September 20, 2024
Dear Kindergarten Parents,
Our Faith Focus this week: Jesus calls us by name. In religion we discussed why our name is important. Saying someone’s name is a sign of respect. We want to show Jesus respect when we say his name by bowing our heads and being quiet during prayer. Alma and How She Got Her Name led to our own class discussion about how our own names are special. Jesus knows each and every one. Some students are named for grandparents, dads, and Saints. More information about our special part in the All Saint’s Day Mass will be forthcoming.
In phonics, we practiced sounding out CVC words (consonant, vowel, consonant). We practiced sky writing and stretching our letters from the plane line to the grass line. Our popcorn words this week were: a, and, the, am. Ask your child to make the hand motions for each popcorn word!
In math, we worked with classification by size, shape, and color. Grouping objects in more than one way was a complex concept. We practiced with magnet shapes on the white board and shape tiles in the math center. This skill will continue next week as we introduce three-dimensional shapes such as cylinder, sphere, and cube. The light box was also used to classify shapes by size and color. We used giant tweezers in the sensory table to classify letters, pom moms, buttons and even dyed rice by color. The kids are working hard to strengthen those fine motor skills!
Mo Willems was featured in our combined lesson with Ms. Bennett’s room. We Are In A Book introduced us to our new favorite characters Gerald and Piggie (and Pigeon!). We had a great time finding all of our popcorn words in the text and reading character expressions to determine their feelings. Pigeon Has to go to School launched an impromptu lesson on comparing and contrasting emotions in a story with Color Monster Goes to School. We made connections from the texts to our real emotions about starting school this year.
Science brought us to the color wheel. We conducted a science experiment that required six jars, food coloring and paper towels. We filled up three jars with water and added one of the primary colors to each. We used the paper towels to disperse the water to the empty jars and the result was a secondary color. We followed up this lesson with our own color circles which required the children to assign a primary color and mix their own secondary colors. These became rainbow birds that we will display in the hallway.
Next Week: Our spotlight sound is T. The first homework packet should be returned on Monday with your child’s library book. I will send out the new packet on Wednesday. Letter box presentations will be on Thursday and Friday. Next week is all about apples!
I am always available for any questions you may have. Do not hesitate to contact me.