Week of Dec. 7th-11th

It’s been gingerbread week in our class!  We’ve read lots of great stories, discussed the characters, endings, and refrains.  We also started a journal that will come home next week that will tell you the endings to all the stories we read.

Today we made elves and the class was SO good this morning that Buddy came back this afternoon and brought us a Pete the Cat Christmas book!  So hopefully the fact that he left will make an impression!

In math, we’ve finished addition, although we’ll keep practicing and are not starting subtraction.  We will continue subtraction after break as well.

Coding was awesome!  If your child wants to continue, go to studio.code.org and they will start with one and work their way through.  If they get through the whole first program, have them print the certificate and send it in!

I sent two notes home this week, one about the sumdog contest.  I gave out those log-ins at parent night.  If you need it again, let me know.  I also sent one home about Schlitterbahn reading minutes.  Hang on to them as they’ll be due Feb. 22nd.  This ends up being a really great deal and the minutes are easy to obtain!

Next week, we will get out all the extra crayons and markers and refill everyone’s box.  Please send in the large 1.4 oz. glue sticks if your child brought the small ones.  If they brought small ones, they’re probably out.  If you could send 3 for the rest of the year, that’d be great.  I’ll put post its in blue folders next week if you’re in need of them.

I will be sending LOTS of things home on Friday of next week, so please let me know if your child won’t be here so I can make sure to get it all to you.  Just a reminder that the party next week will be on Thursday at 2:45.  If you have items to send in, those can come to me on Monday.  If you have questions about food at all, please ask so everyone will be included.

Have a great weekend!

 

Week of Nov. 30-Dec. 4th

Happy December!  I can’t hardly believe it’s Dec. already!  We’ve got lots to do and learn in the next few weeks before break!

This week, we read lots of fun holiday stories, retold some of them, and worked on characters, setting, problem and solution.  We added the letter Uu and the sight words is and of.  We have been playing a game with our sight words and playing zap to practice.  I will start testing kids next week.  It’s super important that they’re practicing those at home.  The more they know, the better readers they will be!

We read the Nutcracker and watched parts of the ballet.  I always love it when the boys are mesmerized by it! 🙂  We also compared two gingerbread stories and made a glyph about them.  One part of the glyph was trying gingerbread cake.  I will share my secret recipe as long as you don’t rat me out to the kids (although they probably don’t care!)  I used a Betty Crocker cake mix! I do add a special touch and sprinkle the top with powdered sugar!  It’s a seasonal mix and I can usually find it at Price Chopper.  The majority of the kids really liked it and were thrilled when we had enough leftover for snack time!

In math, we are still practicing our addition facts and I’m testing the kids on putting the numbers 0-20 in order and matching up the 10 frames.  They’re doing a great job on addition and next week, we’ll have some fun with marshmallow math!

Buddy, our classroom elf showed up this week and each day, he’s doing something different.  Every single day, they write about him in their Elf journal.  I’m seeing some GREAT writing these days!  We also made a chart about what “good elf behavior” looks like.  I am now stressing being kind and have told the kids that we are going to start each day with the question, “What can I do to be kind today?”  I’m trying to really point out those kind acts so hopefully everyone catches on!  I did want to share that one day this week, Buddy brought paper chain links to make a chain to decorate the room.  NO ONE knew what a paper chain was!  Boy, did I feel old!  We used to make them all the time as kids!!  I showed them how.  It’s good for fine motor control and they have to use white glue and count to 20 each time while holding a link shut (good counting practice too!)

Next week on Thursday, we are doing an Hour of Code.  We ask that any kids that have Bentwood shirts wear them on that day.  We will have some high school kids from Olathe South coming that day to help the kindergarteners.  If any parents want to come and help too, you’re welcome to, just let me know.

I think that’s it for now.  I hope you have a great weekend!