Teacher Tip Tuesday: It's in the Signs!

These first few weeks of Kindergarten our academic focus has been on letters, letter sounds, and shapes.   We are learning what makes each letter and shape different from all the others.  Giving your child opportunities to practice and hone these skills does need to be overly complicated, costly, or high-tech.  The world around us is full of letters, shapes, and words just waiting to be discovered!  Try some or all of the following while driving to and from school, waiting in line at the grocery store, or taking a walk through your neighborhood.  

1.  Go on a shape/alphabet hunt:  Take turns looking for letters and shapes.  You can turn it into an ongoing activity by using a notebook to keep track of all the shapes and letters you find, or turn it into a competition by seeing who can find the most of a particular letter or shape in a given amount of time.

2.  Play I Spy:  Include shapes, beginning and ending sounds, and rhymes in your clues.  (I spy something red that begins with a /c/ and rhymes with star.)

3.  The Name Game:  Look for all the letters of your name on signs, advertisements, or books.  Keep track of the letters you find, race the clock, or race a family member to see who can find all their letters first.

4.  Get your head in the clouds:  Take some time to watch the clouds as they pass by.  Look for shapes in clouds.  Be sure to talk about the corners, lines, and curves that your can see. 

Happy hunting! 

Solar Eclipse, Chromebooks, and Farmyards; Oh, my!

It has certainly been a busy week in Kindergarten!  We shared a lifetime first on Monday with the solar eclipse.

Then we shared some Kindergarten firsts with Chromebook center this week.   Your kids are becoming pros at using their clever badges to log-on to technology and are doing a great job navigating our beginning websites independently.  Right now, we are using starfall.com and abcya.com as our go to websites.  These are both free websites that are super user friendly and ready to use at home.  As we become more independent and confident with the technology in our classroom, we will begin to add additional websites that will require a specific student login.  I will make sure that everyone has that information as we introduce it.

And...we began our Farm Unit this week!  (This is one of my favorites!)  Students have been busy using their "Eagle Eyes" strategy to help me read some Kindergarten greats that take place on the farm.  We have been reading I Went Walking and I Went Visiting by Sue Williams along with some old favorites like Old MacDonald Had a Farm and Down on Grandpa's Farm.

After reading Margaret Wise Brown's Big Red Barn we decided to use our imaginations to create our very own barns that could hold one our favorite farm animals.  Then, just like Margaret Wise Brown and Sue Williams, we wrote some words to tell our readers what they could see in our barn.

 

But our farmyard fun did not stop there!  Ms. Cari helped everyone make a special farm animal animal of their own.

We engineered our own farms with blocks.

And we even made a barn you could eat!!

Be on the look out for more farm fun next week!

Teacher Tip Tuesday: Eagle Eyes

We have been talking about all the ways we can make sense of books for a couple of weeks now, but this morning we introduced our first, formal, go-to reading strategy--Eagle Eyes.  

Good readers use their "Eagle Eyes" to look at the pictures to predict unknown words.  

Today we read I Went Walking by Sue Williams and used our Eagle Eyes to predict what animals we would see on each page.  Then we looked for those words on the page, using beginning sounds to make sure we were making the right guess.

As you are reading at home with your child this week, encourage them to use their Eagle Eyes to help you determine "unknown" words as you read.  Give your child a beginning sound clue to help them determine if they are predicting the correct word or have your child find specific words on the page.  (ie If you see a cat in the picture, use your beginning sound knowledge to help you find the word cat.)

Books like I Went Walking, Old MacDonald, Pete the Cat, or ABC type books are great read together opportunities to practice using your Eagle Eyes. 

It may sound simple, but it is your child's first step to literary independence!  

Happy Reading!

Teacher Tip Tuesday: Pencils and Crayons and Markers--Oh, my!

As we are settling into Kindergarten, our Writing Workshop is in full swing!  We are learning about taking the stories and ideas from our minds and putting them onto paper.

The first step to writing good stories is drawing detailed pictures and correctly forming letters of the alphabet.  Encourage your child to create pictures with lots of color and details.  Show me more and tell me more are great prompts to keep your child thinking.

Beginning writers can get extra practice forming letters by writing, copying, or tracing their names.  Remember, you always have more lower case letters than capital letters on your paper!

Whether your child is an old pro at drawing pictures and writing numbers, or this is a developing skill, there are lots of fun ways that you can help your child strengthen their grip and build their stamina for paper pencil activities.  Try some of the following:

• Tweezer activities:  Practice picking up cotton balls, legos, or other small objects using a tripod grip.  Count as you go for some extra math practice! 
• Buttons and Coins:  Practice using a two finger pinch to pick up and sort buttons or coins.  Use this as an opportunity to practice colors, counting, and coin identification.
• Legos and Play-Doh:  Pinching, pushing, pulling, and forming Legos and Play-Doh are a great ways to strengthen little hands.

If your child is having trouble forming or maintaining a tripod grip, try breaking crayons or other writing materials into smaller pieces.  Having smaller writing tools will force your child to use a more accurate grip. 

Happy Writing!  

Chicka Chicka Boom Boom Coconut Fun in Ms. Rachel's Room

We have spent lots of time learning about the alphabet this week--and what better way to enjoy the alphabet than with Bill Martin, Jr.'s classic, Chicka Chicka Boom Boom.

But we didn't stop there!  We sang and danced our way through the alphabet with Elmo, and we learned all about the letters P and U during Animated Literacy. 

We even got a chance to practice blending these two letters' sounds to read and write the words up and pup!  Check out these Sesame Street podcasts for some more practice with P and U. 

You and your child can check out some of our classroom alphabet favorites here and here! 

After spending so much time together talking about letters and their sounds, we all got some independent practice with alphabet.  

Next it was time to talk about why all those letters are so important--they help us read!  We practiced reading the pictures and words together in some of my favorite ABC books, and then we practiced reading pictures and looking for letters and words on our own.

 

               

             

After a week of hard work, we were due a little fun by Friday!  

First, we all thought like scientists and used our senses to help us learn more about coconuts.  

Then it was time for us publish our findings. Your little scientists did a great job showing what they had come to know about coconuts through their explorations.

We also found out that coconuts FLOAT--even though they are heavy.  Check with your child to see if they remember why.

We used different types of blocks to build coconut trees.

And last, but not least, we painted with coconuts.

It was SO messy...but it was SO much fun!

If all this news about coconuts has you itching to hear Chicka Chicka Boom Boom you can listen here.

Teacher Tip Tuesday--Bubbles and Dinosaurs: Showing Self Control in the Classroom

We have spent much of our first few days together learning about what is expected here at school.  After reading How Do Dinosaurs Go to School? by Jane Yolen, we created some dinosaurs of our own to help us talk about what dinosaurs--and kids--should and should not do at school.  

Using our dinosaur friends and classroom conversation, we are quickly learning school and classroom rules and procedures.





But sometimes knowing the expected behavior is easier than showing the expected behavior.  So, we have also spent some time learning about and practicing self-control.  

We began our discussions about self control by talking about bubbles.  What do you want to do when someone blows bubbles?  You want to pop them of course!  But...if you have self control, you can tell your body to be still and quiet--you don't have to pop the bubbles.  

With some daily practice we are learning that we are in control of our voice and our body.  We can make our voices quiet and make our bodies still, even when it's hard.  We are learning to show our self-control.  

You can help your child practice and recognize self control by practicing at home.  Ask your child to place their hands in their lap for a count of ten before eating their favorite snack.  Play the quiet game (see which family member is the first one to talk).  Asking your child to sit and wait for even a few seconds before engaging in preferred activities will help your child understand what self-control feels like.  

Have a great Tuesday!

Monday--A Day of Firsts!

We were back for our first Monday of Kindergarten--and it was a big one!

We started our day with Mrs. Collis, our school counselor.  Everyone had a great time learning about Mrs. Collis, how she helps students at CFES, and talking about our feelings at school.

Next we headed to the computer for MAP.  It was a new--and kind of long--experience, but we all made it through just in time for a much needed play break!

And to top it all off, we got to go hang out with Mrs. Benko in the Media Center.  Your kiddos were super excited to see all the great creative spaces in our Media Center and meet Mrs. Benko, but I hope their favorite part was the BOOKS!

  

After all that, it was time to lay it down!  We were all in need of a little rest after all that!

I can't wait to do it all again tomorrow!!

Rules and Expectations

We spent a lot of time talking about rules and expectations today.  

We started our day by reading No David! by David Shannon and talking about expected and unexpected behaviors.  We decided that we were all a little like David--everyone makes mistakes--but, we can work hard to try to fix them and be happy in the end.  

Then we talked about our classroom rules and expectations.

1.  I will treat other people the way I would like to treated.

2.  I will walk quietly in the hallway.

3.  I will listen quiety and follow directions the very first time.

4.  I will keep my hands feet and objects to myself.

5.  I will work hard and try my best at everything I do.

Everyone worked hard to show expected behaviors and many of us earned horseshoes or moved our clips up to orange or blue throughout the day!  YAY!  #motivatedmustang

If you would like to listen David's story, click here. 

Take some time to talk your child about David and how he fixed his mistakes at school.  How can you fix your mistakes too?

Happy First Day of Kindergarten!

We had a great first day of Kindergarten!!

We made new friends, made some cool creations with blocks, drew pictures of what we were excited to do in Kindergarten, went to Art class, had lunch, danced our wiggles out, played outside, took a rest, and headed home.  

 

We shared a lot of firsts today.  I hope everyone went home happy, and I look forward to seeing you 

all back at school again tomorrow!