Happy Halloween!

We had a busy and fun day today in Kindergarten!  Mrs. Guilmette visited for Guidance and talked about ways to get our bodies back to the green "ready to learn" zone.  Some ideas were take deep breaths when our engines are too high or do jumping when our engines are too low.  We painted some silly pumpkins, enjoyed a couple of halloween treats, and watched The Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown this afternoon!  (We also took a silly picture with 'vampire teeth').

A busy Monday

There was a lot of excitement and energy in Kindergarten as students are excited for Halloween tomorrow.  This morning we carved open a pumpkin and talked about what would be inside.  Students helped remove the seeds and the "guts" and then thanks to Mrs. Weishaar we were able to toast the seeds!  Last Friday and today we were lucky to have some of our Kindergarten Grandparents in as Mystery Readers!  Students were excited and surprised by our special guests!

This afternoon for Math station we did some Halloween themed activities - pumpkin fingerprint counting, card games with Halloween themed cards, and an engineering challenge where we used marshmallows and toothpicks to try to build a tall tower!

Knuffle Bunny Inspired Art!

This week we started a really cool art project inspired by Knuffle Bunny by Mo Willems.  I printed out a variety of black and white photographs and like in Knuffle Bunny we added drawings of people or characters to the scenes!  We took it one step further and students used the app Chatterpix Kids to add talking to the characters.  Once all are done it will compiled as a movie but here is a sneak peek of a few completed today!

A busy Tuesday!

Happy Tuesday!  Mrs. Guilmette visited for Guidance this morning and brought her "breathing buddies" to practice big belly breaths.  She has been talking a lot about expected versus unexpected behaviors and strategies for calming our bodies down when we are sad, upset or mad.

I read the book Pumpkin Jack by Will Hubbell and we discussed what it means for something to decay or decompose.  We learned that over times pumpkins will change (get mushy, slimy and 'smaller') and if put in dirt the seeds can grow into a new pumpkin!

There was lots of work with the iPads during literacy and math and some fall tree painting!

We also played a math game that was a BIG hit!  First we arranged number cards in a chart from 1-20 then students closed their eyes and I hide a 'fish' under one of the numbers and students had to call out a number to guess where the fish was hiding.  A fun way to reinforce counting order and numeral identification. 

Marvelous Monday!

It was a busy and productive Monday in Kindergarten!  Thank you to our two Mystery Reader guests for joining and reading to us!  During Writer's Workshop we practiced writing uppercase M and N.  During Reader's Workshop I introduced the Words game on the Osmo.  Students worked together to match the correct letter tile for the initial sound of the picture shown.  During Math stations a group also used the Osmo to match the correct number of dots with the numeral shown on the screen!  It was a lot of fun.

Introducing iPads in the classroom!

On Monday I had 6 iPads delivered to the classroom!  There will be a slow rollout of the iPads over the next couple of weeks.  Three main things we will be using are: Raz Kids for literacy (leveled ebooks that allow students to earn stars for listening and then independently reading the books), Zearn for Math (Zearn Math is based on Eureka / EngageNY Math curriculum we use and creates a personalized learning experience for every student, the tasks get easier or harder based on how the student is performing) and the Osmo (a reflector that connects to the iPad and allows for students to use physical manipulatives - letters, numbers, shapes in conjunction with technology).  More information will be sent home in the coming weeks allowing you to access Raz Kids and Zearn at home on a computer, tablet or phone.  I introduced the Osmo to one math group today.  Students worked to use tangrams - shape pieces, to build the scene shown on the screen.  This required lots of team work and problem solving skills.

Fifth grade joined us in the woods today and our after school director Ms. Rosie and one of the 5th grade teachers Ms. Raudonat were our Mystery Readers.  Pigeon hide behind the clock today.

Where's pigeon!?

Every class has different things that they like which makes me constantly rethink how I do things as a teacher.  This year the class is OBSESSED with Mo Willems.  Two years ago it was Scaredy Squirrel and last year it was the classic Chicken Soup with Rice.  I am slowly expanding my collection of Mo Willems books as we are flying through the books.  We are using Mo Willems as our first author study this year.  Today we talked about how all authors have a different 'craft' that they use.  I showed how Todd Parr uses bright color backgrounds and characters that do not have 'normal' skin tones and then asked what are things that you notice Mo Willems doing?  Honestly, I was shocked how quickly the group picked up this idea of an author's craft.  We started to make a chart of what we SEE and why?

I also hide the pigeon in the classroom this morning like Mo Willems does in his books.  It took a little bit of time for the class to find him!

This afternoon we had our first CAT card celebration.  At CP Smith teachers give out CAT cards to students who are 'caught' being safe, responsible or respectful.  When the class earns 100 we vote on a celebration.  The class chose popcorn and a movie so we watched the Room on the Broom and enjoyed a popcorn snack!

Terrific Tuesday!

We welcomed two Mystery Reader guests again today and it continues to be an exciting time in our classroom!  Thank you again!

Our poem for this week is: 

Pumpkins

I see pumpkins large.

I see pumpkins small.

I see pumpkins short.

I see pumpkins tall.

I see pumpkins orange.

I see pumpkins green.

Just what we need

For fall and Halloween!

We talked about oftentimes the lines in poems repeat and because of that it makes it easy for us to read the poem! Kindergarten was excited that they could read "I see pumpkins" and kept asking to read the poem.

Happy Monday

It was a busy Monday in Kindergarten!  I typically don't post on Friday but wanted to let you know of something new and exciting we do on Friday mornings in Kindergarten this year.  On Fridays we complete Mystery Science lessons.  Mystery Science is an interactive website with three standards based Kindergarten Units: Forces, Machines and Engineering, Weather Conditions Instruments and Seasons, and Plant and Animal Needs.   Right now we are in the middle of the unit on Plant and Animal Needs.

We ended up having 3 Mystery Readers today, which was quite exciting!  Thank you to all of our readers!

There were also a few new literacy stations: letter building with 'wikki sticks,' free painting at the easel and an uppercase letter search!

The 4 R's Reduce, Reuse, Recycle and RESPECT!

WOW what a busy Thursday! We started our morning in the woods where students were invited to use paper and crayons to make bark and/or leaf rubbings.  Students greatly enjoyed seeing how the different textures made different patterns on paper.  After the woods we welcomed our first mystery reader of the day:

After our Mystery Reader left "Recycle Rhonda" from Chittenden Solid Waste joined us and we learned about the 4 R's Reduce, Reuse, Recycle and RESPECT!  Rhonda brought a bag of "trash" and we resorted it into compost, trash, or recycling.  Tomorrow we will think about a goal to help in reducing classroom waste.

Lately we have noticed that the classroom can be pretty loud even if all students are on task.  This afternoon I read the book Decibella and Her 6-Inch Voice  by Julia Cook and we discussed the five voice levels: outside voice, strong speaker, table talk, 6 inch voice and a whisper voice.  We practiced all together and we all decided that math stations were MUCH quieter this afternoon!  We ended the day with another Mystery Reader and a little time outside in the sunshine.  Thanks again for coming to read to us Kindergarten is looking forward to all of our surprise guests!

Wonderful Wednesday

Wednesdays always seem to fly by!  This morning I read the book Rollercoaster by Marla Frazee and we talked about how the whole book was about one little period of time - waiting in line and getting on a rollercoaster.  Students then had time to work on their stories in their writing and drawing books.  To kick off readers workshop I read Why do Leaves Change Colors? by Betsy Maestro and we learned that leaves make sugar that trees live off during the summer but when the weather gets cooler and the sun stays out for less time the trees begin to prepare for winter.  The bright green fades away, the yellow and orange colors - that have always been underneath - begin to show.

I met with the group at Sketch Book center and we looked at some How to Draw some of our favorite book characters: Elephant, Piggie and Pigeon!  It was great fun and the rest of the class was excited to try this out sometime this week.

A Beautiful Tuesday

It was nice to see the sun shining today after a rainy Monday!  This morning we worked on writing an uppercase D using the language from our Handwriting Without Tears Curriculum "big line, big curve." The Curriculum starts with Uppercase letter formation first.  Here is a link to help at home with the language we are using to properly form letters:  Letter Formation

We welcomed another Mystery Reader to the classroom today!  This reader read two book If You Give a Pig a Pancake  and one of Mo Willems 'Elephant and Piggie' books.  Thanks so much for joining us!

After Literacy Stations we took a look at some "How to Draw" Books and discussed how we can use these resources to practice drawing during our Sketch Book station.  Sketching is a great way to build confidence as illustrators and eliminate that feeling of frustration when thinking 'I can't draw that...' during Writer's Workshop.

A very rainy and busy Monday!

We didn't get outside today due to all of the rain but that didn't stop us from having a wonderful Monday!  We welcomed our first "Mystery Reader" today and Kindergarten was so excited and surprised to have a special visitor in our classroom!  Thanks so much for joining us :) we look forward to welcoming all of our Mystery Readers!

To start Writer's Workshop I read the book Matthew and Tilly which not only teaches the lesson that it is normal to sometimes argue with a friend and then apologize and make up but also is a great book for looking at illustrations.  We have been talking a lot about making sure to draw characters that make sense and with proper details - thinking of the person's skin color, hair color, clothing etc. 

During Literacy Stations Kindergarten worked to paint scarecrows based on the book The Little Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything, sorted our classmates name by if they had the letter e or not, and matched lowercase and uppercase letters.