Fun Run, Here We Come!

Fun Run

Today was our Fun Run kick off and what a way to start one of our biggest fundraisers of the year. There was dancing, singing, and even the Chick-fil-A cow!

 For those of you who are new to the 'Fun Run', students earn pledges from family and friends (either a flat pledge or a certain dollar amount per lap). Students earn individual prizes for their pledges and classes earn group prizes as they make their way towards their class goal (our class goal is $420 or $20 per student). The top 3 earning classes will get to choose from an icecream party, subs and chips from Jersey Mike's, or a pajama/popcorn/movie. The culmination will be the 'Fun Run' itself on 4/27 (parents are welcome to attend) where students will participate and wear the tie-dye t-shirts they will make in Art. 

A 'Fun Run' envelope went home in your child's daily folder this afternoon. You can enlist neighbors, grandparents, even businesses to support our school! 

Language Arts

In reading this week, we are continuing to work on identifying/retelling the main topic and details when reading non-fiction text. Ask your child to share with you the gestures for 'main topic' and 'detail'. We  are also revisiting fiction and retelling the story by stating the characters, setting, problem/solution (or stating events sequentially). As always, we continue to work on our decoding skills such as using first letter/picture clues and sounding out to determine unknown words.

Has your child identified any digraphs 'sh', 'ch', 'ng'  and/or the 'magic e' in words? If yes, then make sure you sing their praises! Being able to recognize and apply these sounds in words will help your child decode words to help them master a level C (or higher) book. 

Sight words of the week: down

In writing, we are continuing to work on creating our 'All About' books. We first start off by thinking about what we know about the main topic (giraffes). Next, we create a list of questions we want to find out about the topic. This week, the kiddos wanted to find out the following questions about giraffes:

-Where do they live?

-What do they look like up close?

-How do they eat/drink?

-How long are their tongues?

-How do they protect their babies?

-How do they protect themselves from lions? 

-What shape are their paws? 

Although all of our questions weren't answered with the book we read, some of our questions were answered (ask your kiddo how long a giraffe's tongue is...you are not going to believe the answer).  We used the questions/answers from our book and the kiddos created their very own 'All About Giraffes' book complete with a table of contents and subheadings (two text features that are commonly found in non-fiction/informational books). 

Math

In math this week, we began sharing math 'take away' stories. Just as with the addition stories, the goal right now is for the kiddos to be able to see take away stories in their own life and be able to represent the story with manipulatives, pictures, or acting it out. If they can solve it, even better, but no equations just yet. Want to support this objective at home, encourage your kiddo to see take away stories in everyday situations. For example, there are 8 slices of pizza. We ate 5 slices. How many slices are left? That's right, 8 take away 5 is 3. 

Quarter 3 Conferences

Keep your eye out for a sign up genius invite to quarter 3 conferences. This time, the kiddos will be the ones showing YOU what they have mastered including representing/solving math stories, reading level C books, sight word mastery and MORE! 

What's going on in room 210?

I can't believe it's already Wednesday. Although our early release and subsequent snow day has slowed us down in the curriculum department, we are still chugging along. Below you will find what we are working on (or will be working on) this week.

Language Arts

In reading this week, we have been working on identifying and re-telling the main topic and key details in non-fiction text. The kiddos already know from earlier in the year that we read non-fiction texts to learn about something, as opposed to reading fiction, where we read for fun, to find out about the characters, setting and what problems happen in the story. Today, we re-read a book about koalas (main topic) and learned things such as koalas have two toes and that they eat eucalyptus leaves (details). To support this objective at home, go to the library and let your child check out a book on something they want to know more about (dinosaurs, butterflies, dolphins). Read the book together and talk about the main topic and details. Want to go even further?? Check out an accompanying fiction book, read it, and talk about the differences. For example, you can check out a non-fiction book about dinosaurs and then a fiction book with dinosaurs as the main characters. The kiddos should be able to notice that the fiction book has characters, setting, problem, and solution, whereas the non fiction book gives information about dinosaurs, has a table of contents, and subheadings. 

Sight Words this week: with

Ask your kiddo about the gesture for this word. At this point in the year, your child should be able to identify at least 25 sight words.

In writing this week, we are introducing informational writing (to coincide with our reading objectives) . We will be immersing ourselves in tons of non-fiction texts, filling out KWL charts (what we KNOW and what we WANT TO KNOW) before we start reading. Then after we finish reading, we will fill out the 'L' of the KWL chart (what we LEARNED). We will then use the what we learned portion to write class books that inform others about a particular animal. As always, we continue to focus on our conventions, using a capital letter at the beginning of each sentence, spacing, sounding out words, using sight words, end punctuation, etc...

In math this week, we are finishing up on finding different ways to make a number. For example, 1+4, 2+2, 3+2, 4+1, 5+0 are all ways to make 5. Your child can show you how to do this with this week's math homework. We will be moving on to addition stories later in the week, with the kiddos using pictures, manipulatives, and acting it out to not just share addition stories, but SOLVE them as well. For example, if I shared a story about seeing 3 blue fish and 2 red fish, your kiddo will represent the story with a picture and be able to say/write how many fish there are altogether. 

PTA Fun Run/T-Shirts

Thank you to everyone who has sent in white t-shirts for our fun run. And an especially big thank you to the parents that donated EXTRA shirts. If you haven't already turned a shirt in, please do so by this Friday. 

And another big thank you to Whitney Tribble, Callie Riggs, Jennifer Norris, and Stacy Kozlowski for signing up to help the kiddos create their tie dye t-shirts for the Fun Run. 

Interims

Interims will be going home this Friday in your child's Daily folder. 

FYI....Upcoming Homework

Part of next week's homework (going home this Friday) will be to make a leprechaun trap. Please know that the intention of this project is to work on the kiddos' problem solving skills in a fun way. It is not intended as a project for you (the parent) to do (at least, not all of it). Talk to your kiddo about leprechauns, their size, and what they would be attracted to (gold, maybe??). Don't worry about it being or looking perfect. At the end of the day, the kiddos should be excited and proud of what they have created :-).

It's Wacky Wednesday.....

Well, it's not really Wacky Wednesday, but we did read Wacky Wednesday by Dr. Seuss today to help celebrate his birthday this week. If you have a chance, check it out from the library. It is a SUPER SILLY book, and the kiddos loved it!

Language Arts

In reading this week, we are focusing on several strategies to help us read our books including:

-sight word mastery (the more words you know, the more books you can read)

-sounding out CVC words (that is 3 letter words with a vowel in the middle)

We have also been learning about digraphs (although the kiddos don't know that word). That is, two letters that, when combined make a one unique sound, such as 'sh', 'ch', and 'th'. Ask your child to tell you what sound these letters make when combined and have them show you the gestures as well. 

Kindergarten students at Banks Road Elementary are expected to be reading on a level C or above by the end of quarter 3 (the end of March). Ms. Cassidy and I, and the rest of our support team are working hard each day to make sure your child will meet these benchmarks. Please help support your child master this goal by having them read to you each night for 10 minutes. Praise your little one anytime he/she uses the following strategies:

-sight word mastery

-sounding out unknown words

-using the picture to determine unknown words

-using understanding of digraphs to sound out words (sh, th, ch)

-flipping the vowel sound when a word doesn't make sense 

Sight Words

Our sight words this week are 'got' and 'have'

Ask your child for the gestures for these words. If your child can identify all the sight words on his/her homework, please email me and I will send home a new list. As always, you can support sight word mastery at home by encouraging your kiddo to identify sight words whenever they see them. Heck, tell them they can earn a penny for every sight word they can identify. However, let me warn you.....you WILL be out of pennies before you know it!

Math

In math this week, are continuing to share math stories. So far, we've learned 3 ways to share math stories including acting it out, drawing a picture, and using manipulatives.

In addition, we have also been working on determining 'partners' for numbers 1-5. For example, 1 and 4 are partners that make 5, 2 and 3 are partners that make 5, and 4 and 1 are partners that are 5. Getting the kiddos to understand the different ways a number can be made is the basis for addition. 

Field Trip

Please make sure you have turned in money AND the field trip form for science field trip. Extra forms for students we do not have forms for went home in today's daily folder. Please email me should you have any questions or concerns.

Early Release Change

Due to the snow days, March 7th is NOW a full day. 

Interim Reports 

Interim reports will be going home next Friday. These reports are intended to inform parents how their child is progressing this quarter. Please know if your child is NOT meeting 3rd quarter benchmarks, your child may be retained. Please email me should you have any questions or concerns. 

A little of this, a little of that...

Moonlight Reading

Our 'Moonlight Reading' night will be tomorrow night from 6:30-8pm at our school. There are lots of family friendly activities like flashlight reading and reading with therapy dogs. If you are looking for an excuse not to cook, our PTA will giving an opportunity to purchase a taco dinner for you and the family starting from 5:30-6:30. The book fair will also be open if you would like to buy books with your child. 

Language Arts

In reading, our goal this week is to work our sight word mastery which helps with our reading mastery. The kiddos know that the more sight words they know, the more books you can read. In addition, we have also focused on nonsense word mastery. This not only helps kids with letter/sound mastery, but also helps when a child is decoding a word and needs to determine if what they think the word is is an actual word or not (for example, make: a child might decode it and think it is make with a short a and e. That is not a real word, so then the child would have to try the word with a long a, which would make sense). 

In writing, we are finishing up our unit on 'how to' writing. This week, we are writing about how to brush our teeth. The kiddos are expected to know and write the materials they will need, as well as break up the task into small steps. As always, we are still focused on using capital letters the the beginning of each sentence, using mostly lowercase letters, spacing between words, sounding out unknown words using phoneme segmentation, using end punctuation, and using sight words in our writing. To support this objective at home, ask your child to tell you the steps to make cereal or pouring milk. Encourage them to tell what materials they need and use sequence words (first, second, third) to describe the steps in order. 

New Sight Words: one, day 

Older sight words: they, out, little 

Ask your child for the gestures for these words. See how many sight words they can find in the real world.

Math

We have just finished up our mini-unit on positional words (above, below, next to, in front of, behind). The goal with these words was to have students use positional words in relation to other objects. For example, place the cylinder behind the chair, where is the cube, etc..

Today, we started a BIG unit on 'Math Stories' which help the students see how math (adding and subtracting) is found in everyday life. For example, I there are 2 boys in my family and 2 girls. So altogether there are 4 people in my family. Through sharing stories, our class realized that in order to have a good math story, you need numbers. So, just sharing a story that you ate pizza doesn't make a good math story, but sharing that you had 2 slices of pizza and your Dad ate 4 slices makes a great math story. Then, we can find out how many slices of pizza you and your Dad ate together. The goal of these early lessons is to introduce the kiddos to adding with real life scenarios. For now, we will be using only pictures to share our math stories and add (not equations: 2 + 4 = 6). To support this objective at home, see if you can come up with some math stories at home (dinner is always a good time for math stories). 

Donations Needed:

Next week will be Dr. Suess' birthday. In honor of his birthday, we will be doing some fun activities that connect to some of his well known books. However, I need a few items to do this

-2 bags of colored goldfish

-1 bag of cornstarch

Thank you

Thank you to Michelle Sourisak for being our Mystery Reader this week. 

What are we learning in room 210?

Language Arts

In reading this week, we have introduced 'I read, you read' as a way to help us become better readers. In short, 'I read, you read' is just what it sounds like. Two people take turns reading the pages of a book. If the partner reading gets 'stuck', the partner listening makes suggestions on how to figure out unknown words. The two partners together will then try said suggestions. Some suggestions might include:

-sounding out unknown words

-looking at the picture to see what the unknown word could be

-trying to flip the vowel sound (for example, sounding out 'make' with a short a sound would not make sense when sounding it out, but flipping the vowel sound to the long a sound would make sense)

If the partner reading doesn't get stuck, the partner listening can give a compliment or ask how they figured out a word that is not a sight word (for example, listener:  "How did you figure out that word was 'woman', I didn't even hear you sound it out. Reader: "Well, I saw the word started with the letters "wom" and then I looked at the picture and saw a woman, so that makes sense.") Listener: "You did a great job using the first few letters of the word and the picture to figure out that word."

By talking and listening to each other, the two readers get to think and talk about the strategies they use to decode words. Just by that exchange of ideas, the two readers get to think/talk about the strategies they use and solidify these strategies as lifelong reading tools. 'I read, you read' would be great to use at home, too. Just make sure that you, the parent reader models getting 'stuck', so your child can make suggestions. 

Sight Words this week: little, out (the join 'they' from last week)

Ask your child for the gestures for these words

Writing

We are continuing our unit on 'how to' writing. Today the kiddos wrote their first 'how to' on how to make microwave popcorn. In addition to the usual writing components (sounding out words, spacing between words, using sight words, end punctuation, etc...), we are also focusing on using sequence words to begin each step, creating illustrations to match each step, and writing at least 3 step directions. And in an effort to make school on Saturday a little more fun,  we will be making/writing how to make a bird feeder:0)

Math 

In math, we continue our unit on 2d and 3d shapes. This week, our focus has been creating large 2d shapes using smaller 2d shapes. For example, through some hands on activities, the kiddos discovered that 6 triangles can be put together to create a hexagon. 

Thank you

Thank you to all the parents who have donated snacks to our school. 

Thank you to Stacy Kozlowski for donating peanut butter, spray cheese, and candy hearts for our upcoming activities.

Thank to our very first 'Mystery Reader', Sheila Tribble. The kids loved your excitement when you read the book and the treats were so thoughtful!! 

We still need....

-bird seed

-toilet paper rolls

-several packs of color coded dots 

Assessment scores, field trips, and holidays....oh my!

Assessment Scores

Today in your child's folder, you will find a brightly colored sheet sharing your child's scores on the mid-year assessments for:

-first sound fluency (naming the first sound in words)

-phoneme segmentation ( breaking up words into sounds)

-nonsense word fluency (saying the sounds in made up words)

-reading fluency and comprehension (the quarter 2 goal for kindergarten students at Banks Road was to be reading on a level B or higher) 

As you know, these objectives are reflected in the weekly homework. If your child did not meet these goals, I have already noted it in their quarter 2 report card. It is important to also note that not meeting these goals may be a reason that leads to possible retention for your child. Please know that if your child did not meet these goals, I and other Banks Road team members are working with your child, so they meet these goals. Please email me should you have any questions and/or concerns. 

Field Trip

A permission form for our upcoming field trip went home in your child's folder yesterday. This field trip will be 'in house' meaning the company will come to us. The cost is $8.50 and will be a hands on field trip correlated to our weather objectives. 

Upcoming events:

Making a Bird Feeder for our 'how to' writing unit

Thank you to everyone who has donated toilet paper rolls to our class to help make our bird feeders next week. However, we still need the following:

-paper towel/toilet paper rolls (enough for 6 students)

-1 bag of bird seed

-a pack of 'to-go' peanut butter (small, individual packs of peanut butter) for 21 students. 

-1 can of 'spray cheese' 

Valentine's Day/100th of School

Since these 2 events fall on the same day (and it's also an early release day), we will be having a combination of Valentine's Day/100th day of school activities. For them, we will need:

-2 large bags of candy hearts

-Several packs of color coded label dots (the ones you might find at a yard sales), enough for each 21 students to have 100 stickers each. They generally come in packs of 500 stickers or more)

Homework This Week

Due to our snow days last week, there will be no homework this week. However, it is still important that you/your child read every night and/or work on sight words, phoneme segmentation, or nonsense word fluency. At this point in the year, your child should be able to sound out most 3 letter words and use their sight word mastery to read. In addition, special emphasis should also be put on comprehension with the kiddos being able to identify the characters, setting, problem (what went wrong), and solution (if its a fiction book). If it is non-fiction, your child should be able to identify the main topic of the book and share interesting facts he/she learned. 

This Friday, the 'homework' for the week will be creating a "100th day Superhero Cape" (a letter will be forthcoming) for our hundredth day of school (capes will be provided, however you are more than welcome to make your own if you would like). 

Welcome Back, er...sort of!

So much for our first official week back. Instead, it looks like we are going to 'marinate' for a few days before we are able to get an official week in school. Regardless, I hope the kiddos are enjoying the snow, as it does not snow very often in these parts. I know we are...

Make Up Days

Wake county has announced the make up days for the past 2 days.

-this Saturday, Feb 1st

In order to make Saturday fun, it will be Pajama Day for track 4.

-Saturday, May 31st

Now, on to the important stuff...

Math

In math, we are continuing our unit on geometry by focusing on 3D shapes including,

-cube

-cone

-cylinder

-rectangular prisim

-sphere

Our goal is to describe and compare/contrast these shapes by telling the number of vertices, the number of faces (the flat parts), and the shape of the face. To help support this goal at home, ask your child to sing the song for each shape, as well as identify/describe 3D shapes in their daily life (and don't forget to send a picture, if you can). 

Language Arts

In writing, we have just started to immerse ourselves in the 'how to' genre. We have read (and made) how to's on making a snowflake and how to make a paper heart. As a class, we have noticed that how to's always have:

-materials

-steps with numbers (1, 2, 3, etc...)

-sequence words (first, second, third, etc..)

-pictures that teach each step

-all 'how to's help you to make something

Our next step is to write a how to as a class. I am thinking maybe how to make microwave popcorn. Eventually, the kids will get to choose a topic that they are 'experts' at and write a how-to all by themselves. You can support these objectives at home by identifying how to writing and their special parts in their daily life (recipes, making a model airplane). You can also help your child explain orally how to do something using sequence words. For example, if you happen to make a snowman, you might say, 'What do we do first, second, etc...'. 

In reading, we have discussed different ways to read a book. This week, we have talked about 'I read, you read' where students read with a partner taking turns reading each page. We have noticed that with this kind of reading, our partners can encourage us, help us sound out unknown words, and praise us for a job well done. In addition, we have also officially started guided reading groups where students meet in a small group with me. Each group is geared towards supporting your child's specific reading needs.

Homework

A new homework packet went home with your child this week. Students must choose one activity from the 'reading menu' each night. The accompanying packet much be completed and turned in on Friday. Please email me should you have an questions or concerns:0)

Upcoming Events

There are so many things coming up, so keep an eye out for information regarding

-Mystery Reader

-the 100th day of school (same week as Valentine's Day)

Donations Needed

As part of our 'how to' writing unit, we will be making (and subsequently writing about) bird feeders. We will need:

-Toilet paper and/or paper towel rolls

-A large bag of bird seed

-individual "To-Go" peanut butter packs (enough for 22 students) 

Items are needed by Tuesday, February 4th. 

Thank you

Thank you to everyone who donated coins on Monday for our bookfair fundraiser. If you are able, please donate any spare change you have when we get back to school.