September 15-19th: New Letters and Picture Day!

 

 

Hello!

It was great to see so many of you at our Parent Orientation. I realize there was a lot of information so please do reach out anytime if a question pops into your head!

We are about to begin our first "full" week of school...I definitely saw some tired children on Friday of this last week so I can imagine next Friday will be even more so (...and a tired teacher, too😆)!

We had a great week learning about the letters t, b, f and their sounds. We are continuing to practice those school routines and expectations for how to learn and listen in a classroom. The children are beginning to remember each others' names better! We have discussed using our number one rule in room 103 "Be KINDergarteners" and showing HEART with each other. The children also learned about appropriate voice levels and about personal space. Here is the book about personal space that you can listen to with your child!

I am encouraging a second snack time in the afternoon during our choice time. I am hoping that this will give the students who are not eating much lunch the opportunity to put something in their bellies! If you'd like, send in an extra snack in your child's snack bag for the afternoon. It might be worth a conversation with your child about which food is for which snack so they do not eat it all in the am- up to you!

The first Scholastic Book Club orders are due on 9/14. I will put the order in late Sunday night to give you all a chance to order (if you want to).

This Week:

The children will...

LANGUAGE ARTS:

• practice the trick word: like
  
  
• learn letters m, n and their sounds

• practice writing and drawing routines
• retell a circle story using props
• learn how to use Lexia on the iPad 
• match upper/lowercase letters
• practice writing our names (with more lower case letters)
• differentiate between the sounds we have learned so far

In Wit and Wisdom- 

We will be completing module 0 (Wild About Books) this week. We will have a "Wild About Books Jungle Jam" on Friday afternoon to celebrate! I will be sure to take pictures💕. I will be sending home all the journal pages from this module as well.

MATH:

• learn and practice counting and writing numbers 0-5
• complete the Into Math "growth measure" assessment
• match quantities to numbers 0-10
• count backwards from 5 (5 Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed activities!)
• navigate Waggle (Into Math app) independently 

SCIENCE:

• explore magnets to celebrate the letter Mm! 

SOCIAL STUDIES:

• we will discuss the word neighborhood (letter n:)

SOCIAL EMOTIONAL: the children will complete the following lessons...

• Second Step lesson #3- following directions
• Social Thinking lesson #4-being part of a group

OUR WEEK:

• Sunday- Scholastic Book Orders are due
• Wednesday- ALICE drill (We handle these drills in a very age appropriate way and, honestly, I do not get into the big "why" we do them. I just address it as a safety drill like a fire drill except without the alarm.)
• Thursday- is our Shaker Lane picture day! Our scheduled time is 9:00 (love that it is before recess:).
• Friday- Wild About Books Jungle Jam (students will decorate a wild animal mask and we will have a dance party! They are invited to wear anything that has a wild animal on it, etc....NOT a have to!:)

Here are some pictures from last week!

coloring a picture that represents the letters we are learning

Cosmic Kids Yoga to end our week

choice time fun!

cooking in the kitchen

 and taking care of the babies

making frog puppets and practicing fine motor skills

acting out feelings with puppets in the 
"Take A Break" space

MATH! We used play dough and squishy frogs to represent numbers, went fishing for numbers then put them in order and did "number rubbing".  

Language Arts: We fed Freddy (the frog) flies that only have pictures of things that start with the letter f, put buttons with pictures of things that start with the letter b into a backpack, put magnet letters in order, sharing books and writing a response to a question from our Wit and Wisdom lesson.

Our First Shaker Lane Community Meeting- we saw Shakey!

drawing our self portrait

RECESS FUN!

This Week and Parent Orientation

 Hello!

I am looking forward to seeing you at the Parent Orientation on Tuesday at 6:25 in room 103. I have lots to share with you about your child's day and come with questions!💖

It has been wonderful getting to know your children. They really are a sweet group of students. As we begin "academics" this week, the children will be practicing how to work independently. This is a process for sure! Any practice at home with having your child do a few more things "on his/her own" would benefit this process. For example, asking your child to pick up some toys or give him/her a challenge to build something independently with blocks/Legos and tell them you will check back in a few minutes to see their progress (but do not do it for them:). 

HERE is a short article with some realistic suggestions on how to build independence in your child.

This week, the students will:

LANGUAGE ARTS-

• focus on the letters t, b, f 
• 

  
  
  
  

here are short videos to show you how we teach the children the proper formation

• learn a new "trick word"= like
• practice writing routines this week and complete directed drawings and representational drawings.
• differentiate between the 3 letter (t, b, f) sounds while playing games and completing activities
• begin Module 0 in our Wit and Wisdom language arts curriculum (the theme is Wild About Books)
  
  
  

MATH-

• represent numbers 0-5 with objects and or pictures
• sequence numbers 0-5
• name numbers 0-5
• count to 10 in a variety of ways (orally as well as dot to dot counting)
• name shapes and recognize shapes in our environment

Social Emotional-

• complete Second Step lesson #2: focusing attention (look for a home link to come home early in the week!)
• practice Social Thinking lesson 1 and 2 (whole body listening and voice levels) 

here are a few videos to watch with your child!

• 
  
• 
  
  
  
• learn more about the components of H.E.A.R.T
• continue to build our classroom community, review classroom rules and learn each others' names
• explore the "take a break" space
• participate in yoga exercises!

This Week-

Tuesday- Back To School Night (adults only) 6:25-7:10

Wednesday- is a 12:20 dismissal

Thursday- Shaker Lane Spirit Day: Littleton Pride (wear Shaker Lane/Littleton colors -blue and yellow, Shakey gear, Littleton gear, etc.)

We had a Kindergarten Community meeting and the students were
introduced to all the K staff.

Our First Days Together

  

Hello!

THANK you all so much for sending in the supplies for our classroom- you are amazing! If you haven't yet, HERE is the general K supplies and HERE is the list specific to our class. Students will need their 1 inch binder by Tuesday and headphones by next Monday (9/8).

I am really enjoying getting to know your children! We have been busy learning routines and a little about each other. This will continue to be our theme moving into the next few weeks. We read this book and it has been our "motto" the first week! Here it is in video form if you want to listen with your child!

We will discuss classroom rules and the importance of taking care of our classroom and each other while we learn procedures. The children are learning about "Whole Body Listening".

• We will be working with shapes and colors as well as participating in rhyming activities. 

• Please help your child find 5 objects that tell a little about him/her for the "All About Me Bag" that was sent home on Thursday. I am excited to learn more about my students!

• We will learn our first "trick word" (sight words) this week: I. We will also begin our Fundations program (phonics) this week and will start with the letter Tt on Thursday! I like the letters to be a surprise, so please do not tell your child which ones we will be learning about that week until I introduce it! We have a "Mystery Box" with each letter and there is a surprise puppet/prop that helps us to learn about that letter sound.

Here is a short video to help you know how we pronounce and write the letter... we do not say "tuh"!

• If you did not send in a picture of your child for our bulletin board, please try to do so this coming week. Thanks so much!

• Please make every effort to attend our Parent Orientation on Tuesday September 9th at 6:25-7:10 in our classroom. I will cover some really important information that will answer future questions! I will be passing out a few things to take home and I have a short slide show of our first few days together to show you. Reminder: This is for adults only...

• If there is going to be a change in your child's transportation home, please update the "Pick Up Patrol".

• Please send a snack that is easy for your child to open and a water bottle each day. THANK YOU for sending in the quick note in the pouch letting me know that your child wants to order lunch. It literally can just say: "pizza", or "hot lunch", etc... Please make sure the pouch is attached to the outside of the backpack as we do not have time to search each backpack in the morning. If you have things to us in the backpack, just put a short note in the pouch telling us to "check backpack"- THANKS!

We will go over all these procedures on our Parent Orientation night😊.

I regularly post pictures of the children in action. This week, however, I will save the pictures from our first few days/week for the slideshow Tuesday 9/9. Remember, if you do not see your child on the blog, it is probably because I did not get permission from you to post. The permission was on the questionnaire sent in the welcome letter I sent in August. HERE is the link if you need it!

As always, please do not hesitate to contact me with any questions! I know this is A LOT of info, etc...!!! It will get easier, I promise!

ALMOST THERE!

 Hello!

Just a quick note about the "sneak peak" in room 103 on Monday Aug. 25th. It will be at 7:30-7:50 am. When you come, please remember to pick up 2 things to take with you.

1. car rider card

2. Student ID DUCK card (please attach it to the backpack and children need to wear it back and forth, just for the first week of school)

Sometimes the "hype" of starting school can cause some anxiety in children. This is very common, even if they do not express it in words! Sometimes, a parent might see their child act cranky or teary leading up to that first day. Please reassure your child that I will be looking for them on that first day and am super excited to see them! HERE is a link to a list of books about starting school if you are looking for something to read to your child in the next few days. HERE are some books for those children who might be anxious about starting school.

How are YOU feeling about your child starting kindergarten? HERE is something for YOU to read. 😀

Here is a cute video sure to make you smile:)