Happy Friday!
I'm glad that the weather is breaking and we were able to survive this unusually hot week! The kindergarten friends were very flexible in adjusting their recess and lunch routines to ensure that they stay out of the heat as much as possible. They also came up with great tips to help them stay cool, including: play in the shade, wear a hat/sun glasses, sunscreen, drink water, and go to the restroom after hydrating. This helped many friends stay a bit more comfortable when outdoors.
This week we tried some new routines, including incorporating the Interview Process into our morning schedule. Each morning a new friend is being invited to help us get to know our community members more. We are also still practicing recognizing, reading, and spelling each others names, so we also do a Name Puzzle together. The interviewee has to unscramble their name cards by asking their friends to move their bodies to the appropriate location.
Twice a week, the class is broken up into two small groups to work on Signs for Sounds with Clara and Number Talks with me. Number Talks is a time for friends to think about different math concepts and share what they see in the first rectangle and how they saw it. This gives friends a chance to see problems in different ways.
I have also introduced a new organizational tool for Planning Meeting--- the Planning Board. This board helps everyone keep track of where they will be working in our class as well as help them find people they are looking for. The students are even able to check what other spaces are available to work in after they complete their first step, and they can adjust their picture accordingly.
This week, we also started talking about how we can use our pattern blocks during Open Choice Time to continue our exploration of making new shapes and using symmetry in our work.
I have also introduced our Sensory Table to invite friends to think about what sensation they get when having, in this case, rice, run down across their skin. Friends are asked to slow down and think about what words best describe how it feels for them.
During Open Choice Time, friends are continuing their ongoing work of either writing messages to friends or family, finishing journal entries, manipulating the pattern blocks, testing their senses, working with friends on either a game or a puzzle, or conducting surveys.
In regards to the surveys, the students ran into a bit of a bump in the road as they collected their data. We originally started our surveys using tally marks, however, since surveying everyone in the class takes a lot of time, sometimes days, it was hard to remember who they had already asked and who they still needed to talk to. We brought this topic to Revisiting Meeting (a time to go over student work, ask questions, give feedback, make suggestions, ask for help) since so many people were having the same problem. Some friends thought it would be helpful to write the names of the people who they have surveyed to help them remember. So now, when conducting a survey, friends can either ask the person to write their name, or find a way to spell the name on their own!
Surveys with Tally Marks
Do You Have a Hat?
Do You Have a Book?
Surveys Listing Names
Do You have a C in Your Name? Do You Have an O in Your Name?
Thank you to Jennifer (Jackson's mom) for being our Family Reader this week!
This week, I talked the kindergartners about us having 7th Grade Buddies this year, and I got their input about what type of Buddy they would feel comfortable with, based on their own personality (see Discussion Notes Binder). On Thursday, we had our very first Meet and Greet circle in the Multipurpose Room. Each group of kids practiced their conversation skills, and incorporated some of the Interview Process of asking open ended questions to help learn as much information about their new friend as they could. Everyone was super brave, even if they were shy at first-- soon they realized that these big kids were actually really nice, they felt excited to chat with them. They will be meeting with their Buddies each Thursday morning!
During a different share earlier this month, I had asked the friends what they would want to learn more about that we could research and write in our journals about (see Discussion Notes Binder). This week, I took one of those topics and found a video to show the kindergartners and get their brains jogging on the topics of cobras (see below)
The children helped to generate a list of questions about what they were wondering about cobras for us to write about in our journals. Come on in to see what they thought!
We tried new Large Motor activities in our afternoons, including Dancing with Scarves and Yoga Poses. When dancing with scarves, the friends listened to the rhythm of the music and swayed their scarf to the beat, watching it dance in the air.
A few friends in our class were familiar with some Yoga poses, so they taught us the moves and the class later tried them, holding them each for 10 seconds! If you would like to research more Yoga poses with your child at home for them to model for us, we'd love to try it. It's great for us to practice our balance and to use our muscles!
Tree Pose
Airplane Pose
Doggy Pose
Panda Pose
Namaste Pose
We have been continuing our end of the day ritual of counting how many days we have been at school and the friends were excited to get to their first 10 bundle. We have been using grouping (skip counting) now, starting with 10 and then counting on from there instead of starting at 1 each day. These friends are still wrapping their brains around the concept of place value and number formation.
Have a great weekend!
Love, Gaby
