K-2's Weekly News (Jan. 23-25)

For a short week, we sure were busy in K-2!  Read on to find out what we have been up to!

Math
This week in math we practiced counting by 10's both orally and by writing the numbers in sequence.  For an extra challenge, we also practiced counting on by 10's starting with numbers greater than 10.

We introduced a new math game this week as well called "Top It," or as you may know it--"War."  In this game, each player starts with a set of cards numbered 0-20.  Players flip over one card at a time, and the player with the larger number takes both cards.  The students LOVED playing this game and did a great job identifying the larger number.

In order to build a foundation for adding and subtracting numbers, we used our interactive whiteboard to play a number line game where students had to either hop forward (add) or hop backward (subtract) from a given number.  Take a peek at the picture below to see how we played this game.  We reinforce this concept of "counting on" each morning during our calendar routine when we add one more day to our class number line.  I always ask the students, "How many more hops until we get to the next 10?" The students are so used to our routine by now that they have their hands raised before I can even ask the question!

Literacy/Social Science
This week we wrapped up our animal themed unit in Treasures.  We finished our workbook pages for Unit 5 and sent home a new sight word book.  We also read a sweet story called Mole and Baby Bird about a mole who rescues an abandoned baby bird.  Mole wants to keep the bird and makes a cage so the bird won't fly away.  It isn't until Grandpa takes Mole for a walk up on a high hill where he feels like he could fly that Mole realizes his baby bird is meant to be free.  

We also read two wolf-themed books this week.  The first book we read was called Footprints in the Snow, which was about a wolf who was tired of reading stories about mean and nasty wolves, so he decided to write his own book about a nice and kind wolf.  His story starts out great but quickly goes awry when he starts writing about a plump and tasty duck!! 

The second book we read this week was called Wolf's Coming!  After reading several pages of this book, we stopped when the wolf was about to enter the house, and the students wrote down a prediction of what they thought the wolf was going to do next.  Just about everyone predicted that the wolf was going to eat all the animals in the house.  After writing down our predictions, we continued to read to the end of the story where we found a very surprising twist---a surprise birthday party for Wolf!

After reading a Time for Kids magazine article, we learned that Martin Luther King, Jr. believed that all people should be treated equally and kindly.  We completed an activity together showing different ways children could be kind to one another, and then the students wrote about one way that they could be kind to others.  They did a great job with this writing activity!

At the end of the week, our class joined Mrs. Schellinger's class to watch the movie The Snowman, which is a movie based on a wordless children's book about a boy who builds a snowman that comes to life and takes him on a magical adventure to the North Pole.  This beautifully animated movie has no words, just music and images to tell the story.  The children loved the movie, and they had a great time creating winter scenes of their own!

Hope everyone has a great week!

Thank you for reading!

K-2's Weekly News (Jan. 14-18)

It's official!  This week we reached the half-way point of the school year.  My how time is flying by in kindergarten!  The children are growing so fast and learning so much!

All About Me
It was Owen's turn this week to share a few of his favorite things.  The class loved his Lego box and all of the goodies inside!  The Hershey's chocolate bar and the stuffed "Where's My Water?" alligator were class favorites!  It was also neat to see Owen and his mom featured in a Daily Herald article about an event organized by Legoland where Owen and several other children helped set a Guinness World Record for having the "Largest Toy Construction Lesson" at St. Alexius Medical Center.  Here's a link to the article if you'd like to learn more.  Way to go Owen!!

http://www.dailyherald.com/article/20121126/news/711269829/photos/AR/

Math
This week in math we practiced using our pan balance scale to practice the concept of "leveling."  We placed a tennis ball on one side of the balance scale and then placed counting bears on the other side one by one until the scale was balanced or level.  It was amazing to see how focused the students were during this lesson as they carefully watched the scale after each bear was added!

We also took a closer look at the "teen" numbers this week and looked at how we can break the teen numbers down into a "ten plus some more."  We used a "teen frame" template (see below) to help us visualize these numbers.

Teen Frame for the number 16

We played a new math game called the "Growing Train" game.  Each student received 10 blocks and rolled a die to see how many cars to add to the train.  The train was complete when there were 10 train cars lined up.  The students loved playing this game over and over again, and it was a great way for students to understand and visually see what numbers make a sum of 10.  Check out the Growing Train game below!

Jolly Phonics
We introduced two more sounds this week and spent some time talking about how sometimes two letters work together to make one sound.  We also practiced making the two different sounds for "th."

sh as in "shell"
th as in "this" and "thick"

Literacy
We continued our animal theme this week as we explored more alphabet books and even created an ABC Animal Book of our own.  The children also spent some time writing some clues for our Mystery Animal Book.  Each student chose an animal, wrote down three clues about that animal, and then illustrated and labeled a picture of the animal.  I know this will be a very popular class book!  We also introduced the sight word "play" and read a story called Elmer in the Snow about an elephant who helps some friends stay warm on a chilly day.

Shell Centers

 During science this week, the children had a chance to explore several different learning centers that focused on sorting, identifying, investigating and drawing shells.  Take a peek at our centers below!

Sorting Shells 

Identifying Shells

Drawing and Labeling Shells

Making Shell Imprints 

Painting Beach Scenes 

Drawing Shells

Have a great weekend and thanks for reading!

K-2's Weekly News (Jan. 7-11)

Happy New Year!  I hope everyone's 2013 is off to a TERRIFIC start!  It was great to be back in the classroom again.  I really missed all of my kindergarten kiddos!  We had a busy and productive week as we eased back into our daily routines.

All About Me

This week we learned all about Nikolas and some of his favorite things.  We learned that he loves swimming and collecting shells, and he likes to play games at Chuck E. Cheese.  The class loved his hacky sack, and they especially loved the picture of Nikolas riding in his go kart.  So cool!

Math
This week the students used a set of number cards to practice ordering the numbers 0-20.  They did a great job sequencing and reading these numbers!

We also explored the concept of probability and introduced the terms: impossible, possible, certain, likely, and unlikely.  We read a story called Ducks Don't Wear Socks and identified which events in the story were possible and which were impossible such as---a duck riding a bike, playing a guitar, or wearing underwear!  It was a fun story and a great way to reinforced the concepts of impossible vs. possible.

Jolly Phonics
We jumped right back into Jolly Phonics this week!  We introduced the following sounds:

ch as in "choo-choo"
Yy as in "yogurt"
Xx as in "fox"

This week we introduced the first of our "h-brothers," which include /ch/, /th/, and /sh/.  Learning and recognizing these letter combinations will be helpful when reading and writing new words.  When learning about the letter "y" this week, we talked about how sometimes it is easy to confuse the sound for "y" with the /w/ sound instead of the /y/ sound.  We will continue to review these sounds as well as all the sounds we have learned in class.  Please take time at home to review these sounds as well, especially the trickier sounds with double letters or long vowel sounds.

Writing
The students did a great job writing about what they did over winter vacation.  I loved reading about where they went and what they did over break.  During writer's workshop time, the students continue to practice drawing a picture, labeling their picture, and writing down their ideas.  When writing our sentences, we have been working to start with a capital letter, end with a period, and leave a space between each word.

Animal Unit in Treasures
We began our animal unit in Treasures this week by reading a story about a mama cat and her sleepy kitten named Boris.  We also worked to create a word web about different categories of animals including: farm animals, zoo animals, animals we would find in nature, and animals we might keep as pets.  We also read about cold weather animals in our Time for Kids magazine.  We will continue to add to our web throughout our animal unit.

We created a mini-book about pet care and completed a sorting activity about which animals would make good pets.  We will work on sorting again next week during our shell unit when we try to classify different types of seashells.

Assessments
This week I used our normal small group guided reading time to individually assess the students' reading progress.  I will be finishing up these assessments next week.  All kindergarten students will also be assessed next week on letter names and letter sounds as part of our winter benchmarking period, and sometime over the next two weeks they will also be given two quick math assessments--one for number identification and one for counting given quantities.  The information gathered from each of these assessments helps us to track individual student growth and plan for instruction that targets individual student needs.  Let me know if you have any questions!

Looking forward to another great week in kindergarten!

Hope you enjoy the rest of your weekend.