Week of 6/1

Dear Parents,

With only 9 days to go in kindergarten, this post will mostly just remind you of upcoming special events, and this week is a week of a few more "lasts!"

It is the last week of sharing.  In celebration of that fact, children may pick ANY share topic-- toy in a bag; book share; song, poem, or nursery rhyme; or homemade item.

Our last Wednesday envelope will go home this week. Please review the papers, and then keep the envelope-- no need to send it back again.

On Thursday the 5th, please come to the cafeteria any time between 5:30 and 8:00 to enjoy the Art Vista Art show.  Every child in our class will have several pieces on display.  The Art Vista art show is always a sight to behold-- such beautiful artwork from all the grade levels!  It is truly impressive.

We have our water play day/class party coming up this Friday the 6th. We will have a pizza lunch, so no need to pack a snack, and some fun in the sun!  Please send your children with a towel, a swimsuit under their clothes (or boys just wear their swimsuits as shorts) water shoes or flip flops or old shoes you don't mind having them get wet. We don't like them to go barefoot on the blacktop, so we need them to be wearing shoes that will work with the water. Please coat them in sunblock before their arrival, as sun block is most effective if applied about a half hour before the activity. Children who are going to daycare after class  should have a change of clothes and shoes.

Our last big event (parental attendance strongly encouraged) together is next Tuesday the 10th for our Promotion Day celebration. This should wrap up before class is out, and then the kids can stay and sign yearbooks, etc. If you want them to leave early that day, please sign them out in the office. Please plan on joining us as we have a small presentation and will look back on our wonderful year together!

Wednesday the 11th, we do have a school-wide Olympic Day. So that the children can participate, the afternoon class will have another Wacky Wednesday that day.  I could use a few parent helpers to walk around with us. Also, I know they are in need of parent helpers to run the various stations. Here's the link if you'd like to help at a station: http://www.signupgenius.com/go/20F0848ACAD2CA02-olympic

There are no events on Thursday the 12th, but all kindergarten classes attend from 8:05 to 11:25. Both the morning class and the afternoon class will be in the room together, cleaning up, signing yearbooks, and wrapping up our year together.

In our final weeks, there will be a few opportunities to watch movies (class party, after Olympic Day, etc.) If your child has any Rated G movies that s/he would like to bring in to share, I'd appreciate it. We do not have a Blue-Ray player, just a DVD player (and VHS if anyone still has those lying around!)  Please clearly mark the movies with your child's name.

Upcoming Events:
6/5:  Art Vista's Art Show 5:30-8:00
6/6: Water Play Day & Class Party-- please have swimsuits & towels!
6/10: Kindergarten Promotion Ceremony-- 8:30 (a.m.) and 1:00 (p.m.)
6/11: June's Wacky Wednesday & Olympic Day
6/12: Last Day of School: all students come from 8:05-11:25

Week of 5/25

Dear Parents,

I hope you are all enjoying this long weekend. We have a few fun things in the upcoming week, starting with a presentation on Tuesday from the Youth Science Institute (YSI) called "Life in the Pond."  The children have been learning about pond life along with studying fish, worms, and pond snails, so this is an exciting culmination of our unit.  Also, I hope many of our classroom helpers received their invitations and will be coming to the Volunteer Appreciation Tea on Wednesday the 28th. I want to thank all the classroom volunteers for their generous donation of time.  Without you, centers, Art Vista, Cornerstone, Clay, computer lab, field trips, and SPARK P.E. would not be possible!

The sharing this week is book share.  Bring in any book your child may have purchased at the book fair or any other book your child wants to share to get us excited about summer reading options.  Children should be prepared to tell the title of the book and a little bit about what it's about.  Also, a favorite page should be bookmarked to share.  In class, we will continue our science unit on animals. The children have really enjoyed observing fish, guppies, red worms, and night crawlers so far. Our butterflies should be hatching soon-- hopefully not over the weekend! This week, we will be observing sow bugs and pill bugs.  We will also wrap up our social studies units.  We continue to do a lot of writing, and this week, we'll do a few pieces of writing for our memory books.  We are also completing our Common Core supplemental math book.  Right now, we are really hitting on addition and subtraction concepts.  Addition & subtraction facts up to 5 (5-3, 4+1, 5-4, etc.) should be very innate at this point and should not require fingers or manipulatives.

"Virtual homework" continues this week.  Please take about 15-20 minutes a day to have your child do either Lexia or ixl.com.

The Home & School Club is conducting a survey right now to get feedback on the various programs that they fund & support.  Please take the time to do the survey-- it's a quick one-- so that they have the opinions of the majority of the school.  The link is: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/AVHSC_2014_Survey

Next week, on Thursday the 5th, please come to the cafeteria in the evening (exact time will be posted soon!) to enjoy the Art Vista Art show.  Every child in our class will have several pieces on display.  The Art Vista art show is always a sight to behold-- such beautiful artwork from all the grade levels!  It is truly impressive.

We have our water play day/class party coming up on Friday the 6th. We will have a pizza lunch and some fun in the sun!  Please send your children with a towel, a swimsuit under their clothes (or boys just wear their swimsuits as shorts) water shoes or flip flops or old shoes you don't mind having them get wet. We don't like them to go barefoot on the blacktop, so we need them to be wearing shoes that will work with the water. Please coat them in sunblock before their arrival, as sun block is most effective if applied about a half hour before the activity. Children who are going to daycare after class  should have a change of clothes and shoes.

Wednesday the 11th, we do have a school-wide Olympic Day. So that the children can participate, the afternoon class will have another Wacky Wednesday that day.  I could use a few parent helpers to walk around with us. Also, I know they are in need of parent helpers to run the various stations. Here's the link if you'd like to help at a station: http://www.signupgenius.com/go/20F0848ACAD2CA02-olympic

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

Our last big event together is Tuesday the 10th for our Promotion Day celebration. Please plan on joining us as we have a small presentation and will look back on our wonderful year together! This should wrap up before class is out, and then the kids can stay and sign yearbooks, etc. If you want them to leave early that day, please sign them out in the office. Remember that this event is for immediate family only due to space limitations, as it is in our classroom. Also, school-aged siblings are not to be pulled out of class to attend.  Thank you for your understanding.

There are no events on Thursday the 12th, but all kindergarten classes attend from 8:05 to 11:25. Both the morning class and the afternoon class will be in the room together, cleaning up, signing yearbooks, and wrapping up our year together.

In our final weeks, there will be a few opportunities to watch movies (class party, after Olympic Day, etc.) If your child has any Rated G movies that s/he would like to bring in to share, I'd appreciate it. We do not have a Blue-Ray player, just a DVD player (and VHS if anyone still has those lying around!)  Please clearly mark the movies with your child's name.

Upcoming Events:
5/27:  In-class presentation from YSI, "Life in the Pond"
5/28: May's Wacky Wednesday
6/5:  Art Vista's Art Show 5:30-8:00
6/10: Kindergarten Promotion Ceremony-- 8:30 (a.m.) and 1:00 (p.m.)
6/11: June's Wacky Wednesday & Olympic Day
6/12: Last Day of School: all students come from 8:05-11:25

Week of 5/17

Dear Parents,

We have an exciting week ahead of us with Open House on Wednesday.  The kids are very excited to show off their work and art projects, so please plan on coming-- the whole family is welcome!  Open House is at 7:00 to 8:00, following a 6:30 Home & School Club meeting to approve the 2014-15 Home & School Club board.

We have another review week covering several consonants this week (Dd, Jj, Nn, Ww). All letters have now been introduced, so please work on practicing both writing and reading consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC) words. Your children should be able to read all of those types of words using their letter sounds and blending skills-- cut, bus, rat, sip, hot, etc. This is a really important skill to work on now and through the summer, as this is something your children will be expected to do proficiently in first grade. Books such as the leveled Scholastic Readers, Bob Books, I Can Read Books, and Ready to Read Books are great for reinforcing blending skills and practicing fluency. Please keep your children reading 20-30 minutes daily now and through the summer. Also, continue working on the sight words.  They need to know all 40, and in first grade, the list increases to 100 words.  That list can be found on the first grade page here: http://www.unionsd.org/cms/lib07/CA01001465/Centricity/Domain/97/100_Sight_Words.pdf:   I can't emphasize enough that the best way to help your child become a successful reader is to offer plenty of opportunity for practice.

Speaking of plenty of practice-- the Alta Vista Book Fair is a great source for new books for your children, and it is open through this Thursday the 22nd.  It will also be open during Open House, if you'd like to make purchases at that time.  Stop by & check it out!

This is our last week of centers!  I'd like to thank all of the volunteers for their commitment to coming in weekly to help us in the classroom.  This was an amazing year for classroom help-- whenever somebody was unable to come in, someone else stepped right up as a sub.  That small-group instruction time is so important, and without all of the helpers, it would not have been possible. Thank you, thank you!


The upcoming final 18 days (can you believe it??) will be devoted to reviewing concepts that we have learned in kindergarten.  We will introduce our final two sight words, by and his.  I have also been and will continue to be administering the final round of assessments to evaluate your children for the 3rd trimester report cards. Those report cards will come home with your children on the last day of school.

We are also continuing our animal unit in science.  We studied our goldfish & guppies this past week, and next week, we will be looking at worms!  We were excited to see most of our caterpillars go into chrysalids last Friday.  The children are really enjoying this hands-on opportunity to take a closer look at several different species.

Please send in your Blue Bags tomorrow.  You will no longer see the Blue Bags!   Please use the extra time in the upcoming weeks to do "virtual homework assignments."  I would like to see the children spending at least 15 minutes a day on either Lexia or ixl.com for the next few weeks.  I have not confirmed whether or not Lexia will be available through the summer, so please make use of it in these final weeks while you still definitely have access to it.  The ixl.com membership is only for 30 days-- please take advantage of it.  I would also encourage using the extra time to read, read, read!

Upcoming Events:
5/21: Open House 7:00-8:00
5/27:  In-class presentation from YSI, "Life in the Pond"
5/28: May's Wacky Wednesday
6/5:  Art Vista's Art Show 5:30-8:00
6/10: Kindergarten Promotion Ceremony-- 8:30 (a.m.) and 1:00 (p.m.)
6/11: June's Wacky Wednesday & Olympic Day
6/12: Last Day of School: all students come from 8:05-11:25

Week of 5/11

Dear Parents,

First of all, I'd like to thank everyone for the wonderful Teacher Appreciation Week.  From the beautiful flowers to the touching notes-- thank you so much for your thoughtfulness and for entrusting me with your wonderful children.  Thank you also to all the moms (and a few dads!) for coming on Friday.  The children were so excited to have you there for our Mother's Day event, and it was wonderful that each child had someone to honor.  I hope all the moms enjoy their day Sunday.

We have now introduced all of the consonants & vowels. This week (and all the rest of the weeks this school year) will be a review week. We will be reviewing the letters Bb, Cc, Ll, but we do have two new sight words-- he & as. In math, we will wrap up our unit on weight & capacity. Then, for the final weeks of the school year, we will return to addition and subtraction review.

In science, we are continuing our unit on the life cycle of a butterfly.  We are watching our caterpillars and awaiting the chrysalis stage!  We also got some land snails, pond snails, and goldfish & guppies in our classroom last week for our final science unit on animals.  We began observing the snails last week and will continue our animal observations this week.

We are busily preparing for Open House, on the night of May 21st.  We will have much on display in our room that night, and the kids are very excited to show off their work. Please plan on attending with your child!  There is a Home & School club meeting that evening in the cafeteria at 6:30, followed by the classrooms being open between 7:00 and 8:00.  Stop by any time during that hour to have your child show off all of his/her projects to you!

Our sharing this week is Letter of the Week: Bb, Cc, or Ll. Have your child bring in something that starts with Bb, Cc, or Ll. They can hide it in a bag and write clues. Great job recently to so many of the kids for writing their own clues!

Please send in your Blue Bags tomorrow!

Upcoming Events:
5/21: Open House 7:00-8:00
5/27:  In-class presentation from YSI, "Life in the Pond"
5/28: May's Wacky Wednesday
6/5:  Art Vista's Art Show 5:30-8:00
6/10: Kindergarten Promotion Ceremony-- Mark your Calendars!
6/11: June's Wacky Wednesday & Olympic Day
6/12: Last Day of School: all students come from 8:05-11:25

Week of 5/4

Dear Parents,

Our Cinco de Mayo dance will be this Monday, May 5th, at 11:15 a.m. Please arrive on time so that you don't miss it!  All four kindergarten classes are involved in this dance, so parking may be tricky.  The afternoon class should probably arrive even slightly beforehand so that they are ready to dance by 11:20.  We have some costume items to hand out, so please arrive on time with that in mind.  If your children have any festive, bright dresses or bright colorful tops and pants, those always make the scene even more vibrant. Remember that if work constraints only allow you occasional days off that we would prefer that you are present for the Muffins with Mom event next Friday the 9th. I am looking forward to celebrating with all the moms or other "representatives" at 8:30 for the morning class, and at 2:00 for the afternoon class. We have a short presentation of a mini-play and a few songs, and then you can enjoy some treats with your child. This is an event the kindergartners always look forward to sharing with their moms/someone special, so please try to have someone come. Thank you!

We are now getting to that time in the school year where there are several events each week, so please keep your calendar updated & come and enjoy all the school has to offer!  This week, in addition to the Cinco de Mayo dance and Muffins with Mom, we also have a great school-wide event.  Fantasy Faire is this Friday, May 9th.  This is a super fun school-wide carnival that your child will not want to miss.  I also really encourage you to participate in the cake-making competition that morning (cakes must be submitted by 8:15, so bring yours early if you are in the afternoon class).  It is really fun to participate, and the cakes are so amazing!  Don't be intimidated-- this is definitely a child-friendly competition :)  Finally, the Fantasy Fair still needs a lot of help.  Please check out the online sign-up to offer your assistance: http://cosmith.ivolunteer.com/faire_001

This week, we introduce our final two letters.  The consonant is Jj and the Alphafriend is Jumping Jill.   Our final vowel is Uu, and the Alphafriend is Umbie Umbrella.  We will also have a new word, are. We are also beginning our math topic on weight, volume, and capacity.  Similar to the measuring unit, children will need to identify which container holds more/less, which container would be appropriate given the item it needs to hold, etc.  While doing last week's unit on numbers to 100, many children struggled with writing numbers in a sequence from a random starting point.  We had papers that had, for example, 66, 67, ____, ____....  Filling in these blanks was quite difficult for some students.  Continue reviewing numbers and number sequences with your children.

The sharing this week is book share.  Please send your child with a favorite book.  Please have him/her be prepared to tell the class the title of the book, a bit about what it's about, and show a favorite page.

In science, we are beginning our unit on the life cycle of a butterfly. We will have some real caterpillars arrive in class this week, and we will watch the metamorphosis from caterpillar to butterfly. This is a very exciting unit for the children.

We are busily preparing for Open House, on the night of May 21st.  We will have much on display in our room that night, and the kids are very excited to show off their work. Please plan on attending with your child!

Please send in your Blue Bags tomorrow-- there are only two weeks left of homework!

For your future planning-- please review all dates in the "Upcoming Events" section below. Critical dates (where I'd really like a parent to try to come) are: Muffins with Mom (this Friday), Open House (May 21st),  and the Promotion Ceremony (June 10th). The Promotion Ceremony is our big last "hurrah" together, where we look back on our year & celebrate the children. Also, please be aware that the last day of school, Thursday the 12th, all K classes are on a MORNING schedule (8:05 to 11:25)-- there are no celebrations or parties as we will have 46 kids in the classroom and don't have room for any extra bodies!  

Upcoming Events:
5/5: Cinco de Mayo Dance @ 11:15
5/9: Mother's Day Celebration: 8:30 (a.m.) & 2:00 (p.m.)
5/9: Alta Vista's Fantasy Faire 5:00-8:30 pm
5/21: Open House
5/27:  In-class presentation from YSI, "Life in the Pond"
5/28: May's Wacky Wednesday
6/5:  Art Vista's Art Show 5:30-8:00
6/10: Kindergarten Promotion Ceremony-- Mark your Calendars!
6/11: June's Wacky Wednesday & Olympic Day
6/12: Last Day of School: all students come from 8:05-11:25