Kinder News!

It's amazing to see how much the children have grown since the beginning of the year! They are learning more and more each day, and I am excited to see more growth in the weeks ahead! We've been busy during the month of October. Take a peek below to see what we have been up to!

Math
This week will be wrapping up our second math unit. This unit has focused on building confidence with the numbers 0-10. The children have had many opportunities to practice writing numbers, counting collections of objects, comparing numbers, and identifying numbers that are one more or one less than a given number. The students have also been working in their math journals and are beginning to complete these pages more independently. We will take a test on Chapter 2 this week and then begin our next unit on measurement!

Counting and moving spaces around a game board.

Making matches for numbers 0-9.

Reading Workshop
The children have been doing a great job during our first reading workshop lessons of the year. The students were introduced to all of the mentor texts that we will be using during our Launch Unit, and they have been doing a nice job applying the skills they have been learning. During each lesson, the students gather together to learn a new skill or strategy. Then they have time to practice the skill with a partner during our "turn and talk" routines and then on their own during independent reading time.

Mentor Texts for our Launch Unit

Reading Workshop: Distinguishing between a letter, a word, and a sentence.

Using pictures to help us read unknown words. 

Reading Workshop Lesson: Who Am I as a Reader?
These surveys are a great way to help students begin
to understand their interests. We will be using the
information from these surveys to help students select
books for their book boxes for independent reading time.

Our "Comfy Reading Spots" collection of photos is growing! You can send
in a photo or email me a photo of your child's favorite reading spot at home
anytime. We will continue to add to our photo collection all year!

Jolly Phonics

The students continue to do a great job working in their Jolly Phonics notebooks each week. We have been introducing two new "double letter" sounds each week, and we also continue to practice all of the consonant and short vowel sounds. Please continue to practice these sounds at home as well. Having a good grasp of the letter sounds will help boost your child's confidence during both reading and writing tasks.

Writing Workshop

The students are really getting into the swing of our writing workshop routines, and they are gaining more confidence in themselves as writers each week! We continue to follow our four steps during our workshop time--THINK, DRAW, LABEL, WRITE--as we have been working to use pictures and words to communicate our ideas.

Centers
The students worked on a variety of skills during center time including: counting, letter identification, fine motor development, teamwork, and matching. Take a peek at some of our centers in action below!

Building Letters with Legos

Roll and Add Apples to the Apple Tree

Building Letters

Counting, Matching, and Sorting Colored Pom Poms

Zones of Regulation

The children were recently introduced to the Zones of Regulation. We learned that we all have many different feelings and emotions and that these emotions can fall into four different zones. These zones can be compared to traffic signs like the ones below. We talked about how it's okay to have many different feelings, but our goal at school is to try and stay in the "green zone," which is when we're feeling happy and ready to learn! We read the book The Way I Feel and then sorted different emotions into the four zones. We'll continue to practice identifying our emotions, and we'll also learn strategies to help us get back to the green zone when we feel ourselves moving away from green.

LMC
The students have been busy learning many different skills in the LMC!

Learning how to code our "BeeBots" to move in different directions.

Learning how to use a shelf marker to look for a book on the bookshelves.

All About Me
We have had a GREAT time learning all about our kinder friends. Keep reading to learn more about some of our students' favorite things!

In the morning class, we loved learning all about Nicolas. We learned that he loves playing with Legos and his collection of construction and military toys. He also enjoys playing with electronics and games like "Spin the Top." He likes the show PJ Masks and playing with his PJ Mask figurines. Nicolas also likes playing and fishing outdoors and spending time with his family too!

The morning class also loved learning about Jasiel and some of her favorite things! We learned that Jasiel is a big fan of Pete the Cat and Hello Kitty, and she enjoys watching movies like Wreck it Ralph, Spiderman, and The Descendants. She also loves cupcakes, bacon, and bread! Jasiel is very active and enjoys dancing and playing tennis. Her favorite color is pink, and she loves to wear dresses. Beyonce and Bruno Mars are her favorite singers, and she loves to spend time with her family too!

We had fun learning all about Kaia too! We learned that Kaia enjoys swimming and playing outside. She likes to take photos with her digital camera, and she is a big fan of American Girl dolls. She is also a fan of JoJo Siwa, and she likes to wear bows. Kaia enjoys reading and writing, and she also enjoys spending time with her family!

The afternoon class loved learning all about some of our kinder friends too! We learned that Elda enjoys playing soccer, and she likes to play outside. She also enjoys coloring, and her favorite colors are pink, red, and blue. She is a great big sister, and she also loves spending time with her cousins in New York. Elda is also a dancer and enjoys doing ballet and tap dancing!

The afternoon class loved learning all about Alexandra too! We learned that Alexandra is a big Disney fan, and she loved visiting the Magic Kingdom. Alexandra also loves to color and draw, and her favorite colors are pink, orange, and yellow. She loves writing with her electronic pen too!

We also had fun learning all about Lila! Lila enjoys collecting Beanie Boos and playing with her collection of Squishies. She also likes to spend time with her friends and her family, and she is a big Cubs fan! Lila enjoys spending time outdoors and playing with her LOL dolls. She also likes to dress up and wear her favorite jewelry!

Thanks so much for reading! 

Click here for more photos from the month of October.

I will post pictures from Halloween once I collect them all as well!

Have a great week!

Kinder News

We're really in the groove now! Take a peek below to see what we have been up to in kindergarten!

Our goal for our first two math units is to help the students gain an in-depth understanding of the numbers 1-10 as well as the concepts of same and different. Our kindergarten mathematicians are not only learning how to read and write these numbers, they are also practicing how to count different collections of objects and to show different ways to represent a number while using their math words to explain their thinking. Check out our mathematicians in action below!

In this activity, we focused on the numbers 1-5 to create pretend animals. From a two tailed horse to a 3 eyed dinosaur, our kinder friends were very creative!

In this math activity, students had to work together to sort through the different ways to represent the numbers 1-10. They did an amazing job!

This week we are moving into a new phase of our Jolly Phonics instruction. The students have learned all of the sounds for the consonant and short vowel letters. Now we will move onto the double letter sounds. These sounds are more complex and trickier to learn, so we will only be introducing two new sounds each week. Students will only have Jolly Phonics homework the first two days of each week, but the other days during the week would be a good time to keep working on the items in your child's blue book bag as well as the poems in their yellow folder. Reviewing our Jolly Phonics sounds and our kindergarten sight words and reading the mini sight words books and poems will all help strengthen your child's early literacy skills. Thank you so much for your support at home. It truly makes a difference! And be sure to check out Brayden singing our September Song to his family below! So sweet and a great example of our poetry folders in action!

Highlighting sight words in our September Song

We recently kicked off Writing Workshop time in kindergarten! We learned that authors write for many different purposes and for many different audiences. Then we learned about the four steps that we will use all year long as we work to share our ideas with others.

During read aloud time, we have been thinking about kindness and empathy. We have been learning what it means to be a good friend and we are becoming expert "Kindness Spotters!" Excited to see their caring hearts continue to grow!

The students have also been exploring the Seesaw app and getting familiar with the app's new features. Mrs. Goldstein and Mrs. Corley, two of our district technology teachers, came into our classroom to help students complete an activity about their families. Students will continue to use Seesaw throughout the year to post work to their digital portfolios!

Arranging letters in ABC Order on Seesaw

In the LMC, students have been learning how to use Pebble Go--an online researching tool designed specifically for elementary students--to learn about the changing seasons. This week we took a closer look at the season of fall and learned how to use the audio feature on Pebble Go to listen and learn about fall foods, fall sports, and different fall activities. The students also had time to practice plugging in their headphones and how to close out a website when they are finished.

The students have loved learning all about their classmates during our "All About Me" presentations. Here are the first several presentations from the beginning of the year!

Morning Kindergarten

We loved learning all about Shea and her favorite things! We learned that Shea enjoys dancing and spending time outdoors, especially with her family. She is a big fan of JoJo Siwa, and she enjoys playing with her Barbie collection. Shea is also a fan of The Descendants and she loves to read!

The morning class loved learning all about Brayden too! We learned that Brayden likes baseball, and he is a big Cubs fan! He enjoys playing card games like Old Maid and Go Fish, and he also likes to build with Magna Tiles. Brayden enjoys coloring, and his favorite color is red! Brayden also enjoys playing chess and spending time with his family!

Afternoon Kindergarten

In the afternoon class, it was great to learn all about Anaha and learn about some of her favorite things! We learned that Anaha enjoys swimming, and she has been doing a great job moving through the different swimming classes. Anaha is a great big sister and loves spending time with her family. She loves to color and draw, and she has many favorite colors!

We loved learning all about Santi too! We learned that Santi is a big sports fan, and he enjoys playing basketball. He loves to get creative with his Legos, and he also enjoys racing with his cars. Santi also likes to spend time outdoors, especially with his family!

And then it was Noah's turn! It was easy to see that Noah loves spending time with his family in Wisconsin, and it looks like he's a great helper when they're up north too! We also learned that Noah is very creative, and he loves to color and draw, especially with his favorite color pink. Noah also enjoys playing baseball and playing with his collection of toys. He enjoys exploring, and he is a fan of fall too!

We also enjoyed our most recent presentation by Serenity! We learned that Serenity loves to sing and dance, and she also loves to spend time with her family. She enjoys going to Florida with her grandparents, and she is a big fan of Disney too--especially Minnie Mouse! Serenity also enjoys learning and using her calculator to solve math problems! 

Thank you all for reading!

We've been enjoying these fall days.
Looking forward to watching the seasons change
with the students in the weeks ahead!