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.
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| We are learning how to form uppercase letters. |
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| We can read and write trick words (high frequency words) quickly. |
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| The morning message provides us with multiple opportunities to apply learned literacy and math knowledge. |
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| We can organize compete sentences to match the morning message. |
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| We can use or kindergarten spelling to create lists. |
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| We made mosaic snowmen and wrote telling sentences to share what our snowmen might do at night. |
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| We can tap, read and write CVC words. |
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| This book inspired us to write about what we could turn a cardboard box into. |
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The children responded used white boards to respond to the question
"What will you do today?" |
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| Winter Art |
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Four Winds
We learned all about three different types of squirrels. |
We are writing How To books in kindergarten. The children are writing to teach How To: Make ice cream, go skiing, plant a garden, make chocolate covered cherries, ride a bike, go fishing, build a snowman, read a book, take care of a pet, be a kindergarten student, ride the school bus, make toast, make paper hearts, and so many more.
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| We are so invested in our writing! It feels good to do our best! |
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| Addition Game |
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| Doubles or Not Doubles Game |
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| Make 5 Addition Game |
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| We are learning to think about numbers that come just before and just after. This helps us add and subtract 1. |
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| We continue to build our understanding of place value when we organize teen numbers into a set of ten and some more. |
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| We are working hard to build our understanding of addition using a variety of materials. |
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| We loved this book so much that we decided to work like the main character in this book and create our own stories out of magazine clippings. |
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HAVE A WONDERFUL WEEKEND WITH
YOUR DELIGHTFUL CHILDREN! |
