Tuesday, February 16, 2016

Fun Ideas for Break

Math and Reading Games

The ideas listed below are optional...
:) 
Family Board Games!!
Board games are great for recognizing numbers, adding more to a given number, reading the rules, following directions...

Memory Game
Write 2 of each star word on flashcards and play a memory game with your child. Have him/her flip over two cards at the same time and try to find a match. 
Try not to add too many words. Start with 4 words with their doubles. As your child is successful, you can add more words! 

You can also play this game with sentences, numbers, pictures, addition sentences...

Counting to 100
Walk to your mailbox and count how many steps it takes to get to your destination. 
Count as much as you can with your child!! :) 

Star Word Mix and Fix
Write star words on flashcards and cut up the card so that each letter is separated. Mix the letters and have your child put the letters back in order.
For an extension, you can have your child make a list of the words, or write each word in a sentence. 

Star Word Hide and Seek
Have your child draw a picture. Inside the picture have your child hide star words.
Another way to play this can be to hide star words in your house or outside. As a family, try to find all the words. Make sure they also say the words as they find them. 

Riddle Relay
Make up riddles and have your child follow the riddles to find star words. 
Have your child try and read the riddle and race another sibling or an adult. 

Starfall
ABC Mouse
Great websites!

Most of these games can be altered to fit math as well. If you have any ideas, please comment below! 


Wednesday, January 20, 2016

Week of January 18, 2016

Letter of the Week:  
This week we will be working on the letter Oo.

Star Word:
on
what
The star word and the letter person worksheet were sent home on Tuesday in your child's red folder.

 Skills  
Letters that have been introduced so far in Unit 5:
b, l, r, u, w, j, y, x...
Words students should be able to read and write are: 
can, man, men, den, ten, tin, tip, sip, zip, zap, fit, fig, fog, dog, hog, hot, hat, cat, vat, van, did, tag, tad, mad, dad, den, end, fed, get, hem, hen, met, net, peg, six, fix, mix, fax, tax, tab, lab, rub, leg, kid, jet, log, rat, box, jug, web, yes, rug...

In unit 5 your child is independently blending words for each lesson. This daily practice is crucial for reading success. You will notice your child sounding out words at a quicker pace.
Students are chaining words in their student folder, and we will also use large cards to help with chaining/ sounding out words. Students are reading their skills book with decodable text each day. We also make time to read our authentic text throughout the day.
This week we will finish unit 5 and next week we will begin unit 6.
Praise your child for their consistent effort each day! 

Writing & Reading
Homework Journal
On Tuesday the homework journal will be sent home to complete again for this week. We were very impressed with the writing that was sent in last week. All of the children presented their work with such pride!

On Tuesday we will finish assessing students on their reading level. We will now have a concrete guided reading level that we will post on the report card for you to use for selecting "just right" books for your child. Please contact us if you have any questions.

This week we were able to visit the Scope Preschool classroom and read to the students. It was fantastic to see our kids acting like teachers and growing as readers!! 
Below are a few pictures: 











Great job K2!!

As always, reading at home every night is encouraged.
Thank you!

Math  
In Module 3 we are working on capacity. Last week we filled containers with rice and water. Students also learned about conservation. We took the same amount of water and placed it into containers of varying sizes. We talked about how it was the same amount of water but how it looked different in each container. We had great conversations while students were making their observations. They had a lot of fun with this!
This week we will talk about more than, less than and equal to.
On Wednesday we will begin working on area.

We will continue to work on writing numbers 0-12. You will notice that we are beginning to have children practice numbers that are formed backwards. We will be rewriting numbers on the bottom or back of worksheet. If you notice this, have your child practice the numbers that we write so that they begin to master forming these tricky numbers.
You will also notice we are working on addition sentences with numbers 0-6. Students are being exposed to these problems but not expected to master adding at this point in the year.

Native Americans
Last week we learned about a fictional native american family, the role of boys and girls in the Lakota Sioux tribe and then we learned about the Wampanoag tribe at the end of the week. This week we will learn about the Lenape tribe that lived in the Eastern Woodlands of North America who lived their lives according to the seasons. Students will learn interesting information about Native Americans with the use of the alphabet and they will also learn that Native Americans are still present today. We will review this information at the end of the week and will give a Domain assessment next week.

Vocabulary your child will be introduced to: 
borrow, coast, roamed, shelter, agile, galloping, scared, warriors, mischief, parfleche, travois, finally, horizon, succulent, burrows, harvested, trekked, wigwam,

We do not expect students to master all of this vocabulary, but it is important that they are exposed to this language. They will now have the prior knowledge that is necessary to gain mastery in future grade levels.


Report Cards will be available on PowerSchool on Friday, January 29th at 4:00.
This week we will continue to assess students and finalize grades. If you have any questions, we will be available to answer any questions you may have!

Thank you for visiting our blog, have a phenomenal week!

Sunday, January 10, 2016

Week of January 11, 2016

Letter of the Week:  
This week we will be working on the letter Ww.

Star Word:
was
will
The star word and the letter person worksheet were sent home on Monday in your child's red folder.

 Skills  
Letters that have been introduced so far in Unit 5:
b, l, r, u, w, j, y, x...
Words students should be able to read and write are: 
can, man, men, den, ten, tin, tip, sip, zip, zap, fit, fig, fog, dog, hog, hot, hat, cat, vat, van, did, tag, tad, mad, dad, den, end, fed, get, hem, hen, met, net, peg, six, fix, mix, fax, tax, tab, lab, rub...

In unit 5 your child is independently blending words for each lesson. This daily practice is crucial for reading success. You will notice your child sounding out words at a quicker pace.
Students are chaining words in their student folder, and we will also use large cards to help with chaining/ sounding out words.
In class we are also working on handwriting. Our expectation is that each child takes their time when writing and tries their best. Children should be bumping lines, forming letters in a word close together, and putting spaces between words. We have been very impressed with every child's handwriting this past week! Praise your child for their consistent effort each day! 

Centers
We will post pictures throughout the week to show you what your child has been working on.
As you start to see some of the games and activities, talk to your child about what they were doing in  each center. 

Writing & Reading
Homework Journal
On Monday you will get your first homework journal. Below is a portion of the letter that was sent home this past Friday:
For homework we are going to start a weekly journal. During the week, each child will write a sentence starting with, "This week I...". They can write down anything that happened during the week. We would like to see at least one sentence that has spaces between the words, best handwriting and a punctuation mark. Each child that completes this homework assignment will get a raffle. At the end of the month we will have a drawing and we will let any student who has 2 or more raffles pick out of the prize box.
On Monday you will get the journal. You can return it the next day (Tuesday) or Wednesday-Friday so that we can have a few readers each day. We are very excited for this important connection between home and school. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us!

As always, reading at home every night is encouraged.
Thank you!

Math  
In Module 3 we are working on weighing objects and comparing objects based on their weight. Students are predicting whether an object is heavier or lighter than another and using a full sentence to compare the two objects. An example of the language we are using in class: "The marble is lighter than the book". We would then start with the book and say, "The book is heavier than the marble". Students have been doing great with weighing and comparing objects.
This week we will also introduce the word capacity. We will fill containers with rice and talk about the capacity of the container.
We will continue to work on writing numbers 0-12. You will notice that we are beginning to have children practice numbers that are formed backwards. We will be rewriting numbers on the bottom or back of worksheet. If you notice this, have your child practice the numbers that we write so that they begin to master forming these tricky numbers.
You will also notice we are working on addition sentences with numbers 0-6. Students are being exposed to these problems but not expected to master adding at this point in the year.

Native Americans
Last week we gave the Farm assessment, and now we have moved onto Native Americans! We are beginning to learn about the Lakota Sioux tribe. This week we will learn about a fictional native american family, the role of boys and girls in the Lakota Sioux tribe and we will learn about the Wampanoag tribe at the end of the week. 

Vocabulary your child will be introduced to: 
borrow, coast, roamed, shelter, agile, galloping, scared, warriors, mischief, parfleche, travois, finally, horizon, succulent...

We do not expect students to master all of this vocabulary, but it is important that they are exposed to this language. They will now have the prior knowledge that is necessary to gain mastery in future grade levels.



Thank you for visiting our blog!
Have a fantastic week!