April showers....

Hello Families,
     Last month we learned about the saying, "March comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb".  At the end of the month we counted up our lamb and lion days we recorded as we checked the weather each day and found that it was about even...9 lamb days and 10 lion days.  Now we have moved on to, "April showers bring May flowers."  Our bulletin board in the hallway is full of Kindergarten-made flowers as we hope to help bring Spring to Middlebury!
     An important part of our learning together in Kindergarten is practicing ways to calm our bodies and redirect our attention.  As I have taught the children several ways to practice different ways to breathe to calm your body and mind, the children have also taught me several different ways.  Then we get to teach others in our community, like Mr. Lester and Mrs. Urban.  We have the opportunity to learn some yoga, too, in the next few weeks.  Prem Prakash from Green Mountain Yoga will be visiting our Kindergarten classes to lead the children through a half hour of yoga.  It will be a great connection to what we have been discussing around ways to calm and settle our bodies.
     I look forward to seeing you at parent conference time in the next couple of weeks.  If you are unable to attend for any reason, please let me know with a note or a phone call and we can reschedule.  My number at school is 382-1458.  There is an Early Release Day this week on Wednesday the 10th.  Our trip to the Flynn Theater is Monday, April 15th and Spring Vacation is the week of April 22-26. 


Friends enjoy building together in B-3.


The latest Art project with Ms. S...texture crowns.


Looking at different places in our community as we get ready to explore jobs and what we want to be when we grow up.



Our Who We Are projects are hanging up in the classroom - we have learned so much about each other and what makes us who we are.  I hope you have a chance to look at them when you come in for parent conference time. 

April showers bring May flowers.....

Stuffy Day Fun

Hello Families,
     Stuffy Day was a big hit in B-3!  I have included some photos of a few of the activities we did with our Stuffies on that day.  I sent home parent conference schedules for everyone in the red folder.  If you haven't yet sent in the sign up paper, please do so promptly so that we can schedule a conference.  There is a new assignment for the Mystery Bag.  It connects to our "Who We Are" unit and directions are in the bag.  Have fun with it!  The students don't have school on Friday, March 29th as it is a teacher work day.  Enjoy the sun this weekend and get out and enjoy some Vermont maple at a local sugarhouse!

 
Reading to our stuffies and building structures for our stuffies.....so fun!

 
Drawing and writing about our stuffies...I loved hearing what they were all named!

 
Helping friends learn more about their animals and making crowns for stuffies....very serious work!


Sorting the stuffies by different attributes....

Fox in Socks

Hello Families,
     We have been practicing our rhyming skills a bunch lately as we read many Dr. Seuss books over the past week.  Today the students responded to the writing prompt:  What did you learn about building bridges?  Mr. Flint enjoys reading what the children take away from the engineering unit.  I am collecting some of my recycling at home so we can have a Bridge Building Extension with different materials and tests.  Tricia came from the Ilsley Library today and read a book about leprechauns, luck and magic.  Then the children used their fine motor skills to make a wee leprechaun to take home.  We all enjoyed sharing our stories about how we got our names!  The children are working on a Who We Are poster to explore more about community, values and traits we have.  Here are a few pictures from our rhyme time fun!

  
Our classroom door is decorated and we practiced identifying real versus nonsense words.

 
The green eggs and ham was a hit!

Lions and Lambs

Hello Families,
     We have a short week of school coming up with the March 7th Early Release Day and no school on March 8th.  With March upon us, we will be be weather watchers as part of our daily calendar.  We talked about the old saying, "March comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb" and what that means.  Our calendar helper for the day will be the weather watcher and tell us if it is a Lion weather day or a Lamb weather day.  We will count and graph our results and practice our comparison language as we go through the month.
     The trip to Middlebury College to see the Ragamala Dance Company was exciting!  The musicians from India were amazing and there was so much to see and hear during the performance.  The Kindergartners were able to discuss what they liked the most, some expressing it was hard to sit for the 45 minutes, but everyone had positive reflections, as well.  One of the reasons I love teaching Kindergarten is having opportunities to experience with them something new that the students have never experienced before. 
     Our last day of bridge building with Mr. Flint will be this week, along with our first all school Morning Meeting assembly on Monday and Wacky Wednesday.  I have included some pictures from our 100th day of school celebration and our bridge building.  You will see the children stacking 100 cups, making the 100th day snack mix, predicting and observing what 100 drops of water looks like, dancing and counting to 100, building bridges in Mr. Flint's room and experimenting with bridge building in the classroom.  Enjoy the week!

 
 
 

An Exciting Week in February Coming Up!

Hello Families,
     It's the week of the 100th Day and Valentine's Day coming up and the excitement is high for both days in B-3!  Please remember to have your child bring in his or her collection of 100 items on Monday and Valentines for the class on Thursday.  I sent home a list of student names last week in the red folder.  Let me know if you need another one.  We want every child to be included on the special day.  Our School Counselor, Julie Cleary, also let all the teachers know it is Random Acts of Kindness week so we will be talking about that in class and working on filling a jar with pompoms when we catch each other doing random acts of kindness. 
    There is no school next week for our February Break.  In March, there is an Early Release Day on the 7th and on the school calendar, it shows March 8th as a No School day for Parent Conferences.  I prefer to do my Spring Parent Conferences a bit later, since we just sent home the midyear report on February 1st.  So you will see a note from me later in March to sign up for conferences.
     After break, our class will start a week long unit with Mr. Flint, our STEM teacher here at Mary Hogan.  We will be using what we know about force and engineering to build bridges.  In literacy right now a big skill we are working on is tapping and reading 3 letter words, like cat, log and fun.  The students use their fingers to tap out the 3 sounds and blend them to read the word.  Have your child show you how they are progressing with this skill.  Our February calendar has the students comparing the number of red and blue dots each day and building a vocabulary of comparison words (all, none, more, less, equal, etc).  Also tied into the calendar this month, we are learning the value of a penny, nickel, dime and quarter, with the help of a song, of course!  Here are some photos from last week.  Have a good week...we will be celebrating big numbers and love this week in B-3!
 
Working on our 100th Day crowns

  

 
Busy with literacy stations: Partner work, individual reading time, small group work, word building


After reading Sneezy the Snowman, the students developed a writing piece telling why their snowman melted.  They are hanging in our hallway.

Peace

Hello Families,
     Last week felt like a very mixed up week with the Monday and Tuesday break from school then the day off on Thursday.  Here's hoping we have a full week of school this week!  We finished up our unit on Pushes and Pulls, are working on correct letter formation for upper case letters, practicing tapping and reading 3 letter words and getting ready to write about melting snowmen and learn a new math game that uses adding skills.  As we talked about Martin Luther King Jr. and all the important messages he wanted to spread, we made Peace Plates and discussed what we think PEACE means.  Some of the Kindergarten ideas were....Peace means love, working out problems with friends, staying calm when you're mad about something and being a kind person.  Here are some photos from that project.





This project opened up great dialogue around different ways to express yourself in art and how unique our individual ideas are.  As the students sat at the table revealing their designs, I heard comments like, "I love the dots on yours."  "Wow, I know you like blue!"  "I might try that flower design next time."  We learn from each other every day in Kindergarten.

Some photos to share....

Hello Families,
     The Kindergartners have loved having some snow to romp around in on the playground!  Here are some photos of what we have been up to....


Our Nature Art we created after looking at Andy Goldsworthy's work.....

 
Creating the art with Mr. Paul.


We are learning about Force and Motion....


Time with our Big Buddies.  (See the calendar in the background?  Ask your child about the pattern on the calendar this month!)


Our Big Buddies helped us make Name Snowmen.


Playing a letter/word game with a partner.