Starting the Daily 5, Going to the library, Fire Drills, and Lunch with Your Child!

Going to the Library
Today was our first day going to the school library. We meet our librarian, Ms. McCool and learned how to check out books. Students will take the book they checked out home over the weekend.

*We still need a donation of 2 gallon ziplock bags to tote our library books to and from school.

Starting the Daily 5
Today was our first day starting the Daily 5. For those of you who don't know, the Daily 5 is a structure that allows teachers to incorporate balanced literacy, which includes the following everyday:
-Read to self  (reading the pictures, reading the words, or re-telling the story)
-Read to others
-Listen to reading
-Word work
-Writing
The kiddos learned what 'read the pictures' looks like. We also created an anchor chart that helps explain what it looks like. The kids decided that when we 'Read the pictures', we should...
1.  Sit criss cross apple sauce
2. Eyes are down and looking at the pictures
3. Our voice is smaller than a whisper explaining what we see in the pictures.

We had some great modeling of  what 'Read to Self'  looks like from Ada, Hutton, Bella, and Will. Ask your child to show you what it looks like.

We will continue to gradually incorporate the elements of Daily 5 for the rest of this quarter.

Fire Drills
Our track 4 kindergartners had their first fire drill today and they did SPECTACULAR!! We talked about how although there was not a real fire, it is important to practice what we would do if one ever happened. We also talked about why the alarm is SO LOUD, how to line up QUICKLY and QUIETLY, and how follow our emergency EXIT ROUTE.

Lunch with Your Child
YAY! The first two weeks are over, so you can now start having lunch with your child. Many parents have asked if this is ok, and my answer is always YES. However, before having lunch with your child, ask yourself the following questions...
-Does my child seem to have adjusted to coming to school? Or does he/she still have some anxiety about school?
-Would my coming to school and then leaving help or hurt the rest of the day for my child?

If your child is taking a bit longer to warm up to school, it might not be in their best interest to have lunch just yet. Give him/her a bit more time to get used to our routines and procedures before you decide to have lunch with your little gal or guy. At the end of the day, you know your child best and what is in his/her best interest.