February Vacation Fun

Hi Everyone!

I hope you are having fun this vacation! I can't wait to hear all about it! Did you visit family or spend time with friends? Did you watch any good movies or travel? Did anyone bake something yummy or do a cool craft project?! Add to the padlet below a sentence or two or even a picture of a special vacation moment that you would like to share. On Monday, each of us will be choosing one special moment to illustrate and write about. This padlet can help with our brainstorming when we are all a little tired as we settle back into our routine. :)

Simply double click on the board and write a note. Write your name at the top of the note as the title.

Vacation Fun

Happy New Year!  I hope all of you are having a wonderful vacation with your families.  The week has gone by sooo fast!  I can't wait to hear about all of the exciting things you did this week.  Add to the padlet below a picture or two or even just a sentence about something you would like to share about your vacation.  On Thursday, each of us will be choosing one special vacation moment to write about.  This padlet can help with our brainstorming when we're all a little tired as we settle back into our routine. :)

Comfy, Cozy Day

Today's frigid temps made it the perfect day for Comfy, Cozy Day! Children and teachers enjoyed being warm and comfortable in their pajamas. 

This morning, children were excited to learn they each got their own Polar Express ticket that would be hole punched by a Conductor.

We then enjoyed watching a read aloud of the Polar Express with the other Kindergarten students in the library.

After, we had a short holiday sing-a-long! "Jingle Bells", "Frosty," and "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" were the favorites.

To conclude our Polar Express morning, each Kindergartner received their very own silver bell!  Our conductor and musical guest was a former student's grandfather, Mr. Rhoads.  He truly helped make the event very special and memorable for the kids!  Thank you for joining us, Mr. Rhoads!

During today's math lesson, I gave my students a challenge.  They counted 1 window and 4 wheels on a picture of a train.  They had to figure out how many windows and how many wheels there would be if the number of trains kept increasing.  Students worked in groups of 3 or 4 to find a strategy that worked best to figure out the solutions to this math problem.  Some students drew groups of 4 circles, some counted groups of 4 fingers, and others counted on from what they had already figured out.  The groups wrote their answers on Post-its and added them to the class chart.  We will finish this activity tomorrow.  At the end, we'll see that most groups got the same data and we'll see what patterns and other observations we can make about this data.  We will learn that the number of windows is always equal to the number of trains because there is only one window on each train, and the number of wheels will always be more than the number of windows.  There's nothing better than critical thinking, teamwork, and perseverance all while working comfortably in our pajamas!

After lunch, we each shared what our favorite part of the day was and I recorded the responses in the Padlet below.

We ended the day with a Gingerbread Cookie Decorating Party to connect with the folktale unit we've been working on these past 6 weeks.  We have read different versions of The Gingerbread Man, The 3 Bears, and The Little Red Hen and have practiced comparing and contrasting stories, identifying story elements, and have been working on retelling stories.  The class loved decorating and eating the cookies!  Thank you to the parents who donated supplies or volunteered their time to help with this party!

It was such a fun day!!

We can label!

Parents, do you know what it means to label? After today’s lesson, I hope your children have a better understanding of what it means to label a picture. A label gives the reader information about the picture.

When we learned about apples before our apple picking field trip, students were introduced to the word labeling.  They labeled the parts of an apple diagram and their pictures about our field trip.

Today they got to label me, the teacher!

Yes, they can!

After, they had the opportunity to practice labeling on their own.  They each got a post-it and labeled something in the room.

I encouraged the children to go home and label the things around their homes – the couch, a table, a book, anything! Food and toys were suggested by students.  Rumor has it that pets, brothers and sisters, and you might be getting labeled tonight – just a warning ;).

When they labeled, I asked the children to listen for and write the first sound of the object and, if they were able to, listen for the last sound as well.  For those who like a challenge, they tried the first, a middle, and a final sound! Associating the sound with a word they are familiar with is always helpful (i.e. giving the clue /t/ like top if they are trying to spell table).

Labeling helps us to understand information in pictures and is a precursor to writing sentences. Recently, we started Writer’s Workshop.  I have modeled and the children have practiced beginning with an idea, illustrating it with great detail, and then labeling the people and things in their pictures. Eventually, they will be able to use those labels to develop their story and formulate sentences.  Children are learning that good writers have enough detail in their pictures to tell the story.  With a little more practice, your child should be able to confidently say "I can label a picture!"

I would love to share with the class what children labeled at home!  You can add a photo or sentence or two to the padlet below.  Simply double click in the large, yellow padlet box, add your child's name as the title and either click on the upload arrow to upload a picture or just write a sentence telling what your child labeled.  If you would prefer to email me a picture, I am more than happy to add it to the padlet for you!

When completing homework each night, encourage your child to listen for the beginning and ending sounds or the beginning, a middle, and an ending sound when labeling their illustrations.  The spelling doesn't have to be perfect!  I like how my neighbor teacher, Mrs. Murphy, reminds her students they are doing "young writer" spelling.  I encourage my students to do their best to listen for the sounds they hear when stretching out a word and to use those to sounds to spell.

Happy Labeling!

Pumpkin Day

Pumpkin day was a success!  A visit from an architect, an extended art class, and a class request for pattern day made the day even more fun!  Ms. Nasser reminded us that the day was perfect for Pumpkin Day because the architect, Megan Carriere, was there to talk about patterns in architecture and pumpkins are covered with lines - a type of pattern!  The day was still filled with many pumpkin activities.

Check out the fun we had!

We read to pumpkins in the Reading Patch.  The children were SO excited to read to the pumpkins!!

We read about the pumpkin life cycle, played pumpkin life cycle war, and matched rhyming pumpkins.

We also sorted pictures that start and do not with the letter p, practiced ordering numbers to 20, and even wrote pumpkin stories!

The children were very excited for the end of the day when they got to travel to four investigation stations that parent volunteers facilitated.

Children counted the number of lines on their pumpkins and remembered to use smart counting strategies and they determined if pumpkins sink or float.  Some students were very surprised that their heavy pumpkins float!

These hard working mathematicians also measured the height of their pumpkins with cubes and had the opportunity to feel the gooey inside of a pumpkin and count its seeds.

To count all the seeds, Mrs. Way had the children each grab a handful and put a group of ten seeds in each small cup.  We arranged the cups of seeds into ten frames so we could practice counting by tens to 100 and then from there counted by hundreds and the leftover tens and ones.  The total number of seeds for our pumpkin was 354!!  

Thank you to family members who shared your seed estimates with the class.  We enjoyed reading the comments!

Thank you to Mrs. Cammarata, Mrs. O'Leary, Mrs. Way, and Emily's Grandfather for helping with this fun activity!  Also, thank you to the Grella family for donating a couple of the pumpkins.

After Pumpkin Day, we used our new knowledge to compare apples and pumpkins in a Venn diagram.

We finished up our pumpkin unit by reviewing what we already knew about pumpkins prior to the start of our unit and what we were hoping to learn.

The children were surprised with how much they learned about pumpkins.  Congratulate your pumpkin experts on the new knowledge they attained and have been eager to share.

How many seeds in our pumpkin?

We are very excited for Pumpkin Day on Friday when we will see if pumpkins sink or float, measure how tall our pumpkins are, and count the seeds of one of our pumpkins!  Today we made predictions or estimates of how many seeds the children think one of our pumpkins has inside.  To help educate the children on how to make a good estimate, I read them the book How Many Seeds in a Pumpkin? by Margaret McNamara.  We learned some important information from the book that helped us make our estimates.  Check out these cool facts we read:

•  Each line on the outside of a pumpkin has a row of seeds inside. 
• The longer a pumpkin grows on the vine, the darker it is and the more lines it has. 
• The largest pumpkin doesn't necessarily mean it has the most seeds!

Check out our estimates!

Moms, dads, brothers, sisters, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and babysitters, we would love to hear YOUR predictions! In the comment section below, add your name and your prediction of how many seeds you think are in this pumpkin!  

Hopefully the 8x10 frame can help give you some idea of the pumpkin's size.

Thank you for sharing your predictions!

Check back next week for pictures of our Pumpkin Investigation Stations and to find out the actual number of seeds!

I spy a pattern!

Throughout the month of October, my class will be exploring, investigating, and creating patterns.  After reading about them and using shapes and movement to practice creating patterns in my room, they will apply their knowledge in the art room with Ms. Nasser.
Ms. Nasser and I created this unit after taking a Project Based Learning (PBL) course this summer.  We have collaborated in the past and love connecting art with our Kindergarten content areas and the Common Core Standards.
Our goal is to help students to see that patterns are all around us.  They help places, clothing, and objects look interesting.  With the new Middleton Center Complex project underway, we thought we could tie in this real life event with what students are learning by having students design community buildings that display their pattern examples.

Our driving question for the students is: How can we, as Kindergarten architects, use shapes and patterns to create beauty in buildings?

We introduced this unit yesterday with a quick video about patterns around Middleton.



I gave students a little background about patterns with a read aloud of My First Book of Patterns by Bobby and June George.  It is a great book.  I highly recommend it!

After watching the video, we went on a pattern hunt around the school.  The students were better at finding patterns than Ms. Nasser and I were!  We were very impressed! Students learned that they are going to become pattern experts.

The children are SOOOO EXCITED about patterns!  Some were even happy to see they had patterns on their clothing.  We decided as a class that we needed to have a Pattern Day and each of us wear patterned designed clothing!  More information will be sent home at a different time about Pattern Day.

Ms. Nasser and I were hoping to gain your help with spotting patterns at home, out in nature, or while you are out driving, shopping, and having fun.  Simply click on the plus sign in the Padlet box below.   Use the up arrow to upload a picture and write your child's name and description of the pattern and where you found it.  If you are having technical difficulties, feel free to email me the picture and caption and I will add it to the Padlet for you.  We will be sharing our pattern sightings over the next couple of weeks!

Thank you for your support!