Happy Saturday!
Good morning Parents of my amazing Kindergarten students!
I hope this blog finds everyone in your house HEALTHY! So much has been going around our school and classroom. We are really focusing on being healthy ... washing our hands, drinking water, exercising and eating healthy. Hopefully that helps us stay as healthy as possible going into Christmas break.
This week we continued our work on patterning, creating our own patterns using beautiful things (beads, snowflakes, pom noms, buttons etc). We are practicing creating our own patterns as well as "reading them" using their attributes (blue, blue, red, blue, blue, red) as well as letters (AABAAB). We did colored patterns on our elves legs and are trying to find ways of making our learning visible to you! Its difficult when so much of our work is hands on and process, not product, orientated. I get to see the students learning, but its important that YOU get to see it too! We have some pictures of the patterns that we did and will continue to try to find creative ways of showing what we are learning/have learned. We have had fun beading Christmas ornaments using our knowledge of patterns too!
We have also been finding different ways of showing number. The students love a new game we are playing on the interactive hundreds chart on our whiteboard called Mystery Number. To start, someone picks a mystery number between 1 and 100. We use the 100's chart to ask questions about what the number could be. I am trying to get the students to ask a question that targets many numbers (such as "does your number have a 1 in it" rather than guessing a single number. Through this activity we are learning more about the numbers 1-100, the patterns in numbers and are becoming increasingly confident in using the 100's chart as a strategy for figuring out addition and subtraction equations. With so many students away this week, it has been a helpful strategy when trying to figure out how many students are in class when 5 are missing! You can play Mystery Number at home by googling "interactive 100's chart" and going to the website https://www.abcya.com/games/interactive_100_number_chart.
We have a busy week coming up with the following activities ...
Wednesday, December 11: Decorating Gingerbread houses with our buddies (morning from 9-10 and afternoon from 1-2). Please send in a bag of candy labelled with your child's name for decorating.
** We are still looking for volunteers to help put the houses together. We have a small group that is meeting after lunch on Tuesday to put our houses together. Please let me know if you are interested!!! If you are in the morning class, I would be happy to host your Kindergarten student in your afternoon class that day!
We are also building a gingerbread village with our decorated houses. If you have any extra indoor lights, we would love to borrow them off of you until the end of the week!
Thursday, December 12: Grinch Day! We will be watching the classic story of "How the Grinch Stole Christmas". Please see the letter attached to the school messenger outlining curricular connections (I haven't learned how to attach it to my blog yet)!
Whispers of Winter Celebration! Thursday night families are invited to join us in celebrating the Christmas/winter season between 6:30 and 7:30. I will be in the idea lab helping with our Giving Tree and Making Merry Cards. Please stop by to say "hi"!
Food Bank: The kindergarten students have brought in 40 items for the Calgary food bank! Our goal is to get to 100 (at least). You are welcome to bring food on the evening of our winter celebration. Please have your Kinder add the items you are donating so that we can add that number to our tally!
Friday, December 13: Morning Class attends!
Have a wonderful weekend! Stay healthy!
Ms. O.
I hope this blog finds everyone in your house HEALTHY! So much has been going around our school and classroom. We are really focusing on being healthy ... washing our hands, drinking water, exercising and eating healthy. Hopefully that helps us stay as healthy as possible going into Christmas break.
This week we continued our work on patterning, creating our own patterns using beautiful things (beads, snowflakes, pom noms, buttons etc). We are practicing creating our own patterns as well as "reading them" using their attributes (blue, blue, red, blue, blue, red) as well as letters (AABAAB). We did colored patterns on our elves legs and are trying to find ways of making our learning visible to you! Its difficult when so much of our work is hands on and process, not product, orientated. I get to see the students learning, but its important that YOU get to see it too! We have some pictures of the patterns that we did and will continue to try to find creative ways of showing what we are learning/have learned. We have had fun beading Christmas ornaments using our knowledge of patterns too!
We have also been finding different ways of showing number. The students love a new game we are playing on the interactive hundreds chart on our whiteboard called Mystery Number. To start, someone picks a mystery number between 1 and 100. We use the 100's chart to ask questions about what the number could be. I am trying to get the students to ask a question that targets many numbers (such as "does your number have a 1 in it" rather than guessing a single number. Through this activity we are learning more about the numbers 1-100, the patterns in numbers and are becoming increasingly confident in using the 100's chart as a strategy for figuring out addition and subtraction equations. With so many students away this week, it has been a helpful strategy when trying to figure out how many students are in class when 5 are missing! You can play Mystery Number at home by googling "interactive 100's chart" and going to the website https://www.abcya.com/games/interactive_100_number_chart.
We have a busy week coming up with the following activities ...
Wednesday, December 11: Decorating Gingerbread houses with our buddies (morning from 9-10 and afternoon from 1-2). Please send in a bag of candy labelled with your child's name for decorating.
** We are still looking for volunteers to help put the houses together. We have a small group that is meeting after lunch on Tuesday to put our houses together. Please let me know if you are interested!!! If you are in the morning class, I would be happy to host your Kindergarten student in your afternoon class that day!
We are also building a gingerbread village with our decorated houses. If you have any extra indoor lights, we would love to borrow them off of you until the end of the week!
Thursday, December 12: Grinch Day! We will be watching the classic story of "How the Grinch Stole Christmas". Please see the letter attached to the school messenger outlining curricular connections (I haven't learned how to attach it to my blog yet)!
Whispers of Winter Celebration! Thursday night families are invited to join us in celebrating the Christmas/winter season between 6:30 and 7:30. I will be in the idea lab helping with our Giving Tree and Making Merry Cards. Please stop by to say "hi"!
Food Bank: The kindergarten students have brought in 40 items for the Calgary food bank! Our goal is to get to 100 (at least). You are welcome to bring food on the evening of our winter celebration. Please have your Kinder add the items you are donating so that we can add that number to our tally!
Friday, December 13: Morning Class attends!
Have a wonderful weekend! Stay healthy!
Ms. O.
