Weekly News: January 30-February 3

We had so much fun celebrating our 100th Day of School! Thank you for all of the help, donations, and snacks!! I can't believe we are more than half way through our school year together! I am so proud of your children for working so hard and for everything they have learned so far.

Our field trip is next Tuesday! We will be going to the Children's Museum of the Desert. Permission Slips for this field trip were sent home last week - please sign and return if you have not already done so. On this day, we will be leaving school around 8:15 and returning around 12:45. Mark your calendars and adjust schedules for the late pick up on this day and please note that your child may be missing any electives they may have on this day. On this day, please pack your child a lunch in a paper bag.  No lunch boxes please. We will be eating our “sack” lunches at the museum following the tour.  Chaperones will be riding on the bus with our classes and need to pay a small fee at the Museum door (Approximately $5.00) Please remember that school policy states NO SIBLINGS. Thanks! We are looking forward to a wonderful field trip! Don't forget to donate $15  into our Dollar a Day fund. This donation will help cover the cost of the tickets and bus. Here is the link: Dollar A Day. 

This week we will be learning all about our country. Please see our Reading section for more information. You and your child can use the following website to check out fun facts on our National Symbols. http://bensguide.gpo.gov Have fun learning and playing some of these fun activities!

A Note About Absences: If you are absent for two or more consecutive days, we ask you to please sign up for independent study in the office. You may back-date this as well - meaning, there is still time to make up for days missed in the past! 

Upcoming Events:  
Tuesday, February 7: Field Trip to the Children's Museum
Monday, February 13: NO SCHOOL 
Tuesday, February 14: Valentine's Day Centers 
Monday, February 20: NO SCHOOL 


What Are We Learning This Week?:

Sight Words: QUESTION, WRITE, WITH, SAW, FROM.

Letter Team:  QU (we are learning that QU are married because they are always together!) and WR (the W is silent!) 

Reading: This week we are reading books all about our country. We will be learning all about our American symbols (flag, liberty bell, bald eagle, White House, Mount Rushmore, etc.) We will learn the meaning behind the words of the Pledge of Allegiance. There is a note coming home on Monday with the words and the meaning of the Pledge of Allegiance. Please go over this with your child and discuss the meaning, as we will be doing the same in class. 

Writing:  We will continue practicing writing a Step Up to Writing paragraph with a topic sentence, three things about that topic, and a conclusion sentence. 

Math: Since we have passed our 100th Day of School, we will start working on place value to the hundreds. We'll be learning that Zero the Hero (I'm sure you heard a lot about him on Friday!) is now our place holder in the tens place. We will discuss how many hundreds, tens, and ones are within a given number and create number sentences to match. You can help at home by asking your child about tens and ones. ("My number is 16, how many tens and ones does that have?" Your child should be able to tell you that it has one ten and six ones, as well as give you the number sentences to match 10+6=16 or 16-10=6.)

Leadership: We will continue to ROAR and discuss what it means to have a growth mindset!

Homework: January 30-February 3

Flashcards: Make flashcards for our new sight words (QUESTION, WRITE, WITH, SAW, FROM), and letter teams (QU and WR). Study flashcards every day. STUDY OLD FLASHCARDS AS WELL. I WILL BE TESTING STUDENTS ON ALL SIGHT WORDS FROM THE FIRST AND SECOND TRIMESTER IN A COUPLE OF WEEKS!

Phonemic Awareness: Please work with your child on the following Phonemic Awareness skills - rhyming, blending, segmenting, syllables, and beginning/middle/ending sounds. 

Reading: Play Smarty Ants for 10-15 minutes each night. In addition to Smarty Ants, we ask that you read your Book Bag every night. This includes: fluency passage, paper books, and library books. 

Writing: Write three to five sentences every day in your at-home journal. 

Math: Play Dreambox for 10-15 minutes each night. Discuss place value with your child. Ask them how many tens and ones belong in each number and have them give you the number sentence to go with that number. Example: The number 14 has one ten and four ones. 10+4=14. 

QR Codes: Download and print the QR Code practice pages on ParentSquare. Work on these pages together. 

SPECIAL HOMEWORK!!!!!!: On Monday, we are sending home our homework project for the week. It is a little book called "Me on the Map". It is meant to teach your child where he or she lives from the big picture (North America) to the small (your street address). Please complete this book together and return it Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday of this week.

Weekly News: January 23-17

On FRIDAY, WE ARE CELEBRATING OUR 100TH DAY OF SCHOOL! We will be celebrating the 100th day with special 100th day Fun Friday Centers!  

For part of our 100th Day Centers, we are asking that each student bring a snack item to be shared with the class on Friday. Some examples include: a box of goldfish crackers, a box of teddy grahms, large bag of gummy bears, large bag of skittles, box of cheerios, large bag of mini Oreos, etc. The students will be sharing these snacks with their classmates to make “100 Day Hash” in celebration of our 100th day!! 

We also have a SPECIAL TURN-IN HOMEWORK this week - please read more in our homework section. 

If you would like, we invite you to join us in class at 12:10 on Friday as we watch a special video from our first 100 days of school. I can't believe that we have already been in school for almost 100 days! I am so proud of your kids and how far they have come! 

Don't forget to keep working on those Community Service Projects! Our kindergarten requirement is 6-8 hours of community service. These projects and presentations will be in May. You do not want to wait until the last minute! 

We are getting excited about our field trip coming up on Tuesday, February 7th. We will be going to the Children's Museum of the Desert. Permission Slips for this field trip will be coming home on Monday - please sign and return ASAP! We will need parent chaperones! If you are interested in being a chaperone please email me (jcbess@inlandleaders.com) and let me know BY THIS FRIDAY JANUARY 27TH, as we need to give our final head count to the museum. Chaperones are welcome to follow us or ride the bus and will need to pay a small chaperone fee at the door (approximately $5.00) Please remember that school policy states NO SIBLINGS. Thanks! We are looking forward to a wonderful field trip! 

We are in need of LOTS of empty Capri Sun boxes!!!! If you have any please send them to school with your child! Thank you very much!!! Note: if you could please open the boxes at the side (not in the middle around the edges) that would really help us out! Thank you!

Upcoming Events:  
Friday, January 27: 100th DAY OF SCHOOL CELEBRATION 
Tuesday, February 7: Field Trip to the Children's Museum
Monday, February 13: NO SCHOOL 
Tuesday, February 14: Valentine's Day Centers 
Monday, February 20: NO SCHOOL 

If you are at the store and happen to think of us, we'd love....  
Black Expo Markers 

Valentines Day stickers

What Are We Learning This Week?:

Sight Words: ONE, TWO, THREE, FOUR, FIVE.

Letter Team:  ONG (like in SONG) and ONK (like in HONK).  

Reading: This week we are reading books all about our 100th Day of School! 

Writing:  We have some fun writing assignments this week. We will be writing all about our first 100 days of school, what we would do if we had $100, and what we would look like if we were 100 years old. 

Math: We will continue our unit on measurement. This week we will focus on sorting and graphing. You will see some sorting and graphing pages come home throughout the week. Please go over these pages with your child and reinforce the concept of sorting and graphing at home. 

Leadership: We will continue to ROAR and discuss what it means to have a growth mindset!

Homework: January 23-27

Flashcards: Make flashcards for our new sight words (ONE, TWO, THREE, FOUR, FIVE), and letter teams (ONG and ONK). Study flashcards every day.

Phonemic Awareness: Please work with your child on the following Phonemic Awareness skills - rhyming, blending, segmenting, syllables, and beginning/middle/ending sounds. 

Reading: Play Smarty Ants for 10-15 minutes each night. In addition to Smarty Ants, we ask that you read your Book Bag every night. This includes: fluency passage, paper books, and library books. 

Writing: Write three to five sentences every day in your at-home journal. 

Math: Play Dreambox for 10-15 minutes each night. Continue to discuss measurement and help your child to measure items at home. Reinforce addition and subtraction math facts through 5. Count the money in your "bank" each day. Tell addition and subtraction word problems to your children and have them explain to you how they got the answer.

QR Codes: Download and print the QR Code practice pages on ParentSquare. Work on these pages together. 

SPECIAL SHARING HOMEWORK!!!!!!: We would like our students to practice counting to 100 by collecting 100 items to bring to school. Help them choose something small like 100 beans, 100 buttons, 100 pennies, 100 cotton balls, etc.Be creative! Help them put their collection into a paper “mystery bag” with their name on it (like a brown paper lunch bag that we cannot see through!). When they bring it to school, the class will try to guess what they brought! We will be doing fun activities with these collections all week long! These 100 Collections will be due Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday! Please DO NOT BRING ON FRIDAY! 

Weekly News: January 16-20

I hope you had a wonderful and relaxing three-day weekend with your families!

Last week, we began taking Math Fluency Tests on our Number Bonds (ways to make 3, ways to make 4, etc.) and adding and subtracting math facts through five. These tests will come home every Wednesday and Friday. Please take some time to review these tests, and reinforce and practice these skills at home. Thank you for your support!

A LOOK AHEAD: Our next kindergarten field trip is scheduled for Tuesday, February 7th. We will be going to the Children's Museum of the Desert. It is sure to be an exciting “hands on” experience.  We will be leaving school at 8:15 AM and returning at approximately 1:00 PM. Permission slips for our field trip will be coming home as the field trip gets closer. If you are interested in being a chaperone please email me (jcbess@inlandleaders.com) and let me know BY FRIDAY JANUARY 27TH, as we need to give our final head count to the museum. Chaperones are welcome to follow us or ride the bus and will need to pay a small chaperone fee at the door (approximately $5.00) Please remember that school policy states NO SIBLINGS. Thanks! We are looking forward to a wonderful field trip! 

We are in need of LOTS of empty Capri Sun boxes!!!! If you have any please send them to school with your child! If every child brings ONE empty Capri Sun box, we will have enough! Thank you very much!!! Note: if you could please open the boxes at the side (not in the middle around the edges) that would really help us out! Thank you!

Upcoming Events:  

Monday, January 16: NO SCHOOL
Friday, January 27: 100th DAY OF SCHOOL CELEBRATION 
Tuesday, February 7: Field Trip to the Children's Museum
Monday, February 13: NO SCHOOL 
Tuesday, February 14: Valentine's Day Centers 
Monday, February 20: NO SCHOOL

If you are at the store and happen to think of us, we'd love....  
Black Expo Markers 

Valentines Day stickers

What Are We Learning This Week?:

Sight Words: WOULD, COULD, SHOULD, WALK, TALK.

Letter Team:  ANG (like in HANG, SANG) and ANK (like in TANK, BANK). 

Reading: This week we are studying and reading about Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King Jr., the Civil Rights Movement, and equality for all people. Students will be taking home a couple of little paper books about Martin Luther King Jr. this week in their book bags. These paper books will replace our fluency passage this week - please practice these every day for fluent reading! 

Writing:  We are learning how to write a five sentence paragraph. I have been modeling a structure for paragraph writing called, "Step Up to Writing" for the students. Kindergarten Step Up to Writing is writing a paragraph with a topic sentence, three sentences about that topic, and a conclusion sentence. This week, we will write five sentence step up to writing stories about Martin Luther King Jr. 

Math: We will continue our unit on measurement. This week we will focus on comparing how objects are similar or different. For example: If the glue stick is 5 cubes in length and the pencil is 10 cubes in length, which object is longer? The tricky part of comparing is when we ask, "HOW MUCH LONGER?" We will learn that comparing problems are really just subtraction problems (10-5=5 so the pencil is 5 cubes longer). This is very difficult critical thinking for our kindergarten students. You can help at home by asking similar comparing/subtraction questions. 

Leadership: As always, we will continue to ROAR. Last week, we learned all about what it means to have a growth mindset. We watched videos, read books, and wrote all about this. This week, we will discuss how to use our growth mindset to accomplish our goals at school and at home. 

Homework: January 16-20

Flashcards: Make flashcards for our new sight words (WOULD, COULD, SHOULD, WALK, TALK), and letter teams (ANG and ANK). Study flashcards every day.

Phonemic Awareness: Please work with your child on the following Phonemic Awareness skills - rhyming, blending, segmenting, syllables, and beginning/middle/ending sounds. Please check your child's report card from first trimester and see the Foundational Skills areas where they may still need support.

Reading: Play Smarty Ants for 10-15 minutes each night. In addition to Smarty Ants, we ask that you read your Book Bag every night. This includes: fluency passage, paper books, and library books. 

Writing: Write three to five sentences every day in your at-home journal. 

Math: Play Dreambox for 10-15 minutes each night. Continue to discuss measurement and help your child to measure items at home. Reinforce addition and subtraction math facts through 5. Count the money in your "bank" each day. Tell addition and subtraction word problems to your children and have them explain to you how they got the answer.

QR Codes: Download and print the QR Code practice pages on ParentSquare. Work on these pages together. 

Turn-In Homework: Please write THREE SENTENCES about what we are learning about Martin Luther King Jr. Draw a picture to go with your sentences.

Weekly News: January 9-13

 

There is no school next Monday, January 16th due to Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Enjoy the three day weekend with your families!

Students have been doing such a wonderful job on writing last names! If your child is still struggling with this, please practice at home! You can make it a part of your writing homework. 

Our "banks" have been a big hit in the classroom! Students are excited to "earn money" for making good use of classroom time and for good behavior and hard work throughout the day. On Friday, we will have our first visit to the classroom store. Students have the opportunity to trade out their money for larger coins (5 pennies for a nickel, etc) and choose to spend money on a prize or save it for a larger prize later. Please continue to count money received everyday and reinforce the responsibility of taking care of banks. Also, if you are able, we'd love more prizes for our "class store"!!! Thank you for your continued support!

This week, we will begin taking Math Fluency Tests on our Number Bonds (ways to make 3, ways to make 4, etc.) and adding and subtracting math facts through five. Our Common Core Standard is that by the end of kindergarten, students will fluently (meaning without fingers or manipulatives) be able to add and subtract within five. Students will have the opportunity to practice these facts and take weekly tests. Please remember that we would like all students to master this standard by the end of the year. My hope is that each week, we will accomplish a little bit more on these tests. Please reinforce and practice these skills at home. Thank you for your support!

A LOOK AHEAD: Our next kindergarten field trip is scheduled for Tuesday, February 7th. We will be going to the Children's Museum of the Desert. It is sure to be an exciting “hands on” experience.  We will be leaving school at 8:15 AM and returning at approximately 1:00 PM. Permission slips for our field trip will be coming home as the field trip gets closer. If you are interested in being a chaperone please email me (jcbess@inlandleaders.com) and let me know BY FRIDAY JANUARY 27TH, as we need to give our final head count to the museum. Chaperones are welcome to follow us or ride the bus and will need to pay a small chaperone fee at the door (approximately $5.00) Please remember that school policy states NO SIBLINGS. Thanks! We are looking forward to a wonderful field trip! 

We are in need of LOTS of empty Capri Sun boxes!!!! If you have any please send them to school with your child! Thank you very much!!! Note: if you could please open the boxes at the side (not in the middle around the edges) that would really help us out! Thank you!

Upcoming Events:  

Monday, January 16: NO SCHOOL
Friday, January 27: 100th DAY OF SCHOOL CELEBRATION 
Tuesday, February 7: Field Trip to the Children's Museum
Monday, February 13: NO SCHOOL 
Tuesday, February 14: Valentine's Day Centers 
Monday, February 20: NO SCHOOL

If you are at the store and happen to think of us, we'd love.... 
Gluesticks  
Black Expo Markers 

Valentines Day stickers and trinkets

Any sort of small {or big} prizes for our class store

What Are We Learning This Week?:

Sight Words: OF, BACK, SAY, SAYS, PLEASE.

Letter Team:  CK (We are learning that CK makes the K sound and helps the vowel to say it's short sound, like in BACK, NECK, PICK, LOCK, DUCK).

Reading: This week we are studying and doing projects with "The Mitten" by Jan Brett. We will discuss and record story elements such as author, illustrator, setting, and characters. We will read books about winter and other stories by the author, Jan Brett. In our fluency passages, we are learning how to be "reading detectives" and answering comprehension questions by going back to find evidence in the text to support our answer. 

Writing:  We are learning how to write a five sentence paragraph. I have been modeling a structure for paragraph writing called, "Step Up to Writing" for the students. Kindergarten Step Up to Writing is writing a paragraph with a topic sentence, three sentences about that topic, and a conclusion sentence. For example, "We had a great day at school today. First, we learned about measurement in math. Next, we colored snowmen at centers. Last, we read a lot of books about winter. As you can see, we had a fun time at school." 

Math: Last week, each student took a pre-test for our measurement unit. I will use those results this week for some fun measurement lessons. We will learn different ways things can be measured, including length, height, width, weight, and capacity. We will have fun measuring various items around the classroom. A big part of this unit is also sorting and graphing. You can help by discussing measurement, sorting, and graphing at home. Tell your child to sort different things around the house and ask how they sorted those things. 

Leadership: As always, we will continue to ROAR. We will also discuss New Year's Resolutions and make goals for 2017. We will learn and discuss what it means to have a growth mindset and work hard on accomplishing those goals.  

Homework: January 9-13

Flashcards: Make flashcards for our new sight words (OF, BACK, SAY, SAYS, PLEASE), and letter team (CK). Study flashcards every day.

Phonemic Awareness: Please work with your child on the following Phonemic Awareness skills - rhyming, blending, segmenting, syllables, and beginning/middle/ending sounds. Please check your child's report card from first trimester and see the Foundational Skills areas where they may still need support.

Reading: Play Smarty Ants for 10-15 minutes each night. In addition to Smarty Ants, we ask that you read your Book Bag every night. This includes: fluency passage, paper books, and library books. 

Writing: Write three to five sentences every day in your at-home journal. 

Math: Play Dreambox for 10-15 minutes each night.  Please continue to work on Counting and Cardinality and Geometry areas your child may still need support with.  We will begin our Measurement and Data Unit.  Please see the Measurement and Data Goal sheet below. Work with your child on the Measurement Vocabulary and encourage them to use these words to describe everyday objects. (I can measure my weight with a scale, this cup measures capacity, the height of the chair is 4 books tall, the spoon is shorter than the knife, I can measure a book’s height, weight, and length, etc) Keep going over those Daily Math worksheets that go home each day to see if your child needs help with a particular skill. Remember to check the back to see our Math Talk of the day. 

QR Codes: Download and print the QR Code practice pages on ParentSquare. Work on these pages together. 

Turn-In Homework: Please write THREE SENTENCES about something that you can measure. Make sure you tell me what you measured and the attribute (length, height, width, capacity, weight). Draw a picture to go with your sentences.