We are thankful....

In Kindergarten this month we have been focusing on the idea of feeling thankful.  To be thankful is to be grateful, and to recognize all that we have.  This can be a pretty hard thing to do in a world that keeps pushing toys and the latest gadgets in our faces!  We have read books such as The Secret of Saying Thanks (did your children tell you the secret?) and thought about all we have to be thankful for - family, friends, food, clothing, homes, etc  The children created paper turkeys and then wrote about what they were thankful for. Come see our turkeys on display in the hallway!

Connecting with the idea of thankfulness is our spiritual theme for November and December - Simplicity/Simple Gifts.  We have been talking about how everything doesn't have to be fancy or cost a lot of money.  Simple gifts come from the heart.  For example on Brenda Crawley's birthday, we gave her simple gifts - a song, some hugs, and homemade cards and notes.  Sometimes it's the simplest things that matter the most.  

Life Skills - Connected and Respected

In Life Skills we have been talking about our feelings.  We have many different feelings and some that we feel at the same time!  When we are feeling two things we call that a "double-dip feeling".  The children brainstormed and created an amazing list of different feelings - the teachers were very impressed.  Then, we made feeling soup.  Children represented the different feelings using facial expression and body language and joined the soup! Can you identify the feelings the classes are showing?

 

 Curriculum Highlights

Language Arts -   Reading Horizons - Most Common Words - "and", "the", and "of", capitalization rules - beginning of sentence and the letter "I", letter and sound for /h/.  Writing Workshop - What are we thankful for?, putting spaces in between words when writing sentences.

Math -   Comparing numbers from 1-5, math language "greater than", "less than", "same".  The number 6 - how can we combine numbers that will equal 6?

Science -  Nature walk, looking for different leaves outside and identifying them, looking for signs of fall.

Social Studies -  Roots - Cora, Katie, Alexa, and Toni, Learning about Divali with Anjali's family.

Special Events -  Making special thankful turkeys with our Reading Buddies, Third grade play - "Oliver Button is a Star"

Welcome November!

It's hard to believe October is over and that we are heading into November.  The last two weeks we have been exploring pumpkins and leaves and all that fall has to offer.  The children have enjoyed art projects such as using stamps and paint to create spooky Halloween pictures.  Painting on black paper gives the work a completely different feel!  We have been learning how pumpkins grow from seeds to fruit, and the children colored and sequenced pictures of the life of a pumpkin.  We were amazed at how many seeds were inside our pumpkins and enjoyed toasting them and nibbling on them!  Our campus is covered with with beautiful fall leaves this time of year.  Wherever we walk, the children notice the different hues and the shapes of the leaves.  It's been fun using leaf identification tools to figure out which kind of tree our leaves came from.  Of course, the highlight of last week was our Halloween Parade!  How fun it was to dress up in different costumes and parade to a cheering crowd. Thank you to all of the parents who were able to come help the children get in costume and who joined us in the parade.  Many thanks as well for the special Halloween snack!

Life Skills - Connected and Respected 

In Life Skills we talked about the word "cooperation".  The children had heard this word before, and shared what they knew.  We talked as a group about what "cooperation" means - to work together as a team and to help one another out.  The children brainstormed ways we use cooperation at school - in the classroom, on the playground, etc.  Then we practiced using cooperation as we created a "spider web" by passing around a ball of yarn.  Each person had to hold on to part of the yarn for this to work, and the children shared ideas on how to work together.  In the end, we had a beautiful class web, with each person holding onto a piece.  

Curriculum Highlights...

* Language Arts - Letters and sounds - D /d/, F/f/, and G/ g/.  Slides with consonants and the vowel "a", creating three letter words by adding another consonant to the end of a slide, nonsense words, marking vowels.  Writing Workshop - What do you do when you get stuck? (Hint - remember the Little Engine That Could), adding more detail to writing and drawing, the "king of -ing"

 * Math - Finishing up Chapter 1 -  Combinations that make 5, the number zero, correct number formation. Beginning Chapter 2 - Comparing numbers - learning new vocabulary "same" and "greater than".  Patterns on the calendar and 100's chart. Pumpkin glyphs 

* Science - Pumpkins - cutting open the pumpkin, scooping out seeds and "goop", learning the life cycle of a pumpkin, sequencing the life of a pumpkin, looking at fall leaves, trying to identify the leaves we find.

* Social Studies - Roots - Chloe, Ava, George

It's Pumpkin Time!

Kindergartners had a great time last week scooping out their pumpkins.  The teachers cut open the pumpkins and then the kids reached in and pulled out the seeds and goop.  Not everyone wanted to do this, but the ones that did had a fabulous time.  We separated the seeds out and toasted them in the oven with a little seasoning.  What a yummy fall treat!