April 1st - Newsletter Updates

DATES TO REMEMBER:

-Friday, April 5th—Sophomore Carnival

-Friday, April 12th—No School for Kindergarten

-Monday, April 15th—Delayed Start

-Friday, April 19th—Half Day—Good Friday

-Friday, April 26th—No School for Kindergarten

KINDERGARTEN ROUND UP: 

Just a reminder that this year’s Kindergartners will NOT be coming to school on Friday, April 12th and Friday, April 26th, as we will be holding Kindergarten Round-Up for incoming students:) We apologize for the inconvenience!

DRESSING FOR RECESS: 

It’s that crazy time of year when the temperatures fluctuate significantly from am to pm.  Please continue to send mittens, hats, & warm coats for those cold mornings, as well as a lighter jacket/sweatshirt for later in the day. I will check the temperature before each recess and let them know what they should wear accordingly. Please continue to send boots as well; the playground will be muddy for a while yet and this will help protect your child’s shoes, as well as our classroom carpet that we spend a lot of our day sitting on:) You may also want to continue having your child wear their snow pants in order to keep the mud off of their clothes, depending on how hard they play:)

READING:

This week our class will be reading stories about different kinds of pets and how to care for them. Children will learn about grooming, feeding, walking, and caring for pets. Here are some activities that you can do with your child to help reinforce the skills we will be practicing:

· Vocabulary—responsibility & train—talk about the responsibilities associated with caring for pets, as well as how people train pets.

· Sightwords—they & of—Think of short sentences that include they and of and write them down. Have your child point to each word and read the sentences aloud. Ask them to underline the words of and they.

· Category Words—pets—Play a game of ‘Thumbs Up, Thumbs Down.’ Ask your child to show a thumbs up if what you say is true and to show a thumbs down if what you say is not true. For example: “a dog can be a pet.”

· Phonics—Letters Gg & Ww—Both are tricky letters because G makes 2 sounds and many students think W makes the /d/ sound because of it’s name. They also need to be able to recognize g like this—g

· Comprehension—character, setting, & plot.

WRITING:  

This week we will celebrate the completion of our first small moment story by sharing it via Author’s Chair. We will also begin writing another small moment story—as we work on zooming in and sequencing our stories.

MATH: 

This week we will be playing several games involving addition and subtraction. We will also work on sorting according to various attributes—shape, color, size, & thickness.

SCIENCE & SOCIAL STUDIES: 

This week we will continue learning about Living Things—as we learn the 7 traits of a living thing and discuss their needs.  We will also be reading several books related to Spring and learning about Responsibility at home and at school.

 Please be sure to return your March Book-it

Calendar and your child’s blanket for rest time. :)

March 18th - Newsletter Updates

DATES TO REMEMBER:

-Friday, March 22nd—Pajama & Popcorn Day; Half Day—Dismissal @ 11:35

-March 23-March 31—Spring Break

-Friday, April 5th—Sophomore Carnival

-Friday, April 12th—No School for Kindergarten

-Monday, April 15th—Delayed Start

-Friday, April 19th—No School—Good Friday

-Friday, April 26th—No School for Kindergarten

STUDENT OF THE MONTH:

Our new Student of the Month is Kimberly Rebolledo Garcia. She comes to school each morning with a smile because she LOVES school! Her favorite color is purple and he likes to eat pizza; she enjoys coloring & likes to read books about animals. This year she wants to learn how to tie her shoes, and when she grows up, she wants to be a mom, which she will be GREAT at! Congratulations to Kimberly on being our Student of the Month.

KINDERGARTEN ROUND UP: 

Just a reminder that this year’s Kindergartners will NOT be coming to school on Friday, April 12th and Friday, April 26th as we will be holding Kindergarten Round-Up for incoming students:) We apologize for the inconvenience!

SCIENCE & SOCIAL STUDIES: 

This week we will continue learning about Living Things. We will be observing living things, discussing what we notice, and discovering what they need in order to survive.  We will also be reading some stories related to baby animals to correlate with our Reading.  We will also celebrate the first day of Spring on Wednesday by reading some books related to Spring. Hopefully, Mother Nature will also be in a Spring-like mood and bless us with some Spring weather soon!

READING:

This week our class will be reading stories about baby animals. We will be using words to describe how the appearance and behavior of these animals are alike and different. Here are some activities that you can do with your child to help reinforce the skills we will be practicing:

· Vocabulary—appearance & behavior—discuss the appearance and behavior of a kitten, as well as other baby animals.

· Sightwords—for & have—Write sentences about baby animals using the words for & have. Read the sentences together and have your child circle the sightwords.

· Category Words—animal parts—Play ‘guess the animal.’ Take turns giving clues about an animal’s appearance.

· Phonics—Letter U—We will use Flippy the Dolphin to read words with the short u and long u sound (u with the magic e). We will also use Chunky Monkey to read words with the ug, ut, un, & uck chunks.

· Comprehension—Compare & Contrast—Have your child choose 2 animals and tell ways they are alike and different.

WRITING: 

This week we will finish writing our first small moment story as we practice using our strategies to sound out ‘tricky words,’ conference with a peer, edit, revise, and complete our ‘wow cover.’  We will also wrap up our Nursery Rhyme books which the students are doing a great job with!

MATH: 

This week we will be working on comparing and measuring lengths.  We will introduce subtraction and continue to work on addition & 3D shapes.

Reminders

Just a couple reminders on the icy day . . . .

Don't forget tomorrow - Friday - is Movie Star Day - dress-up in your fanciness and BLING!

Also, tomorrow we will be going down to watch the Irish Dancers from 1:00-2:00; therefore, we will visit the library on Monday afternoon instead!

We've had our share of sickness these past couple of weeks in our classroom - a mixture of fevers, stomach bugs, headaches, sore throats, etc. So please be extra mindful of 'complaints' - The trend has been that they often tell me they don't feel well throughout the day, and then later in the afternoon the fever finally hits. :)  Also, please be sure to make sure your child is fever-free for 24 hours before sending them back to school, this helps tremendously with minimizing the spread of germs:)

Hopefully Spring is on it's way and we can get on to nicer weather and healthy kiddos!!!!

March 11th - Newsletter Updates

DATES TO REMEMBER:

-Friday, March 15th—Move Star Day—wear your bling, boas, hats, ties, sunglasses, etc.

-Friday, March 15th—Irish Dance Assembly

-Friday, March 22nd—Pajama & Popcorn Day - Half Day—Dismissal @ 11:35

-March 23-March 31—Spring Break

READING:

This week our class will be reading stories about different kinds of weather. Your child will be predicting the weather and learning how to describe it. Here are some activities that you can do with your child to help reinforce the skills we will be practicing:

· Vocabulary—predict & weather—look outside with your child and try to predict what the weather will be like later in the day; try to predict the temperature and weather for tomorrow.

· Sightwords—she & was—Keep practicing reading and writing those sightwords at home.

· Category Words—weather words—Print off a blank calendar and each day have your child draw a picture and/or write a word to describe the weather.

· Phonics—Initial Kk, final ck—Help your child find objects that begin with the letter k and end in ck. Make a list of words.

· Comprehension—Key Details in a Sequence—Have your child listen to a story, then put the story’s pictures in order, numbering them 1, 2,& 3. Invite your child to retell the story.

· Reading Folders—Thanks for taking the time to read with your kids at home; as I stated during Pastries with Parents—these books are at their Instructional Level—so they will need encouragement and support with using their strategies:)  I will try to send new books home 2-3 times a week.  Keep up the great reading!!!

WRITING: 

This week we will begin writing our own small moment stories as we zoom in on a true story that happened to us. We will be making sure we have details & feelings, as well as a beginning, middle, & end.

MATH: 

This week we will continue to work on 3D solid shapes, comparing lengths, addition, and building teen numbers. We will also play a sorting game called ‘What’s My Rule?’ and discuss sorting by various attributes. We also have some fun math activities related to St. Patrick’s Day—we will be graphing Skittles & Lucky Charms cereal.

SCIENCE & SOCIAL STUDIES: 

This week we will begin learning about Living Things. We will be observing living things, discussing what we notice, and discovering what they need in order to survive.  We will continue to learn about weather and read several fiction and non-fiction stories about clouds.  We will also be creating our own cloud masterpieces with inspiration from the book It Looked Like Spilt Milk.

  

Please be sure to return your Library book on or before Friday!

March 4th - Newsletter Updates

DATES TO REMEMBER:

-Friday, March 8th—Wear Your Words—wear something with words on it

-Friday, March 15th—Move Star Day—wear your bling, boas, hats, ties, sunglasses, etc.

-Friday, March 22nd—Pajama & Popcorn Day

                           Half Day—Dismissal @ 11:35

PASTRIES WITH PARENTS:

What an AWESOME turnout we had—THANK YOU for taking the time to come in and read with us!!  I absolutely LOVE this time of year when the students get to take home books to read with their parents.  It’s AMAZING to see them blossoming into READERS!!!

READING MONTH: 

Our Theme this year is Lights! Camera! Read! and the genre that Kindergarten will be spotlighting is Nursery Rhymes!  Please send in a flashlight for your child to keep in their book box to read with for the Month of March.  The students will be earning tickets during our Read to Self & Partner Reading times at school.

AND THE PACE QUICKENS:

Report cards are complete and ready to send home on Monday! For those who didn’t have a conference, I’ve included their DIBELS & NWEA results, as well as copies of their classroom assessments. As you look over their report card and assessments, please let me now if you have any questions or concerns.  We’ve established some great routines and foundational skills; now the pace quickens a bit. We will still be adding 2 new sightwords each week, learning a total of 51 sightwords this year; and instead of 1 letter a week, we will be focusing on 2 letters a week. I am beefing up my interventions at school for those students who need some extra practice and support with skills. You can help as well by reviewing these same skills at home. Now that we have many strategies in our toolboxes for reading—you should be seeing your child grow as a reader. I’ll send home take-home reading folders a couple times a week and they can do Raz-Kids at home as well.

READING:

CONTINUING FROM LAST WEEK— our class will be focusing on the 4 seasons and how they are different. We will be reading stories and poems related to the weather in each season.

· Vocabulary—weather & seasons

· Sightwords—is & little

· Category Words—seasons

· Phonics—Letters Bb & Ll

· Beanie Baby Strategies—We will introduce Skippy Frog for Accuracy. Skippy helps us when we come to a word that we just cannot figure out; he reminds us that we can ‘skip’ the word, read on, try to use the context clues to figure it out, and then go back and reread the sentence.

WRITING: 

We’ve completed our pattern book unit and we will begin our next unit of study—Small Moments—by reading several small moments stories and discussing the qualities. This week we will be editing our January/February Journals to bring home to share and we will be reading and writing about Nursery Rhymes.

MATH:  

This week we will measure how tall we are and practice comparing lengths. We will be creating a graph of our pets and analyzing the data.  We will also be hosting a 3D solid shape museum in our classroom on Friday, and ask that each student bring in 2-3 items from home that are either a cone, cube, sphere, cylinder, or rectangular prism. 

SCIENCE & SOCIAL STUDIES: 

This week we will be reviewing the 4 seasons and the weather patterns that come with each season.  In addition, we will begin learning about the Sun and it’s heating effects on Earth.

Please be sure to return your February Book-it Calendar!