Week in Review ~ April 13th - 17th

Hello K2 Families! I can't believe we are headed into April vacation week. Back when my son Andrew started school 5 years ago we compared the school year to the game of baseball. The first day of school up until Christmas break we say we are heading to 1st base...January up until February vacation we are heading to 2nd base, and February until April we are making our way to 3rd base. So, when we get back to school, we will be heading for home plate. I hope everyone has a safe and enjoyable April vacation and that the K2ers are ready for the home stretch when they come back to school on the 27th!

This week in ELA we finished up with Unit 8. We talked about what we see up in the sky. Our vocabulary words were distance, recognize, space, challenge and surface. We read the stories Bringing Down the Moon, A View from the Moon, and Day and Night Sky. We reviewed the sound of Jj and introduced the digraph /ch/ as in chip and cheese. The sight words for, have, here, me, of, said, they, this and want were reviewed. Please continue to review these words at home. When we return to school on the 27th Miss Davis will be starting Unit 9 where the "Big Idea" is How do things change? Here are a few pictures of the K2ers busy during learning center time.

 

In Math Topic 14 was started which is titled "Identifying and Describing Shapes." Rectangles, squares, circles, triangles and hexagons were studied and students were busy naming items that are those shapes. When we return from vacation 3-dimensional shapes will be introduced as they continue working in Topic 14.

IMPORTANT BOOKS & BEYOND REMINDER!!!! The last day to turn in Books and Beyond sheets will be Thursday, April 30th. We currently have about 18 students that have completed all 8 stations and will be receiving a reading medal at the Books & Beyond ceremony on May 29th. We are SO CLOSE to having all K2ers completing the Books & Beyond challenge. If your child has not completed all 8 stations THERE IS STILL TIME! If you do not have a recording sheet at home just list the 15 books that were read on a plain sheet of paper and sign it. April vacation is a perfect time to read, Read, READ!

Enjoy your week and I will see everyone back after vacation!

 

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Thank You!

A BIG thank you goes out to my sister Donna for sending lots of really cool things for the K2ers from her job at NASA in Florida. I hope everyone enjoyed going through the goodies!!

 

 

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Sight Word Check-in

Kindergarten students do not get a report card for the 3rd quarter. However, I did assess them on the sight words introduced so far. Today, in your child's message tube you will find a sheet with the words introduced as of the end of the 3rd quarter and what percentage of words they knew. If they were not able to correctly say the word within 3 seconds they did not get credit for knowing it. As a reminder, sight words are words that usually can not be sounded out and words that we want them to look at and immediately say.

 

 

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Week in Review April 6th - 10th

Hello K2 Families! I don't know about you but I was very excited to see next week's weather forecast...it actually looks like spring may be here!

This week in ELA we talked about what we know about our country. We talked about different Landmarks in the U.S. and discussed places we have been. We listened to the stories Ana Goes to Washington, D.C., The Best of the West, and See Our Country. Our vocabulary words were country, travel, careful, purpose, and connect. We focused on the letters Yy and Zz and introduced the sight words this and what. In small groups students read either See This!, Places to See, or My Trip to Yellowstone. In learning centers we worked a lot with nonsense words. The K2ers had fun using Twist & Turn Word Builders to make words and decide if they were real or nonsense. I am so proud of how well they are sounding out and reading words.

In Math, Miss Davis continued working in Topic 13 which talks about sorting, classifying, counting and categorizing data. The students sorted shapes by 1 or 2 attributes and then took containers blocks and sorted and graphed the data to show what attributes the they had.

Next week they will begin Topic 14 titled Identifying and Describing Shapes.

I am so happy to see how many families have tried Footsteps2Brilliance at home. The K2ers are really enjoying the program at school. Please take a minute to register. If you do not receive an email back with your own username and password please check your SPAM folder as it may have accidentally been sent there. Here are some pictures of them using the program at school.

Enjoy your weekend especially since the weather will be warming up. Plus, in my eyes, all is good in the world...the Red Sox are playing again!

 

 

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Footsteps2Brilliance

Today your child came home with information in their message tube about a new exciting and fun program called Footsteps2Brilliance that they can access from a home computer/laptop or smart device (iPhone, iPad, android phone, kindle, etc...) Please take the time to register the computer or device of your choice so that your child can listen to stories and then answer questions, play games and write stories at home. I showed the K2ers today how they can log in using their "super secret code" and get started once an adult registers a device.

Once your child logs in using their super secret code they can listen to books and then answer comprehension questions, play games or create a book which all go along with the story they listened to. Here is what the page will look like once they choose a story.

If your child uses a computer or laptop, all stories will be available for them to access. If they use a smart device the story chosen will need to be downloaded by pushing the green circle with the arrow. We were told by the presenter when we learned about the program that the stories do not take up a lot of space on your device but to download just a few at a time as downloading all at once will take a lot of time.

If you have any questions at all, please send me an email or a note in your child's message tube and I will get back to you as soon as possible.

 

 

 

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Week in Review ~ March 30th - April 2nd

With having in school on Friday, what a fast week it has been!

In ELA this week we started Unit 8 which talks about where we can go that is near and far. This week's focus was on transportation and what helps,us get from one place to another. Our vocabulary words were journey, transportation, vehicle, wide, fierce. Our new sight words are here and me and we focused on the sound for the letter Jj and Qq. We also listened to the read alouds When Daddy's Truck Picks Me Up, The King of the Winds, and From Here to There. Everyone came home with a copy of a story we read in small groups this week. Please continue to encourage your child to practice reading these stories at home, as well as practice the Nonsense Word sheet that came home earlier in the week, to help build their fluency. Our grammar lesson this week focused on prepositions. We watched a Schoolhouse Rock video and the K2ers asked me to post it to the blog so that they could watch it again.

In Math we started Topic 13 which is all about sorting, classifying, counting and categorizing data. Miss Davis has taken over the teaching of Math as she moves closer to her complete "take-over week" in May. She focused on sorting items by 1 attribute such as color, size or shape. The K2ers have loved all the extension activities she has planned to help make the concepts more concrete. Here are some pictures from a button sorting activity where they had to choose an attribute and then sort the buttons by if they had the same attribute or not. She ended the lesson by reading The Button Box and I found it on YouTube so that the students can listen to it again if they like.

 

As a reminder, please be sure to send in 5 items from around the house (ie: buttons, straws, bottle caps, scraps of material, etc) on Monday that will be used by the class for sorting activities. Please keep in mind that these items WILL NOT BE RETURNED so encourage your child to choose items that they will not be sad to part with.

Books & Beyond will be continuing for the next FIVE weeks. This week, anyone who has not completed all 8 stations were sent home a packet of recording sheets and a slip of paper that said how many stations your child needs to finish to receive a reading medal. I am SO proud of how many K2ers have already completed all 8 stations and how many are so close to completing. Keep up the great job!

Enjoy your long weekend...Hopefully spring weather is just around the corner!

 

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