May 20th-24th

Reading & Writing 
This week we are beginning our last reading unit which is on Amazing Creatures. Our first week's focus is on insects. We read a story today about Beetles and the kiddos came up with some great questions based on things they were wondering about beetles. We talked about some features of non-fiction texts including real photos and the table of contents. We also discussed the vocabulary words insects (creatures with 6 legs and a body that has three parts: head, thorax, abdomen) and interesting (something that gets your attention).

Our letter of the week this week is Z and our word of the week is friend. Students will learn the /ie/ sound on Wednesday and will do a post-test on opinion writing on Thursday. The goal for opinion writing is to express an opinion and to back it up with two reasons why.

Math
This week in math we will focus on "Tiny Tumblers" which is a visual used for drawing the two numbers/groups that are being added together to create a sum. Students will also learn about recognizing tens and ones and will work on writing numbers to 30.

This week I will also be reviewing some concepts that I identified as needing some more practice when assessing students such as 3-D shapes (sphere, cylinder, and cube), counting backwards from 10, and identifying sight words.

May 13th-17th

Reading and Writing
This week we will doing several different writing activities. We will finish our digital butterfly books, label the parts of a butterfly using the Skitch app, and write an opinion piece about whether or not we should release our butterflies. I hope you enjoyed the books we worked on for Mother's Day! On Thursday we will have DIBELS testing school wide to check in with how the kiddo's reading skills have advanced. If you are reading at home, keep it up! Reading with your child and having him or her read to you is so important!!

Students will also learn the /or/ sound this week as in corn. The letter of the week is Y and the word of the week is where. We are almost through the entire alphabet and only have one more letter after this week.

Math
We are continuing to use our pretend grocery store to practice story problems with addition and subtraction. The kiddos are really having fun pretending to shop and writing equations to match what classmates purchase.

Science
I arrived at school this morning to find that all five of our butterflies hatched over the weekend! The kids were very excited to photograph the butterflies with their iPads and to see what they look like. We watched a video about butterflies today so they could see some examples of other types of butterflies, learn about the butterfly body, and see how what it looks like when the butterfly emerges from the chrysalis because they didn't get to witness that with our own butterflies. Later this week, we will release the butterflies outside.

(Photo by Wondi)

The kiddos also have a few butterfly projects to do this week. Today, they colored butterflies to make them symmetrical on both sides and later in the week we will be making a butterfly out of a coffee filter. 

We've learned a few songs about butterflies and one student asked for a copy of the words, so I thought I would post them here.

The Fuzzy Caterpillar

(Tune: Itsy Bitsy Spider)

The fuzzy caterpillar

curled up on a leaf, 

spun her little chrysalis

and then fell fast asleep.

While she was sleeping

she dreamed that she could fly,

and later when she woke up

she was a butterfly!

I'll take a video of the class singing this song and another song and I'll post it. 

May 6th-10th

Reading & Writing
Our letter of the week this week is Q and our word of the week is me. The students will be learning the /ea/ sound as in team on Tuesday. They will continue working on a secret writing project and will label the parts of the butterfly using a photograph on the Skitch app. Students are also continuing to make their own digital book using the app Book Creator to tell about how the caterpillars are changing into butterflies.

Math
We are starting a new math unit that utilizes a pretend grocery store to create story problems. I have a little grocery stand set up with fake fruits and vegetables that the kiddos will use as props to tell story problems about buying food. Today we had two helpers at a time acting as the cashier and the shopper. The shopper chose two types of food to buy and told the rest of the class how many of each he/she was getting. Then the cashier and the rest of the group had to write the addition sentence to go along with the shopper's purchase on their iPads and solve the equation. It is really temping for Kindergartners to use materials like this just to "play," but they did a really great job of following the directions and everyone was engaged in math!

Science
We now have four pupa encased in chrysalises hanging from the top of our cup and one chrysalis that became unattached that is on the bottom. We are eagerly awaiting the arrival of butterflies, but that will probably not happen until next week. The kiddos are very excited to see the changes. It's cool to have creatures right in our classroom! Later this week, the kiddos will do an art project showing the life cycle of the butterfly and the different stages it goes through.

April 29th-May 3rd

Wow! 

I can't believe it's almost May already. 

Soon enough the kiddos will be leaving me to become big First Graders! 

Reminders

• Scholastic Book orders are due next Monday. This will be the last book order of the school year. 
• Spring photos are Thursday May 2nd. Only students who have an order form and payment will have their photos taken. If you are sending an order form with you child, please send me an email to let me know. That way I know to ask for it/check his/her backpack.

Reading/Writing
This week we are finishing up our unit on Plants. Our story this week is called Sunflower house and we will focus on the vocabulary words senses and garden. Our letter of the week is J and our word of the week is with. On Tuesday the kiddos will learn the /ay/ sound. Later in the week we will start working on a super secret writing project that will be revealed next week ;0)

Math
On Wednesday the kiddos will get to do some graphing and adding with jelly beans for some J week fun. We will continue practicing teen numbers by building ten-groups and extras with stamps. The kiddos will also fill in a blank 100 chart to see how many numbers they know between 1 and 100.

Science
It's that time of year...we have butterflies in our room! Well--not quite yet...we have caterpillars! This is one of the most exciting activities we do all year because the kids get to watch the caterpillars change into butterflies with their very own eyes. We will be documenting the changes by photographing our caterpillars with the Ipads. We've also started using a new app called Book Creator to make a book all about Butterflies. I am amazed at how quickly the kiddos learned how to add text, photos, and sound to their books. They are working on writing scientific descriptions of what they see and how the caterpillars are changing. We have also practiced using QR codes and the scan app to access beautiful photos of butterflies from the internet. QR codes are used to ensure that kids are accessing appropriate photos on the internet rather than running the risk they will encounter something they shouldn't see.

April 22nd-26th

Reading

Students are continuing to learn "first grade sounds" during phonics instruction. Because these sounds are more challenging, I introduce one new sound each week rather than several. This helps give a little more time for it to sink in.

Sound we have covered recently
/oo/ zoom to the moon
/ar/ start the car
/c/ city mice on ice (soft c)

This week our sound is
/ou/ shout it out

Our letter of the week is X and our word of the week is look.

This week we are continuing our reading unit on plants. We are in the second week of this unit and the focus this week is on Seeds and Plants. Last week we focused on How Trees Grow. Today our story talked about many different ways seeds can move from place to place such as getting carried by birds, blowing in the wind, or being carried by water. Later this week, the kiddos will get the chance to dissect a seed and see what it looks like inside.

Writing

Our current writing focus in Opinion writing. In this type of writing, the kiddos are expected to state their opinion relating to a particular topic or prompt and then give reasons to explain their opinion. When I was absent last Friday they wrote a piece in response to the question "Do you like to eat vegetables? Why or why not? As they are becoming more and more proficient in writing, spelling is becoming more accurate and we are now working on making sure to put periods at the end of each sentence and to capitalize the first letter of each new sentence. Writing is looking great!

Math

This week we are focusing on measurement. Today we looked at several different tools used to measure (measuring cups/spoons, a ruler, and two different kinds of measuring tape). We talked about how we use particular tools based on what we need to measure. One example I gave was that if I wanted to measure chocolate chips to add to my cookie recipe, I couldn't use a ruler for that. Throughout the week the kiddos will be doing some hands on measuring during math time and we will be using the math vocabulary words long/longer/longest, short/shorter/shortest, tall/taller/tallest.

March 11th-15th

Reminders/Upcoming Events

Starting March 18th Durham will be collecting food for the food backpack program. Ramen noodles, rice, beans, cereal, and cans of corn or green beans will be collected until March 22nd. We appreciate your donations!!

Next Friday will be our Teddy Bear parade. The kiddos have been working hard on their bears and they are ready to show them off! Our parade will begin at 9:30 and we will parade into other classrooms. After the parade I would love to have a special Bear Parade snack and serve some Teddy Grahams. If you would like to contribute a box of Teddy Grahams, please let me know. 

Spring conferences are this Friday! Your child is looking forward to showing off all that he/she has learned this year! Students will be using their iPads to show you some work during the conference and I am requesting that older/younger siblings not touch the iPads. Thanks for your help in honoring our Kinders and all their hard work.

Reading/Writing
Yesterday students completed the writing post assessment for informative writing. Their task was to write about why it is important to read. Informative writing can be quite challenging for students who are still focusing on learning the mechanics of writing and mastering sounds, but they did a great job.

We have been focusing a lot on writing in the past few weeks including some writing jobs about all of the wonderful Mo Willems books we have been reading. I introduced the kiddos to Knuffle Bunny last week during K week and they were big fans. Mo Willems also write stories about Pigeon as well as Gerald & Piggy. We use Socrative to vote for our favorite stories and characters and then analyzed the graph that was created based on our votes. The kiddos also wrote about which story was their favorite and why.

Next week we will begin a unit on weather and the kiddos will do some writing about weather.

Math
We are continuing to practice teen numbers in math. You will get to see how we use our iPad to practice showing ten groups and ones at your conference.

February 11th-15th

Reading & Writing
Students are continuing to work on narrative writing in their journals. Each Monday they write about one thing they did over the weekend. I ask them to include two details and a feeling about what they did. This week we talked about trying out some different words/feelings other than "good" and "fun."

They have also started working on their bear books where they will write about the process of sewing their Teddy Bear.

Our reading theme this week was animals and we read a story called Mole and the Baby Bird. Our new vocabulary words this week were habitat and responsibility. In the story, the mole came across a baby bird that had fallen out of its nest. Mole took the bird home to be his pet and put it in cage. Even though Mole was trying hard to take care of the bird, the bird wasn't happy because it couldn't fly. At the end of the story, Mole realized that the bird needed to be able to fly and wasn't able to do that if he was in a cage, so he let the bird go. At first Mole was sad, but then he was happy when he saw how happy the bird was to be free. After reading the story, students talked to their partners about whether or not they thought Mole was responsible to let the bird go.

This week we tried out a new app called Socrative with the help of Mr. Engstrom who works for the district and is available to help me co-teach when we use iPads. Socrative requires students to log into my "classroom" where they can take a quiz that I have prepared. I used this app to administer a quiz to practice spelling words. The great thing about the app is that I receive the student data via email so that I can track how students are doing and what sounds may need more practice.

We also tried out a new app called Scan that uses QR codes, but due to Internet issues, we had some trouble.

Our letter of the week this week was B and our word of the week was what.

Math
A letter was sent home in the Friday folders today that talks about what we are currently working on in math. We have begin unit 3 and are focusing on teen numbers. Students should recognize that when we write teen numbers they all start with a 1. They should also recognize that teen numbers have a group of ten and extra ones. I posted a Teen Number video prior to this post that you can watch. I add a second verse to the song that goes, Come on everybody let's sing it again, numbers in the teens have a group of 10! We've used the Doodle Buddy app as well as some hand motions to practice 11-13 so far.

We also practiced sorting candy hearts by color and graphing how many of each color students had.

Bears
Looking forward to having Amanda, Grammy Deb, Lindsay, and Stephanie next week for help with our Teddy Bears!

Teen Numbers

Super e

February 4th-8th

Reminders/Announcements:

• If you are interested in ordering from the February Scholastic Book Club flyers, please submit your order either online or on the paper order form by Monday the 11th. 
• We have officially started sewing Teddy Bears and the kids are so excited! We are a bit behind, so next week the kids will finish sewing on a heart and two buttons for eyes, and then they will sew their bear from ear to ear. 
• On Thursday, we will have a Valentine Party beginning at 10:00 AM. If your child is doing Valentine cards remember to have them complete a few at a time instead of the whole class at once. That's a lot of writing! Use the list I sent home and include students' numbers on the cards please.
• We are now starting our second round of Star/Co-Star of the Week. If your child was the Star the first time around, he/she will now be the Co-Star and vice versa. Students will still have a chance to do a show and tell, but a family project is replacing the family photo this time around. 

Reading/Writing

This week our letter of the week was E and our word of the week was this. The class was very excited that they are now able to listen to our sight word songs in iTunes on their iPads. We had to practice not singing out loud and dancing around while listening, but they are really enjoying the opportunity to listen to music. The sight word songs are a fantastic way to help them remember how to spell the sight words, which I do expect them to spell correctly in their writing. There are also some Learning with Hip Hop songs on there which I can already tell are going to be favorites.

We started using an app called Popplet this week, which is an app that I am also using for organizing my dissertation data. It's a mind-mapping tool that allows the kids to create webs and organize information visually. We made a Mrs. Toppel Popplet where my name was in the center and they wrote (typed) different things they know about me in the bubbles, which are called Popples, around my name. They also made a Popplet about either pets or zoo animals yesterday when Mrs. Emerson was subbing. They used information from the Baby Animals ABC book we read this week to categorize animals as either pets or zoo animals, then used their category at the center of the popple and the names of the animals in that group around category Popple. Once the kiddos have had a little more practice with the app, I will have them email their work to me so I can forward it to you. 

We are continuing with the theme of animals and learned about many different baby animals with our big book story this week--one animal for every letter of the alphabet! During big book read alouds, I always ask students to talk to their partners in order to have them recall information they learned, make predictions, and have a chance to interact rather than just sitting and listening. Kids love to talk, so I like to respect that and provide them with opportunities to share their ideas during my lessons. The vocabulary words this week were information and parents.

Math

This week we finished up our second unit in math, which focused on 5-groups. I gave the end of unit assessment today and the kids did great. The objectives of the unit were to write numerals 1-10, see and make numbers in 5-groups, and identify and continue a pattern. We also worked a lot on practicing the names of the basic shapes (circle, oval, square, rectangle, triangle) as well as hexagon and trapezoid. Starting Monday, the students will be at tables that are now marked by different shapes. From now on when I call table groups, I will use the name of the shape that is on the tables to help reinforce the shape names. 

Next week we start Unit 3 in our math program, which focuses on teen numbers 11-19. These numbers can be tricky for students, so I have a few fun ideas planned to get them interested and excited about teen numbers. The goals of Unit 3 are for students to find partners of numbers through 6, see teen numbers as tens and ones, and to use = and ≠ to pose and solve addition and subtraction problems. 

January 29th-February 1st

News & Reminders:

• We will be starting our Teddy Bear Project soon! Each student will get to sew his/her very own Teddy Bear. If you would like to send in special buttons to be the eyes on your child's bear, please do so by Wednesday February 6th.
• I already have a few parents who volunteer weekly, but I will need some additional help for the Teddy Bear project. If you are interested in helping please let me know! 
• We will have a Valentine's Day party on Thursday the 14th. I am sending info home about Valentine cards tomorrow in the Friday folders. 
• Report Cards are being sent home tomorrow.

Reading & Writing

Our letter of the week this week is R and our word of the week is for. 

This week we started a new unit on Animals which started with a story called Mama Cat and her Three Kittens. The vocabulary words for our story were compare and actions. We read the big book story that told about what the mama cat and her three kittens did, then we did a silent picture walk to remember all of the actions the cats did. After that, the kiddos talked with their partner to see how many actions they could remember from the story. Finally, they did some writing and completed the sentence "Cats can ____."

I introduced a new app this week called Skitch. We use this app to label pictures/photos in order to practice sounding out and spelling words. I will periodically email you examples of your child's work using this app so you can see the development in his/her spelling.

We have completed our Fast Track Phonics units, so we are now moving on to reinforce some word work skills. We are using various apps to practice spelling words and changing sounds to create new words.

Math
We are continuing to work with 5-groups, but this week we used pennies and 5-groups of pennies instead of the square inch tiles that we typically use. Today the class built the numbers 1-10 using 5-groups and extra pennies. Soon we will be moving on to teen numbers which helps to build the foundation for place value. All of the repetition in math is intended to build number sense and automaticity with basic math facts.

January 14th-18th

Reminders & Info: 

• There is no school on Monday due to MLK day. 
• I will be out next Wednesday because I am attending a workshop for our Digital Learning Collaborative grant.

Reading & Writing:
This week we are finishing up our third unit of Fast Track Phonics with the sounds /y/, /th/, and /x/. Next week I will be assessing students on recalling the sounds and writing the letters for the last 10 lessons we have done. We are continuing to practice sounding out simple words and writing them using the Sketchio app as a way to practice "break it down" which helps with figuring out how to write/spell words.

Our letter of the week is H this week and our sight word is you.

On Monday we read a big book story called Our Special Sweet Potato Pie. We talked about the vocabulary words special and feast. Students practiced retelling the important parts of the stories with their partner using picture clues. With our big book stories, we focus a lot on not just sitting quietly and listening to a story, but stopping to talk about what is happening, make predictions about what will happen next, and make connections between  the story we are reading and other stories we have read before. This type of shared reading is a great way for students to share their ideas and to do more thinking during story time. When I ask questions, I have students answer the questions with their partners because that way everyone gets a chance to talk and say what they think instead of just a few children who raise their hands.

Math:
This week we are spending a lot of time working with shapes. We have been drawing shapes, talking about the characteristics of shapes (how many sides, straight or curved lines) and today we used a new app called Geoboards to create shapes using virtual rubber bands. Most students can identify the basic shapes (circle, oval, square, rectangle, triangle) but we are also working to identify hexagons and trapezoids as well. Those two shapes are now considered "basic" shapes in Kindergarten. Times have changed...

Tomorrow we will work on building 3-D figures (cylinder, sphere, cone, and cube) with playdough. The concept of 3-Dimensional can be tricky so I think the kiddos need to create those figures and hold
them in their hands in order to really understand and learn about what they look like. I'm pretty sure the kiddos are going to be really excited about the play dough!

January 7th-11th

Welcome back and Happy New Year!

Reminders & Info

Next week on January 17th we have DIBELS testing at Durham. DIBELS is our school wide reading assessment that allows us to check in students' progress and to determine which students would benefit from additional reading support. 

Students received their snowmen, which is our January family project. Projects can be turned in anytime next week. The official due date is Tuesday January 22nd. Please let me know if you need any additional supplies for your creation. 

Reading & Writing

This week we started a three week unit on the topic of Food. Our vocabulary words this week were farmer and market. We read a story called Apple Farmer Annie and the kiddos worked on retelling the events of the story using picture cues with a partner. We also read a non-fiction piece on the process of making strawberry jam called From Strawberry Field to Strawberry Jam. We are continuing to work on informative/explanatory writing, so as a pre-writing activity, students used StoryKit to record the steps for making strawberry jam that we learned from the story. We practiced using the words first, next, and 

last. The goals for informative/explanatory writing in Kindergarten are for students to:

• Identify a topic about which they are writing (Dictation or Writing)
• Supply information about the topic (Dictation or Writing)
• Demonstrate proficiency in proper spacing between most words and word placement on lines (Writing)
• Capitalize the first word in a sentence and the pronoun "I" (Writing)
• Write letters for most consonant and short vowel words (Writing)
• Spell simple words phonetically (Writing)

Those are end of the year goals so we are working towards them and focusing on be able to organize and tell information at this point. 

This week we covered the sounds /ch/, /j/, and /v/. We are very close to completing our third unit which means the students are now using their skills to hear a word and "break it down" (or sound it out) in order to write it down. 

Our letter of the week this week is F and our sight word is "play."

Math

We are continuing to practice 5-groups. Our math program includes extensive practice with the intention that students will become proficient in knowing how to separate numbers into a group of five and extras which is building automaticity in basic math facts. Utilizing basic math facts is a necessary math skill that will be used in many grades to come, so, although it may seem like we practice the same thing over and over, it is with purpose. 

We have also been reviewing basic shapes which include circle, square, rectangle, oval, triangle, trapezoid, and hexagon. Today we did another shape picture similar to the tree and snowman that came home before break. These activities involve coloring the shapes according to the directions, cutting out the shapes, and assembling the shapes to create a new image. I modified today's activity a bit in that I didn't model for the students how to arrange the shapes once they were cut out. Instead I asked the class to think of a way they could go together and I got some very creative ideas. My original thought was a barn, yet I had students arrange the shapes to make a house, a school, a hotel, a tree house, and a secret fort. 

December 3rd-7th

Reminders/News

Hopefully you all received the info about our Gingerbread House Decorating party which will take place on Friday December 21st starting at 9:30. Please send in the item you were assigned to by December 14th. If you are in charge of icing, please send that in the day of the party (in the morning so it can be portioned out and ready when the party starts). If you are unable to provide the item you were assigned please let me know asap.

Family Tradition collages are due Monday December 10th.

Scholastic Book Club orders were due today. If you'd like to order and have not done so already please have your order submitted online by the end of the day today. I will submit it tomorrow.

We welcomed a new student to our class today. His name is Reimundo. And sadly, our friend Xander and his family moved to Germany so last Thursday was his last day with us.

This week in class....

Reading/Writing
We are finishing up our second Fast Track unit which means I will be assessing the students at the end of the week to check in on their progress. We will be covering the /ng/ sound this week and that can be a tricky one, so I will spend more time on that sound than I do with other letter sounds.

We are starting a 3 week study of transportation. Today we read a big book story called The Bus For Us. While listening to the story students made predictions using the clues in the illustrations and then when the story was over they talked with their partners to see how many different vehicles from the story they could recall and what those different vehicles do. Our vocabulary words this week are transportation and vehicle. The new Common Core State Standards that Oregon has adopted place a lot of emphasis on reading non-fiction texts and responding to questions that require students to use information found in the text. We are also starting a unit on informational/non-fiction writing which will be informed by the information we learn in the stories we read. Students will still be writing in a narrative style for "Weekend News" on Monday mornings, but they will also be learning how to write in a way that explains or gives information about our topic of study. Later this week they will use the sentence frame A ______ is a vehicle to write about one of the vehicles in the story. The goal is for them to write a topic sentence and then provide two details.

Math
We are focusing on five groups and seeing five groups in the numbers 6-10. We have been practicing some different hand games to get students comfortable and fluent with recognizing the five group and extras in those numbers. Student will also be using their math trays and number tiles as well as a new app called Doodle Buddy to demonstrate how to visually show the numbers 6-10 as a group of five and then extras. Using five groups is a great segue into seeing that quantities can be grouped in different ways and that builds foundational knowledge for addition.

We also started using math stories today. Following my model, students were asked to use some props (napkins, spoons, cups, and "marshmallows" (pom poms)) to tell a math story having to do with eating dinner or having a snack or drinking cocoa. One student in each group told the math story and the other students had to write the equation that goes along with that story on their whiteboard app. We will revisit the concept of math stories throughout the year so that the kids can see that we use math in our everyday lives and practice writing equations based on those stories.

Science
We don't have a lot of time for Science but we have begun talking about tools we use for observation in Science and I have introduced a few hands on science/observation activities during choice time. They were very popular and the kiddos had fun examining objects with magnifying glasses.

November 5th-8th

Thank you for all the hard work you put into the Turkey Family Projects. They look great decorating our bulletin board in the hallway. 

Reminders: There is no school tomorrow, Friday November 9th because it is a teacher workday. We are preparing the progress reports that will go home next week. 

There is no school Monday November 12th because it is Veteran's Day. 

I am still collecting hair conditioner for the hygiene drive

Reading and Writing:

This week we worked on the sounds /b/ and /f/. I introduced a new activity in our letter lessons called "quick erase" in which I write a word on the board and then change one sound a time. For example I might start with sun and say what happens when the /s/ becomes a /b/. Then the kids say bun! Then I'd say okay what happens if the /u/ becomes an /i/ and the kids say bin! It's meant to be a quick practice in sound manipulation and focusing more on listening to the word and what sound will change than actually sounding the words out. I also introduced a new app called I Speak Word Wizard on which we practiced quick erase together. This app has all the letters displayed like a keyboard and we practiced spelling the words and then changing one sound at a time. 

In writing this week we continued working on the narrative stories about the pumpkin patch and when the kiddos finished they did a new story about something they did over the weekend. When writing or dictating I am looking for kids to produce the following:

1. The topic-what they did/where they went

2. Two details about the topic-what happened, who was there etc.

3. A feeling-how they felt about what they did (and more than just "it was fun" which can be a very popular Kindergarten way to end a story)

We have been using StoryKit to practice including these important parts of a narrative and today the kiddos were asked to do the same exercise only this time trying to actually write it out on paper. We started with just writing the topic because at this point it is still hard work for Kinders to sound out all the words and get the topic written down. We are not at the point yet, where they can easily write out their entire story which is why we use StoryKit and dictation as well. This allows me to determine if they know what elements to include in the story and if they can do so in an order that makes sense even though they're not ready to write all of that. As they continue to practice writing they will be able to write more in their stories. 

Math:

This week we finished up our first math unit with a graph predicting who would win the presidential election. We talked about who the main candidates were (names only) and the kiddos drew a picture of who they thought would win. I created a graph Monday after school and on Tuesday we looked at the graph to compare how many votes each candidate got. I gave the first assessment yesterday and overall the results were really good. The only thing that I want to review is shapes as there is still some confusion between triangle, square, and rectangle. Next week we'll do some activities to promote shape recognition. 

Enjoy the long weekend! 

October 29th-November 2nd

Wow! I can't believe it's November already. I realized in posting this that I missed a few weeks of posting, so I apologize and I will fill you in on what we've been up to in the classroom. We had a fun week with our field trip to Baggenstos and our Halloween celebration. I managed to get pictures in the rain at the pumpkin patch which I emailed out, but didn't get any during the business of our Halloween activities. 

Here are a few of Halloween at the Toppel house :)

Reading & Writing
In the past two weeks we have covered the letter/sounds /c/, /k/, /ck/, /u/, and /r/. The kiddos are making great progress in remembering their sounds and many students are already able or starting to be able to sound out words. We have also been practicing the sight words "a," "my," and "see." I've started to do some simple writing activities in class once a week where we being by writing a sentence starter together such as "I like my ..."  or "I am a..." (on Halloween). When I model writing I am showing the class where the letters go on the lines and how we use a "finger space"in between words when we write them. I remind them of the sight word songs we have learned because I expect the children to spell sight words correctly in their writing. I also remind them that a sentence starts with an uppercase letter and ends with a period. Then we write the sight words together (I on my paper and them on their paper). After that, they choose how they want to complete the sentence and try sounding out the word(s) they want to write. This is where the children are using the "break it down" skill to hear the different sounds in the word in order to write down the corresponding letters.

Today we did a pre-writing activity where students were asked to draw a picture of one part of our field trip to the pumpkin patch on Sketchio and then record where we went, two details about what we did there, and then a feeling about the field trip. That activity was done so students could practice retelling a personal narrative which is one of our writing standards. As they become more competent in writing, they will also write words to go along with their dictation. Some students did not finish yet, but if your child finished I forwarded you the email with their story.

Math
We have been continuing to focus on numbers 1-10. In class, do several finger games to show different numbers and we've been using our number cards to practice line em up. We do this in two ways. First, I give out one number card each to a group of students and ask them to line themselves up so their number cards are in order from one to ten. We do this a few times with different groups to practice putting the numbers in order but also to practice teamwork. Then students get their own set of number cards from 1-10 and have to put the numbers in order. Once the cards are in order we do a series of activities to help the children practice identifying, counting out, and arranging tiles to show a specific number as well as comparing different numbers. The extensive focus on numbers 1-10 is to build automatic recognition not only of the numbers themselves but of quantities of those numbers and different amounts that make those numbers when put together.

Science
Before visiting the Pumpkin Patch we read a book called From Seed to Pumpkin to learn about how pumpkins grow and what they look like as they are growing. We are continuing to practice making observations of what we see in the world around us.

Social Studies
We talked a little bit yesterday about the upcoming presidential election and the two main candidates. I read a book called Grace for president which talked a lot about what presidential candidates do, but in the context of a little girl running for class president.

Other Stuff
Thank you to the parents who were able to come with us to the Pumpkin Patch. It's always great to have parents with us and it was great to talk with so many of you last week during conferences.

Our Hygiene drive is starting up. Our class item is hair conditioner, so please contribute some if you can.

Have a great weekend!

October 8th-12th

Reading & Writing
This week we finished up our first section of phonics and then reviewed our first ten letter/sound combinations. Yesterday and today I spent some time assessing the class one child at time so I can determine which letters need a bit more practice before we move on. Today the students did a whole group writing assessment during which I said a sound and they needed to write the letter that corresponds with the sound I said. I just went through and scored those assessments and I was really impressed with the letter formation that I saw. I can tell that practice with the Letter School app has contributed to neat writing!

Our letter of the week was "S" and our sight word was "like." Our country this week was Switzerland and the kiddos learned how to say hello, goodbye, and thank you in German which is one of the languages spoken there.

During small groups this week I introduced a game called the Alphabet Mystery Box. The kiddos had to read into the mystery box and pull out one of the objects. Then they had to identify the initial sound and the letter the item starts with. We had a lot of fun with it!

Math
This week we worked a bit on graphing and comparing numbers. First I introduced what a vertical graph looks with two bars and talked about how we can look at the graph and determine which side shows more and which side shows less. Then I asked the kiddos to create their own graph by asking 7 classmates whether they are five years old or six years old. They had to color a square on their graph for each response and then determine which answer had more responses and which answer had fewer responses. They enjoyed interacting with one another and "interviewing" each other. Today we talked about the words "same" and "different" and the kiddos drew pictures of two things that were the same and two things that were different to demonstrate their understanding of the words.

Coming Up
Monday is the first day of Extended Day Kindergarten. If your child will be participating, a new bus schedule was sent home in his/her Friday folder today.

Next week we will start Science! We don't do Science as often as we do Reading, Writing, and Math, but it's a lot of fun when we do! Our first objective in science is for the kiddos to understand what "science" is and to understand how they can observe the world using their senses. On Thursday, they will make observations about pumpkins and use StoryKit to photograph a real pumpkin and record their observations.

Reminders
Don't forget to save your empty pop cans and water bottles for the Drive By Can Drive.

Please sign and return the permission slip for our field trip to the Pumpkin Patch on October 30th.

Have a great weekend! 

Choice Time

I just wanted to share a few pictures from Choice Time today. It's always a great day when everyone has earned their choice time and gets to enjoy a fun activity of their own choosing.

building with magnets

exploring magnets (attraction and repelling)

initial letter sound recognition game

listening station

counting cakes

coloring

Each week I set out different activities that give the kiddos a variety of options that typically include educational games to practice literacy and math skills, science exploration trays, books on CD with headphones, blocks or magnets for building, markers and paper for coloring. 

Coming Up:

Next week our letter of the week is S and our word of the week is like. We will complete our first series of sound lessons with the letter o on Monday and then I will review our first 10 sounds [m, a, s, d, t, n, p, o, g] and assess the kiddos one on one. In Math we will begin learning about graphing so that we can compare numbers and determine which is bigger/more and which is smaller/less next week and we will also talk about the math words same and different. Additionally, the children will begin to practice number writing, which will be reinforced with Letter School on the iPad because that offers number practice as well as letter practice.

Our Star and Co-Star of the week are Mackenzie and Jena! 

The homework that went home today includes two sheets of math homework. Each sheet is double sided. Please help your child do a little bit of the homework each night instead of attempting it all at once. 

Helpful hint for math homework==> You will often see one side of sheet has an empty box without any directions. The directions are actually on the bottom of the previous page....look carefully! 

Have a great weekend and enjoy the beautiful weather! 

Can Drive

Durham's Drive-By Can Drive will be Wednesday October 24th. Please start collecting your empty pop cans and water bottles because the grade that collects the most cans wins a popcorn party! Wouldn't that be FUN!

Cans will be collected in the parking lot on October 24th at the following times:

before school

after school

5:45-6:15 pm

Please do not send cans/bottles to school prior to that date as I do no have any room in the classroom to store them. 

The money raised by collecting cans will help the Caring Closet buy new shoes and other items for families who need them.

Let's go Kindergarten! Collect those cans and bottles!!

In other news, the Literacy Bags are all ready to go for Friday! I bought some new games and activities and refreshed all the bags so they are new and improved for the kiddos this year. If you have not signed up and would like to--you still can! I have 23 bags which is an entire class set, so everyone is encouraged to participate provided you promised to take super good care of all the books, activities, and materials so everyone can enjoy complete bags with all the materials intact. 

October 1st-5th

 My family and I were off to a wedding in California right after school on Friday and we were away all weekend, so I am catching up from last week and giving a sneak peek into what we'll be doing this week.

Reading & Writing
Last week we did the letter sounds for /d/, /t/, and /i/. Now that the kiddos know a good number of sounds, we are beginning to practice sounding out words. Our phonics program introduces one letter at a time for students who are just learning sounds, yet it moves quickly so that children who already know their sounds are still engaged. It offers a lot of opportunities for review for kiddos who need to see and hear the sounds/letter multiple times before they "stick." Review often entails games, coming up with ideas, and sharing/talking with a partner, so there are many skills being practiced besides just the letter sounds. I want the children to be communicating as much as possible and using the words/sounds/letters we learn in context. In an effort to have as many kids engaged as possible, I am trying to move away from having just one child answer or demonstrate in exchange for activities where all kids respond and all kids are asked to share with their partners while I rotate and listen. This week we will cover /n/, /p/, and /o/. After 10 lessons, I will stop and assess students to see if we need to go back and practice any particular sounds before we move on to the next set of 10 lessons.

 We are also continuing to use our iPads to assist with our letter writing practice. I introduced an app called Letter School and it was a huge hit. Letter School is an app for practicing letter and number formation that corrects for letters that are not written properly. The students have learned that we always start our letters from the top so Letter School helps to ensure that is being done. Letter School requires the use of individual headphones, so we started using those last week and the kiddos have been doing a fantastic job using them, taking care of them, and recognizing when it's a time to take them off and listen to directions.

Math
In math the children have been practicing putting their number parade in order and counting out and/or drawing sets of different numbers. We have been creating "scenes" with the Sketchio app that model different numbers which will be made into a book using the app StoryKit. StoryKit is the app I demonstrated at Back to School Night which allows the kiddos to import their pictures from their photo album, record their voice to describe their photo/scene, and then eventually write the words to go along with what they say about their photo/scene. Initially, our math lessons have a slower pace and emphasize follow the directions and using the materials/manipulatives according to the directions. We do a lot of practice with number 1-10 to develop number sense and a deeper understanding of the numbers and their "number partners" which is a precursor to addition. It may seem like it's repetitive, yet our math program emphasizes depth over breadth. "Math Talk" is a huge part of our math curriculum because being able to explain math concept and mathematical thinking is both important and challenging!

Apps We're Using
Sketchio
StoryKit
Line Em Up
Letter School

Other Stuff
We have started our Star of the Week rotation and the kids are getting the hang of listening when a peer is sharing and are beginning to ask questions. Working on recognizing the different between asking a question and telling something about their own life is definitely something that we will talk about and think about when we have our Star of the Week presentations.

Our school Can Drive is beginning. I don't have the exact info with collection dates in front of me, but start saving your empty pop cans and water bottles. The class to collect the most wins a popcorn party! I will post more specific details another day.