaging and educational app that the children love to play!

Conferences and Thanksgiving
I am really looking forward to meeting with all of you at conferences next week.  I love working with your children each day, and I am so thankful to be their teacher!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Mrs. Hasemeyer, one of our literacy teachers, sharing photos from Plymouth, Massachusetts!

Weekly News (Nov. 5-9)

All About Me
It was Mia's turn this week to share her "Me Box!"  We were so excited to learn that she loves to surf.  How fun!  We also learned that Mia loves to play soccer and sing.  She loves cats too and wishes she could get one!

Math
Our focus in math this week was learning and recognizing the "Tricky Teens."  Learning the numbers 11-19 can be tricky because the pattern isn't as simple as it is once you get into the 20's.  We will spend a lot of time in kindergarten reading, writing, and playing games to reinforce the "Tricky Teens."  When lining up one day this week, we practiced lining up in order from 0-20!


Jolly Phonics
We've been busy learning new sounds this week including the following:

ie as in "tie"
ee as in "feet"
or as in "sport"

Literacy
After assessing all of the students early this week, I was able to squeeze in some time to meet with students in their guided reading groups.  The students were so excited to get a new book for their book bags.  Please have your child read their new book at home.  The children also enjoyed listening to several stories this week including Thanksgiving Day and On the Go as well as several Thanksgiving poems.  We even created acrostic poems of our own that told about all of the things we are thankful for.  The students did an amazing job with this writing activity.  Their poems will be on display in the hallway for parent teacher conferences!

Looking forward to meeting with all of you!

Weekly News (Oct. 29-Nov. 2)

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!
Loved seeing all the kiddos dressed up in their costumes!

All About Me
It was Jessica's week to bring in her "Me Box."  We had a great time learning about her favorite things.  As you can see from her photo, she loves princesses, coloring, singing, and decorating cakes.  I had to ask her if she takes orders.  Her cakes are absolutely beautiful!!!

Math

This week we continued to practice counting and writing our numbers.  We also completed a whole class activity where we created a number board that showed the numbers 1-10 represented by dots.  Looking at numbers in this visual way helped students see that each number is "one more" than the previous number.  Thank you to Owen, one of our Hello Helpers this week, for adding our last dot to make 10!

Jolly Phonics

We took a big leap with our Jolly Phonics sounds this week--we introduced our first long vowel sounds.  The pictures in the students' notebooks this week were FANTASTIC!  Keep up the great work K-2!  We will continue to add new sounds next week.  Please continue to review all the sounds at home that we have learned.  This will help your child with both reading and writing!  The following sounds were introduced this week: 

ai as in "wait"

Jj as in "jiggly jello"

oa as in "goat"

Assessment

You may have noticed that your child may not have come home with a new guided reading book this week.  I have been using our guided reading time to assess students one-on-one for progress reports.  I have a few more quick assessments to give next week, but I'm hoping to resume guided reading groups by the end of next week!  Report cards will be sent home Friday, November 16, and conferences are scheduled for Monday, November 19 and Tuesday, November 20.  Thank you so much for your input and patience with scheduling conference times.  I think my schedule is just about ironed out!  I look forward to meeting with all of you!!

Happy November and thanks for reading!