**Parent/Teacher Conferences for Ms. Gullo's Kindergarten class will be held on Monday, October 20th, Tuesday, October 21st and Wednesday, October 22nd. Thanks to all of you who have already signed up. If you have not signed up or need to change your day and time, please email me. PLEASE NOTE: School will be in session MORNING ONLY on Thursday, October 23rd and Friday, October 24th. Dismissal will be at 11:00 am.
**DIBELS testing and PHONEMIC AWARENESS SCREENERS have been completed. Our math baseline assessment EASY CBM will be administered sometime in the next week or two. All testing and assessments will be shared with you at conference time. We are looking at beginning Route to Reading Skill specific groups on September 30th. You will receive notification of your child's skill group placement at that time.
**School Pictures will be taken on Tuesday, September 30th. I usually try to have the students pictures taken first thing in the morning. You will be receiving more info soon.
**Pledge information on PTO's BIGGEST FUNDRAISER of the YEAR--THE FUN RUN went home on Tuesday. You can also sign up and pledge on line. It will take place on WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 22nd. Kindergarten will "run" around the turf from 8:15-8:30 am. Help raise money for our school!!
**Irving PACERS Running/Walking club began last Friday. Students used their lunch recess time to run/walk around the school grounds. 3 times around (1mile) and the student earns a special necklace with a foot on it. Each week, the students will get another opportunity to add a foot. The students are making special envelopes to hold their necklaces and we will keep them in the classroom for safekeeping. PACERS will meet 9/26, 10/3, 10/17, 11/7, 11/14, 11/21 weather permitting and resume in the spring. Let's say YES to exercise!!
**I will be choosing our STUDENT COUNCIL REPS on MONDAY. Anyone else interested...let me know. The first meeting will be October 7th at lunch recess time.
**We have a GREEN TEAM!! Each class will send 2 reps to the meetings that meet every other Tuesday with our Green Team Leaders, Mr. Packer and Ms. Parkinson. They will plan projects, discuss how to create a "greener" environment for our school and will relay information to our class.
We need 2 reps for our class. I will be having a discussion with the class on Monday to see if anyone is interested. It is a commitment for the entire school year and we will talk about what that means.
**Author of "Five Little Monkeys" fame, Eileen Christelow will visit Irving School on Tuesday, October 28th at 1:00 pm. She will speak about her work and how she gets her ideas. Ms. Noonan will send an order form of Ms. Christelow's books prior to her visit. There will be a book signing.
**Information on Irving School's TRIVIA NIGHT was in your child's homework folder. SAVE THE DATE--Thursday, November 6th, 7:00 pm at The Wire in Berwyn. Registration begins next week.
**No School--Friday, October 10th---Teacher's Institute Day.
**No School--Monday, October 13th---Columbus Day Observance.
**In Friendship Club this week, Ms. Bell Bey continued her discussion on the Zones of Regulation and what it means to be in the YELLOW ZONE and RED ZONE. She also went into more detail about being a "Social Detective." We have been having some well thought out and heart felt discussions and comments about our behavior and what we can do to shape it.
**In Mr. Packer Problem Solving, we went to Mr. Packer's room to continue our project on positional concepts. Concepts in, on, under, next to, behind, in front of, between were discussed and the students looked again at the video demonstrating the concepts.
This week:
It was all about letters and numbers. The students have found letters around the classroom and school. They also located numbers around the classroom and school. What is the difference between letters and numbers? The students began a conversation about consonants (letters that have 1-2 sounds) and vowels (letters that have many different sounds.) The students found the consonants and vowels in their name. They compared that number to the number of consonant and vowels in a friends name. We are counting everything in sight---markers, crayons, chairs, books, feet, fingers, noses, shoes........What is a reckenrek?????? Station Day activities included creating patterns and counting teddy bears, continued exploration of pattern block shapes, playing "Show Me" using their ten frames, reading their paper stories to a partner, reading their word wheel sentences.
Reading/Language Arts: We have begun Unit 1 FAMILIES in our Treasures Reading Series. Students build background knowledge about types of families they knew about. They discussed human families and animal families. We all shared experiences about our families and the number of family members we have. The students listened to the Big Book story,"Whose Baby is It?" The students reviewed parts of a book--front cover, back cover, title page, spine. They also located where to find the page number. The students noted the question and answer pattern in the book. They reviewed their previous sight words and added new target words we and the. We played "Hands Up, Hands Down" adding our new words. Our target sound in isolation this week is Mm. The students worked with the sound toy box and sound cards and created a list of words that began with Mm. They also listened for the sound of Mm at the end of words. Our puppet friends, Mr. Happy and Mr. G. assisted in our Mm sound reinforcing activities. The students worked on additional vocabulary when listening to the fable," The Lioness and the Ostrich." This vocabulary is referred to as ROBUST VOCABULARY. Ask your child about the words ANIMAL, PROTECT, TOGETHER and RESEMBLE. We defined each word and gave a sample sentence. We used them frequently in our discussions. The students used retelling cards to retell the Big Book story to a partner. The students worked on story words JOEY, PUP and CUB in the baby animal world. We read aloud our pre decodable story, "I Can, We Can." The students continue to work on tracking each word and picture using their pointing finger while reading. They also read the paper story, "I Can" to a partner. The students continue to work on additional Common Core skills---recognizing FICTION and NON FICTION stories and examining the similarities and differences between a story and a poem. The students continued to work on recognizing certain parts of speech. They brainstormed lists of words that named people, animals and places (NOUNS) and words that name an action (VERBS.)
Formal literacy workstations began this week. While I worked with small group leveled readers each day, the students also worked in rotating small groups writing an I am.....sentence with picture, "walking"/writing their words, comparing family sizes project, play the beginning sound game, playing upper and lowercase match, draw a picture of your family and write about something you do together and retelling their leveled reader story to a person in their group. Each week each group is assigned a "table manager" for their group. Their jobs are setting up their workstation, controlling the noise level, gentle reminders to keep working etc. We spent time last week role playing various scenes in a workstations. Our table managers did an excellent job!
Math: The students reviewed simple shape recognition. They did the "Shape Rap" a cool listening as well as shape recognizing song activity. The students continued their exploration of pattern blocks. We looked at hexagons, trapezoid, rhombus and ovals. Students brought up how many sides each shape had. The students worked on a variety of counting activities using their 10 frame. We played "Show Me' where I write a number and the students have to create it on their 10 frame. Students worked with a variety of objects--pennies, bears, blocks and cubes matching one to one. Students worked with number cards and partners to match and sequence and sequence numbers 0-5, 0-10, 0-15 or 0-20. Movement activities that included work on greater than, less than, over, under, between, beside, behind, above, below had the students up and moving and having fun!
What is a reckenrek?????? Check out the photo on the side of the blog. Looks somewhat like an abacus but a little different..... 10 rows---5 white beads and 5 red beads in each row........mmmm. The reckenrek is a calculating frame that acts a visual model for developing strategic reasoning in math. Students are beginning to see or visualize patterns and strategies for solving math problems. There may be more than one way to solve a problem. Right now we are in the beginning stages of its use. We started by looking at the 5 white and 5 red.....10 all together. If you already know that there are 5 white....what if I add one more??? Do you have to count it???? The students worked on an activity called "slide and say." I slid the the beads from one side to another they had to "figure out" what number was being illustrated. Loads of fun........I have some serious math heads in the house!!!!!!
Writing: The students began work on their FROG JUMP capitals. They are using their mini chalk boards, chalk and sponges. The small chalk and sponge pieces help to reinforce their tri pod grasp. The students are also working with large wooden straight, curved and slant shapes to create the letter. Letters F and E were introduced this week. The students also learned a song about where ALL LETTERS start.......Where do you start your letters....AT THE TOP!!!! Appearing in the upper left corner is Mr. Smiley. He is there to remind the students to always begin on the left side. Next week the students will apply what they have learned in their orange practice books. Students continue to work on journal entries in Writer's Workshop. The student are using journal prompts from our Treasures Unit. Lots of writing and drawing about family members. Students are now seeing that they can come back to a piece of writing they have done and add more to it or they can continue to work on a piece of writing that is not finished. The students saw the video, "Arthur is a Writer."
It helped reinforce to the students that they can write about any topic that interests them.
Technology: I have begun to work with small groups of students on iPad etiquette. The apps Sound Sort and Alpha Tots were introduced to one group. Next week I will work the remainder of the groups and introduce 2 math apps. Feel free to download these apps thru the App Store on your devices. Many of them are free or between $.99-2.99.
Literature: "Arthur's Back to School Surprise," "The Cat in the Hat Comes Back," "Fox in Socks,"
"Oops, David," "Hands Are Not For Hitting," "If You Give a Pig a Pancake," "Whose Baby Am I?' "Maya Was Grumpy," "A Rainbow All Around Me," "The Alphabet Adventure," "Big and Small Animals," "Animal Babies," "How Do We Learn," "Where in the Wild."
Sunday, September 21, 2014
Sunday, September 14, 2014
UPDATES for 9/8-9/12 2014
**Thanks so much for your attendance at OPEN HOUSE/CURRICULUM NIGHT! I know there was a lot of material presented and I could have talked for another 30 minutes! Please read through your curriculum packet. If you have any questions or would like to meet me after school or early evening to go over anything, please email me. I know the students had a great time. They were a bit sleepy eyed the next day but full of conversation about who they saw and who they introduced. Most of you signed up for Parent/Teacher Conferences. The list is posted in the room. I will send you a formal confirmation and reminder letter. Parent/Teacher Conferences for my class will be held Monday, October 20th, Tuesday, October 21st and Wednesday, October 22nd. At that time, I will be sharing my assessments, student progress in all academic areas, participation and social/emotional growth reflections. I will also share with you the standards based report card.
**I was not able to attend Barriefest but heard the Pet Parade was the bomb!!
**Eagle Extras after school classes will begin on Monday, September 15th. The students signed up will be picked up from the classroom at dismissal.
**I have completed DIBELS testing and am almost finished with the Phonemic Awareness Screening. These screeners will be used to create groupings for our Route to Reading Skill specific groups. We hope to begin Route to Reading September 30th. You will receive notification of your child's skill group at that time.
**School Pictures will be taken on Tuesday, September 30th. More information will be forthcoming.
**We have LIBRARY every MONDAY. Don't forget to send the book back. Next week, the students will get to select 2 books to take out.
**The PTO's BIGGEST FUND RAISER of the YEAR is coming up on WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 22nd!! It's the annual FUN RUN!! Students seek pledges from family and friends. They in turn will "run" around the turf on October 22nd. Incentives and prizes galore!! KINDERGARTEN will RUN from 8:15-8:30 am. All are welcome to attend and cheer us on!!! Pledge packets will go home on Tuesday, September 16th. Help up raise money for our school!!!
**Author of "Five Little Monkeys" fame, Eileen Christelow will visit Irving School on Tuesday, October 28th at 1:00 pm. She will talk about her work and how she gets her ideas. Ms. Noonan will send a an order form of Ms. Christelow's books prior to her visit. There will be a book signing.
**If your child will be "TRAVELING" over any weekend or taking a vacation, let me know.....I will send a Travel Journal with them. Our class will track our "travels" throughout the year on our state and world map. It can be anywhere Chicago, Florida, Lombard, Colorado, South Carolina, a water park, hotel, France......if you go there...we will track it!!
**In Friendship Club this week, Ms. Bell Bey talked about the Zones of Regulation and what it means to be in the GREEN ZONE and the BLUE ZONE. I will send you information on this topic as we delve deeper into working with the students on shaping and regulating their own behavior.
**In Mr. Packer Problem Solving, the students got to go up to Mr. Packer's room to view a video on the positional concepts--in, on, under, behind, next to, in front of and between. There were dancing fish and a cute catchy tune! The students then began work on a project that will give them a better understanding about the various positional concepts covered. Stay tuned for part 2 next week.
This week: It was all about getting ready for OPEN HOUSE. The students worked hard on projects to display in our hallway. They thought about their future in their illustrations and writing of what they wanted to be when they grew up. They work on retelling a story both verbally and with the help of their classmates recording letters and words. It was a total group effort! The students shared information on who was in their family with each other. They drew a picture of their family members.....even their pets. Totally adorable!! The discussions on expectations, behavior, Eagle slips and direction following remain important topics.
Reading/Language Arts: The students finished Week 3 of our prep for Treasures Reading series called Smart Start. They completed their Activity Book for the unit. It is in their homework folder. The students worked on reinforcing the recognition of letter names A-Z and sounds A-P. They again used mirrors to observe where each sound came from...open/closed mouth?...puff of air?....vibrations?.....where is your tongue? The students continue to work on sight word vocabulary. They had fun with an activity called, "Walk Your Words." Sight words introduced so far--red, blue, go, I, am, yes, no, can. I read the trade book, "Jazz Baby." Before the first read, the students made predictions about story content. They were able to point out the title, title page, spine and that the story was fiction. After the second reading, the students used the retelling cards to orally retell the story. Some students volunteered to write words under the picture cards. It was a group effort to help in the sounding out words and the recording of letters to create the sentences. The students continued to work on the common core standards of comparing texts and asking and answering questions about a story read. The students compared the fiction story, "Jazz Baby," to the informational (nonfiction) story, "Made From Clay." They noted the real from the make believe, photo vs. illustrations and what each story was about (main idea. ) They also continued work on recognizing the CHARACTERS and SETTING (where the story happens.) The positional words under, in, on and over were reviewed. During oral read aloud time, the students read their paper story, "I Can." They concentrated on finger pointing each word and picture and noting each sentence begins with a capital letter and has an ending mark (period, question mark, exclamation mark.) Students took turns reading aloud while the other students followed along with their finger. (tracking)
Workstations this week included "Froggy, Froggy Where's Your Home?" (upper/lowercase match), Sound Toy Bag Game (matching toy to its appropriate initial sound box,) "Walk Your Words," and Initial Sound Magnet Board.
The students continue to work on the Haggerty Blue Book exercises which include rhyming, letter naming, sound recognition, segmenting, substituting, adding and deleting sounds and counting syllables.
Math: The students worked on common core standards matching one to one on their number boards and building number. Students worked in groups-recognition 0-5 and 0-10. They also worked on sequencing numbers 0-15. The students continue to use our calendar ten frames to count the number of days they have been in school. They also played "Swat It," (similar to Hand Up, Hands Down) The students played Towers of Ten where they drew number cards to build their tower. Concepts GREATER THAN/LESS THAN were worked on. Students began exploration of pattern block shapes (hexagon, trapezoid, rhombus, square and triangle) They use the blocks to create really cool designs and then counted how many blocks it took to make their design. Workstations this week included egg carton math, sorting and classifying activities, matching number with quantity, counting and writing to 5 or 10, playing number bingo 0-20.
Writing: Now that the students have awareness that different types of lines form our letters, we have begun to explore our writing series, Handwriting Without Tears. The students used wooden pieces (straight lines, curved lines and slant lines) to construct their name on the floor. We talked about always starting at the top when producing a letter in writing. Next week, we will begin learning to form our FROG JUMP letters and working in our orange practice book. In Writer's Workshop this week, the students are enthusiastically working in their journals. They have been using their idea lightbulb when choosing a topic to write and draw about. Students are also labeling parts of their drawings and beginning to us their inventive or phonetic spelling when sounding out words. The students are beginning to grasp the concept of a sentence NAMING (subject) and TELLING (action.) As you saw when you came to Open House---lots of exciting stuff happening with regards to writing!
Technology: The students are continuing to work on iPad etiquette. How to turn on and off, using the pad of their finger, control the sound, adding the headset and where to find activities. Our data coach, Mr. Degman will be assisting in fostering greater independence in using the iPad. iPad use in our classroom is another tool the students can use to enhance and support what they are learning in the classroom. Stay tuned!
Literature: "When I Grow Up," "The Pout, Pout Fish," "1,2,3 Peas," "A Hippopotamus Ate the Teacher," "I Like Me," "The Colors of Us," "The Alphabet Mystery," "The Cat in the Hat," "Hop on Pop," Alphabatics," "I Will Try," "Smile If You Are Human," "Ten Black Dots," "Big and Little," "How Will I Get to School this Year?" "Made from Clay,"
**I was not able to attend Barriefest but heard the Pet Parade was the bomb!!
**Eagle Extras after school classes will begin on Monday, September 15th. The students signed up will be picked up from the classroom at dismissal.
**I have completed DIBELS testing and am almost finished with the Phonemic Awareness Screening. These screeners will be used to create groupings for our Route to Reading Skill specific groups. We hope to begin Route to Reading September 30th. You will receive notification of your child's skill group at that time.
**School Pictures will be taken on Tuesday, September 30th. More information will be forthcoming.
**We have LIBRARY every MONDAY. Don't forget to send the book back. Next week, the students will get to select 2 books to take out.
**The PTO's BIGGEST FUND RAISER of the YEAR is coming up on WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 22nd!! It's the annual FUN RUN!! Students seek pledges from family and friends. They in turn will "run" around the turf on October 22nd. Incentives and prizes galore!! KINDERGARTEN will RUN from 8:15-8:30 am. All are welcome to attend and cheer us on!!! Pledge packets will go home on Tuesday, September 16th. Help up raise money for our school!!!
**Author of "Five Little Monkeys" fame, Eileen Christelow will visit Irving School on Tuesday, October 28th at 1:00 pm. She will talk about her work and how she gets her ideas. Ms. Noonan will send a an order form of Ms. Christelow's books prior to her visit. There will be a book signing.
**If your child will be "TRAVELING" over any weekend or taking a vacation, let me know.....I will send a Travel Journal with them. Our class will track our "travels" throughout the year on our state and world map. It can be anywhere Chicago, Florida, Lombard, Colorado, South Carolina, a water park, hotel, France......if you go there...we will track it!!
**In Friendship Club this week, Ms. Bell Bey talked about the Zones of Regulation and what it means to be in the GREEN ZONE and the BLUE ZONE. I will send you information on this topic as we delve deeper into working with the students on shaping and regulating their own behavior.
**In Mr. Packer Problem Solving, the students got to go up to Mr. Packer's room to view a video on the positional concepts--in, on, under, behind, next to, in front of and between. There were dancing fish and a cute catchy tune! The students then began work on a project that will give them a better understanding about the various positional concepts covered. Stay tuned for part 2 next week.
This week: It was all about getting ready for OPEN HOUSE. The students worked hard on projects to display in our hallway. They thought about their future in their illustrations and writing of what they wanted to be when they grew up. They work on retelling a story both verbally and with the help of their classmates recording letters and words. It was a total group effort! The students shared information on who was in their family with each other. They drew a picture of their family members.....even their pets. Totally adorable!! The discussions on expectations, behavior, Eagle slips and direction following remain important topics.
Reading/Language Arts: The students finished Week 3 of our prep for Treasures Reading series called Smart Start. They completed their Activity Book for the unit. It is in their homework folder. The students worked on reinforcing the recognition of letter names A-Z and sounds A-P. They again used mirrors to observe where each sound came from...open/closed mouth?...puff of air?....vibrations?.....where is your tongue? The students continue to work on sight word vocabulary. They had fun with an activity called, "Walk Your Words." Sight words introduced so far--red, blue, go, I, am, yes, no, can. I read the trade book, "Jazz Baby." Before the first read, the students made predictions about story content. They were able to point out the title, title page, spine and that the story was fiction. After the second reading, the students used the retelling cards to orally retell the story. Some students volunteered to write words under the picture cards. It was a group effort to help in the sounding out words and the recording of letters to create the sentences. The students continued to work on the common core standards of comparing texts and asking and answering questions about a story read. The students compared the fiction story, "Jazz Baby," to the informational (nonfiction) story, "Made From Clay." They noted the real from the make believe, photo vs. illustrations and what each story was about (main idea. ) They also continued work on recognizing the CHARACTERS and SETTING (where the story happens.) The positional words under, in, on and over were reviewed. During oral read aloud time, the students read their paper story, "I Can." They concentrated on finger pointing each word and picture and noting each sentence begins with a capital letter and has an ending mark (period, question mark, exclamation mark.) Students took turns reading aloud while the other students followed along with their finger. (tracking)
Workstations this week included "Froggy, Froggy Where's Your Home?" (upper/lowercase match), Sound Toy Bag Game (matching toy to its appropriate initial sound box,) "Walk Your Words," and Initial Sound Magnet Board.
The students continue to work on the Haggerty Blue Book exercises which include rhyming, letter naming, sound recognition, segmenting, substituting, adding and deleting sounds and counting syllables.
Math: The students worked on common core standards matching one to one on their number boards and building number. Students worked in groups-recognition 0-5 and 0-10. They also worked on sequencing numbers 0-15. The students continue to use our calendar ten frames to count the number of days they have been in school. They also played "Swat It," (similar to Hand Up, Hands Down) The students played Towers of Ten where they drew number cards to build their tower. Concepts GREATER THAN/LESS THAN were worked on. Students began exploration of pattern block shapes (hexagon, trapezoid, rhombus, square and triangle) They use the blocks to create really cool designs and then counted how many blocks it took to make their design. Workstations this week included egg carton math, sorting and classifying activities, matching number with quantity, counting and writing to 5 or 10, playing number bingo 0-20.
Writing: Now that the students have awareness that different types of lines form our letters, we have begun to explore our writing series, Handwriting Without Tears. The students used wooden pieces (straight lines, curved lines and slant lines) to construct their name on the floor. We talked about always starting at the top when producing a letter in writing. Next week, we will begin learning to form our FROG JUMP letters and working in our orange practice book. In Writer's Workshop this week, the students are enthusiastically working in their journals. They have been using their idea lightbulb when choosing a topic to write and draw about. Students are also labeling parts of their drawings and beginning to us their inventive or phonetic spelling when sounding out words. The students are beginning to grasp the concept of a sentence NAMING (subject) and TELLING (action.) As you saw when you came to Open House---lots of exciting stuff happening with regards to writing!
Technology: The students are continuing to work on iPad etiquette. How to turn on and off, using the pad of their finger, control the sound, adding the headset and where to find activities. Our data coach, Mr. Degman will be assisting in fostering greater independence in using the iPad. iPad use in our classroom is another tool the students can use to enhance and support what they are learning in the classroom. Stay tuned!
Literature: "When I Grow Up," "The Pout, Pout Fish," "1,2,3 Peas," "A Hippopotamus Ate the Teacher," "I Like Me," "The Colors of Us," "The Alphabet Mystery," "The Cat in the Hat," "Hop on Pop," Alphabatics," "I Will Try," "Smile If You Are Human," "Ten Black Dots," "Big and Little," "How Will I Get to School this Year?" "Made from Clay,"
Saturday, September 6, 2014
UPDATES for 9/2-9/5 2014
**The students are becoming more familiar with our daily routines and expectations of all of their teachers and classes. Lunch is going well! The students are learning to eat their main entre first, drink all of their beverage and recycle school lunch trays and milk cartons. A big shout out to our parent volunteers at lunch! You have helped make a big difference. Next week will be our final week of parent helpers. I believe I have 2 parents signed up. If you would like to help, just meet us out on the playground at noon.
**The Irving Back to School Party was rained out. Bummer!!! We all were hoping it would clear up! On the bright side---next week looks like very comfortable weather.
**COME ONE, COME ALL TO Irving School's OPEN HOUSE/CURRICULUM NIGHT on Thursday, September 11th beginning at 6:30 pm. The schedule is as follows: A PARENT ONLY Curriculum Overview for Kindergarten families is from 6:30-7:00 pm in our classroom. You can drop off your child in the auditorium for a supervised special feature. I will be speaking about our daily routine, all subject areas, testing that is done in Kindergarten, Route to Reading skills specific groupings and special area classes. I will also have handouts with other information on our year. There will be a SIGN UP SHEET for PARENT CONFERENCES, ROOM PARENTS SIGN UP (I have 2 so far) and OTHER FUN EVENTS. Please pick up your child in the auditorium at 7:00 pm and let them be your TOUR GUIDE as they bring you to meet the teachers who will be working with them. I will give you a list with the teacher's name, subject and room number as an assist. Don't forget--from 6:30-7:00 pm is PARENTS ONLY in my classroom. Hope to see everyone on Thursday!
**We will have our first LIBRARY TIME with teacher librarian, Ms. Noonan on Monday morning. The students will be able to take out a book from the library and keep it out for 7 days until the next library time. After awhile, the students will be able to take out 2 books. Ms. Noonan will be reading many types of fiction and nonfiction books, helping with projects and showing the students how the library is organized and where to find certain books. It is recommended that if a student is not reading his/her library book....it should be kept in their backpack for safe keeping.
**The students had their first Friendship Club meeting with Ms. Bell Bey, our social worker. She will be working with the class on a variety of lessons centering around fostering positive peer relationships, feelings, conflict resolution, sharing, bullying and other topics. She will use a variety of materials and approaches including stories, videos, role playing, acting, games, puppets to name a few. This week, Ms. Bell Bey showed a video on school rules and being ready to learn and being a social detective knowing how to respond to different situations.
**The students also had their first meeting with Mr. Packer who will work with the students on problem solving skills and higher level thinking skills. He played a cool name game to get to know each student and remember their name.
**Last week I began screening students with the DIBELS test and a PHONOLOGICAL SCREENER. These assessments will help in determining each students placement in our skill specific ROUTE to READING groups. You will hear much more about this at CURRICULUM NIGHT.
**We had our first FIRE DRILL on Friday. We talked at length about a practice to help us get out of the building safely and quickly in the event of a fire. The students did a super job of following directions. We even got to see the Fire Chief! We will be having fire drills periodically during the school year.
**Don't forget--a healthy snack each day. Gym shoes and socks for gym days.
**The students continue to learn about the process of earning an individual Eagle Slip and how the whole class an earn an Eagle Slip. This is in conjunction with our school wide PBIS behavior incentive. Many students have gotten Eagle Slips this past week!! Yeah!!! Every Friday, Mr. Hodge will put his hand in the big purple box and pull out 10 lucky winners. Lily's Eagle Slip was drawn the first week of school and she got to pick a prize!
**School Pictures will be taken on Tuesday, September 30th. More info to follow.
**Don't forget to check out the cool after school Eagle Extra classes handed out last week. Email me with any questions.
This week:
It was all about the students continued effort to feel comfortable with daily routines and meet all of their teachers for the year. It was also about ABC's everywhere! Why do we need them? What do they look like? How do they sound? What does our mouth do when we say them. Many sounds? Only one or two sounds? Uppercase? Lowercase? What happens when we put letters together? The students experienced many activities surrounding the alphabet.
Reading/Language Arts: The students are continuing to work on their prep for our Treasures Reading series using SMART START. The students are focusing on letter recognition and sounds for letters A-M. They are learning about imprinting sound and how our mouth looks when we make that sound. The students are using mirrors to really see what happens when a letter sound is produced. Is their mouth open or closed? Is there air coming out of their mouth? Is there a vibration in their throat? Lots to think about! The students are learning to work with me to create word webs on suggested topics---What do we do in Kindergarten? What do hands do? How do we look? These exercises generate conversation and participation that stimulate oral vocabulary. The students continue to listen to rhyming patterns in words. They are learning to chant the ending. An example would be--bat, cat they end in at. Rhyming words have the same ending part. The students continue to work on their sight words--I, can, am, yes, no. The students listened to the Big Book story, "Hands Can." We discussed the TITLE and found the TITLE PAGE and SPINE of the book. The students also talked about the job of an AUTHOR and ILLUSTRATOR. They have also begun to notice certain story elements such as WHO is in the story (characters) and WHERE the story takes place (setting.) As I read the story, the students are watching as I model tracking each word from the left to the right as I read. The story was read a second time and the students made connections in their own lives about what their hands do. The students read aloud from their paper story, "I Can." They practiced finger pointing each word and picture. Together, we worked on story structure and sequence. The students then practiced their reading to a partner. In our Haggerty Blue Book exercises, the students continue to work on letter naming, rhyming, blending, saying the beginning sound, segmenting and substituting sounds and counting how many words there are in a given sentence. Our small group workstations this week included Alphabet Bingo, "Go Fish for Letters," sound sorting board, sequencing upper and lowercase letters, upper and lowercase match, stamping your name, "Hands Up, Hands Down" sight word swat and oral comprehension and story retelling.
Math: This year District 97 has added the curriculum, My Math along with Everyday Math to support the teaching of the math Common Core Standards. Students worked on a number of recognition/counting activities including Egg Carton Math, Listen and Count, building number boards, "Got It," Number/Object Match, sorting and classifying in their small group workstations. We did a whole class activity called, "Name Train" where the students wrote their name, one letter in each box and place one cube in the box for each letter in their name. They connected the cubes to form a train and then they went around comparing---is my name train longer or shorter then yours? Who has the longest name train? Shortest? The same number of cubes? They each counted how many letters they had in their name box and matched it with the number on our big chart. Who had the most letters in their name??? (10) Ask you child! We talked about the patterns we see around us. The students noted the shape and color pattern on our calendar. The students continued to work using the calendar for number sequencing and counting. We are using a ten frame to keep track of how many days we have been in school. Our AGE CHANGE CHART has everyone's picture on it waiting for their birthday so they can make the change. Ethan has already moved to the land of the 6 year olds! The students reviewed basic flat shapes--circle, square, triangle, rectangle and positional words--ABOVE, BELOW, BETWEEN, IN THE MIDDLE.
Writing: The students are learning about what types of lines we use to form letters--straight, curved and slanted. The students used these lines to form MAT MAN. We even learned a song about him. Students used the body image in MAT MAN to make their own "One thing you should know about me" portrait. They are displayed in our room. Too cute! We are working on strengthening our hands and fingers. We use clay to do this. Kneading, squishing, rolling are good ways to get our hands and fingers moving. We even made some letters with straight, curved and slant snakes! In Writer's Workshop, the students the students talked about writing about ideas that interest them. This week, the topics were friends, family, animals, what you like to do at home. During our journal conferencing, the student may have tried to write words, the first of a word in their picture, label one of the pictures or tried to write a complete sentence. We just begun to chat about what a sentence is--a group of words that NAMES and TELLS. Students will use "inventive spelling" just what they hear--it could be just the beginning sound, beginning and ending sound. Many times the vowel will be omitted. This is just the beginning of their sound foundation. Let them spell what they hear!
Technology: We are just in the beginning stages of iPad use. We are learning about iPad care and operation in our classroom. More on this next week.
Literature: "Pirates Go To School," "Crazy Hair Day," "Two Eyes, A Nose, A Mouth," "When Dinosaurs Go To School," "The Recess Queen," "What Will the Fat Cat Sit On," "This is the Teacher," "The Mixed Up Alphabet," "Cool Dog, School Dog," "Hands Can," "I Measure Myself," (poem) "Schools Around the World," "New Bear At School."
**The Irving Back to School Party was rained out. Bummer!!! We all were hoping it would clear up! On the bright side---next week looks like very comfortable weather.
**COME ONE, COME ALL TO Irving School's OPEN HOUSE/CURRICULUM NIGHT on Thursday, September 11th beginning at 6:30 pm. The schedule is as follows: A PARENT ONLY Curriculum Overview for Kindergarten families is from 6:30-7:00 pm in our classroom. You can drop off your child in the auditorium for a supervised special feature. I will be speaking about our daily routine, all subject areas, testing that is done in Kindergarten, Route to Reading skills specific groupings and special area classes. I will also have handouts with other information on our year. There will be a SIGN UP SHEET for PARENT CONFERENCES, ROOM PARENTS SIGN UP (I have 2 so far) and OTHER FUN EVENTS. Please pick up your child in the auditorium at 7:00 pm and let them be your TOUR GUIDE as they bring you to meet the teachers who will be working with them. I will give you a list with the teacher's name, subject and room number as an assist. Don't forget--from 6:30-7:00 pm is PARENTS ONLY in my classroom. Hope to see everyone on Thursday!
**We will have our first LIBRARY TIME with teacher librarian, Ms. Noonan on Monday morning. The students will be able to take out a book from the library and keep it out for 7 days until the next library time. After awhile, the students will be able to take out 2 books. Ms. Noonan will be reading many types of fiction and nonfiction books, helping with projects and showing the students how the library is organized and where to find certain books. It is recommended that if a student is not reading his/her library book....it should be kept in their backpack for safe keeping.
**The students had their first Friendship Club meeting with Ms. Bell Bey, our social worker. She will be working with the class on a variety of lessons centering around fostering positive peer relationships, feelings, conflict resolution, sharing, bullying and other topics. She will use a variety of materials and approaches including stories, videos, role playing, acting, games, puppets to name a few. This week, Ms. Bell Bey showed a video on school rules and being ready to learn and being a social detective knowing how to respond to different situations.
**The students also had their first meeting with Mr. Packer who will work with the students on problem solving skills and higher level thinking skills. He played a cool name game to get to know each student and remember their name.
**Last week I began screening students with the DIBELS test and a PHONOLOGICAL SCREENER. These assessments will help in determining each students placement in our skill specific ROUTE to READING groups. You will hear much more about this at CURRICULUM NIGHT.
**We had our first FIRE DRILL on Friday. We talked at length about a practice to help us get out of the building safely and quickly in the event of a fire. The students did a super job of following directions. We even got to see the Fire Chief! We will be having fire drills periodically during the school year.
**Don't forget--a healthy snack each day. Gym shoes and socks for gym days.
**The students continue to learn about the process of earning an individual Eagle Slip and how the whole class an earn an Eagle Slip. This is in conjunction with our school wide PBIS behavior incentive. Many students have gotten Eagle Slips this past week!! Yeah!!! Every Friday, Mr. Hodge will put his hand in the big purple box and pull out 10 lucky winners. Lily's Eagle Slip was drawn the first week of school and she got to pick a prize!
**School Pictures will be taken on Tuesday, September 30th. More info to follow.
**Don't forget to check out the cool after school Eagle Extra classes handed out last week. Email me with any questions.
This week:
It was all about the students continued effort to feel comfortable with daily routines and meet all of their teachers for the year. It was also about ABC's everywhere! Why do we need them? What do they look like? How do they sound? What does our mouth do when we say them. Many sounds? Only one or two sounds? Uppercase? Lowercase? What happens when we put letters together? The students experienced many activities surrounding the alphabet.
Reading/Language Arts: The students are continuing to work on their prep for our Treasures Reading series using SMART START. The students are focusing on letter recognition and sounds for letters A-M. They are learning about imprinting sound and how our mouth looks when we make that sound. The students are using mirrors to really see what happens when a letter sound is produced. Is their mouth open or closed? Is there air coming out of their mouth? Is there a vibration in their throat? Lots to think about! The students are learning to work with me to create word webs on suggested topics---What do we do in Kindergarten? What do hands do? How do we look? These exercises generate conversation and participation that stimulate oral vocabulary. The students continue to listen to rhyming patterns in words. They are learning to chant the ending. An example would be--bat, cat they end in at. Rhyming words have the same ending part. The students continue to work on their sight words--I, can, am, yes, no. The students listened to the Big Book story, "Hands Can." We discussed the TITLE and found the TITLE PAGE and SPINE of the book. The students also talked about the job of an AUTHOR and ILLUSTRATOR. They have also begun to notice certain story elements such as WHO is in the story (characters) and WHERE the story takes place (setting.) As I read the story, the students are watching as I model tracking each word from the left to the right as I read. The story was read a second time and the students made connections in their own lives about what their hands do. The students read aloud from their paper story, "I Can." They practiced finger pointing each word and picture. Together, we worked on story structure and sequence. The students then practiced their reading to a partner. In our Haggerty Blue Book exercises, the students continue to work on letter naming, rhyming, blending, saying the beginning sound, segmenting and substituting sounds and counting how many words there are in a given sentence. Our small group workstations this week included Alphabet Bingo, "Go Fish for Letters," sound sorting board, sequencing upper and lowercase letters, upper and lowercase match, stamping your name, "Hands Up, Hands Down" sight word swat and oral comprehension and story retelling.
Math: This year District 97 has added the curriculum, My Math along with Everyday Math to support the teaching of the math Common Core Standards. Students worked on a number of recognition/counting activities including Egg Carton Math, Listen and Count, building number boards, "Got It," Number/Object Match, sorting and classifying in their small group workstations. We did a whole class activity called, "Name Train" where the students wrote their name, one letter in each box and place one cube in the box for each letter in their name. They connected the cubes to form a train and then they went around comparing---is my name train longer or shorter then yours? Who has the longest name train? Shortest? The same number of cubes? They each counted how many letters they had in their name box and matched it with the number on our big chart. Who had the most letters in their name??? (10) Ask you child! We talked about the patterns we see around us. The students noted the shape and color pattern on our calendar. The students continued to work using the calendar for number sequencing and counting. We are using a ten frame to keep track of how many days we have been in school. Our AGE CHANGE CHART has everyone's picture on it waiting for their birthday so they can make the change. Ethan has already moved to the land of the 6 year olds! The students reviewed basic flat shapes--circle, square, triangle, rectangle and positional words--ABOVE, BELOW, BETWEEN, IN THE MIDDLE.
Writing: The students are learning about what types of lines we use to form letters--straight, curved and slanted. The students used these lines to form MAT MAN. We even learned a song about him. Students used the body image in MAT MAN to make their own "One thing you should know about me" portrait. They are displayed in our room. Too cute! We are working on strengthening our hands and fingers. We use clay to do this. Kneading, squishing, rolling are good ways to get our hands and fingers moving. We even made some letters with straight, curved and slant snakes! In Writer's Workshop, the students the students talked about writing about ideas that interest them. This week, the topics were friends, family, animals, what you like to do at home. During our journal conferencing, the student may have tried to write words, the first of a word in their picture, label one of the pictures or tried to write a complete sentence. We just begun to chat about what a sentence is--a group of words that NAMES and TELLS. Students will use "inventive spelling" just what they hear--it could be just the beginning sound, beginning and ending sound. Many times the vowel will be omitted. This is just the beginning of their sound foundation. Let them spell what they hear!
Technology: We are just in the beginning stages of iPad use. We are learning about iPad care and operation in our classroom. More on this next week.
Literature: "Pirates Go To School," "Crazy Hair Day," "Two Eyes, A Nose, A Mouth," "When Dinosaurs Go To School," "The Recess Queen," "What Will the Fat Cat Sit On," "This is the Teacher," "The Mixed Up Alphabet," "Cool Dog, School Dog," "Hands Can," "I Measure Myself," (poem) "Schools Around the World," "New Bear At School."
Friday, August 29, 2014
UPDATES for 8/25-8/29 2014
**We are off to a great start! I am so glad you are a part of our Irving School Family! I was so happy to meet all of you. We are going to have a great year!
**We were a bit hot and sweaty, but we survived the heat and humidity this week. The students were real troopers!! Although the temperature and humidity will come down next week, you can continue to send a water bottle with your child.
**Thanks to all of you who have signed up to help at lunch. Things are going well! The students are learning about the lunch routine and recycling milk cartons and paper trays. We are eating with our friends Ellie and Navid from Ms. Von Hagel's class. Please continue reinforcing--HOME LUNCH or SCHOOL LUNCH---MILK??---WHAT KIND?? Our parent volunteers and I are encouraging the students to eat their MAIN ENTRE first, whether it is a sandwich, pizza, salad, bagel, noodles etc. and then eat their pudding, chips, cookies etc. Thanks for sending good choices for snacks and lunch. I will always have Veggie Straws or fruit on hand if your child forgets their snack. Next week, Denise Frank will help out Wednesday and Thursday.
**Your child's HOMEWORK FOLDER is in their backpack. It has their homework for the week and other information for you. Please check folders EVERY FRIDAY!!
**Please remember to send/wear GYM SHOES and SOCKS everyday. Check the special's schedule for gym days.
**Information on EAGLE EXTRA after school programs, Birthday Book Club, Scholastic Book Orders, updated schedule, lunch menu for September, New Family Welcome Dinner and Nut Free Policy letter are in your child's HOMEWORK FOLDER.
**We have scheduled our lab time for LEXIA CORE 5 which matches up well with our Reading/English Language Arts program. As soon as I set up the student passwords, we will begin. You will also be able to access it from your home. I am also working on setting up our on line activities SPELLING CITY, BRAINPOP JR, MY MATH and XTRAMATH. You can access FREE activities STARFALL and MATHNOOK from the left side of the blog under "check out these great resources" if you want to explore.
**ROOM PARENTS WANTED!!! Email me if you would like to be a room parent. You can help plan, facilitate and organize activities in our classroom. The more the merrier!!!!
**OPEN HOUSE/CURRICULUM NIGHT is Thursday, September 11th from 6:30-7:30 pm in Room 110. (our classroom) More information will be forthcoming.
**School Pictures will be taken on Tuesday, September 30th. More info coming.
**I have included some information about pencil grasp (tri pod grasp) and the clay recipe in your child's homework folder. Clay is a great way to get those fingers and hands moving! We have been developing our tri pod grasp by "feeding" the dog his dog bones and picking up small pebbles with kid tweezers. Kid chopsticks with a connection is also great for practice--all very tactile and sensory oriented.
**NO SCHOOL--Monday, September 1st in observance of Labor Day.
This week:
It was all about routines, expectations and meeting new people. Yes.....I talked a lot!!!!! Our special's schedule is now set. The students met with most of their special area teachers. Library, Friendship Club and Mr. Packer Problem Solving start next week. The students are getting to know each other and fostering new friendships. The students have learned how to earn individual and class EAGLE SLIPS as part of our school wide behavior incentive (PBIS-Positive-Behavior-at-Irving-School.) Our daily EAGLE ESSENTIALS are....Be Respectful.... Be Responsible....Be Safe.....Be Peaceful.....Everywhere and HAVE FUN!!!! Every student has earned eagle slips this week!!!!! Our class earned 8 Eagle Slips. Great Start!!!
Reading/Language Arts: In our first week of school, the students began a 3 week prep in our Treasures Series called Smart Start. Adoption of Common Core State Standards is now in full swing. I will be speaking more about this at Open House/Curriculum night. Our Kindergarten Team is using Treasures along with other materials to ensure that each standard is taught and assessed. Students used their language skills to respond to a daily warm up question. We are working on raising our hands to volunteer information. Students worked on their listening comprehension skills and making predictions and connections by listening and responding to the Big Book story, "Animals in the Park-An ABC Book." The students worked to identify a sequence of sounds that rhyme in "Hey Diddle Diddle." We began to speak about rhyming words as words whose ending parts are the same. Students began to generate words with rhyming patterns. Students worked on both upper and lowercase letter recognition. They learned how to play "Hands Up, Hands Down" to reinforce letters. The sight words I, can, yes, no were introduced. The students worked on "tracking" their words and pictures from the left to the right by finger pointing each work and picture. We practiced reading the story, "I Can" during group read aloud and then again reading to partners. We discussed what a TITLE is and who the CHARACTERS are in the story. What is an author? What does an illustrator do? The students are also using the Haggerty Blue Book to assist in letter and sound recognition, rhyming, upper and lowercase letter recognition, counting words in a sentence and isolating beginning and ending sounds. Workstations this week included "Giraffe ABC's," "ABC Letter and Sound Parking Lot," "Oh No," "Go Fish for Letters," "Broken Egg Upper and Lowercase Match, "Hands Up, Hands Down" ABC swat and "Find the Rhyme" and partner reading.
Math: The student were introduced to calendar activities. Using a ten frame, the students will count and place a black dot on a ten frame for each day we are in school. When we get to 100.....PARTY!!! Our Problem of the Day was about a different positional word each day. We are counting and counting and counting!!!! Students worked in small group workstations on "egg carton math," (counting one to one) "number/picture match," number recognition--"Got It" game, number boards to ten, find the numbers activity and "what's my number" activity. The students also explored pattern blocks, unifix cubes, geo boards, simple plain shapes, making numbers with clay and problem solving skills using "Gears."
Social Studies/Cross Curricular: Our theme is All About Me and My Family! This week the students shared information about their daily lives and their likes and dislikes. They chatted about their family life and what is important to them. Each student constructed their own paper doll. They also drew their self portrait and related a little fact about themself. We talked about our differences and similarities in humans. Some students even shared some future goals!! The students met with their Book Buddies from Ms. Balicki's 5th Grade. Each student was matched up with a 5th grade buddy. They worked on a getting to know you book/interview. Cool!! So much fun for everyone.
Writing: The students discussed what a school journal was and how to it and what to put in it. We talked about what we could draw and write about and I modeled the format. Most students were able to talk about the picture they drew and some even wrote some letters, or words to describe their pictures during our Writer's Workshop.
Literature: "You Are Beautiful As You Are," "It's About You-Writing Your Own Journal," "Your Finally Here," "Kindergarten Rocks," "How Do Dinosaurs Go To School," "We Go To School," "Planet Kindergarten," "Mouse Loves School,"Splat the Cat,"Who Will Be My Teacher?" "School Days Around the World," "Hungry for Numbers."
**We were a bit hot and sweaty, but we survived the heat and humidity this week. The students were real troopers!! Although the temperature and humidity will come down next week, you can continue to send a water bottle with your child.
**Thanks to all of you who have signed up to help at lunch. Things are going well! The students are learning about the lunch routine and recycling milk cartons and paper trays. We are eating with our friends Ellie and Navid from Ms. Von Hagel's class. Please continue reinforcing--HOME LUNCH or SCHOOL LUNCH---MILK??---WHAT KIND?? Our parent volunteers and I are encouraging the students to eat their MAIN ENTRE first, whether it is a sandwich, pizza, salad, bagel, noodles etc. and then eat their pudding, chips, cookies etc. Thanks for sending good choices for snacks and lunch. I will always have Veggie Straws or fruit on hand if your child forgets their snack. Next week, Denise Frank will help out Wednesday and Thursday.
**Your child's HOMEWORK FOLDER is in their backpack. It has their homework for the week and other information for you. Please check folders EVERY FRIDAY!!
**Please remember to send/wear GYM SHOES and SOCKS everyday. Check the special's schedule for gym days.
**Information on EAGLE EXTRA after school programs, Birthday Book Club, Scholastic Book Orders, updated schedule, lunch menu for September, New Family Welcome Dinner and Nut Free Policy letter are in your child's HOMEWORK FOLDER.
**We have scheduled our lab time for LEXIA CORE 5 which matches up well with our Reading/English Language Arts program. As soon as I set up the student passwords, we will begin. You will also be able to access it from your home. I am also working on setting up our on line activities SPELLING CITY, BRAINPOP JR, MY MATH and XTRAMATH. You can access FREE activities STARFALL and MATHNOOK from the left side of the blog under "check out these great resources" if you want to explore.
**ROOM PARENTS WANTED!!! Email me if you would like to be a room parent. You can help plan, facilitate and organize activities in our classroom. The more the merrier!!!!
**OPEN HOUSE/CURRICULUM NIGHT is Thursday, September 11th from 6:30-7:30 pm in Room 110. (our classroom) More information will be forthcoming.
**School Pictures will be taken on Tuesday, September 30th. More info coming.
**I have included some information about pencil grasp (tri pod grasp) and the clay recipe in your child's homework folder. Clay is a great way to get those fingers and hands moving! We have been developing our tri pod grasp by "feeding" the dog his dog bones and picking up small pebbles with kid tweezers. Kid chopsticks with a connection is also great for practice--all very tactile and sensory oriented.
**NO SCHOOL--Monday, September 1st in observance of Labor Day.
This week:
It was all about routines, expectations and meeting new people. Yes.....I talked a lot!!!!! Our special's schedule is now set. The students met with most of their special area teachers. Library, Friendship Club and Mr. Packer Problem Solving start next week. The students are getting to know each other and fostering new friendships. The students have learned how to earn individual and class EAGLE SLIPS as part of our school wide behavior incentive (PBIS-Positive-Behavior-at-Irving-School.) Our daily EAGLE ESSENTIALS are....Be Respectful.... Be Responsible....Be Safe.....Be Peaceful.....Everywhere and HAVE FUN!!!! Every student has earned eagle slips this week!!!!! Our class earned 8 Eagle Slips. Great Start!!!
Reading/Language Arts: In our first week of school, the students began a 3 week prep in our Treasures Series called Smart Start. Adoption of Common Core State Standards is now in full swing. I will be speaking more about this at Open House/Curriculum night. Our Kindergarten Team is using Treasures along with other materials to ensure that each standard is taught and assessed. Students used their language skills to respond to a daily warm up question. We are working on raising our hands to volunteer information. Students worked on their listening comprehension skills and making predictions and connections by listening and responding to the Big Book story, "Animals in the Park-An ABC Book." The students worked to identify a sequence of sounds that rhyme in "Hey Diddle Diddle." We began to speak about rhyming words as words whose ending parts are the same. Students began to generate words with rhyming patterns. Students worked on both upper and lowercase letter recognition. They learned how to play "Hands Up, Hands Down" to reinforce letters. The sight words I, can, yes, no were introduced. The students worked on "tracking" their words and pictures from the left to the right by finger pointing each work and picture. We practiced reading the story, "I Can" during group read aloud and then again reading to partners. We discussed what a TITLE is and who the CHARACTERS are in the story. What is an author? What does an illustrator do? The students are also using the Haggerty Blue Book to assist in letter and sound recognition, rhyming, upper and lowercase letter recognition, counting words in a sentence and isolating beginning and ending sounds. Workstations this week included "Giraffe ABC's," "ABC Letter and Sound Parking Lot," "Oh No," "Go Fish for Letters," "Broken Egg Upper and Lowercase Match, "Hands Up, Hands Down" ABC swat and "Find the Rhyme" and partner reading.
Math: The student were introduced to calendar activities. Using a ten frame, the students will count and place a black dot on a ten frame for each day we are in school. When we get to 100.....PARTY!!! Our Problem of the Day was about a different positional word each day. We are counting and counting and counting!!!! Students worked in small group workstations on "egg carton math," (counting one to one) "number/picture match," number recognition--"Got It" game, number boards to ten, find the numbers activity and "what's my number" activity. The students also explored pattern blocks, unifix cubes, geo boards, simple plain shapes, making numbers with clay and problem solving skills using "Gears."
Social Studies/Cross Curricular: Our theme is All About Me and My Family! This week the students shared information about their daily lives and their likes and dislikes. They chatted about their family life and what is important to them. Each student constructed their own paper doll. They also drew their self portrait and related a little fact about themself. We talked about our differences and similarities in humans. Some students even shared some future goals!! The students met with their Book Buddies from Ms. Balicki's 5th Grade. Each student was matched up with a 5th grade buddy. They worked on a getting to know you book/interview. Cool!! So much fun for everyone.
Writing: The students discussed what a school journal was and how to it and what to put in it. We talked about what we could draw and write about and I modeled the format. Most students were able to talk about the picture they drew and some even wrote some letters, or words to describe their pictures during our Writer's Workshop.
Literature: "You Are Beautiful As You Are," "It's About You-Writing Your Own Journal," "Your Finally Here," "Kindergarten Rocks," "How Do Dinosaurs Go To School," "We Go To School," "Planet Kindergarten," "Mouse Loves School,"Splat the Cat,"Who Will Be My Teacher?" "School Days Around the World," "Hungry for Numbers."
Sunday, August 24, 2014
It's Time for Kndergarten!!
**Welcome to Ms. Gullo's Class!
**Classes begin tomorrow, August 25th at 8:00 am! Please meet me outside by our patio door. There will be a line indicating where to line up. The first bell is at 7:55 am. and I will be opening the door at 8:00 am. with a HUGE SMILE on my face!
**Because of the hot weather---please send a water bottle with your child. We do not have air conditioning, but have places to cool off in our building.
**We will always enter and exit the BROWN patio door.
**The first hour from 8:00-9:00 is a FAMILY HOUR. I will chat with both students and adults. We will have story and perhaps an activity.
**ABSOLUTELY NO NUTS or NUT PRODUCTS in the classroom. If your child has a nut allergy, arrangements will be made in the lunchroom for them.
**Your child should bring a healthy snack each day.
**Your child should know if he/she has a HOME LUNCH or will be getting a SCHOOL LUNCH. Did you send a drink or will they be ordering milk?
**Our LUNCH RECESS begins at 11:45 am on the playground. We will be eating lunch in the lunchroom from 12:10-12:40.
**For the week of 8/25-8/29----I have KATE MEIER and DEANNA PACELLI helping out. Please meet us on the playground at NOON. If anyone else wants to join us---that would be great!
**In the interest of safety--please have your child wear or keep in school a pair of gym shoes and socks.
**For MONDAY--our SPECIAL'S SCHEDULE includes--12:45-1:15-PE (please send or wear gym shoes and socks) and 1:15-1:45-MUSIC. I am in the process of finalizing the other classes. You will get a hard copy tomorrow.
**Continue to bring in supplies and medical forms if you have not.
**Our regular dismissal is at 2:55 pm.....BUT......tomorrow families can come back at 2:15 pm for a closing activity.
**I have received transportation and aftercare information on students taking the DISTRICT SCHOOL BUS, MAGICAL MINDS, HEPHZIBAH AFTERCARE and HOME DAY CARE. All transportation will be directly in front of the school. Hephzibah staff will pick up from our classroom. I have been told that Hephzibah begins on Tuesday. Siblings picking up students must dismiss with their own class and walk around to the front of the building to our patio.
**I can't wait to see all of you TOMORROW!!!!!
**Classes begin tomorrow, August 25th at 8:00 am! Please meet me outside by our patio door. There will be a line indicating where to line up. The first bell is at 7:55 am. and I will be opening the door at 8:00 am. with a HUGE SMILE on my face!
**Because of the hot weather---please send a water bottle with your child. We do not have air conditioning, but have places to cool off in our building.
**We will always enter and exit the BROWN patio door.
**The first hour from 8:00-9:00 is a FAMILY HOUR. I will chat with both students and adults. We will have story and perhaps an activity.
**ABSOLUTELY NO NUTS or NUT PRODUCTS in the classroom. If your child has a nut allergy, arrangements will be made in the lunchroom for them.
**Your child should bring a healthy snack each day.
**Your child should know if he/she has a HOME LUNCH or will be getting a SCHOOL LUNCH. Did you send a drink or will they be ordering milk?
**Our LUNCH RECESS begins at 11:45 am on the playground. We will be eating lunch in the lunchroom from 12:10-12:40.
**For the week of 8/25-8/29----I have KATE MEIER and DEANNA PACELLI helping out. Please meet us on the playground at NOON. If anyone else wants to join us---that would be great!
**In the interest of safety--please have your child wear or keep in school a pair of gym shoes and socks.
**For MONDAY--our SPECIAL'S SCHEDULE includes--12:45-1:15-PE (please send or wear gym shoes and socks) and 1:15-1:45-MUSIC. I am in the process of finalizing the other classes. You will get a hard copy tomorrow.
**Continue to bring in supplies and medical forms if you have not.
**Our regular dismissal is at 2:55 pm.....BUT......tomorrow families can come back at 2:15 pm for a closing activity.
**I have received transportation and aftercare information on students taking the DISTRICT SCHOOL BUS, MAGICAL MINDS, HEPHZIBAH AFTERCARE and HOME DAY CARE. All transportation will be directly in front of the school. Hephzibah staff will pick up from our classroom. I have been told that Hephzibah begins on Tuesday. Siblings picking up students must dismiss with their own class and walk around to the front of the building to our patio.
**I can't wait to see all of you TOMORROW!!!!!
Monday, August 18, 2014
Welcome Students and Families!!!
**This week is very busy at Irving School. I am working on getting everything in place for the beginning of our school year. We have new classroom furniture and some updates in technology for our classroom.
**Please come to school to meet me and drop off your supplies in the classroom on THURSDAY, AUGUST 21st from 4-6 pm. in ROOM 110. Once you are finished you can join other kindergarten families on the playground for a popsicle treat! If you cannot make it....no worries. I will see you on the first day.
**I will be looking for interested parents to help with the lunch program for the first few weeks. You can sign up on a week by week basis. Email me if interested. The time is 11:50-12:25 each day.
**Our very first of school is Monday, August 25th. Students are here from 8:00-2:55 pm. The first bell rings at 7:55 am. Please line up on our patio next to the main doors. You will see my smiling face at 8:00 am. Families may join us from 8-9 am. Come see our new furniture and learn more about our class.
**Some things to ponder---home lunch? school lunch? ordering milk? what kind?
**All medical information about your child is due on the first day of school.
**See you soon!!!!!
**Please come to school to meet me and drop off your supplies in the classroom on THURSDAY, AUGUST 21st from 4-6 pm. in ROOM 110. Once you are finished you can join other kindergarten families on the playground for a popsicle treat! If you cannot make it....no worries. I will see you on the first day.
**I will be looking for interested parents to help with the lunch program for the first few weeks. You can sign up on a week by week basis. Email me if interested. The time is 11:50-12:25 each day.
**Our very first of school is Monday, August 25th. Students are here from 8:00-2:55 pm. The first bell rings at 7:55 am. Please line up on our patio next to the main doors. You will see my smiling face at 8:00 am. Families may join us from 8-9 am. Come see our new furniture and learn more about our class.
**Some things to ponder---home lunch? school lunch? ordering milk? what kind?
**All medical information about your child is due on the first day of school.
**See you soon!!!!!
Friday, July 11, 2014
Garden Updates for July 2014
**Summer greetings!! Hope all of you are having a relaxing and fun filled summer. I wanted to bring you up to date on the status of our class garden and the rest of the garden beds. It has been just a little over a month since we planted our garden. Check out how it looks now!! There are lots of herbs you can come and harvest including sage, chive, oregano, parsley, basil, mint (LOTS of mint) and some baby kale. There is nothing else to pick yet but blossoms are appearing on tomatoes, potatoes, squash, onions pumpkins and cucumbers. If you stop by, check out the corn! It is pretty cool. Our potatoes are doing great as well as our peppers, tomatoes, herbs. No flowers on our nasturtiums yet. Remember that wild flower garden-----you should see it now!!! That is all for now. Have fun and keep cool!!
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