Kindergarten is the BEST place on Earth!

The year is officially over... The room is all packed up and the walls look a little drab. :( Here are a few pictures to showcase the sad little room.

I hope everyone has a wonderful summer and that next year is just as great as this year was!!! :) Chimney Lakes has lots of wonderful teachers! So I know you'll be happy with who ever your child receives. :)

I was checking my email and I came across this email from the School District. I wanted to share it with all of you, just in case you don't have any plans for this coming Saturday, June 7th.

Jacksonville Sharks Education Night and birthday celebration - June 04, 2014 The Sharks are inviting elementary school students to celebrate Chum’s birthday party during the game on Saturday, June 7 at 3:00 p.m. Students may receive a free ticket to the game with the purchase of at least one adult ticket (up to two free children’s tickets per paid adult). Fans may visit jaxsharkstickets.com/chum, or call the Sharks Ticket Office at 904-621-0700 (subject to availability). In addition, all teachers, administrators and employees are eligible to purchase Buy One, Get One Free tickets to the Education Appreciation Night game on June 7 with the presentation of a school ID at Will Call. To take advantage of this offer, visit jaxsharkstickets.com/education, call the Sharks Ticket Office at 904-621-0700, or simply bring their school ID to the arena box office. Tickets purchased online or over the phone must be picked up at Will Call with the presentation of a school ID.

Great weather, great kids and great activities! The class loved being outside and having the freedom to visit 14 stations outside during Water Play. :) I believe their favorite stations were walking through the car wash and sitting in the swimming pool... but it could have been spraying a plastic duck with a water launcher and playing with shaving cream... To get the true favorites, you'll probably have to ask. :)

Our Beach Party had the yummiest food. The kids ate "octopus hotdogs," fruit skewers, goldfish and veggies cups. We drank "ocean water," (blue Kool Aid). Then they have Bella's Birthday cupcakes for dessert. :) The cupcakes had bears laying on beach towels under umbrellas. They were so cute! After everyone ate and cleaned up we went to six different stations: painting, coloring, decorating, F-U-N! (tomorrow the students will bring home three of the projects... they were still wet from paint and we wanted them to dry.)







I want to give a HUGE thank you to all the parents that showed up and volunteered today: Mrs. Conner, Mrs. Parker, Ms. Jennifer, Mr. Nord, Mrs. Nord, Mr. Tokarek, Ms.Hutchison, Ms. Smith and Ms. Navarro. Plus another big thank you to Mr. Tokarek and Ms.Navarro for taking pictures of the students.  :)

Enjoy the pictures!!

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Today was a great day!! Thank you so much for taking time out of your busy schedules to come to school and see all the students receive their awards. :)  If you forgot your cameras or your batteries died during the Ceremony... no need to worry, Mrs. Conner sat up front and took lots of pictures of the students shaking the principal's hand. :) 

Enjoy the slideshow!

This picture slideshow personalized with Smilebox

I hope the children have enjoyed their first year of school. :)  I know I am tough Kindergarten Teacher and I expected ALOT, but I hope they had lots of fun in the process.  (Ms.Godbold would tell me at least once a week my expectations were too high and my response was always, "No it isn't. They can do this! They are a bunch of smartie pants. Just watch and see... And the students always made me proud.) Also, I hope the blog helped many of you to follow along with the school year and get a little sneak peek of our school days. :) The blog was a lot of work for me!! Teaching sometimes was easier than making a blog post... haha. But the comments that were left always kept me going. (Thanks so much to all the parents that left comments, especially Mrs. Tokarek. She was our Number 1 Commenter!!!)

Anyway, before I start to shed a few tears... let me get on with what our week will be like:
MONDAY: Award Ceremony at 11:15 in the Multi Purpose Room and a Cookies & MIlk Celebration to follow in our Classroom.
TUESDAY: A (somewhat) Regular Day... reviewing all of the skills we've learned throughout the year, going to LOTS of Centers :), discussing our Water Play Rules and eating any leftover cookies. :)
WEDNESDAY: Water Play (outside from 9:00-11:30) and Beach Party (in the classroom from 11:30-2:00, or when all stations are completed).
THURSDAY: Music w/ Ms.Biernacki. Pajama Day!! Wear your pajamas to school, bring your favorite stuffed animal, even bring your slippers. :)(If you have any questions, please write me a note or email me.)
FRIDAY: The Last Day of the 2013-2014 School Year... The official dismissal time is 12:00, but I surmise that Car Duty will begin about 11:30. Please note~ We will not be going to the cafeteria for lunch. Please send snacks for your child, we will be eating them in class. The Extended Day Program is not open on the last day.



Now that I have saved my tears, let me go ahead and post the slide show that shows the students beginning of the year picture and their end of the year picture... Make sure to have a tissue or two handy, you might need them.

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The first was a visit from Ms. Bailey (a 2nd Grade Teacher and our very own Jacob's~ Aunt Nini). She came to our classroom and allowed us to be part of the Butterfly Release with her students. :) She has had 14 butterfly eggs in her class and her students have watched the butterfly eggs go through their life cycle.  Our second surprise was seeing Mrs. Hardage, Mrs. Elliot and Mrs. Walker's (all 4th grade teachers and don't forget Ms. Walker is our FCAT Buddy) classes perform the Shakespeare play~ A Mid Summer Nights Dream. The students loved watching the sword fighting and seeing glitter everywhere, but I must admit they all really loved when one of the characters pretended to die and a fairy kissed the mask of a donkey. haha (Also, the play meant A LOT to Gavin because his big sister~ Abigail was in the play. She was one of the Narrator's.)

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 Last year I started a Donors Choose Project and for whatever reason... I didn't finish it. Well I decided to finish it today. :) I had to wait a little bit for them to accept the Project. But after only 2 hours... they did!! So now we can now start earning money to fund a new listening center, with headphones and Non-Fiction book sets. (Unfortunately do to my lack of planning and completion time... this years class won't be able to use the listening center, but next years students and all the students after that will be able to.)

Please tell anyone you can get to listen and even list the Project on your Facebook pages to get the word out to EVERYONE!! (I don't have Facebook or else I'd list it on my page.)  For the next 7 days, until June 2, when someone donates to my Project and enters the code INSPIRE... DonorsChoose.org will match the donation dollar to dollar (up to $100.00!!) Woohoo!!!



                      Go to this link to read all about the Project 
                          and maybe make a donation to too. :)
                                           

While searching through Pinterest for a fun under the sea craft to get the class excited about Water Day and our Beach Party... I came across some Youtube videos on blends and silent e.  They are catchy, so be ready to sing along with them. :) Especially the silent e one!


Enjoy! And in case you're wondering... I didn't find a craft yet. haha But I will. :)

                                 
            

I can't believe we are down to only 9 days left of the school year... This has been a great year. :) I have the best Kindergarten Class at Chimney Lakes!! (I tell the students this fact every day. :) Every single day! haha They are probably sick of hearing me say it. )

Reading: We will be reading books from the Phonics Tales Series about the short vowel sounds. The titles are: That Cat Max, The Best Nest, The Little Pink Pig, Todd's Odd Day and Lucky Duck. We will be reviewing characters, settings and why the Illustrator chose the particular pictures they did for the book. After the reading we will discuss the short vowel words that were in the book.  Our Word Family is the -ag family, our blend is fl- and we will review all of the Sight Word learned through out the year. :) Here is a link to the fl- blend power point I made. :)           
                 

At home, read your child a book and review the characters and setting. Then ask them why they think the Illustrator chose the pictures they did for the book. After that discuss the meaning of words used in the story. Ex. We read a book in class where the main character felt puzzled. The students had a little trouble at first, but then they figured out it meant he was confused. :)


Writing: We are continuing our Kindergarten Memory Books. We haven't had much time to go back and complete the sheets... so this week we will be doing just that! :) The students will be making their pages perfect and making their pictures beautiful!
At home, please remind your child even to apply all the writing skills they have learned through out the year: spaces, capitalization, punctuation, using their sounds/ blends and sight words!
Science/Social Studies: We will be reviewing the motions push and pull. Using a T-chart the students will be deciding if the items can be pushed or pulled safely. :) Below is a short little song to get the students excited in acting out  the two movements.
         
At home, discuss the movements with your child and then ask them if a ______ can be pushed or pulled. Be prepared for your child to say both and when that happens ask them to explain. Ex. The chair... they will need to explain and possibly model why they are saying both movements are acceptable.


Math: We are going back to review vocabulary "Greater Than" and "Less Than." I found Topic 4 still on the shelf and this is a great time to break it out. :)  Not only does it review the vocabulary it also asks them to make groups that have one more or one less, than the group they are given. (So secretly we are reviewing addition and subtraction too... but I'm not going to mention that to the students. haha)
At home, review the worksheets with your child and discuss the vocabulary. Have your child bring out a toy that they have lots of (barbies, race cars, ninja turtles, etc) and use the toys to make groups. Then ask your child how many there are, after that ask them, "Without recounting, how many would there be if I added one more?" Next do this with one less and if it is easy... increase the difficulty by saying 2 more or even 3 more. :)



**While searching for songs I could you to make our lessons more inviting... I came across this video for the song Tooty Ta. We have danced to this song many times on Fun Friday's. haha I thought you would enjoy watching it with your child and maybe acting it out too. No worries if you have trouble, your child can help you out. :) The video is a little over 3 minutes, but the song ends at 2:30.   Enjoy!
          

Today was a great day!! The fun started at 8:00 when the students entered the classroom. :) (I brought the students in early so that they could change into their International Day T-shirts.) The students were full of talking and laughter about what they thought today would be like.  Then at 8:40 we all piled outside our room into the hallway to watch the parade. Walking with our Principal, 
Mrs. Knott, was our very own Bailey and Carmen. :) Then right behind them was Hannah and Santana. The four of them all looked adorable in the parade!! (My pictures were a little blurry from the fast walking... so I recorded the 2nd loop of the Parade.)  Next we all traveled  down to our first presenter and then real fun began! We saw four different presenters and we walked the whole school, about 3 times. (The class got a lot of exercise in! haha) We didn't end our "traveling" until 1:50. Everyone was pretty tired, so we relaxed some: Fun Friday Snacks, Treasure Box and then ANY Math Center of their choice. :)

Hopefully all the students went home with lots of stories and if they didn't... show them the slideshow and I'm sure they'll start talking about all the fun they had real fast! :)

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I walked all around the "WORLD" after the dismissal bell rang today :) and took lots of pictures!! I took pictures of things hanging on the walls, set up on the floor, hanging from the ceilings and stapled on the bulletin boards. :) It was A LOT of picture snapping, but totally worth it... the decorations around school look BEAUTIFUL!!! Everyone did a great job getting our school together for our Annual International Cultural Day.

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Today I had a meeting with the Kindergarten Team about Water Play Time. :) I was so excited thinking back to all the fun the students had last year... that I jumped ahead and showed the class the pictures from last year. haha I then told them the paper wasn't going home yet to Parents, but I figured I should give you all the heads up I gave your children...

Please help the Kindergarten Team by donating one or more of the following items by May 28th. :) Most of them can be found at Dollar Tree.

Reading: We will be reading the book How the Guinea Fowl Got Her Spots by Barbara Knutson. It is a Swahili folktale about friendship. We will be discussing the vocabulary in the text and the meanings of the words. The we are making story maps for the guinea fowl and ending with creating our own guinea fowl characters... with white spots of course. :) (I tried finding a reading of the book on Youtube. However I was not lucky... so I chose another African Folktale for the students to enjoy. ) Our Word Family is the -an family, our blend is sl-, our vowel focus will be letter u again (short sound & long sound) and we will review all of the Sight Word learned through out the year. :) Here is a link to the sl- blend power point I made. :)                                    
                             
At home, discuss African Folktales with your child and possibly watch videos of them on Youtube. A few of my favorites are Anansi the Spider and Zomo the Rabbit. **The video above is a variation of the Anansi story.
Science/Social Studies: We will be working on projects for International Cultural Day again this week. The animals we will be making this week are giraffes and zebras.
At home, discuss the animals with your child. Ask them to tell you the steps for making the animal heads. :) Then ask them/ teach them facts about Africa.


Math: We are finishing up the Topic on composing and decomposing numbers. This time around our numbers are larger~ 11-19. When discussing the numbers, your child will be asked to make a number by having the ten frame and then ask how many ones are needed.
We will be taking the practice test on Wednesday and the real test on Thursday. :)
At home, go over the same type of questions with your child. If your child is having trouble go back to composing and decomposing up to 10. Then when they seem more comfortable with the process, go on to the larger numbers.