Tuesday, September 30, 2014

The IPICK rap so you can practice at home!




Stay tuned for our video once we have really learned the rap! Until then, practice this one at home when you are getting ready to choose a book at home! (our moves are a little different then the ones in the video so ask your kids to show you our movements to the words!)

We have been talking about good fit books in class!

Ask your child to try and sing their IPICK rap at home!

What's a Good Fit book?!

Making pumpkins with our sense of touch!!!

We used our fists to stamp pumpkins on our paper and then used fingers to make the pumpkin stems! Using our sense of touch is so much fun!





Sunday, September 21, 2014

What’s up this week?!

Literacy- We will be working on GOOD FIT books for us. We will continue to work on building our stamina in Read to Self and Word Work. We are talking about the parts of a book and making some simple connections with the stories we read. The boys and girls are still Reading the Pictures but we are beginning to transition into looking for sight words and words we know in the stories we are reading.
Writing- We will continue to be working on drawing pictures, labeling our pictures and trying to write some words about our stories.
Letterland- We will meet our final two Letterland characters and then we will be digging deeper and getting to know about each letterland character even better!
Math- In math this week we will be continue to work on understanding our numbers. We will also begin to introduce the way that Math Workshop will look in our classroom.
Science- We will continue our study on the 5 senses
Social Studies- We will be learning about helpers in our community!
-Reminders-
·         No School this Thursday (sept. 25) TEACHER WORKDAY
·         Progress Reports will be going home Sept. 30
·         Conferences will begin in the next couple weeks. Stay tuned for the sign up info.
·         We are in need of board games for our math class (candyland, chutes and ladders, jax, pick up sticks, sorry!, trouble, connect 4, etc.)
·         Friday October 17th will be an early release day
·         Homework will begin in October
·         STUDY YOUR SIGHT WORDS!

Help! We are in need of.....

some board games for math!

During math time we have the opportunity to rotate through math centers where we get a chance to perfect our math skills. One great way to do that is through board games. These games are a great way to practice through fun!

Some examples of games we need:
Chutes and Ladders
Jax
Pick up sticks
Candy Land
Hi-Ho Cherry-O
Trouble
Sorry!


If you would like to donate one or a few of these games we would be forever grateful! It's ok if we have multiples because it allows more groups to play through the games at one time. Thank you so much for helping with your child's education!

Thursday, September 18, 2014

Mistakes are beautiful!!

Today, we read the book Beautiful Oops! We talked about how we all make mistakes and that mistakes help us learn! We then made our own beautiful oops works of art! The boys and girls had so much fun making "oops" pictures and getting quite messy doing it!!! Creativity is a wonderful thing!!!!









Word work!








Wednesday, September 17, 2014

Twin day at Douglas!

 Friday is Twins day! Find a friend or group of friends to dress alike this Friday, September 19th!

Tuesday, September 16, 2014

Math games!

Today in math we learned how to play a few math games! The boys and girls had so much fun learning!!!




Writers workshop!

Today we used white boards to draw pictures and label. We worked with buddies to come up with stories and help each other label what was happening in our pictures! 





Sunday, September 14, 2014

What's going on this week?!

Writer’s Workshop: The boys and girls have been working on drawing pictures of something we know about or something we have done. We have been working on labeling our pictures and hearing the first sound in a word. This week, we will continue to work on the above, but will start to stretch out the words in our pictures and write the letters that we hear.

Letterland: We will continue to meet the rest of our Letterland friends!

Daily 5: We have been working so hard on Read to Self. This week we will talk about our “book baskets” and continue to practice Read to Self (we are really focusing on reading the pictures and beginning to pick out some words we might recognize in our books). We will also be starting Word work this week. Word Work is using different manipulative and activities to help us learn our sight words and become better readers. Keep posted for updates on how it’s going!

Math: We are continuing to work on really understanding the meanings of numbers. We will start to learn a couple games that help us with our numbers. The math workshop model will begin to be more present the next couple weeks.

Science: We will continue our study on the 5 senses. We will determine if things are salty or sweet!

Social Studies: We will start talking about community helpers and what they do to keep our community running and safe.

Reminders:
·         Open house is this Thursday from 5:30-7pm
·         Don’t forget to sign up for Remind 101 so that you can get reminders for simple things throughout the week
·         We will not have rest time anymore. Please keep towels at home.
·         Breakfast is $1.00 Lunch is $2.00
·         Practice your sight words EVERY NIGHT

·         Keep posted for an update on homework

Thursday, September 11, 2014

Read to Self

We have been practicing read to self in class as the first part of Daily 5. We are really focusing on one of our three ways to read the book, read the pictures. The boys and girls are doing an awesome job!

Wednesday, September 10, 2014

What's the Daily 5?

I'm sure a lot of you are hearing your child come home and talk about the Daily 5 (if not, ask them! We are working on Read to Self right now)

 So, what is the Daily 5?  It is a way of structuring the reading block so that every student is independently engaged in meaningful literacy tasks.  The research based tasks are ones that will have the big impact on student reading and writing achievement, as well as foster children who love to read and write.  Students receive explicit whole group instruction and then are given independent practice time to read and write while I instruct individuals or small groups of students.  

  This program will help me learn about your child’s greatest strengths and needs as a reader which will help me plan for his/her individual instruction.  One thing you might notice is a decrease in the number of worksheets your child brings home.  Instead your child will be taught how to select “Just Right Books” for reading.  By reading books that are “Just Right” for your child, he/she will be able to read it more fluently and comprehend the book that they are reading.  Your child will be spending most of his/her time reading, which research supports as the #1 way to improve reading.  I anticipate the Daily 5 will motivate and improve your child’s reading.  I am always excited about implementing this reading program and giving your child the opportunity to grow as a reader. 

 It will take a while to get the program up and running in the classroom, however, if you have any questions or concerns about the Daily 5 please contact me.  I want you and your child to be comfortable and LOVE this program.  

Monday, September 8, 2014

3 new things we have learned!


We were introduced to our 5 senses.

We talked about 3 important ways to read a book (we don't always have to know the words!)

We started writers workshop today and learned how to draw a picture and label the things in our picture! 


It was a rainy day, but our brains were busy getting smarter! Way to go boys and girls! Kiss your brains! 

Sunday, September 7, 2014

sight words start this week! In case you forgot here is the list of words for the year!


Sight Words
The Kindergarten Team expects that you practice your child’s sight words daily.
Sight words are frequently used and repeated in text. Young children are
encouraged to memorize them in order to allow them to concentrate more on
less familiar words while reading as well as the text's meaning. They are critical
to your child’s reading success!
September 8 12: I, a, at
January 26 30: yes, run
September 15 19: is, to
February 2 6: was, big
September 22 26: like, me
February 9 13: not, where
September 29 October 3: it, am
February 16 20: day, out
October 6 10: come, and
February 23 27: down, of
October 13 17: in, here
March 2 6: are, from
October 20 24: up, go
March 9 13: little, who
page1image28344
October 27 31: see, my, because
March 16 20: her, then
November 3 7: you, look
March 30 April 3: get, away
November 10 14: the, said
April 6 10: came, could
November 17 21: we, on, has
April 13 17: why, again
December 1 5: can, one, got
April 20 24: first, do
December 8 12: his, with
April 27 May 1: eat, mother
December 15 19: she, want
May 4 8: saw, what
January 5 9: for, have
May 11 15: after, there
January 12 16: went, he
May 18 22: make, did
January 21 23: will, they
page1image56368
May 26 29: father, night
                  Practice, Practice, Practice!!!! 

2nd week updates!

Happy Second week of Kindergarten! The boys and girls had a very busy week last week and I know they slept well every night :) Hopefully this weekend they have gotten plenty of rest for the busy week ahead! 

What are we doing this week?


Literacy- We will be launching Daily 5! We will be learning about our special gathering spots, 3 ways to read a book, where we sit in the room to read and all about building our Stamina! Be ready to ask and hear all about Daily 5 this week! There will also be papers going home throughout the "launch" to help you, as parents, better understand the program. 

We will also meet more Letterland friends! We are having so much fun traveling to letter land! Ask your child which friends we have already met! 

Our sight words start this week. Please practice them at home every night. The students are expected to know these words and how they are spelled. The more time you put in to helping them learn them, the more successful they will be in the classroom during writing time and mini lessons in Daily 5.

Writing-  We will be launching Writer's Workshop! We will learn all about our writing materials (pencils, crayons, writing folders and writing offices), we will learn how to draw and  label our stories.

Math- We will continue to learn our quick practice routine of learning all about numbers. We will also continue to work on learning all about groups of numbers and counting!

Science- We will begin our unit on the 5 senses. We will talk about what our five senses are and how we might use them!

Social Studies-   We will continue to talk about rules and procedures in our classroom and our school.

-A few reminders-

  • Please remember to sign up for Remind so that you can get quick updates and reminders right to your phone!  (info on how to sign up is below in another blog post)
  • Our snack calendar starts up this week, don't forget on your day to please send in snack for 21 hungry Kindergarteners! Please do not send in juice or napkins. The boys and girls will have water to drink and we have plenty of paper towels
  • Weekly homework will be starting up soon. For now, have your students get familiar with reading every night. They can also begin to learn their weekly sight words!

Thank you so much for making this first week a huge success! All of your kiddos are a such joy and I can't wait for all that is to come this year. Again, don't hesitate to ask any questions you may have! 

Yay!
Mrs. Pauley




Thursday, September 4, 2014

Reminders

Tomorrow is football Friday at Douglas! Wear your favorite team jersey or shirt!

Also, early release is tomorrow. We will dismiss at 1:15. 

tomorrow!

Tomorrow at Douglas is football friday!!! Wear your favorite NFL team gear or jersey!!!

Wednesday, September 3, 2014

Remind!

Don't forget to sign up with remind so that I can easily and quickly remind you of anything going on at school or in out classroom! Sign up below: 

Tuesday, September 2, 2014

What a great first day!



We had a great first day in Kindergarten! We met some new friends and we took a tour of the school with our friend, Pete the Cat. We read The Kissing Hand and created a really fun craft (seen above), we ate a yummy lunch, we took a rest (we were so wore out), we learned about two letterland friends (annie apple and bouncy ben), we read “David goes to school” and talked about how we can be Peace Makers, we danced and,  last but not least, we went to music class! Phew! 

Make sure your students get a great night’s sleep tonight, because we have another busy day tomorrow! It’s going to be a great year in Mrs. Pauley and Ms. R’s Kindergarten class!