Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas from a few of my fellow kinder teachers! (it was also Grinch Day!)

Gingerbread Man Hunt

For the last few weeks we have been reading many different stories about gingerbread. (The Gingerbread Man, The Gingerbread Girl, The Gingerbread Cowboy, etc) While reading The Gingerbread Pirates, a special note fell out of the book and sent us on a Gingerbread Hunt. It led us to the library, the nurse's office, the playground (in which the clue had somehow disappeared!), the cafeteria and then the classroom. When we arrived in the classroom there were special treats for us! The kids were super excited and enjoyed every minute of it. There were some very create responses of where the Gingerbread man went. It was a great afternoon! Sad part...my camera battery died, and I forgot to take my phone on the hunt, so I only had 1 picture.

Puppet Show

Free through the Arizona Puppet Theater and a Local Dentist, we got to watch a puppet show about Pirates and the Tooth Fairy. It was all about brushing and eating healthy foods. The kids LOVED it!!

Thanksgiving Fun

We had a fun day at school before Thanksgiving Break. We did rotations with 2 other classrooms. It's fun challenging the students to make a new friend. They get excited when they see their new friend at the playground. We also got to make turkey cookies! I assigned a few parents some of the supplies, and I had a few supplies. I really put 2 parents on a hunt looking for candy corn. Who would have thought they only sell it as a seasonal item!

We had fun CLEANING our tables with shaving cream since it was the end of the month.

Constructing Knowledge

As part of my own personal development, I have been taking a class about getting students to construct their own knowledge. (It is quite difficult at a kindergarten level) I posed a problem: "I went to the candy store and wanted to buy 5 pieces of candy. The man at the candy shop told me, I can only buy 5 jolly ranchers or 5 tootsie rolls. I didn't have enough money to buy 10 pieces, and I wanted both. The students were to help me think of ways to buy 5 pieces of candy-some jolly ranchers and tootsie rolls." Many told me, they'd give me money so I could have both or told me I needed to work harder! (Though LOTS and LOTS of questioning we were finally able to come up with some ideas)

Free Time Fun

A choice when they are done with their work is to work on their white boards. They are able to draw pictures or shapes, write names, words, or numbers. The possibilities are endless! Here is a student who decided to make a circle map and think of things that begin with a letter. (We do this every week for each new letter) The neat thing is, we hadn't even done "B" yet, and she was doing her own!! Great learning!!

Halloween Centers

On October 31, we had fun dressing up like characters from books. We also did a few fun centers!

Adding dots with q-tips on ten frames to show a number.

Close up picture of the ten frames.

Writing the room with Halloween words.

Playing a dice game.

Reading Halloween Books

Illustrating a Halloween Book

Coloring By Color Word

October Update

We have been busy in October. We have been  working in our math stations. We learned a new dice game where we play with our partner. We roll the dice and then color in that number! Each time we play, I encourage picking a new partner. Sometimes they are partners with a boy or a girl, sometimes, it's a friend.

We also spent a week learning about  bats. Below is our tree map we created about bats. I used orange highlighter tape to show how I use the map to write a sentence.

After reading a story called Monster Musical Chairs, we decided to also play. Our game was a little different, No one got out! When the music stopped we sat on a chair, under the chairs were our zoo-phonic cards. We had to say the sound before we were ready to play the next round.

Last was our PAWFECT attendance assembly. We had 3 people from our class get PAWFECT attendance for Quarter 1! Congrats Ladies!!

Buddy Reading with Bici North

On Friday, October 4th we met with students in 8th grade from Bicentennial North to read and enjoy a cookie. The 8th graders did an AWESOME job reading to the kindergartners. The best part was seeing some of my old students from my first year teaching! Boy, have they grown up!! I couldn't believe how much they look like young adults. I remember them back in kindergarten when they were little! How time flies!

5 senses

For our final project with our 5 senses unit, we made popcorn! We were able to use ALL our senses!! I hope your child went home and told you WHY we ate popcorn!

Patiently waiting for the popcorn to come out!

They were SO excited to see the popcorn fall into the bowl!

 We filled out a paper describing what we saw, felt, smelt, heard and tasted! It was good practice to copy from the board!

Enjoying our 5 senses snack!

Math Stations

We have been working hard on what it looks like to be working at a math station with a partner. This week, we brainstormed a list of things students should be doing and what the teacher should be doing. (It was funny to hear their ideas of what I should be doing...Some said I should be talking to teachers!)
We practiced how to work in our math stations by following our rules. We also got to practice what NOT to do! They thought this was quite entertaining!! Here is a picture of our Math Station Rules (expectations).

Week 4

This week, we read the story, Pete the Cat I Love my White Shoes. On Friday, we got to wear our favorite shoes to school! Here is a picture of us with our Favorite Shoes! We also made a book that will be on display in our classroom.

In writing this week, we worked on adding a setting to our picture. We came up with some great settings (pool, Wal-Mart, Target, aquarium, park, etc) We have a lot to remember now with writing. We have to draw a person (us) with all our features and now a setting, can't forget to use appropriate colors!!

We got to learn and play with 3 new centers!

Playing in the Housekeeping

Playing with Legos

Putting on a puppet show