Kindergarten is the BEST place on Earth!

Reading: We will be listening to books about characters that have problems. We will discuss how we would feel if we were the people having the problems and how we would deal with them. The books I have chosen are: Pinkalicious, Alexander and the Terrible Horrible No Good Very Bad Day, A Bad Case of Stripes, Lily's Purple Plastic Purse and The Carrot Seed. :) We will continue to practice all the sight words (I have introduced all of the 1st quarter words). We will also be practicing rhyming, blending, segmenting, phoneme deletion and language awareness. (Each of these items is done for about two minutes. We started last week and the class is doing great!)
When choosing books to read with your child this week, continue to choose books where the characters have a problem and by the end of the story there is a solution. After reading the book, ask your child how they would have handled the problem. :)Also, practice rhyming with child~ tell them three words and have them pick out the two that rhyme. If they need some reminding of what rhyming is, share the reading of the book I Ain't Gonna Paint No More. We read it in class and everyone loved it! They class did great at picking the body part the child was going to paint. :)
                                    
Writing: We will work one more day on our Alphabet Book and then it will be sent home on Tuesday. Unfortunately, do to the District's Curriculum Pacing Guides, we are not able to finish the book at school. Please complete it with your child at home and then send it back to class. A completed Alphabet Book (three pictures drawn for each letter with details and color ~ some letters you may only be able to think of two pictures... I understand.  :) will earn your child a Treasure Box toy!
On Tuesday we will begin Opinion Writing. We will discuss the difference between facts and opinions. Then we will discuss our opinions for the following topics: What pet is the best? What lunch food is the best? What Resource is the best? (I can't wait to hear all the wonderful opinions!!)
When drawing pictures with your child at home give them a topic/ question. An example would be~ What is your favorite toy to play with? Have your child draw a picture of them self playing with the toy in a setting of their choice. They ask them why that toy is their favorite. Help them write the reason/ sentence why.

Here is the writing example I gave in last week's overview:
             Parent: " Beautiful picture!! Tell me a sentence that will match your picture."
             Student: "My family walks to the Circus."
             P: "Great sentence. Let's stretch the words and write them down."
             *Some students will stretch the words with me, other are in the listening stage and wait for
             me to make the sound. At this time both are okay. :)
             P: "/m/
             S: "m."
             P: "That's it! Write letter m. (Pause for your child to write the letter.) I need to start stretching
             at the beginning of the word. /m/ / i/."
             S: "i."
             P: "That's right! The letter said it's name. Write letter i."
             ** Until we learn the word as a Sight Word, I do not expect students to write the word the
             adult way. Mi is acceptable right now for my.

Science: We will continue to discuss Scientist Tools~ balance scale and thermometers. Students will each get a chance to compare the mass of two items of their choice on the balance. They will practice drawing their scale and telling me which item is heavier (has more mass), which item is lighter (has less mass) or possibly have the chance to tell me their objects are equal in weight (the same amount of mass). We will use thermometers to check the temperature outside of the classroom, inside of the classroom and inside cups of hot and cold water. We will illustrate each temperature in our Interactive Science Journals.
Ask your child what Scientist tools we are discussing in class and if possible get your hand on one to use with your child. Discuss the benefits the tools give to the Scientist. Here is a Powerpoint Slideshow I found on the web that we have been looking at. Use it to discuss the different tools with your child. :)    Science Tools

Math: The class did a great job listening to the poems about Gus and Linus last week. :) (I think they liked Linus more than Gus. They thought he was silly with his angry face. haha) This week we will focus on Gus the Plus. We will review the bolded words from the poems. We will listen to story problems and discuss how many are in each group and how many are in the sum. We will illustrate them by drawing the groups in Gus's hands, I will write the mathematical signs (+ and =) and then call on students to come up and write the numbers in the equation.
At home, continue to review all of the bolded words that are listed for Gus.Practice telling your child a story problem and then asking them how many are in each of the groups and how many are in the sum. If this process is easy for your child, have them illustrate the story problems and write the equations. :)