Super Second Week!!

We had another great week in Kindergarten!  Everyone is becoming more familiar with our routines and seems pretty comfortable in our room!

This week we read a story called This Year Will Be the Best and brainstormed what our hopes will be for this Kindergarten year.  Some children want to learn to read and make friends and others are just hoping to get ice cream or build snowmen!  Their beautiful illustrations are hanging out in hallway outside our room.  Be sure to check them out if you stop by!  We then took our hopes and dreams and talked about how we needed to act and behave in the classroom in order for everyone to achieve their hopes, to learn, and to grow.  We created a long list of ideas and then narrowed them down to being safe, responsible, and respectful.  You can see our classroom promises below that everyone signed!  Ask your child to tell you about our classroom promises!  We also read our first Let's Find Out magazine from Scholastic News.  This week was about classroom rules!  We read the magazine together and the children practiced reading the part: "We can do it!".  I have included the Let's Find Out Magazine in your child's Friday Folder.  Have fun reading it together at home!

We began our first unit in math this week as well.  This first unit focuses on the counting sequence to 20 and quantities of 10.  The children were also introduced to some Work Places. Work Places are mathematics centers that children visit each day that connect to our math unit.  This week the children investigated pattern blocks, unifix cubes, polydrons, and geoboards.  Ask your child which Work Place was a favorite!  After using the Work Places, we also focused on attributes and sorting.  We looked our shoes and sorted ourselves into groups based on attributes, such as color, laces, velcro, no shoelaces, etc.

Lastly, we started our "All About Us" unit with an introduction to Totally Terrific Child.  Each day for the next few weeks, children will be sharing their timelines and pictures of themselves to help us all learn about each other.  After a child shares, we will ask questions about his or her interests and make connections.  We will also use this as an opportunity to start working a bit on letter formation and pencil grip as each member of the class will make a page for the Totally Terrific Child's book!  I was today's Totally Terrific Child.  Ask your child what he or she learned about me!  If your child has not brought in his or her timeline, please send it in as soon as you can.  I put an extra copy (if your child's was not returned yet) in the Friday Folder.

We have had a lot of fun dancing, singing, and learning together so far!  I am looking forward to our first five-day week!

 Ask your child about...

• Painting birthday crowns
• Making a birthday month graph and an age graph
• The Hip Hop Hokey Pokey Milkshake songs
• Reading The Good Egg and The Bad Seed
• Winning the whole-school game of Four Corners at our first PreK-4 assembly!