Kindergator Update 11.9.18


On my way into Tech tonight, I saw some students stop, thank and shake hands with another young man in military uniform. It made me think about our Veteran’s Day unit this week and how small kindnesses can often be a big deal. Here are some of the big things our small kids worked on this week in class.

Reading: We worked hard to understand the terms “main idea” and “details” as we learned about the Bald Eagle, Veteran’s Day and the branches of the military. We also began thinking about how an author adds details to support their point. We wrote letters to soldier moms this week and will work on soldier dads next.

Math: We wrapped up our unit on comparing numbers using strategy and we will be comparing and contrasting strategies that work best for the situation next week. We now have 17 out of our 18 students counting to 100 by 1s and our last one is very close so we will hopefully be celebrating 100% soon. We continued our introduction to word problems and introduced some of our groups to the “Draw and Tell” app that allows them to digitally represent a word problems and orally explain their process. They had a blast with it.

Writing: We finished our second narratives today. We will work on terrific titles next week, and publish these stories.

Science: We finished our unit on how an object's attributes affect its motion. The students had to think about how the shape of an object, its material and even weight affected its type of motion. It was fun to watch them explore.

Vocabulary: soldier, sailor, veteran, military, talons, prey

BIG THINGS:

Be sure to check out the family Thanksgiving lunch days and times on the school website and in last week’s BLOG post.

Please encourage “math drawings” instead of illustrations when your child is doing a word problem in their journal.

We discovered this week that many reply emails are going directly to our “junk” folder and not to our inbox. If you send an email to me and I do not reply within 24 hours, please resend it or leave a little note that you sent in your child’s agenda. I will be checking my junk now that I know, but who knows what else might go wrong with technology this year. I am just happy that this one issue cannot have been my fault!!!

Be on the lookout for the "My Thanksgiving Customs" project guidelines to come home next week. The project is not due until after Thanksgiving and there will be homework time allotted for it the week following Thanksgiving for it, but you may wish to take some pictures or do some pre-work for it on Thanksgiving Day itself.

Thank you to:

Grant who was voted our “Leader of the Month” for November.

Arnold who has become a puzzle expert.

Grant for making a giant list of multiple meaning words for the class to consider.

Jackson for teaching the class about BOB phonics books and being our first to master counting by 1s, 5s, 10s and 2s.

Reese’s family for sending in CLOROX wipes. Mrs. Watson works feverishly to keep the germs away.

Olivia for making napkin wrapped artwork for the class. It was super sweet of her.

Reese for her great work “throwing the brain” in class.

Rayell, Olivia and Pennelope for working hard to master their counting to 100.



Popular posts from this blog

KIndergator Update 9.14

I am watching a 6 year old jump off a high diving board here at Georgia Tech as I type this. There is so much excitement and fear at the same time in her eyes as she gets ready to jump. It reminds me of how our kiddos look right before they sound out a big word in class. It is such fun to watch. Here are some things we worked on this week: Reading: We continued blending sounds together in guided reading groups. We began introducing the “letters that work together to make one sound” trick with blends like (sw, sn, st, sp). We also began our study of the parts of a story by discussing characters. Did you know anything can me a character if you write a story about it? We read about a blue dot as a character and a chameleon. We also reviewed th difference between real reading and fake fiction through our topic of chameleons this week. Math: We finished naming all the 2d shapes and describing them. Next week we will begin “eating” them. If your child can correctly describe the at...
Read more

KIndergator Update

Happy first week of Kindergarten! It has been a really smooth transition so far, so thank you parents. Here are some things we worked on this week: Rules, rules and more rules. What to do if you don't know what to do......raise your hand or look for a clue! Who are the people in your campground (school)? Who are the people in you camp (through sharing our all about me bags)? Next week we move into our regular schedule and begin curriculum. Our focus will be getting used to the schedule, building independence and an "I can" attitude. Look for an update next week to see how well we did. In the meantime here are some great quotes from our class this week. "I have a joke for you" "Okay" "What did the corn dog say?" "What?" "No. no monkey!" The whole class falls out laughing. "The lunch choices are hamburger, mac and cheese or salad. What would you like?" "Pizza." "Well there is ...
Read more

Kindergator Update 9.21 and some requests

Break time! I hope you have a wonderful week off. We can all use some rest and hopefully some fall weather. Here are some things we worked on this week. Reading: We continued working on the difference between real reading and fake fiction with our unit about apples. We also began our talk of how to do a great story retelling by focusing on the who (characters) and where (setting) in our first sentence. Math: We worked on comparing and contrasting 2d shapes and introduced vocabulary for 3d shapes such as edges, vertices and faces. Social Studies: We compared and contrasted the GA and US flags. Vocabulary: Cube, edge, vertices, orchard, pollen, nectar, symbol Big Things: We have had some big chats this week about how we treat others. Within the past week I have heard kids tell Mrs. Watson she doesn't pack them up right. After a student dropped their fruit on the ground they told Mrs. Watson she was supposed to clean it up for them. She and Mrs. McGhee have been told just ...
Read more