Week of November 15-19

Grandparents Day Information
On Tuesday, November 23rd Special Guests or Grandparents are invited for class presentations and refreshments. A 3:00 performance by the Leawood Choir tops off the afternoon. The schedule is below:


AM Kindergarten:
10:50 Check in, name tags
11:00 Classroom activities, goodies and coffee/tea in classroom

December Field Trip
Last week, permission slips for the December field trip to Heritage Square went out in the Friday Folders. These were due on Thursday, November 18. If you misplaced yours and would still like your child to go, please turn them in to me ASAP! I took the first 5 parents who said they could help as volunteers for the trip. I wrote a note in your child's Friday Folder if you were one of these parents and I will also send out an email with more details for these parents when we get closer to the date.

Movie and Snack with Ms. Kellogg
If you purchased this student activity at the PTSA Silent Auction, I will be sending out an email to you with the date/time. We will watch a movie, enjoy snacks, and have a special time together!

Weekly News
This week in the classroom, kids further explored symmetry in math. As kids find pictures of symmetry in newspapers, magazines, or in nature, have them bring them in so we can add to our "Symmetry All Around Us" poster hanging in the classroom. Kids also created a graph in math where kids picked their favorite classroom activity (recess won, how shocking :). They also looked at pictures of dominos and matched them to their numbers on our classroom wall and they continued to work on their number sense by rolling a dice then recording the numbers. We will soon make another graph with the results. Kids explored the concept of weight using a pan balance and items in the classroom.

In reading, all the groups read different books that match their reading level and worked on word families -ap and -at. We also discussed how action words can have the ending -ing and how knowing different ending sounds make us better readers. All groups are working on the reading strategies of looking at the picture, sounding out the letters, and asking if it makes sense for unknown words. All the groups are really impressing me with how well they are learning how to read! Keep it up kids!

Our letters of the week were "e" and "u" so kids practiced handwriting and writing topics starting with these letters. Topics in writing included egg, umbrella, elephant, and more. The Sight Word Reader this week was I Did It! Kids will now only have one day in class to practice using Sight Word Reader books, so they will need a little more assistance at home after they make their own books.

Week of Nov. 1-5

This week in the kindergarten classroom, kids explored different words in the -at family. We used our magnetic letters to make -at words in our reading groups. We also introduced two new letters this week- "o" and "g." We wrote about many "o" and "g" topics in our writing notebooks, including "octopus," "grass," and "goat," among others. In math, we looked at teen numbers and practiced putting them in order. At home, you can play a fun game with your kid with teen numbers. Play "I'm thinking of a teen number" and give hints about what teen number you picked. For example, "I'm thinking of a teen number between 12 and 14," or, "I'm thinking of a teen number that has a 1 and 5 in it." This will give your child a fun way to practice those tricky teens. We also worked on filling in a number grid and talked about patterns in math this week. In reading, groups works on finding rhyming words, what sounds they hear at the start and end of words, and retelling the story. When your child reads at home, have them practice retelling! This is something that is new and still rather difficult for most students. Ask them what happened first, next, and last. All groups read a new Sight Word Reader book titled Animals. They practiced writing and using the words "like" and "to."

In the Friday Folder this week, I included a sight word list and also a note about the large white blank feather that went home today. When you work on this feather with your child, explain how one side of the feather is the same as the other. It would also help to draw a line down the middle so they make both sides the same. This is an introduction to symmetry that we will start in math.