Help Wanted

 This week we studied community helpers.  We read books about firefighters, police officers, and doctors.  We looked behind the doors of our anchor chart to read about a new helper each day.  This was an exercise in using our first two reading tools: 1)Make the first sound (of a new word) and 2) Look at the picture for help.

     The students stopped on the underlined letters and made the sounds. Then we opened the door and used the picture to figure it out.  Encourage your child to use these two strategies when reading with them at home. Most are not prepared to sound out entire words yet, so this is a developmentally-appropriate strategy for now.
       At centers, the students got to be the community helpers we were learning about.  In the blocks area, they were construction workers building with Lincoln Logs. They wore hard hats since they were in a construction zone!

In the math games center, they were dentists. Each student got their own giant mouth full of dirty teeth.  They took turns spinning the spinner and brushing that many teeth clean.  This game is a good introduction to subtraction.

 

 In the number work center, the students were zoologists. The students fed all the alligators in the same way we'd been practicing on the SmartBoard game (in August).  The students place the correct amount of  alligator food (pom poms) on each number, then choose the correct alligator mouth to show greater than and less than.

  

The students were firefighters who had to get their fire engine ready to go in the puzzle center.

And our letter work center was transformed into a vet's office.  Rover, the puppy, ate all the letters in the alphabet. The students had to operate, using tweezers, to remove all of the letters and place them in alphabetical order on the letter arch.

At the end of the week, the students chose which community helper was their favorite. They drew the tools they needed to do their job.

In other news, the students recited their first poem this week!  The AM class recited theirs to the office staff (all the other classrooms were in an assembly). And the PM class recited the poem to  Mrs. Wise's 5th grade classroom. 

We have a new calendar to play with on the SmartBoard. Our calendar and games change every month to go along with the learning targets and themes in the classroom.  Our first page looks like this:

The students touch the green card and it disappears to reveal the picture behind it. As you can see, we are going to start working on patterns this month.  We sing through the days of the week and change the sentence at the bottom to show today's date.  

On the next page, we track our days in school. We add a ones unit, change the numbers above the tens' and ones' pockets, then move the apple on the hundred chart.  After that, we count as we do that many exercises.

The final page is a game that each child will get a turn to play.  The student taps the interactive spinner and picks that many apples off of the tree.  We started with 20 apples on the tree and zero in the basket.  With each child's turn, we see how the number of apples on the tree gets smaller and the number of apples in our basket grows larger. 

The next page is a link to games that we play when time permits. We played this one for the first time this week. Its a good one to play at home, too.

Next week's theme is "Where We Live" and the color for Monday is PURPLE.  Here are the best of the rest. Have a great weekend!

We're all fans of the MINI cupcakes!

It was easy being green

Let's Sort This Out

This week was all about sorting things to show how they are alike and different.  It all started last week when we read "Mouse Paint." When we came back to school on Monday, we read "Mouse Paint," by the same author, Ellen Stoll Walsh.  We compared the books and found the ways they were alike and different. We did this again after we read the classic, "Chicka Chicka Boom Boom" and the lesser known, "Chicka Chicka 1,2,3" (both by Bill Martin Jr).  The students drew a piece of paper out of a basket and placed it on the Venn diagram to show whether it was a likeness or a difference between the two stories.    

For the last three weeks, we have been telling alike and different when we see whats in our mailbox each day.  Everything that comes out of the mailbox starts with the new sounds of the week. On Monday, we found an egg and french fries. The students always talk with their teaching partner about all the ways they can think of these items being alike and different. Then we share what they discussed.  One of the differences they came up with was that eggs come from chickens and french fries come from McDonalds! They almost got it, almost.

The next day we had two animals, an elephant and a fox. Another day it was 'elbow' and 'feet', and so on.

The sorting theme and the books mentioned previously were the inspiration for our centers this week. In the letter work center, the students sorted the lowercase letters onto three different coconut trees according to how they are formed: all curves, all straight lines, or a combination of the two.

In the fine motor work center, they made capital letters using rubberbands and geoboards.

In the number work center, the students played Chicka Chicka Bingo.

In the math games center, they played Mouse Count.  They loved filling up the jars with the tiny little mice.

And they got to play with the Legos for the first time in the block center.

All this talk about painting ("Mouse Paint") and climbing trees ("Chicka Chicka..") made me wonder what the students would rather do; play with paint or climb a tree. So I asked them to answer that question in their journals.

That does not say 'climate,'by the way. This is an example of invented spelling and it says, "climb a tree." This is how your child will be writing for a while. It's a great way for me to assess whether they are hearing the correct sounds and that they know which letters to write to represent those sounds. It takes a WHILE to learn conventional spelling, so encourage and praise your child when you see them using invented spelling. It's a good thing, and a developmentally appropriate thing.

 

We tied everything together with our art project on Fun Friday. The students first colored two trees: an apple tree and a coconut tree.

 

Then they cut out apples that had numbers on them (a la Chicka Chicka 1,2,3) and coconuts with letters on them (a la Chicka Chicka Boom Boom)

Finally, they sorted the letters and numbers by gluing them onto the correct trees.

In other news, our Super Star segment of the day is still going strong. Within a few more weeks, every student will have had their chance to sit in the super star chair and tell about themselves as I write it all down on their poster (which we laminate and send home with the student).  This activity is great for teaching print conventions (writing from left to right, top to bottom, starting with a capital, spacing between words, and ending with a period).  It is also great for learning sight words. Here is Sophia's Super Star in action.

 And here are some of the finished products.

 We began MAP testing this week in the computer labs.  We completed the reading test. Next week we will finish up with the math test.

 

Don't forget that your child has a BIG assignment this coming week. Attached to their newsletter is the shape poem we've been working on in class.  Your child is to read or recite it to as many people as possible and collect their signatures (or you can write them) on the signature sheet. Return this on FRIDAY. The student who reads it to the most people will win a trip to the coveted treasure box, then our whole class will visit a big-kid classroom and recite it to them.  I'll have footage of it on next week's blog.

Enjoy your long weekend. Wear GREEN on Tuesday. And I leave you with the best of the rest! 

YELLOW DAY!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Color Me Gak

Boy, did we have fun this week-

 though we started the week off feeling kind of blue.

 Okay, not really - it was just blue day.  First thing on Monday, we made an anchor chart about things that are blue and the students wrote about things they have that are blue.

 We learned how to spell and read the word blue using this music video from youtube. And we put the word together using this game online. 

We also made anchor charts about the new letters of the week: Cc and Dd. 

We review these and add on to them everyday after we play a game that teaches us about their sounds. (We always use the letter games from starfall on Mondays to get us started).  The students talk with their teaching partner about things that begin with the new sounds.

 

And we check our mailbox and find two things everyday that start with the new sounds of the week. More about that next week......

Moving on.....We had a science theme this week: mixing colors to make new colors.  We began the week by reading the story "Little Yellow and Little Blue" by Leo Lionni. Then we read "Color Dance" by Ann Jonas.  We wrapped up the week with the BIG book of "Mouse Paint" by Ellen Stoll Walsh.

 

We made another anchor chart on mixing colors which made them more familiar with the new sight word, 'is.' (Our other sight words were 'am' and 'blue').

We referenced this anchor chart when we played Mix and Paint with Curious George on the Smartboard.

Then the students got to mix the colors in real life on Fun Friday.  Each student got their own handful of homemade gak. It is the easiest, quickest recipe EVER. Make it on a rainy day (or the snow days that I pray we don't have). Your child will love you forever. The students used any combination they wanted of the red, yellow, and blue markers placed on the tables to color their gak.  Some stuck to just two, but most couldn't contain their excitement and just used them all and ended up with a lovely shade of grayish-brown. It was a fun learning experience for sure!

There were other fun learning experiences in math this week.  We have been learning about circles. The students learned a motion chant about the properties of circles.  We did a circle hunt on the Smartboard (they tap the circles and they disappear). Then they did a circle hunt around the room. I do the whole "Riddle me, riddle me, ree. I see something you don't see and its shape is a circle," thing, and then the students look all over the room, finding as many circles as they can (as secretively as they can). Then we meet back at the carpet and they get a chance to guess.  They LOVE this. So it will definitely be something we do often as we are learning about the shapes.

The students found out about our pet alligator this week, too. Each day, as part of the calendar math time, we say this chant:

Alligator, alligator

Time for lunch

Find the biggest number and

Munch! Munch! Munch!

Then a student comes to the board and touches the interactive spinner.  The student puts that many circles (alligator treats) in the ten frame. We spin again and do the same for the other ten frame. Then we compare the amounts and put the correct alligator mouth in the middle to show 'greater than' or 'less than.'

And we can't forget about centers. Outside of recess and PE, its our favorite time of the day! Here's what we did this week.

Raced letters a,b,c,and d to the top

Played with the wooden, magnetic trains

Sorted pom-poms by color using oversized tweezers (also built up fine-motor skills)

Pinned clothespins to match amounts (again - fine-motor bonus)

Read books and worked on phonics in our reading groups

Added in increments of 0,1,2, &3 as we raced our partner to 20.

And to top it all off - we earned all of our brownie points (from whole group participation) so I brought in real brownies as the promised reward.  Except for they looked a lot like Oreos. (Who knew CVS didn't sell Little Debbie brownies?).  As you can tell, the kids didn't mind at all.

 On Monday, WEAR YELLOW! I'll leave you with the best of all the rest. Have a great weekend!

Getting ready for MAP testing next week

Mr.B's superstar on Friday.

cuteness