Kindergarten Connection ~ December 18th

KINDERGARTEN CONNECTION

Literacy Highlights

This week we talked about the different purposes for reading and writing. We focused on reading informational text to learn about winter weather and animals in the winter. The children were really excited about the opportunity to read a variety of informational books. Remember to check out the nonfiction/informational section the next time you visit the library or bookstore with your child.  

We are reading and writing in kindergarten! During reading groups I noticed children applying all of the reading strategies learned thus far in kindergarten.  The focus this week was on reading with a smooth talking voice, reading bold print and matching our voice inflection with different ending punctuation marks.  We also practiced looking closely at words for little parts that can help us read whole words (office, upside, candy, inside).  Please continue to read with your child for 20-30 minutes everyday.

We are learning how to tap consonant-vowel-consonant (cvc) words on our fingers to isolate individual letter sounds and then blend all three sounds together to read and write cvc words. Ask your child to teach you how to tap the words cat, dog, fun, lip, pot, sit, hot.   

Lists, lists and more lists! We discussed the different types of lists people write to organize their lives and work. We made several class and individual lists. The children said they often see their family members writing grocery, errand and name lists. Ask your child to write your next grocery list ~ I promise you will be impressed with his/her phonetic spelling, handwriting and eagerness to help with a family chore!  

Math Highlights

We are learning how to compose and decompose numbers. Please support your child’s understanding of number relationships by working at home with pennies and other counting objects. Help your child discover all the different combinations to make numbers 1-6 and 1-10 for a challenge. Ask your child to represent addition and subtraction sentences with pictures and/or equations. Most important, encourage your child to explain/justify his/her math thinking. 

We are gearing up for the 100th Day of School which will be in early February.  We have been practicing oral counting by 1’s and 10’s to 100. We continue to work on naming, sequencing and writing numbers 1-30. We are working on “counting on” from a known number/quantity such as ten beans and five more beans 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15 beans all together. We are also learning how to count intervals, compare sets of objects, how to count backwards, and how to identify the number that comes just before and just after a given number.

Thank You Thank you for attending our gingerbread house event! It is always a pleasure to share our classroom with you! Scroll to the very bottom of this post to see your photo. 

Look at these little writes bursting with enthusiasm about sharing their latest narrative pieces.

We are so proud of how far our writing skills have come!

Mrs. Spellman, our CCS literacy specialist, popped in to read our narrative pieces. We know that good writers can read their own work and do their best kindergarten writing so that anyone else can read it. 

We used the iPad app Line'Em Up to practice sequencing numerals using the strategy of locating the numeral that comes just before or just after. This is a great app to add to consider adding to your home iPads.

We are learning all about the weather. We know that there are different types of temperature thermometers. This tool helps us track and prepare for different weather conditions.

Winter is finally here and we need to dress for the cold weather.
We learned that labels are a quick way to share and learn important information. 

This is what we need to wear to be prepared for the recess.

We are beginning and ending sound experts.

December Calendar
This calendar helps us use positional language to describe different locations. The bear is hiding inside, outside, behind, in front of, to the left of, to the right of, and top of the box.

We used pattern blocks to fill the same shape three different ways. We discovered that two triangles make o rhombus, 6 triangles make a hexagon, three triangles make a trapezoid...

Beat You to Ten
This game helped us practice adding, finding the difference and counting on.

Weather Science
We conducted an experiment to observe and label different temperatures.

We can observe weather with our different senses.

We can use temperature words to explain how things feel.

We recored different temperatures in our Science Journals.

Teen Number Game

Busy Authors and Illustrators

Add caption

We read Owl Moon to inspire our latest art pieces.

Torn Paper and Paint

We check our thermometer before heading out to recess.

We used thermometers to measure different temperatures inside and outside of the school.

Look how many sight words we can read in a snap!

We came up with our own telling sentences that included two or more sight words.

"I like" sentences are always popular with kindergarten children.

We are so proud of our writing!

We are working hard to begin sentences with uppercase letters, space between words and add ending punctuation marks.

He's heading to Florida! He said he'd bring a little sunshine back for us.

We learned that doubles are even numbers.

We can represent doubles in different ways.

We can skip count by 2's

We read 10 versions of the gingerbread man story! We sequenced story events and practiced oral story telling.

We worked hard to tell the beginning, middle and end of the story.

Young authors choosing to write when ever they get the chance.

"I went hiking on Pease Mountain."

"I was scared on the first day of school. Then I got a little better because I was in a nice classroom."

A few friends built this pattern block robot during Explore Time.

Thank you so much for coming to our gingerbread house event! 

HAVE A WONDERFUL WEEK WITH YOUR DELIGHTFUL CHILDREN! PEACE!

Kindergarten Connection - December 5th

Finger Print Math
We can represent teen numbers as a group of ten and some more. 

We are beginning to recognize teen numbers with automaticity.

We can respond to writing prompts in complete sentences. We wrote about what we can do on the CCS playground with friends.

We can say words slowly (stretch/sound words out) to help us write independently.

We memorized and recorded our last fall poem. We're excited to learn snow/winter poems in the months to come.

Read and Write the Room
We went on a word hunt and wrote down all the words we can read in a snap. We surprised ourselves by how many words we could read and write!

Word Woman flew in to teach us the word look. We discovered that knowing how to read this word helps us read other words like book, cook, hook, took, shook, and nook.

Literacy in the Home Center
We like to play restaurant in the classroom. We can make menus and take orders. 

We finished learning how to form all of the lowercase letters the kindergarten way!

Mrs. Brady read The Little Engine That Could to help us understand the importance of working hard and not giving up. We call this effort and we know that it feels good to put a lot of effort into our work and play.

We made our November self portraits. We are amazed by how much more detail we're able to add to our pictures as the months go by.

New Weather Science Unit
We are learning all about weather! We observed different types of weather and made a chart of important weather vocabulary.

We have our very own Weather Science Notebooks. We recorded different types of weather on the first page. 

We worked with Ms. Rowntree's Room to investigate different weather and talk about what weather we observe out the classroom window.

We went on another word hunt around the room just for fun!

December Calendar

We wrote almost all of the numbers 1-20

We wish there was real snow in Vermont.

Hour of Code
Mr. Bianci taught us how to work a coding app. 

We collaborated to solve coding problems.

We are weather scientist! We recorded the day's weather in our Science Notebooks.

We are recording the day's weather and working hard to add weather clues to our pictures and use weather words.

We played letter/sound bingo just for fun!