Visits to our Class Page

Sunday, September 28, 2014

In to the Rainforest......



We began using Center signs this week to see how many are allowed at one center.  The children are taking an active role in organizing our schedule.  This and walking in line and other skills will help in Kindergarten.

 Science was fun as we watched capsules grow in our water cups during Ocean week.  The children were anxious to see what grew with water in the cup.   As we moved on to our Rainforest unit, we put a dried plant in water to see what happens.  When it is submersed in water, the plant opens and becomes a fern.  Many of these are in the rainforest.   When the plant dries out it goes dormant again.
We'll see the result on Monday!



Rainforest week was fun as we made rainsticks, fun snakes and a collage of things from the rainforest.

Cole brought in his spider book to share with friends.

  Many have been working hard on Reading.
Our Reading Group works on beginning words during our quiet reading time.
Sharing books and re-telling stories is all part of the language process and is essential for learning to read.

Rylee drawing a monkey from the rainforest.

Trying to make it rain in class!
And at the end of centers, we are a team cleaning our room!




Tuesday, September 16, 2014

Forest to Sea.........more on Friday!


Art is important in creativity , math and reading language skills.  We used colored packing peanuts to build and create from our ideas.

  Math activities during our unit included weighing 'bears' to see how the scale tips.  It is interesting to hear the dialog and how they are figuring out how a scale works.

 Harlow tries her hand at copying FOREST on the board.  Reading from a board and copying are Kindergarten skills.
Cole is looking at our new fish and sharks as we begin our new Sea unit.  Marcus is enjoying counting with gold fish.  Everyone counted their fish in their cup and we graphed how many everyone had.   A great lesson for "more" , "less" , "greater than" and "less than".   Sean won with 20!


We had a great time with our Forest unit, and
the "What Does the Fox Say" song and book
were a hit.  As we go through our animal units
we are learning how different animals can
be in different environments.  We are looking at
eating habits, prey and similarities and contrasts.

The children have been learning to count pennies, identify money and recently they have decided to "open a movie theatre" and sell tickets with their dollars.  (I love when they come up with their own ideas.  Don't worry - the movies are rated G.)     : )  


Sunday, September 7, 2014

Short Week~

I hope you all had a safe and fun Labor Day!   Back in class on Wednesday and Friday we learned about different farm animals.   We also had our "Buddy Bag" time.   These are small bags with games, projects, manipulatives, puzzles, etc.   that we do with a buddy.   The children get randomly chosen to be with a buddy and then spend sometime with just that friend doing the activity.  They must like this new activity because they keep asking "When is it Buddy time?"



The piggy banks were a hit as we learned to identify pennies and count them.  We used our piggy counting mats and put them in groups of five.
During our farm unit, we played with animals in a tub of rice.  This was VERY popular, but messy.
Look who decided to help clean up!



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Tuesday, September 2, 2014

Week of August 25, 14

Learning centers were fun today using our light table and new blocks.  Someone was surprised the blocks stayed on top!




We read Elmer and the Whales and the children made a patchwork elephant of their own!


Put Me in the Zoo was a sure favorite read this week!  They were so excited to show you what came out of the book.   I heard a few questions...."We are pretending, right?  "The spots come off, right Miss Kathi?"  These kind of activities are a way for your child to experiment with new things and to learn trust from their teachers and adults.
Our science experiment was using shaving cream and mixing it with watercolors.  We swirled them together and layer paper on top.  Voila!  We made marbled paper.  The children thought it was "magic".
We had fun celebrating Kevin's birthday with special ice-cream and Missy the Mouse!
Be sure to let me know if your child is having a birthday this session!