My goodness, our time in kindergarten seems to be flying by! I cannot believe that it is already March and half way through third quarter! We have been working hard in our classroom on many different topics and or projects.
Let's start with reading:
We are just about to finished unit four. We have had some of the best conversations about weather, the four seasons, the effects of pollution, and how to take care of nature. Our next unit, unit five, will be all about different kinds of celebrations. This will include everyday celebrations, family celebrations, celebrations in our country, and how we show pride in our country. This is a fun unit where many text connections come up.
Phonics:
Identify the beginning, middle, and final sounds of a word
blending sounds to form a word
vowel sounds - long & short
sounding out words / sliding through the sounds
segmenting words
Comprehension Strategies:
Make predictions
Draw conclusions
Make text connections
- text to self
- text to world
- text to text
Sight Words:
have not what that said down of puts on was
Writing:
This quarter we have really jumped into writing feet first. I am so impressed with their work thus far. (I know you haven't seen much of it! I keep all of their writing in a binder for them and then at the end of the year they take home the binder full of all their hard work!) We have been working really hard on figuring out how to write complete sentences and even stories with more then one sentence. When we write we follow this rubric:
2. I can use finger spaces between my words.
3. I can sound out words.
4. I can use punctuation. ( . ! ? )
5. I can draw a picture to match my words.
*When your child is practicing writing at home these are easy things to look for. Sounding out words has proven to be the toughest one yet. We still need practice.
As your child does start to bring home writing please don't be alarmed by spelling errors. In kindergarten we encourage the children to write the sounds they hear in a word. Here is a cute letter from a teacher explaining more on the spelling we use in kindergarten.
Don't be worried if things are not always spelled correctly. Be proud of the writing they have done. Encourage them to sound out more words and write the sounds they hear. This will help build them into confident writers!
Math update:
We are finishing the chapter 5 on addition this week. We will be moving on to subtraction next week. We still need practice in breaking numbers down into pairs for example, 8=4+4 or 8=7+1 or 8=6+2. We will continue to practice with these.
Math online problems sorted by standard and skill: great resource!
a few online math games for addition/subtraction:
Our school carnival is March 11th. This year there will be a chili feed starting at 5:30. The games will take place in the classroom from 6:00-7:30. At 7:45 in the commons we will have the drawing for carnival baskets, 50/50 winner drawings, and silent auction results. This is a fun night designed to support Meadowlark and help us reach our goal towards building a new playground!
They have started a facebook group to promote the carnival. They are adding pictures of the baskets and other auction items. Here is the link to the page. Go check out all the cool prizes you can win! (Meadowlark Spring Carnival facebook event page)
Important dates to remember:
March 2nd: Field trip to Albert Bair
March 11th: School Carnival
March 16th: PTA meeting; 6pm in the libraryMarch 24th: Early out; dismissal at 11:45am
March 25th: No school
March 28th: No school
