Into the Woods...

It was very beautiful in the woods this morning.  Students enjoyed adding to structures built by Mr. D's class as well as searching for signs of animals.  We noticed a large hole in a tree and students predicted that maybe an owl or chipmunk lived in it. 

This afternoon I finished reading the book Scaredy Squirrel  by Melanie Watt which is always a favorite! Thanks to Mr. D we have two more iPads to use in our classroom!  Students will be learning how to access See Saw a digital portfolio app where they will be able to photograph, record and share their work!  Be on the look out for how to access See Saw at home in the coming weeks.  This afternoon you should have also received an e-mail for access to Raz-Kids.  Raz-Kids is an app and computer based program where students are able to read, listen to and record books at their own reading level.  We will be using this in the classroom and you will be able to access at home.  The e-mail will name the teacher as Beth Lane or blane2 who is our librarian in case you are confused by the teacher name. 

Happy Wednesday!

After enjoying some time out in the snow we worked on writing, Mrs. Guilmette visited for Guidance and continued talking about celebrating differences in our unique skin tones and had math stations.  Students worked with Ms. Gunnarsson to continue building number sense through counting and subitizing as we will be moving on to addition and subtraction in the coming weeks.  I worked with students to continue our conversation on volume/capacity.  Students were challenged to use play dough to build a container that would hold 15 beads.  After they completed this challenge tried to build a bowl that would hold as many beads as possible. 

Students have been taking much more ownership of our morning message and have been filling in the blanks with sight words and uppercase letters. 

Exploring Capacity

This morning during Math Stations we worked at our sand and water table with rainbow rice to introduce a new math word capacity. Students learned that capacity is one math word for how much something holds.  Students made predictions about which containers would hold a greater capacity of rainbow rice and then had an opportunity to explore with these materials.

Our book today was Boot and Shoe by Marla Frazee, one of my personal favorites!  We will be looking at this book more closely from the eyes of a writers as Marla Frazee is known for using lines in her books to show motion as well as drawing multiple pictures of the same character to show both motion and different activities.  There continues to be lots of excitement around making, writing, and reading words!  This is such an exciting time of growth in the classroom as students are beginning to read and write more words everyday.  Kindergartners have greatly enjoyed using our brand new table top easel and magnetic letters to support with this work!

Finishing up Weight and Lots of Word Building!

We bagn an illustration study and students are learning to look at books like writers.  Today we looked at the book The Emperor's Egg, which we read last week during Writer's Workshop.  Students noticed that they can tell that it is windy and snowing just by the illustrations because the illustrator Jane Chapman drew the snow in swirls covering the blue pages.  Some students thought that maybe they would try this in their writing if it made sense.

Last week we began reading (and singing!) some of my favorite poems from Maurice Sendak's Chicken Soup with Rice.  As we read the poems together students then work to circle upper case letters and sight words.  The sight words (words readers and writers should know very quickly) we have worked on so far are: I, a, is, the, to, at,  in.  Students are working on recognizing these letters in print and adding them to their writing.  As you read with your child at home be sure to point out these words!   

In Math we are finishing up a unit on Weight.  Today we focused on making a scale balanced or equal and predicting which objects would be heavier or lighter despite some being bigger, or taking up more space. Students used balls of play dough to demonstrate that even if you take one ball of play dough and break it into smaller balls it still weighs the same amount.     

Snow People!

I have been busy yesterday and today with Mid-Year literacy assessments.  I have been able to get to more than half of kindergartners and it is always amazing to see how much growth students have made since the beginning of the year.  If your child mentioned 'another teacher' (our building sub Mrs. K) being in the room the last few days it's because I am pulling students to complete assessments.  Tomorrow should hopefully be more of a 'normal' day as I will not be testing.

We did however get to go out in the Woods this morning before the rain!  It was pretty mild and much of the ice had melted.  Many Kindergarteners enjoyed working together to build snow people!

Happy Monday!

It was a terrific Monday in Kindergarten!  Last Thursday Ms. Gunnarsson and I were able to get A LOT of work done in the classroom.  We spent the afternoon making some small changes to our daily schedule and students seemed to respond well to the changes today.  After outside time and a quick morning meeting we went right into Writer's Workshop.  Students are working on using uppercase letters for the first word in their sentences and lower case letters for everything else (unless it is a name of a person or a special place).

After Writer's Workshop we went right into our new Math Stations.  Everyday students will work in small groups and go to four stations during math: Station 1 is a teacher directed station, Station 2 is a math game on the computer, Station 3 is responding to a word or application problem in Math Journals and Station 4 is a game or activity based on the teacher station.  This week we began working on measurement and today talked about the words equal, lighter and heavier.  At Station 4 students worked with balance scales and noticed that when it is heavier that side goes down and the lighter side goes up, you need to put the same amount of 'stuff' in each side to make it even or equal, and you need to use the same objects on each side to make the scale balanced.  We will continue to work on weight for the rest of this week.  

Our book today was The Emperor's Egg by Martin Jenkins and learned LOTS of interesting facts about penguins.  We discussed how sometimes we read books as readers - to learn more information and sometimes as writers - to get ideas for our their books.  Tomorrow we will be beginning  an illustration study.  Students will look through a pre-selected stack of books and mark illustrations that find especially interesting with a post it.  I will read these books at Reader's Workshop and the next day will focus on a different 'illustration move' that students can try out on their own.  Be on the look out for some fabulous illustrations from Kindergarten writers!

Also - by the end of the week I will have met with all students for Reading Groups.  All students will have a colored book bag with books we have read (I will try and switch these up every two weeks).  These books are also read independently during Reader's Workshop.  Instead of the bags going home nightly, students will bring the bags home over the weekend and can share the books with you!  Students have been very excited to read these books and share with others in the classroom.

Owls Visit the Woods!

Today was a VERY exciting day in Kindergarten!  We enjoyed the snow this morning and even did some sledding outside on the playground.  After snack we were given the chance to visit the woods and met an educator from Shelburne Farms who rescues Owls!  Craig brought 3 different owls: 2 Screech Owls and 1 Barred to visit with us.  We learned that all of these Owls were injured, many by cars, and are not able to be released back into the wild but live very happily in an aviary at Shelburne Farms.  It was a very exciting opportunity that was enjoyed by all.  This afternoon we read the book White Owl, Barn Owl by Nicola Davies and learned more interesting facts about owls.