So Much Learning!

*Late Post! These pictures are from last week.*

We are finally into our 40th day of school. I can’t believe this year is already almost a fourth over! Here are some snapshots from what the Kinders have been up to in Room 1!

Math Rotations

During the week, math instruction varies from whole group to small group with fun, hands-on activities. We had the SMART table in our room last week and will still have it this week. 

Here the kids are sorting sets of objects.

This group was counting sets of objects in their My Math workbook. Can you believe that if I say “Find page 137” they can find it!?! 

This a fun game called “Grab a Handful”. Sounds just like its name! Watch out for any backwards numbers from the backwards police! 

Patterning is so fun!

This was a tricky one --- sorting numbers 6 & 9.

Ordering numbers! This one involved “collaboration” and taking turns. 

Reading Rotations

During our center time, we often meet in reading groups. We were SO excited to finally have a vowel to start building consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC) words. We made words that belong to the -at word family (cat, sat, bat, mat, etc). 

So proud to show off their -at word family bats!

Meanwhile, the rest of the students were hard at work making....

Halloween patterns!

And practicing reading their reading books...

Finally, after a long stretch of reading, writing, and building words --- GO NOODLE! You might have heard your child refer to this on occasion. It is the best! Yoga, Zumba, running, stretching, brain games, and so much more right in the classroom! Plus, our class mascot “Flo Yo” gets to grow every time we complete a level. It’s pretty much awesome! :)

Here the kids are stretching with Maximo! 

We are all working on our balance ;)

Ending with a little quiet “zen” before moving on to our next activity! I’ll have to post a video of the kids doing Zumba. It’s hilarious!

Our First Vowel --- Letter A!

Mystery Bag Homework for vowel “a”:

For homework, your child will need to think of an object that either starts with the short a “ah” sound or a word that contains that sound (i.e. cat, bat, map, etc). Now that we finally have a vowel, we can start building simple one-syllable words :) 

Here is the Letter A song from Have Fun Teaching. It has both the short a (as in apple & cat) as well as long a (as in angel & cake).

This video contains only the short a sound.

Sight word: to

Sight word: go

Spooky Sightings in Room 1!

I wanted to share a few snapshots from this last week before you come for parent/teacher conferences. The kids have been hard at work during our Halloween unit which includes learning about pumpkins, spiders, bats, and doing fun Halloween activities! We just finished our spider week (ahh!).

Cody - hard at work finishing up the Halloween How Many? book.

Macy - organizing the pages 1-10. 

Abigail - adding details to her book.

Carson - finishing up his pumpkin. I have never seen such tiny pieces from a tear art project. Great work, Carson!

Kali - writing what makes our first Superstar of the Week, Auden, special! We have an aspiring rally car driver in our class :)

Patrick’s “have” journal page.

I knew Avery LOVES Donald Duck. I didn’t even have to look at the cover of her journal to find out who’s page this was!

The room is looking SpOoKy!

I LOVE these adorable cats the students made in Art class with Ms. Trudell. 

Letter N!

Pumpkin Time!

As you probably already know, we teach thematically here at MATES --- and Fall and Pumpkins just so happen to be one of my favorite themes of the year. In addition to planning lessons around a theme, I try to incorporate art and technology projects into our weekly centers and activities. Room 1 is transforming from the multi-colored look to a splash of pumpkins, fall leaves and other spooky decorations. Here's a preview of what you'll see during parent/teacher conferences.

This project took us a few days to complete, but the big black wall in our class looks amazing! The students were given a large piece of white construction paper to paint a large orange pumpkin on. They also painted a separate stem and the leaves of the pumpkin vine. Once the pumpkins were dry, we assembled the pumpkins and made the faces. The students got to choose what type of facial features to put on their pumpkin. Finally, they wrote "I can see the _____ pumpkin." This was the kids' first real exposure to adjectives. They described each of their unique pumpkins. Here are some examples:

"I can see the funny and cute pumpkin."

"I can see the Halloween pumpkin."

"I can see the vampire teeth pumpkin."

"I can see the mutant pumpkin."

Aren't those the cutest?! And what better way to practice writing our sight words and to get into the spirit of fall (since clearly our weather is not cooperating)! 

One great fine motor skill strengthening activity is through the practice of tearing paper. Here we made tear art pumpkins. These mosaics are beautiful!

To incorporate math, we made jack-o-lanterns with shapes. Once the kids colored and made the faces, they counted how many of each shape they made.

Many of the other things we do in class do not make it home in your child's Friday Folder. Every week we have activities that we do in journals, notebooks, math text books, dictionaries, spiral "Daily 4" journals, and a newly introduced activity: writing to the Super Star of the Week. Every week, a student is giving the opportunity to be the Super Star of the Week. They share their interests, information about themselves, and what they want to be when they are older. Later in the week, all of the kids create a page for a Super Star book all about what makes that student special. This week, I was the Super Star. I am amazed at the quality of work the kids put in to writing about how special Mrs. Roll is. The kids made me wait until they were finished with their "wow" pictures for me to see them. 

Avery knows that my favorite Disney princess is Belle :)

These dogs are adorable!

What a great week it was! 

Letter T

Please play the Letter T song with your child to help come up with their mystery bag item.

Please also play this sight word song to help your child learn the word THE. Please remind them that the letter t alone makes the /t/ sound, but the “th” in THE makes the /th/ sound.