Week of Jan. 26-30

Well, this will have to be short, after all we all turned 100 today and you know it’s exhausting being 100!!  We had a great day today!  Thanks for all the parent volunteers, thanks for sending 100 posters and snacks, and for helping your kids turn into 100 year old kindergarteners.  What fun!  You’ll have to check out our 100 year old selves in the hallway!  Because we had a LONG assembly (which the kids did a great job listening to the choir, band, and orchestra), we are going to have to do our 100 day class book pages on Monday.  The day flew by!

This week, we added the sight words, they and can and the sound of ing.

We have learned ALL kinds of interesting facts about penguins.  We’ve seen interesting videos, read a ton of great expository books, written down facts, labeled, and even made marshmallow penguins!  We got to have some empathy for Emperor penguins when we tried to walk and keep our penguin “egg” on our feet so it would stay alive!  Now we know why penguins waddle!  We also learned new vocabulary words: rookery, chick, molt, oviparous, and regurgitate!  Be sure to have your child tell you what they mean! We also finished our KS books.  Your child should be able to share and read that to you.

In math, we worked on graphing, and number sentences to 12 starting with a base of 10.

Thanks to all who came to Fathers, Facts, and Football night.  We hope you enjoyed playing math games with your child.  If you have any suggestions from the night, feel free to pass them along.  We’re always trying to improve.  We saw a big improvement this year because we split the grade levels up.  So next year, your child can come and play all new games. Thanks to all who brought food to donate this week as well!

I sent home the notes about the Schiltterbahn reading program before I was supposed to…oops!  Hang on to them.  The program starts Feb. 13th and runs through April 24th.  It’s a great way to earn a free ticket to the park.

Please send conference notes back as soon as you can.  I do have a couple people needing to reschedule and I can only do so if others reschedule.  At this point, I have very little wiggle room to move people around.  I’ll try my best, but I have to meet with 24 families, so it’s not really easy.

Kindergarten roundup is Feb. 26th from 1-6 if you have any Kindergarteners headed my way or know of any in the neighborhood.  My K kids will NOT have school that day.

I hope you have a great weekend!  These old bones are headed home now! 🙂

Week of Jan. 20-23

This week, we learned about Martin Luther King Jr., started our Kansas books, and started our penguin unit.  We added the words for and here.  Don’t forget to keep practicing those sight words!!  In math, we’re working on writing all the different numbers sentences to equal up to 10.  Next week, we’ll work on adding 10 to numbers to equal teen numbers.  We’ll be doing LOTS of activities with penguins in the next couple of weeks which will incorporate all areas of our curriculum.  I love when we can use such a high interest topic to practice all of our skills.  We also found a live penguin cam on the Monterey Bay aquarium site.  So we can really see them up close and personal!

On a totally side note, we also started watching the decorah eagle live cam.  In Feb., we learn about presidents and American symbols.  A few years ago, I found the decorah eagle cam and it has been such a HUGE hit with my students and parents.  It’s in Decorah, Iowa and is a live cam on a 5 ft. long eagle nest.  The same parent eagles have returned to this nest for a few years.  The past two years, we were lucky enough to actually see a couple of eaglets hatch.  We turned it on Friday and both parents were in the nest getting it ready.  She doesn’t usually lay the eggs until the middle of Feb. and then they hatch around the middle of March.  The kids absolutely love it and I’ve had many parents thank (and curse) me 🙂 because it really becomes addicting.  But how cool to learn about something and then see real life!  Now, I will warn you, last year, they brought a rabbit up to the nest to eat and that was a little more than I cared to see, but the kids were fascinated.  We talk about how they don’t go to McDonalds, so that’s what they eat!  If you want to watch at home, google decorah eagles and choose the ustream link.  (Can you tell this is one of my favorite things? :))

OK, we have a BUSY week ahead!  Here’s what’s coming up:

Mon. If you haven’t mailed in your Local Option Budget vote, I encourage you to do so.  We can’t afford to lose any more funding for our schools, and it will NOT raise taxes.

Wed., is the first day for Major Savor cards turn in.  This is totally optional and I try not to make too big a deal out of the ones who get prizes.  They go straight to backpacks.

Thurs. is our Fathers, Facts, and Football night for kids and Dads.  RSVP forms were due Friday, but I will still take them until Wed. of next week.  Please let me know yes or no as soon as you can.  And this gets asked every year, NO the Dads don’t have to know anything about football!  It will just be a night to play fun math games with your child with a football theme.  We are also collecting canned and boxed food all week for Harvesters.  Your child can bring it during the week, or that night.  On Thursday, please have your child wear their favorite team shirt, jersey, or cheerleader uniform.

Friday is our 100th day of school so we put penguins on hold for a few days.  I’ve sent several notes home and I have one coming home Monday to give you some suggestions about what they can wear to dress like they’re 100!  It is SUCH a fun day and yes, you may feel free to laugh at me.  I always threaten to pick my own kids up from school on that day.  They’re really kind of mortified that I go out like I do on 100th day! 🙂  (I’ve already forewarned you that to teach K, you have to be a little crazy! 🙂  Please bring 100 pieces of a peanut free snack, that means under the ingredients, it also can NOT say made in a factory with nuts.  If you’re unsure, please ask, or send in the packaging.  100 posters can come in whenever they’re done, but would like them all by Friday.  Reminder that your poster should only have 100 items on it and I am hanging them, so make it light.  I have had kids bring canes in the past, and they can, just remind them that I have the choice to take them away if not used properly!

Conference notes will go home on Friday.  You will have the same time as last conference except for a few people that I had to move for being out of town.  If you absolutely can’t make it, or know you’ll be gone, please let me know asap.  It is really hard to shuffle around 24 families.  I’ll do my best to accommodate everyone, but it’s not always possible.

Thanks to all who asked about Jack this week.  I did put him on the prednisone and Friday afternoon he finally started feeling better.  Now, he has a week’s worth of homework to make up!  Thanks for checking on him.

Looking forward to a fun, busy week!

Week of Jan. 12-16th

I’m headed out to the East girls bball game right after school to watch Hannah’s friend play, so I thought I’d update the blog early.

This week we had LOTS of indoor recess and read lots of snow books.  Sure wish we’d have had some snow too!  We learned what rebus stories are as we read The Jacket I Wear in the Snow and then we made our own jackets and wrote our own rebus stories. We also read The Snowy Day and hopefully you saw the sequencing cards come home and they retold you the story!  We did some opinion writing where they had to choose which of the two books was their favorite and then tell me WHY.  We read a great book called Sneezy the Snowman and learned about what snowmen must NOT do.  You’ll be see a similar class book coming home soon.  Well…some of you will.  As I looked at class books the other day, I realized the turkey books are still making their way around!  Takes awhile with 24 kids!  We added the words that and go this week.  We also wrote about story elements.

In math, we have been working on different ways to write number sentences.  For example, 4 can be 4+0, 3 +1, and 2 +2. We will continue working on this until we hit 10.  We are also reviewing addition and subtraction and playing math games for reinforcement and practice.

At second semester, we feel like the kids have a good idea of the routine and their jobs to do.  This is the point in the year in which I tell parents that it’s time to let them walk themselves to class.  They know where to go and what to do and it’s good to give them the confidence to do it by themselves.  Of course, if it’s a rough morning or you need a quick word with me that’s fine, but for the most part, it’s time to let them go.  Trust me when I say it will be much more difficult on you than it will them.  And trust me when I say, you’ll be fine! 🙂  Thanks for helping your child show some independence.

Tonight is PTA family game night from 6:30-8.  I’m sorry I won’t be there, I’m sure it’ll be tons of fun.  No charge, just come and play bingo and have fun.

Notes went home about Fathers, Facts, and Football and I had quite a few returned today.  If you can NOT come for some reason, please let me know and I won’t send you a bunch of reminder emails to return your slip.  I explained to the kids that if Dad is out of town, they can come with a Grandpa, a friend’s Dad, neighbor, etc. and that if no one else is available, it’s okay for Mom to come with them.  It is NOT a night however for siblings.  Thanks for making other arrangements for them. Please return those notes as soon as possible so we can get a head count.  They are due by next Friday.

100 posters are coming home today.  I would like them completed by the 100th day which is Jan.30th.  They can return them whenever they are finished.  I showed the kids an example (from when my Hannah was in K!) and gave them some ideas.  I’d like them to have 10 groups of 10 on their poster, but I’d like it to be the same object.  For example, some have glued on 10 orange pom pons, 10 yellow pom pons etc.  You can glue anything on that is light as I want to hang them in the hall.  I did tell the kids that they could also draw, but I want it to be bright and colorful.  I want this to be their work, but told them lots of items may need a hot glue gun and parents would need to help with that!  Let me know if you have questions.  The note tells more about our 100th day and I’ll give more details closer to that date.   I wanted to get these to you so that you had plenty of time to work on them.

I also need more help in the afternoon for our 100th day rotations.  Please email me if you can help.  I can’t do it on my own! 🙂  (Don’t make me beg…but I will if I need to! 🙂

Next week, we’ll talk about Martin Luther King Jr. and then we start penguins!  Have a great weekend and enjoy this nice weather..or nicer I should say!

Week of Jan. 6th-9th

Well that was a COLD week!  Thank goodness for gonoodle.com!  They are a kid website with exercise videos, zumba, yoga, you name it!  We’ve been working out at recess!

This week, we added the letters y and q and we’re DONE with letters, meaning they should know all of them AND all the sounds.  We also added the chunks oo, wh, sh, ch, and th.  No new sight words this week, just reviewing.  We did not do reading groups this week, just got back into the swing of things and sorted out who goes where.  Next we’ll be hard at it again!

We read lots of fun snow books this week and had a science lesson on the 3 properties of water, solids, liquids, and gas.  We also made “snow paint” today and made melted snowmen.  I had two great comments this week.  One after watching a short 3 minute video that went with our weekly reader on snow/water.  “Boy, we had a lot of learning in that video! ”  And today after we made snow paint, “you sure have some great Science ideas Mrs. Bettis!”  I loved it, but I did fess up and say it wasn’t MY idea! 🙂  We also practiced our handwriting and wrote a poem about our melting snowman.  In the hall, you’ll see our opinion writing answering the questions, “Do you like winter?”.  We’re working really hard in our writing to get down our ideas, remember capital letters, spaces, and punctuation.  It’s hard work here in kindergarten! 🙂

In math, we reviewed and reviewed subtraction and today took our subtraction test.  Most everyone has it, but practice is still good!  I always offer the opportunity to use manipulatives or else they can draw the problem.  You can tell who has a math brain, when they just “know” the answer.

Everyone that had their folder and their books got new books on Wed.  Don’t forget to write down the titles so that we know you’ve read them.

Get out your calendars!  We’ve got LOTS of things coming up!

Friday Jan. 16th is PTA game night from 6:30-8.  It’s free with paid concessions.  Come and have some fun!

Mon. Jan. 19th  No school

Thursday Jan. 29th is Fathers, Facts, and Football night.  It’s a fun night for Dads and kids to come up and play math games with a football theme.  6:30-7:30.  We will also be doing a canned food drive that night to benefit a local food pantry. This is not a night for siblings, so please make other arrangements, and Moms, don’t worry, you’ll get your Mom/kid night in April!  We will be sending the info. home as soon as it gets back from the printer, but mark your calendars!  If Dad is out of town, Mom or Grandpa can step in!  We will ask for an rsvp as we have a slice of pizza snack that night.

On Thursday, we’ll ask the kids to wear their favorite team jersey or a cheerleading outfit if they’d like!

Friday, Jan. 30th is our 100th day of school if we have no snow days before then.  I will need parent volunteers again to help out with rotations in the afternoon.  Please email me if you can help.  I will send lots more info., but you will get a 100 poster home soon.  I’d like the kids to pick one item and glue on or color 100 items on their poster.  I will be showing them examples.  Please make it light as I hang them up.  I would like those back by the 30th, but they can be sent back anytime before that.

AND, the best part of the 100th day is that everyone comes to school dressed like they’re 100!  Again, one of those days, where you must be partly crazy to teach K and dress like you’re 100!  It’s a ton of fun!  More info. will come closer to that date.

Sat. Jan. 31st is the district Science festival.  We will have a display from our gingerbread science experiment.  Flyers will come home in the next week or so.

Feb. 5th is a spirit day and it’s twin day!

Feb. 6th is a professional day, so no school for kids

Feb. 10th is our Valentine party.  Kids will need to bring a decorated box to put their valentines in.  They need to have a slot big enough to get them in and out.  I ask that you bring valentines for everyone in the class.  I will send a class list closer to that date.  Please do NOT send boxes before the 10th.

Feb. 11th and 12th will be conference days.  I will go with the same time that you had last time.  If you will not be in town, please let me know asap.  Please keep in mind that I am meeting with 24 families in a limited amount of time, so it is very difficult for me to switch times as that affects everyone else.

Feb. 13 and 16th there is no school

Feb. 26th is K roundup for incoming Kindergarteners, so your child will NOT have school that day.  If you have neighbors with 5 year olds ready for K, please let them know it will be that day from 1-6.

I TOLD you there was lots coming up!! 🙂  You can always email me with questions, but I will also make sure I get more details to you as I have them.

I hope you had a great break!  I ended up not going to Dallas, and had a few extra days at home and boy did I get stuff done!!  I was on a roll!  I also enjoyed some great family and relaxing time!  Enjoy your weekend!