Week of 1/26

Dear Parents,

I wanted to thank parents and students for having such a great first month of journal entries with the Blue Bags! Everyone is working on letting their children do all their own spelling, and are encouraging them so well in their efforts! I already see improvement in the writing just in this short time. Remember that the focus in kindergarten is giving kids the ability to use their phonics skills to write on their own and get their thoughts down on paper. As they move through the grade levels, spelling will become more of a focus. Right now the focus is the process and applying phonetic sounds so that they have that framework to fall back on whenever they need to write on their own.

We had a wonderful "Snow Day" last Wednesday-- thank you!  It seems that for the past 3 or 4 years, Snow Day is always on one of the warmest days in January, and this year was no exception!  The kids had fun with the snowball fight, and enjoyed a treat afterward.

Our new letter this week is Ll, and the Alphafriend is Larry Lion. We have a new word this week, is. We will also introduce another vowel sound this week, Ii, and that Alphafriend is Iggy Iguana. Iggy will help us spell words with the short i sound, such as: bit, pin, rib, etc.  We are now up to 18 sight words.  Please check the sight word link on the website and make sure that your child knows the words we've introduced, as this is a heavy emphasis at this time.  If your child is struggling with these words, a good website to go to is http://www.spellingcity.com
and log in under my name for the "40 Word List" of all the sight words we're covering this year.

We will continue working on subtraction this week.  Please continue reinforcing the concept at home using apps on iPhones & iPads or logging into the Xtra Math accounts we have set up for your children.  Although Xtra Math isn't a "game," it does provide reinforcement of math facts that increases in difficulty as your children become more familiar with the facts & concepts.

This week's share is homemade item.  Children should bring in something they made or mostly made themselves, and be prepared to talk about how they made it.  Crafts from parties, preschool, home, etc are all great for this share.

Our art activities this week will continue to center around our snowy theme,  and penguins.

On Friday, February 14th, we will be celebrating Valentine's Day in class.  Just a reminder (since I know your children will be eagerly shopping for Valentines soon!) in kindergarten, we have the kids sign their valentines, but we do not have them write who the valentine is "to." This makes distribution MUCH easier, since many kids cannot read the names. So please sign the cards, but leave the "to" box blank. Please send in 22 valentines so that there are enough for each child in the class. Thanks!

The afternoon class has a Wacky Wednesday this week.  Class runs from 10:00 to 1:20.

Please send in your child's blue bag tomorrow, with the book & homework folder inside.  Thank you!

Upcoming Events:
1/29:  January's Wacky Wednesday & Chef's Night Out at Willow Street Pizza
2/5: 100 Day
2/13: "Helping Your Child Succeed at School"  6:00-7:30 in the AV Cafeteria
2/14:  Valentine's Day celebration-- bring cards that are signed by your child
2/15-2/23: President's Week Vacation
2/26:  February's Wacky Wednesday
3/29: Bocce Ball Tournament & Auction @ Campo Di Bocce

Week of 1/19

Dear Parents,

I hope you are enjoying some fun family time on this long weekend!

Of course, we have tomorrow off school in observance of Martin Luther King Jr. Day. On Tuesday, it will be very important to return the Blue Bags on time since we only have a day to turn them back around. So please put them by the door or wherever you will remember them Tuesday morning :) Please remember to check your child's blue bag to be sure that it includes the book and the homework folder. Many blue bags have been returned recently that are missing one item. Thanks!

We have a new letter this week, Ff, and the Alphafriend is Fifi Fish. We have a new sight word, we.  This week, we will be more than half-way through our kindergarten year. This is where the kindergarten curriculum really takes off, and your continued support with the curriculum will be especially important at this time. Completing homework weekly, including the journal, reading to your children and asking them questions about what they are reading, and reinforcing math facts and sight words is really important at this time. We want to ensure that everyone is prepared for first grade, and we definitely need your help :).

We will continue working on subtraction this week.  On Friday, we had a great teacher training on a math technique called "Number Talks," which really makes computations and number sense much more innate for children.  Our trainer pointed out that in the "real world," most computations that we do are in our head-- figuring out the tip at a restaurant, how much an item will be after taxes, how much of a discount we are getting, etc., are all computations we do on a regular basis in our heads.  Number talks are one way to encourage mental math at an early age to build up these skills as they go through school.  Continue talking to your children about math computations and how they are solving problems.  Common Core encourages much more of the explaining how you arrived at an answer versus just stating the answer.  Conversations like, "I know that 9 + 5=14 because 9 is one less than 10 and I know that 10 + 5 = 15, and 9 is one less than 10" are the types of conversations we will be encouraging in class.

We also have Snow Day this week. It will be on Wednesday, right at the beginning of class for both the a.m. & p.m. classes.   This is a day when the children come to school all dressed in their snow gear-- whatever items you have. Mittens, knit hats, jackets, snow boots, scarves, goggles, etc. are all welcome! Please do not buy anything special for this day, just use what you have or borrow from a friend. They wear their gear, and then we will have some snow-themed fun! We will be having a "snowball fight" using wadded up recycled paper & have an icy treat!  It is always lots of fun.  After the snowball fight, they can take off all their extra gear as temperatures & weather for Wednesday don't look too snowy!!

At the end of this month, we have the start of Chinese New Year/Tet/Lunar New Year. We have several fun art projects surrounding this theme. If any parents would like to come in and talk about this holiday, we would love to have you.  Please e-mail us!

Another fun day to mark your calendars for is 100 day on February 5th. This is an in-class celebration of our 100th day of school. We will have many fun activities for counting out 100. This is another very memorable day for the children. The sharing theme Feb. 3-7, in honor of 100 day, will be a collection of 100 things. This does not have to be anything fancy-- the kids can bring in 100 pennies, Legos, Cheerios, etc. The main thing is that you & your child sit down together to count out the item. You can count them by 1s or put them into 10 groups of 10-- whatever your child prefers. It is a fun activity for them to see the different ways that "100" can look, so start discussing with your children what they'd like to bring in for 100 day.

This week's share is Letter of the Week sharing. Please have your child bring something in that starts with the letter Ff.  The children like to bring this sharing in a bag with clues, so please help them with that. Many children are writing their own clues now, which is wonderful! Children who normally share on Monday can share any other day this week.

We look forward to seeing everyone on Tuesday, Blue Bags in hand!

Upcoming Events:
1/20:  No School: MLK B'day
1/21:  Incoming Kindergartners' Informational Night 6:00-7:30 @ AV Cafeteria
1/22: Snow Day-- Send your children in their winter accessories!
1/29:  January's Wacky Wednesday
2/5: 100 Day
2/13: "Helping Your Child Succeed at School"  6:00-7:30 in the AV Cafeteria
2/15-2/23: President's Week Vacation
2/26:  February's Wacky Wednesday
3/29: Bocce Ball Tournament & Auction @ Campo Di Bocce

Week of 1/12

Dear Parents,

I hope that the journal writing has gone successfully this week. My goal is that the children are excited about writing, not stressed out by it, so please let me know if there were any problems. A few other reminders about the journal page:

• Writing should always be in PENCIL.
• Above the writing, in the blank box, children should draw a neat, (at least) four-color picture.
• Encourage your children to spell high-frequency words that we've introduced correctly.
• Please DO NOT copy a sentence from the book.

Blue bags should be returned tomorrow, with the homework folder inside. They will go home again on Wednesday. Obviously, due to the Martin Luther King holiday, they will not be due back until Tuesday the 21st. Please make sure you send them that day so that we can turn them back around quickly the following Wednesday.

We have a new letter this week: Gg. The Alphafriend is Gertie Goose. We also have a new high frequency word: go. Please review the "High Frequency Word" tab on the right to learn which words we've introduced.  A good way to practice reading and spelling the sight words is by logging onto http://www.spellingcity.com/k2grist.  "Missing Letter" and "Audio Word Match" are great games for younger players. The link to this site is also on the right.

We will begin our math topic on subtraction.  This will need plenty of reinforcement at home.  There are many great free apps for the iPad, iPhone, and Android phones & tablets that provide engaging reinforcement in both addition & subtraction facts.  Additionally, free websites like arcademicskillbuilders.com are also a fun way to reinforce math facts.

We have Martin Luther King's birthday holiday coming up. We will be talking about him in class and doing some art projects. When we discuss MLK, we will discuss some of the discrimination that took place in the past, and how he helped change that. So if you hear your children asking questions about that, you will know why. We try to keep it fairly simple in kindergarten in terms that they can understand and relate to.

This week's share will be Book Share.  Friday children can share any other day this week.  Please have your children choose a book and be ready to tell the title, a bit about what it's about, and have a favorite page bookmarked.  We had a lot of children forgetting sharing last week.  Sharing is important to oral language development and is an introduction to public speaking.  Please make every effort to help your child be prepared for his/her share day.

We continue to need glue sticks & baby wipes if you can donate those-- thank you!

Also-- please take note below at some new special events that have been posted.  They are:

• Transitional Kindergarten (TK) Info Night 1/16 6:00-7:30 @the District Office: If you have a child born between September 2, 2009 & December 31, 2009, s/he may be eligible for Union School District's Transitional Kindergarten program.  Please let friends know as well about this informational meeting at the District Office.
• Kindergarten Registration Info Night 1/21 6:00-7:30:  If you have friends with incoming kindergartners who live in the AV attendance area, please let them know about this informational evening, preparing them for registration on 2/1.
•  Snow Day 1/22: children will dress up in whatever snow gear they have-- hats, mittens, coats, scarves, etc. and we will have a fake snowball fight with K1.  
• 100 Day 2/5-- we celebrate the 100th day of school with some special activities.  Also there will be special homework that week.  
• Workshop: "Helping Your Child Succeed in School"-- Jan. 30 & Feb. 13: Our own "Grandpa Sam" (volunteer reading aid) and his wife Julie (teacher & teacher trainer) will put on a two-part workshop on reading and writing with your children.  This is sure to be a very informative workshop & will be in the evenings for our working parents (6:00 to 7:30 pm).  Come and check it out if you can!
• Bocce Ball Tournament & Auction 3/29 6:00-11:00 @ Campo di Bocce:  There are still tickets left for this new fundraiser!!  It is sure to be a fun evening, raising money for Alta Vista's Enrichment programs.  Get a group of 6 together & create a bocce team!  Enjoy hors d'oeuvres, dinner, and dessert and bid on auction items.  Contact Nicole Crandall if you'd like to get a ticket: nicole@thecrandallfam.com

We look forward to seeing everyone tomorrow, Blue Bags in hand!

Upcoming Events:
1/16: TK Informational Night, 6:00-7:30 at the District Office
1/17:  No School: Staff Development Day
1/20:  No School: MLK B'day
1/21:  Incoming Kindergartners' Informational Night 6:00-7:30 @ AV Cafeteria
1/22: Snow Day-- Send your children in their winter accessories!
1/29:  January's Wacky Wednesday
1/30 & 2/13: "Helping Your Child Succeed at School"  6:00-7:30 in the AV Cafeteria
2/15-2/23: President's Week Vacation
2/26:  February's Wacky Wednesday
3/29: Bocce Ball Tournament & Auction @ Campo Di Bocce

Week of 1/5

Dear Parents,

Happy New Year! We hope you all had a wonderful vacation & are rested and ready to get back into the swing of things!

First of all, I wanted to thank everyone for all the help I received with the Nutcracker performance. From making the paper pieces of the costumes at the paper party, to applying the make-up and helping them get dressed, to photographers-- every job was covered! The kids did a wonderful job and they all looked so cute! We had a great cast party afterward, thanks especially to our room moms for coordinating.  A huge thanks to Anna Rubilcava for updating our Ribbon Candy tutus by making those beautiful red & white candy cane tutus.  Finally, a huge thanks to everyone for their generosity and thoughtfulness with all the wonderful gifts I received. I have been so touched by how giving this class is, and I appreciate it so much.

We have a pretty academic month ahead of us with no breaks other than the observation of Martin Luther King's Birthday on the weekend of the 17th-20th.

We will start right in with a new letter-- Pp-- and a new word-- and. The Alphafriend's name is Pippa Pig. We will have centers all this month. Art projects will revolve around the theme of weather, especially snow! We will conclude our math topic on addition, and then begin the topic of subtraction. Again, plenty of at-home reinforcement is appreciated on this topic, as it can be quite difficult.

Our sharing this week is toy in a bag to give the children a chance to show off all those favorite holiday gifts!

Now that we are coming up on our half-year mark (the 90th day of school out of 180 days is in the upcoming week), we do need to refresh a few of our supplies.  Especially needed are glue sticks and baby wipes.  If you can donate either, we'd appreciate it.

 Blue bags will go home on Wednesday, of course. Remember that from now on, the blue bags will contain a "book report" component. Very specific directions about our expectations with the book report will be in your child's homework folder this week. Please leave it there for your continued reference. Basically, your child will use the journal page attached to the homework packet to respond to the book that's in the blue bag. Children need to write at least one sentence about the book-- what they liked/didn't like, who their favorite character was, etc. We DO NOT want children to copy a sentence from the book or copy a sentence that you have written for them. This is their chance for developing writing skills, which will help their confidence when we take our first writing assessment in February. A sentence written: "I like the fune got" for "I like the funny goat." is great and is what is expected from them at this time. If you would like to go over spelling with them once they are done, you can pencil it in underneath their words and show them what the conventional spelling looks like. However, do not make them correct their writing at this time. We want to encourage them in their thinking before we start focusing on the mechanics.

Enjoy your final days of vacation, and I look forward to seeing your children on Monday!

Upcoming Events:
12/21-1/5:  Winter Break
1/17:  No School: Staff Development Day
1/20:  No School: MLK B'day
1/29:  January's Wacky Wednesday
2/15-2/23: President's Week Vacation
2/26:  February's Wacky Wednesday