Saturday, May 18, 2013

UPDATES for 5/13-5/17 2013

**What a great week!  The students, under the guiding eyes of Ellie's mom and myself planted in our outside garden bed.  They helped move soil, sprinkle seeds and plants 4 baby basil plants.  They have been carefully watering them each day.  This summer, the PTO volunteers will see to the watering and weeding.  Next week, students from BLUE BEAR Table will be responsible for bringing in "food" to "feed" our "wormy" compost.  Once again, little bits of paper, banana/peel, veggies, egg shells are acceptable.
**"K" for King Day was truly imperial!  The kings decreed--afternoon recess and playing in our space stations.  The girls sang songs and recited poems to them and wrote some very touching notes.
**Reading Grandma Mary's last day with us was Friday.  She reported that the students have made a great deal of progress and encouraged them to keep reading over the summer.  The students presented her with written notes and flowers.  We all love her!!!!  She is truly a treasure!!!!
**We had our last meeting with our Book Buddies on Friday.  Since it was "O" day-"Origami Day", both sets of students had a super time assisting and creating.  We have some very talented kids of both grades.  We wished our 5th grade buddies well.  They are going to the Middle School next year.
**Our field trip to the Oak Park Conservatory was awesome!  The great weather made it a very comfortable walk.  The students also got to observe plant and flower growth on lawns that we passed.
Our docents were super knowledgeable and each room that the students visited contained plants, animals and fish with colorful histories and interesting facts.  The century plant was the very favorite of the group.  It is growing out of the rooftop window!  Stop by to see it.  Back at school, the students worked in their journals to write down what they learned about and what was the most interesting to them.  Some thoughts:  venus fly trap, cactus plants, ponderosa lemons, cacao plant, banana plant, ferns with spores and moss.
**The Art Fest/Poetry Slam was the bomb!!  Thanks to our own "little slammers" Zaria, Zoie, Amare and Cobie for their participation.  The art work was beautiful, the games and the play were fun.  The chorus sounded great!!!
**Monday, May 20th is our Picnic Lunch at Barrie Park.  We will leave around 10:50 am and return to school by 12:05 pm.  I am still missing some permission slips.  Don't forget:  BAG LUNCH and DRINK!  Feel free to walk with us or meet us there!
**Tuesday, May 21st is our trip to the Gurgas/Chien backyard to see and learn about the chicken coup.  We will leave around 9:50 am and return to school around 10:40 am.  It is a regular lunch day.  I am also missing permission slips for this event.  Please don't forget to send them in.  Thanks!  Feel free to join us or meet us there.
**Family Math Night is Tuesday, May 21st from 6:30-8:00 pm.  It's MONEY MADNESS!!!  Come on--join in the fun!  See me for a sign up sheet.
**"S" is for Sibling Day on Thursday, May 23rd at 2:30 pm.  Come check out the room.
**Olympic Day is Friday, May 24th from 8:30-10:30 am inside and outside of the school.  Come on out to see Team Gullo participate in events such as Basketball Hotshot and Egg and Spoon Race.  There will be 11 events and 1 rest station.  Please see that your child is dressed in comfortable clothes for the day.  GYM SHOES and SOCKS ARE A MUST!
**Keep sending in slips and money for PIZZA and PLAY End of the Year Family Picnic to be held at Rehm Park on Tuesday, May 28th from 9:30-12:30 pm.  Thanks to C. Cummings for the on line sign up. 
**BYE BYE BLACKTOP PARTY--Friday, May 24th from 4-8 pm.  Say goodbye to the blacktop and hello to our new playground!!!  Outside activities include--dunk tank for teachers, special song and t shirt sale, parent/teacher soft ball game, Robinson's Ribs food truck or bring your own picnic, ice cream truck.  WOW!  It is going to be great!!  Ms. Gullo has been waiting 8 long years for this new playground.  Come on out and celebrate!
**NO SCHOOL-Monday, May 27th in observance of Memorial Day.
This week:
It continues to be all about seeds and plants.  The students are not only monitoring the growth of their plants at home but continue to monitor our indoor class garden.  We now have cosmos, spinach, beans, peas, pumpkins, swiss chard, cantalope sprouted seeds.  Our potato plants are really growing and are ready to be planted outside.  The students used the magnifiers often to take a closer look.  I love listening to their conversations on what they are observing!  On our last station day of the year, the students worked on reading and coloring the illustrations in their plant cycle read aloud book, painted the stem and leaf structures on their coke bottle flowers and continued developing their social interaction skills while creating origami with their Book Buddies.
Reading/Social Studies:   The students continue to demonstrate what they know in Unit 10-- I Know A Lot in our final Treasures Reading unit.  The students are working in small groups, leveled reader groups and individually to review all vocabulary pertinent to kindergarten.  They are reading story literature both fiction and non fiction in their groups discussing story elements, asking and answering questions, making connections, discussing cause and effect and drawing conclusions.  The students are also working on grammar which includes recognizing nouns, verbs, adjectives and pronouns.  Some groups have done some work with articles and adverbs.  The students are using a variety of games and iPad apps as reinforcement.  The students themselves have been called upon to "be the teacher" in many review situations.  Each day, we have "volunteer read alouds."  Wow! I have so many volunteers!  After each read aloud, the students can critique their own reading and other students can give suggestions.  This is done in a kind, caring way and the care shown each reader is amazing!  In our Haggerty Blue Book exercises, the students continue to review phoneme blending, adding, deleting and substituting phonemes and work on words containing blends, digraphs, vowel teams, silent e and controlled "r".  They have come so far!!  The students listened and responded to a variety of poems.  We had many poetry breaks in our day.
Math:    The students continue to review counting beyond 100 by 1's, 10's, 2's and 5's, reading and writing 2 and 3 digit numbers, place value and addition and subtraction processes using numbers 0-10.  The students continue to work in their math process journal--reading the story problem, illustrating the process and writing the number sentence or equation.  They are using the "function machine" to play "What's My Rule?  The students are using a game format to review coins and values, telling time and counting down.
Writing:    The students have been putting into practice all the elements of writing a good sentence.  They continue to reflect in their journals about given topics--Kings, the Conservatory and Reading Grandma among this weeks topics.  Next week, we will begin our final writing project--topic: WORMS!  We will also begin work on an individual poem relating to an art project that the students recently finished.
Science:    A companion piece to our Conservatory trip was the Traveling Seed Experience Box sent over by the Oak Park Conservatory.  The students took a hands on look at the way seeds travel or are dispersed depending upon their shapes and sizes.  The box contained experiments to show--blowing in the wind, floating on water, popping from pods and how they can be carried by animals.  Lots of fun!  The students also checked on their sprouting seed bags and seed sponges. (hydroponics)  Wow!  Something is sprouting!  Students also notice some mold, another living organism, on some of the seeds.  The students recorded in their science journals by illustrating, writing and diagrams what their bags and sponges look like after one week.  This week the students began the study of the life and times of a worm.  This amazing creature is very vital to our earth.  Stay tuned for more next week!
Technology:   The students are doing some preliminary work with the app Story Kit for our final project of the year.  Stay tuned!!  In reading and math, student groups of 4 continue to work on the app Teach Me.
Lots of discussion and encouragement by the members of each group to each other.  In science, the students use the apps  Life Cycles and Enchanted Learning to seek out supplemental information on plants and insects.  Small group student work centered around the story, "The Seed Grows" on our book app.
Literature:    "Counting in the Garden," "The Garden," "Bright Yellow Flowers," "Compost Stew," "Seeds," "The Earthworm," "Plants Bite Back," "Curious George Plants a Tree," "Oh Say Can You Seed," "The Reason for a Flower," "Planting a Rainbow," "Me Want Pet." (Kings request!)
   

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