Week of 9/25

Dear Parents,

Happy Fall!  In our first days of Fall, we continue with our FOSS science unit on trees.  We are still studying the leaves on trees.  Last week, we collected leaves around campus.  This week, I ask that you and your child go around your yard/neighborhood and collect 5 or so leaves from different trees.  If you can send those in with your child in a plastic baggie (that helps keep them fresh) on Monday, I'd appreciate it.  Additionally, if any of you have trees with a large leaf for leaf rubbings, I'd love to have those, too.  We will be doing leaf rubbings on Thursday.  Finally, we will be talking about things that come from trees this week.  If you have a fruit or nut-bearing tree,  it would be great if your child can bring in an apple, walnut, lemon, etc. from a tree that you may have.  I have not seen any nut allergies listed for our classroom, which is why our room is not nut-free.  However, please let us know if a science lesson involving handling and possibly cracking nuts will be a problem.

We are wrapping up our overview of the alphabet this week, and will begin our weekly study of the letters next week with the letter Ss. The letters do not go in alphabetical order. To help your children in learning the sounds of each letter, we will have an "Alphafriend" that goes along with each letter. Their names are all alliterative, like Sammy Seal, Larry Lion, Mimi Mouse, etc. The children will learn a song for each Alphafriend. They really enjoy these songs and have fun with them. Look forward to hearing your children singing these songs around the house!

We have begun focusing on beginning sounds in our "Daily Phonemic Awareness." We have fun activities where we jump if the two words start with the same sound, etc. You can reinforce this concept at home with similar activities. Riding in the car is a great time to play games like these. Children can respond with a silly word if the two words that you say to them start with the same sound: "Say boo if bunny & boat start the same," etc. It's a fun way to reinforce what's going on at school.

We will start a new math unit this week, "More & Fewer." This is a more challenging topic, where we really delve into the value of numbers and understand their value in relation to other numbers.

This week's share is homemade item. This does not need to be hidden in a bag. The children just bring an item that they made (or mostly made) at home or at preschool or elsewhere. They should be able to tell a bit about how they made it.

We have our first Wacky Wednesday this week on the 28th.  Please bring your child to school at 10:00.  Dismissal is at 1:20.  Holy Cross & Champions have been notified of these days, but you may want to confirm with them that they have it on the calendar.

Remember that Friday is Picture Day. Send in your picture order NO LATER THAN Friday morning, because it is very difficult to order afterward. You are also able to pre-order online by following the directions on the order form, which you received a couple of weeks ago.  If you are not happy with the pictures when they come in, your child can do a retake.

Please send in your child's Red Bag tomorrow, with the homework folder inside the bag. I go through the bags and pull out the homework, so there is no need for it to be separate. Thanks for the great job with that last week!

Please note below: we have set the dates for the Friendship Feast & the Nutcracker performance-- mark you calendars-- you won't want to miss out :)

Upcoming Events:
9/28: First Wacky Wednesday (10:00-1:20)
9/28: Willow Street Pizza Fundraiser
9/30: Picture Day
10/14: No School, Staff Development Day
10/17: Field Trip to See a Play: Wacky Weds. Schedule
10/22: Walk-a-thon
10/26: October's Wacky Wednesday
10/31: Halloween Parade @ 1:15
11/7-11/17: Parent-Teacher Conferences
11/11: No School, Veteran's Day
11/21: Kindergarten Friendship Feast @ 10:15 (a.m.) and 1:30 (p.m.)
11/22: Grandparents' Day @ 10:30 (a.m.) and 11:30 (p.m.)
11/30: November's Wacky Wednesday
12/16: Kindergarten Nutcracker Performance @ 10:00 (a.m.) & 1:30 (p.m.)

Week of 9/18

Dear Parents,
 

We had a great first week of centers & sharing, and hopefully homework is going well, too! Thanks so much to all our center helpers. I appreciate your diligence in coming on time, working with the children, and finding substitutes when you are unable to come. All went very well last week!

 

Remember to send in your child's Blue Bag on Monday, with the homework folder inside. No need to pull the homework folder out and turn it in separately-- I go through all the bags and pull out the homework. You will receive a new book and some new homework again on Wednesday. 

 

This week's sharing is book share. Remember, if you ever forget what the share topic is (or I forget to mention it), it is marked on the calendar on our web page. For book share, I'd like the children to come prepared with a favorite page bookmarked, and to also know the title of the book and a general idea of what it's about. No clues necessary on this one! 

 

We will continue with our math topic on numbers 1-5. I am especially reinforcing the formation of numbers in handwriting. Some of these numbers are quite tricky to make, so watch that your child is starting at the top and going in the right direction. 

 

We will also continue with our overview of the alphabet, plus working on rhyming. Letters Pp through Tt will be covered this week. 

 

I began introducing some of our line strokes last week using Handwriting without Tears, and as mentioned, I also worked individually with each student on his/her name writing. This week, I will begin another component of the Handwriting program called "Sentence School." In sentence school, we will all copy a sentence from the easel and work on handwriting and word spacing, while also reinforcing vocabulary and sight words. We started using "Sentence School" a couple of years ago, and found that it really improved sentence writing. 

 

We began our science unit on Trees & Leaves last week, and the children really enjoyed it. We introduced important vocabulary such as roots, leaves, branches, and trunk. We talked about evergreens and deciduous trees. This week we will begin looking more closely at leaves. 

 

We have our first Spirit Day this week. Spirit Days are decided by Alta Vista's Student Council (4th & 5th graders). They are just fun theme days to show school spirit, and are totally optional. This Wednesday, it is Rainbow Day. Each grade level has been assigned a different color to wear. Kindergartners should wear red on the 21st. 

 

Our next school-wide event is this Thursday, the 22nd-- Family Science Night. It starts at 6:30 p.m. in the cafeteria. This is a fun night that is sponsored by the Children's Discovery Museum. The children have an opportunity to participate in some great hands-on projects with their parents. Come out and enjoy the fun & learning!  

 

Upcoming Events:
9/22: Family Science Night
9/28: First Wacky Wednesday
9/28: Willow Street Pizza Fundraiser
9/30: Picture Day
10/14: No School, Staff Development Day
10/17: Field Trip to See a Play: Wacky Weds. Schedule
10/22: Walk-a-thon
10/31: Halloween Parade @ 1:15

Week of 9/11

Dear Parents,

We've made it to our big week in kindergarten, where we start sharing, centers, and homework!

Just a reminder that homework goes home on Wednesday and is due back on Monday.  The Red Bags are no longer red-- they are blue!!  We got an entire new set of bags (which is great because the other ones were getting worn out and stinky!) so the bag you are looking for on Wednesday is now blue.  It will have a book inside that we'd like you to read a few times.  There is also a homework folder.  On the right side of the folder is the homework packet for the week.  On the left side of the folder are two laminated reference sheets, that stay in the folder all year.  One sheet explains the Red/Blue Bag program, and has a letter formation guide from Handwriting without Tears on the back.  The other sheet has discussion question ideas for when you finish reading the book with your child.  Please keep in mind that the book in the blue bag is not a book that we expect your kindergartner to read alone.  These are to be read to your children.  Also, the books in the program are of different genres and themes.  The idea is to expose your children to different types of literature.  If the book is really not a favorite of your child's, just read it once and move onto other books that your child prefers.  Please try to keep the brand new blue bags in a place where the dog won't eat it, food won't be spilled on it, etc.  We'd like to keep them nice for the future years of kindergartners!

In language arts, we continue our overview of the alphabet and our readings of familiar tales and fables. In the past few weeks, we've covered The Gingerbread Man, The Three Pigs, The Three Bears, Chicken Little, The Three Billy Goats Gruff, The Tortoise and The Hare, The Lion and the Mouse, and Jack and the Beanstalk, among others. The children have had fun listening to retellings of these favorite stories.

In math, we will start a new topic: Numbers 1-5. We will be looking at the value of these numbers, as well as how to write them correctly. Math is one of the subjects we cover in centers, so though the paperwork is the same, the hand-on activities will be different, depending on the ability of the group.

In science, we will begin our unit on Trees & Leaves. This is a fun hand-on science unit through our FOSS science program. We will be looking at trees and learning some names of different types of trees. We will be learning about deciduous trees vs. evergreens.   We enjoyed many activities with last week's science unit on the Five Senses.  The children tasted sour, sweet, salty, and bitter foods and they felt items in "mystery bags."  They also smelled some mystery smells in canisters and tried to guess what they were.  We had a great time!

Our art this week is centered around apples. We have a few fun apple art projects, and we'll be using paint!   Parent helpers and students beware-- don't wear clothes that you are overly concerned about keeping neat this week. :)

Our sharing topic this week is Share in a Bag.  Just a reminder again that your child should bring one item, hidden in a bag or backpack, with clues attached. The clues are very important and are part of the preparation for this oral language activity. So please work with your child to come up with three clues that will help the other children guess what is in the bag. If you are not sure of your child's sharing day, please check the link on the right or e-mail me.

Book orders are due this Friday, if you are interested.  Please go to the link on the right if you are interested in ordering.

Upcoming Events:
9/22: Family Science Night
9/28: First Wacky Wednesday
9/28: Willow Street Pizza Fundraiser
9/30: Picture Day
10/14: No School, Staff Development Day
10/17: Field Trip to See a Play: Wacky Weds. Schedule
10/22: Walk-a-thon
10/31: Halloween Parade @ 1:15

Week of 9/5

Dear Parents,

I hope you all enjoyed a nice 4 (or 3) day weekend!

Thank you very much for coming to Back-to-School night.  I covered a lot that evening, and I still feel like there was much left to say!  I hope you all got a better idea of the kindergarten program.  If you have any further questions, please don't hesitate to e-mail me.  Thank you also for your support with the CCP!  I know it's a big check to write, especially if you have more than one student at the school, and I truly appreciate your support of the kindergarten "extras." If you still have forms to turn in, please try to have those for me on Tuesday morning.  Thank you.

This week, we will continue with our overview of the alphabet. We will be covering letters Gg-Jj. We will also be studying the five senses. I have a fun book with some hands-on activities that I do with the children, ending with doing a taste test of different apples for "taste". We will continue on our math topic on sorting, and we will also be working on number writing in a book called, "My Beary Good Book of Numbers."

In the next couple of weeks, we will be working on our first Social Studies unit on being a Good Citizen. This is basically an overview of rules in the classroom and rules in our community. Some newsprint "booklets" accompany the Social Studies program.

We have also been learning how to spell color words through singing some catchy tunes. We are introducing a new song each week. You may have enjoyed hearing your children sing the "red" song last week.

Of course, next week is a big week for us. We will begin sharing on the 12th. Our first share topic is "toy in a bag." The topic lasts for the whole week, (each week is a different topic) but your child's share day never changes. Please see the "Sharing Info & Schedule" link to the right for your child's share day.

Homework will also begin next week on the 14th.  Finally, centers will begin next week on Monday. I am working on the helper schedule and will have it out this week. If you signed up to help with centers on Monday, be prepared to possibly come in on the 14th!

We are looking forward to a fun short week ahead! See you Tuesday.

UPCOMING EVENTS:
Monday, September 5th: No School-- Labor Day
Friday, September 9th: Back-to-School Movie Night 
Thursday, September 22nd: Family Science Night
Wednesday, September 28th: First Wacky Wednesday
Wednesday, September 28th: Willow Street Pizza Fundraiser
Friday, September 30th: Picture Day