It was a short but busy week! We started the week learning about what makes a good leader and characteristics we like to see in leaders. Then we talked about making sure we were doing those same things as leaders in our class. We learned about George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. We also learned about American Symbols. One of the symbols we discussed is the bald eagle. In past years, I have always had the kids watch the Decorah eagles in Iowa, but they moved to a new nest this year so we are watching the ones by Big Bear Lake in CA. Interestingly, they left the nest for hours at a time last week for some unknown reason. There are two eggs but they are “past their due dates”. Scientists are watching to see if that delays the hatching or if they don’t hatch. It’s always a fun learning experience to watch the live animal cams!
Today was hibernation day! We reviewed what hibernating animals do and why. We wrote about whether or not we would choose to hibernate and put ourselves in our own den. We made dens out of our tables and read by flashlight. We foraged for fish for snack and built bear dens out of toothpicks and marshmallows. Then we gave our bears a big bear hug and put them in their den to hibernate until Spring. It was a fun and busy day!
We are working on subtraction and also understanding what the plus and minus signs mean. They need to be able to know what it is and what computation to do.
We added the sight words too and can and reviewed the letters, u, y, v and q.
The little books that come home in color are books they should be able to read. They only contain sight words we’ve gone over and words they can decode (stretch out). They brought Mel and Gus home yesterday after we read it several times together.
We had a lock down ALICE drill and a conversation about what to do if we would have to evacuate the building. We locked down in the bathroom and they did a good job understanding the seriousness of the situation. We will NOT practice an actual evacuation. They have been told to run and hid behind the church to the north of us if we needed to evacuate. We are also having lots of conversations about quiet voices at lunch in case the aides need to hear the walkie at lunch. They had a lot of “what ifs” and when it got to, well what if they got in the locked room and could pick the lock to the bathroom. A lot of answers went through my head, but I told them we do the best we can to stay safe. We practice so we can be smart and prepared and will know what to do.
Next week we will dive into learning factual information about bears and become bear scientists. We will write a research report on all the bears we learn about.
Next THURSDAY March 2nd is Read Across America day. If your child has a favorite Dr. Seuss book or two, have them bring it on that day!
Looking ahead, we will learn about bears, we will have a Teddy Bear day on Wed. March 8th and our bears will come out of hibernation. We’ll do all sorts of investigating with our bears on that day. On Thurs. March 9th, we’ll do some March/St. Pats day activities and then Friday March 10th, we’ll have QU wedding!! The letters Q and U will get married because they have to stay together to make words! We’ll have an actual wedding and reception! Probably my favorite day of the year!! The girls will come dressed as queens and the boys will be quarterbacks!
As we get closer to the end of the year, I will send a note out with all the EOY dates as it tends to be a busy time. We will go on a field trip to the Coterie and Legoland on Fri. April 28th and will need some parent volunteers. I will send more info. home later when we figure out exactly how many people can go.
I hope you have a good weekend! My son is coming home for a visit this weekend and I’m hoping to catch a few moments with him as he travels back and forth to his girlfriend’s house! 🙂 They just get big too dang fast! Enjoy your family this weekend and be sure to ask your child to tell you all about what they learned this week!
bentwoodkindergarten 