Here are a few snap shots from this week in kindergarten. Enjoying going over this post with your child to gain more information. Thank you for leaving your comments at the end!
We started our week with a new game typically known as Hangman, but since the motive of the game was to decode the mystery word before the man's body was fully drawn, we called this game, Save the Man. It was interesting how different children were able to unravel the mystery using different techniques: sounding out the word in their brain to make an educated guess, and recognizing the familiarity of the word from our calendar and Songs and Poems ritual! How would you have filled in the blanks?
Early on this week we celebrated another friends' special day. We sang All Together Now, gave special birthday messages to her, played her game of choice: Hula Hoop Challenge, and enjoyed a special homemade rice crispy treat!
Check out some of the student's work samples from Signs for Sounds, with Clara. As she makes the sounds, the friends identify which symbol matches it by circling it and writing it in the space provided. They work together to practice new sounds, write and read new words.
Another fun way to practice which symbols make matching sounds is generating a list of words that have the same beginning sound. Check out their list of ideas below. What fun ways do you practice letter to sound connections at home?
This week, we generated another brainstorm of different questions we had about roses. After doing so, we looked to the internet to type in some key words to research one of these questions. After watching a video on youtube, we thought about which question it answered for us, and we took to our journals to document what we had found. You can watch the video together and discuss with your child their thoughts, as well as come in to look at their journals!
Thank you to Heather (Ronny's sister) for being our Family Reader this week!
We had another Meet and Greet time with our 7th Grade Buddies to finish meeting everyone for a brief chat.
We are still in the process of interviewing friends and practicing asking open ended questions. This week, it's been so lovely out, we went for a brief walk to the grassy area next door for this special time.
We ended our week with a Game Day! I introduced some new games that some of them were familiar, so they helped to explain different ways to play the game. For example, those familiar with Hi Ho Cherry O! were able to explain to the rest of the friends what each symbol on the spinner represented and how it affected your progress. During this game, students practiced simple addition and subtraction to get all the cherries into their basket.
Most of the class had already played this Memory Game during Open Choice Time. As they practiced their turn taking skills, they were also noticing the differences in the clothes and features of the characters on the game pieces and how the children on the cards may have looked similar or different from them and their friends. How do you discuss multicultural studies with your child at home?
In our Meeting Space, I brought out a new floor puzzle which depicted our solar system. This gave the friends the chance to work on something together and it required everyone's participation to get to the final product! The students were using many different strategies to solve this puzzle, including starting with the edge pieces, referencing the images on the box, and reading the words to make sure the parts fit together.
Clara assisted with our Word List game, where friends were challenged to find the cards that matched the letter on the die that she would roll. When someone found a word that contained that letter, Clara would writing it that letter's list.
I also presented the class with a grid sheet to help them identify what unit value different cuisenaire rods had. Friends worked slowly and carefully to align the blocks onto their sheet and count how many spaces or units they needed to color in.
This week, we kicked off our Home to School Learning Extensions shares! Friends worked on different areas of interests at home and brought in their ideas to talk to us about what they had been practicing outside of our classroom. These presentations ranged from brainstorms, a game a friend created, travel planning lists, lists of daily routines, language games played at home, autobiographical photobooks, journal entries, sign making, handling finances, anatomy, and practicing stewardship. Check out our Home to School Learning Extensions wall the next time you come in to check out our work. What new subjects will your child investigate this week?
