Super Science

Even on Saturdays, teachers make the time to learn...for the love of teaching and love of children. :)

Mrs. Frohlich, Mrs. Lacher, and I attended the Literacy Super brought to us by Summit McGraw-Hill School Education. I only attended the science portion where we did the gravity experiment with water. I tried it twice and lost my fluids! On the second try...I got my mentor teacher wet! You think she'll still pass me??? ;)

Spilled Milk

One of the art activities for our Kindergarten Color Book was 'spilled milk.' You put white paint on black paper and do this...

To get this...

Reading Group Activities

Here are some developmentally-appropriate activities we do with our reading groups. I think Howard Gardner would approve. :)

TEXTURED ALPHA CARDS - helps kids 'feel' the letters' shapes
DIFFERENT BOARD GAMES
DIFFERENT MANIPULATIVES
WHITEBOARDS & MARKERS
READING TOGETHER
GROUP DISCUSSIONS
HANDWRITING WITHOUT TEARS Curriculum

Eye Exam

During our morning routine with language arts, the kids took turns getting an eye exam. Four our kids who do not know all their letters, the nurse had a letter chart so they can point to the letters that they can see.

Wrapping up with M

Today we did an art activity celebrating the letter M. Whenever the kids do activities with M, we ask them for the sound and a word that starts with M. Simple things to help them learn about M. Repetition helps!

Colors

White Rabbit's Color Book by Alan Baker is a great color book for kids. Our kids really enjoyed this book and our related art activity was mixing blue and yellow paint to make GREEN -- my favorite color! This art activity is part of their Kindergarten Color Book.

Air Force Band during Red Ribbon Week

What a special treat to hear the Air Force Band play during Red Ribbon Week (no to drugs!). It's great to spend time teaching and telling kids in different ways to say no to drugs at an early age.

Wait for each song to finish playing before clicking to another one:

Free picture collage created with Smilebox

Dental Hygiene

This morning we got a visit from a dental hygienist, Ms. M. She taught the kids how to properly brush and floss their teeth. Here is a picture of Delaney, Lyssia, and Dakota posing as teeth. The white-spotted red snake is acting as the floss. This is a great opportunity to extend this visit with literacy, art, math, social studies, and science activities. =)

Fun with Literacy

The Reading Tigers had fun with three different literacy games:
(1) Recognizing lower-case letters
(2) What's Missing? (comparing two pictures)
(3) Rhyming words (the Tigers couldn't read the word so they relied on the pictures)

Patterns with the Tigers

For our reading group time today, the Tigers worked on making patterns. This was the first time this pattern game was opened in our classroom, so, it was nice to have the kids do patterns with different materials. They also automatically sorted the shapes.

We also learned how to write the letters F, G, H, I, J, K on individual whiteboards.

After we were finished with our reading groups, I got to read I See A Song by Eric Carle. I've been saving this book for the right time and today was the perfect time. In the past two weeks the kids learned the words "I" and "see." This book has no words, only pictures. They kids decide what beat of music they hear when they look at the pictures. I played songs from my iPhone after they said what beat (fast, slow, happy, sad). They all liked the book...me, too. Love Eric Carle!

M! M! M!

This week the kids were introduced to the Alpha Friend, M. Mimi Mouse is the character for the letter M. In the morning, the kids worked on M worksheets.

Then, we met with our reading groups. My Reading Tigers read the book Colors by Mary Thurber. I had the kids write each color on the whiteboard. We also learned how to write the letters A, B, C, D, and E. To end our reading session, we played a game that was about alphabet recognition. The Tigers really liked this game. It's also a great opportunity in learning to take turns.

Afterwards, it was Big Buddy time with the 6th graders; our kids really look forward to this time. Together they worked on sorting and math problems involving M&M's! =) Of course, they got to eat them after they finished the entire activity. The second activity the kids work on together was the kindergartener's shape book. They're going to be tested on shapes and colors soon, so, it was good to get in more practice with their big buddies! :)

Putting Our Names Together

Something different the kids did this morning, 10/5/11, was putting their names together like puzzle pieces. Mrs. Frohlich wrote their names on index cards and cut each card like a puzzle. For some kids this was an easy and fun task. Other kids needed more time and showed a little bit of frustration. I thought this was a creative way to have the kids 'recognize' their names.

Reading Tigers - 2nd Meeting

This morning, our reading group read Fruit by Will McGovern. It was an appropriate book for their development: short sentences with pictures. We learned that we read from left to right and where the page numbers are. I read first and pointed to the words. Then, the students repeated (read) what they heard while pointing their fingers to the words. Afterwards, we wrote on our individual whiteboards about the fruits we read about (i.e. "banana," "watermelon"). This activity involved drawing the fruit, writing the name of the fruit, and reviewing the letters of the fruits orally.

The "Reading Tigers"

Today, Friday, 9/30/11, we met with our reading groups for the first time. We have four reading groups in our class. My group is called the "Reading Tigers" with Sammy, Lyssia, Olivia, and Delaney. We will meet every morning, except on Mondays. I haven't led a reading group before, so this is GREAT experience for me. I'm excited to see how I can help my group and to see their progress by December.

For our first meeting, we played two types of literacy games. I would get both of these games for my classroom. They are a fun way to learn and review letters. :)

M and R Lesson Planning

Here we are -- Mrs. Lacher and I on a Thursday morning -- putting two weeks worth of literacy lessons for the letters M and R before school starts. My thoughts..."This is what it's like." ;) Mrs. Frohlich's filing system is by themes. Good idea!

The Number 2

This morning we worked in our Handwriting Without Tears book. The students learned to write the number 2. Students also reviewed the letter S by cutting a big S shaped like a snake.

Reviewing "S"

This morning, we reviewed the letter "S" through a worksheet that involved coloring, cutting, gluing, and tracing and writing the letter S. I like worksheets like this that exercise children's fine motor skills in various ways.

Afterwards, students got to roll out and shape the letter S with Play Doh. We love Play Doh! :)

Elbow bump!! Ethan is one of our students who scored 100% on his alphabet upper-case recognition assessment! =) We used this assessment to form reading groups in our class.