School Family Update 4.30

Reading
Students have been focusing on identifying long and short vowel sounds. This week we are focusing on the long i sound. Students should be able to identify all letter sounds and vowel sounds at this time. We have gone over the different sounds for c, g, and y at calendar time and in small reading groups when applicable. Knowing those extra sounds is needed to exceed the standard. I have been pulling over students to reassess letter knowledge, parts of a book, the setting, and other reading standards we have learned this year. While I was assessing, students were at their regular centers. This week the centers are:

Library- reading or acting out a story
Computer- starfall
Activboard- this week is the ipad
Game- homophone puzzle, long i puzzle, blends puzzle
ABC- create an icecream cone/dish with long i words written on the scoops
Write the room- identify long and short i words
Listening- Friends with Trees story and book report
Writing- Free writing with a focus on details and punctuation
Creation- Animals where the center of the body is a globe for Earth week!
Pocket chart- sorting opposites, short i puzzle

Homophones/homonyms have also been a focus this week. These are words that sound the same but have different meanings. We discussed the multiple meanings and students were to illustrate the 2 meetings on paper M&Ms. Some examples are : bat like the animal, bat like a baseball bat; watch like you wear, watch like watching tv.

Thank you to everyone who returned their book in a bag!

Writing
We are revisiting the informational/how to genre. The topic for this week is how to make a sundae. Students brainstormed items and wrote their rough draft. On Thursday, students will edit and revise their work. On Friday, they will publish and share their work.

Math
Students are completing their math centers we started last Wednesday. They are playing games and doing activities that review counting, adding, subtracting, and decomposing skills. They visit one of eight centers each day. They are working with one or two other students.

Science
This is our final week for plants. Students should be able to sort plants various ways (color, size, habitat, etc.). Students drew plants in 2 different habitats and compared with a partner how their plants were similar and different. Then, we shared as a group. I emphasized how the temperature and amount of water habitats have affect the plants that can grow in each habitat.

Upcoming Dates
- Monday, May 5th Volunteer Brunch 8:30-10:30
Teachers make goodies to share with all the awesome parents who have volunteered this year!
- Thursday, May 8th Field Day from about 8-11am. Please make sure your child has tennis shoes and appropriate clothing on. If needed, you will need to apply sunscreen  on your child before they arrive at school. We will not be able to assist with this at school.
- Monday, May 12th Mother's Day Celebration 9:00-10:00am
Thanks for all of the rsvp's! If you haven't sent it in, please do. It helps me plan the food. The kids are excited to share some songs with you and eat some muffins.
- Monday, May 19th 8am Kindergarten Awards Ceremony
- Thursday, May 22nd Kindergarten Carnival 12:30-1:30
To volunteer for a game at the carnival click here.

FYI, Ms. Madojemu has been out for four days due to an injured foot. Please keep her in your thoughts!

Newsletter & Snack Calendar

The newsletter and snack calendar for next week (April 28th- May 2nd) will come home on Monday. I forgot to put it in their folders today!

Some dates to remember for next week:

• Landscape Day this Saturday starting at 9:00am at REES.
• Next week is Earth week. See a note in your child's folder with more details.
• Monday is the final day for the CRCT; Tuesday the schedule will be back to normal.
• Thursday is College Day/ Earth day colors.
• Friday from 12:00-2:00 is Art Day. We will be making art with recycled materials.
• FYI: GKIDS is also due for the final time by this Friday. You will receive a copy of your child's gkids report with their final report card.

Future dates:

• Monday, May 5th Volunteer Brunch: If you've ever volunteered, we'd love to show our appreciation! Come to the media center for special homemade treats 8:30-10:30am.
• Thursday, May 8th is Field Day. It's about 8am-11am.
• Friday, May 9th is STEM Day. STEM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics.
• Monday, May 12th is our Mother's Day celebration. Join us in our classroom from 9:00am-10:00am for songs and muffins. A formal invitation will be coming home next week.
• Monday, May 19th at 8am will be the Kindergarten Awards Assembly.
• Thursday, May 22nd Kindergarten Carnival 12:30-1:30. Thank you for all of the donations and volunteers so far. You guys are awesome!
• Friday, May 23rd last day of school. Kids will not bring backpacks to school on that day.

FYI I will be out of the classroom on Wednesday, April 30th and Wednesday May 7th so for the next two weeks I will check sight word folders on Thursday.

Hope everyone enjoys the weather and has a great weekend!
~Mrs. Daugherty

School Family Update April 23rd

SCIENCE
Last week, we started our plant unit. We focused on characteristics of plants. Students compared living plants to nonliving plants. This week students planted grass seeds. We are observing them each day. The kids are anxiously awaiting to see something! Students sorted plant pictures by height and color.  We are also talking about taking care of our Earth. Students will record how they will help the Earth next week. They have some great answers.
Standards we are working on:
*SKL1- Students will sort living organisms and nonliving materials into groups by observable p hysical attributes. c. Group plants according to their observable features such as appearance, size, etc.
*SKL2 Students will compare the similarities and differences in groups of organisms. b. Explain teh simlarities adn differences in plants. (color, size, appearance, etc.)

READING
Last week, students visited learning centers while I was assessing GKIDS. You will get a final copy of your child's GKIDS with their repord card at the end of the year. However, I have an earlier deadline for the state. Look for updates on strengths and skills to practice on signed papers this week. Below are pictures of the centers from last week.

 At the ABC center students found the sight word that was missing from six different sentences. They had a word bank of words. This allowed students to practice reading the sight words and thinking about what made sense in each sentence. This was at centers for 2 weeks. One paper will come home in their folder, and one will be in signed papers.

The Activboard center is a favorite. Students go through the flipchart and practice various skills. This picture shows a sight word memory game. They touch the star to reveal the word. Students must say the word. There are new words each week. Other activities include handwriting practice, sorting pictures based on sounds, and writing word family words.

At our computer center, students are working on www.starfall.com. It allows students to practice various reading skills. It can read books aloud to students and highlights each word as it's said.

 At our game center last week, students worked on the IPAD. The REEF foundation purchased these cool pens (I forgot the name....) that work with the IPAD. It is wonderful to use for the handwriting apps so it mimics using a pencil instead of a finder. The app they are using is called BT free handwriting. It models where to start your pencil for each letter, then students trace it and write it next to it.

 Students have accesst to our class library throughout the day. However, during the library center there are a few more activities availalble. Students are reading together in the picture above. There are also puppets to read to or with and reading phones. The reading phones help students hear themselves reading.

 In the listening centers, students listen to a story. This help students hear what fluent reading sounds like. Then, they fill out a book report with the title, author, character, setting, and a sentence about the book. Your child should be able to name the characters and setting of any story that you read. They also should know the role of the author and illustrator.

 At writing center, students created their own book. It could be any topic, and they chose from a few different formats. Here a student is using the word wall to find how to spell a word. This is a skill we have really been working on especially during editing in writing.

 In creation, students had various materials (construction paper, white paper, tissue paper, markers, colored pencils, popsicle sticks, etc.) to make a flower. I chose a flower because we are learning about plants in science. Sometimes students are given more loose directions in creation to explore their creativity.

 At pocket chart, students have multiple bags of different sorts to choose from. Students were working on identifying middle short vowel sounds and above singular and plural pictures are being sorted. Students do not need to know these terms (It's kindergarten!) but they should know dogs with an s means more than one. The word dog just means one.

Here are some examples of books that wrere created at writing center! Hope you enjoyed them at home. I love hearing the stories they come up with!

This week students are doing literacy centers. They rotate through the same ten centers but have different activities. They are listed below.
Computer-starfall
Activboard- sight word games, handwriting practice, sorts with letter sounds, making words
Game- ipad BT Hand...Free
Creation- Make a tree
Writing- Write about a tree
Write the room- record words around the room that have ea or ee to make the long e sound.
Pocket chart- vowel sort
Listening- The Lamb and the Butterfly by Eric Carle.
Library- reading independently, with a friend, or using phones.
ABC- Sorting pictures with their medial (middle) vowel sound.

Continue to read the leveled books sent home with your child last week. Please return the book in a bag on Monday, April 28th. Thank you.

Standards:
*ELACCCKRF3b: Associate teh long adn short sounds with the common spellings for teh five major vowels.
* ELACCKL4a: Identify new meanings for familiar words and apply them accurately (homophones: ex: duck like the bird and duck like the verb. The ball is coming...duck!)
* ELACCKRF2d: Isolate adn pronounce the initial, medial vowel, and final sounds. Distinguish between similarly spelled words.
* ELACCKRL3: With prompting and support, identify characters, settings, adn major events in the story.
* ELACCKRF3c: Read common high frequency words.

WRITING
We focus on three genres of writing in kindergarten. They are narrative, informational, and persuasive. The last six weeks of the school year we revisit each genre and get a final work sample. This final sample will be passed to their first grade teachers at REES next year. Last week students went through the writing process with the topic of spring break. All of their hard work went home at the beginning of the week. This week we continued writing narratives. The topic was fun with friends. Students brainstormed activities they do with friends and wrote a rough draft. Today, we discussed adding details to make our writing better and editing. Students did this in a colored pencil so I could see any changes that were made. We are also working on incorporating how they felt into the story. Tomorrow students will complete their final draft and publish. Here is a link to a song we sing often as our hook. It goes through the writing process.

Standards
* ELACCKW3: Use a combination of drawing, dictating, adn writing to narrate a single event or several loosely linked events, tell about the events in teh order in which tehy occurred, and provde a reaction to what happened.
* ELACCKL1a Particpate in collaborative conversations with diverse partners about kindergarten topics adn texts with peers and adults in small and larger groups.

MATH
Students went to math centers last week. This week students had new math centers. They will visit one center a day. Each center is reviewing skills. The standards that correspond to our centers this week are below.

Standards:
* MCCKOA1, MCCKCC1, MCCKOA4, MCCKCC2, MCCKOA3, MCCKG3. You may go to www.georgiastandards.org to see the full standards. These are too long to type! Basically, review 2D and 3D shapes and their attributes (# of sides and corners). Also, adding and subtracting, finding the missing number in an equation, breaking a number down into parts (ex: 9= 4+5 or 3+6) and decomponsing teen numbers. This means 17 is 1 group of ten and seven ones. We will continue to review this concept as it is tricky for most kinders.

If you made it to the end congrats! Sorry it got so long. I have been working on this on and off for a week...and it just got longer as we kept learning!
~Mrs. Daugherty

CRCT

What does CRCT mean for your kindergarnter? Your kiddos are definitely not taking the test; however, there are some changes that affect them. First, there are no visitors allowed in the building until after 11:15. This means no lunch guests until next Tuesday. I am giving the test to a small group of fourth graders so I am out of our classroom frmo 7:45 to around 11:00. Ms. Madojemu is with our class. I have created detailed plans for this time. Our specials and recess times are different due to testing. Below is our schedule for April 22nd- April 28th.

7:10-7:45 Morning Work
7:45-7:50 Announcements
7:50-8:00 Finish morning work if needed; silent reading
8:00-8:30 Morning greeting and calendar.
8:30-8:45 Phonics lesson and read aloud
8:45-9:20 Science
9:20-10:30 Literacy Centers
10:30-11:00 Inside Recess and restroom breaks
11:02-11:32 Lunch
11:32-11:55 Sight word games; checking plants; practicing mother's day songs; read aloud (varies)
11:55-12:20 Specials T & W PE; Th- Art; F- Music
12:20-12:30 We take the long way and walk outside from specials. Students get to run, spin, yell, whatever. :)
12:30-12:45 Snack and Sharing
12:45-1:30 Math
1:30-2:00 Writing
2:00-2:20 Checking writing, silent reading, preparing for dismissal

The last day of the CRCT is Monday, April 28th. Thanks for your patience!

Mrs. Daugherty

Leveled Books at Your Library

Ever try and find a book for your child to read independently at the library? It can be tough. There are many ways to organize books based on their difficulty. River Eves uses  Fountas and Pinnell to assess our students' reading levels. It is an alphabetical system. Kindergarten levels are typically A-C with first grade starting at a level D. The links have a list of books by levels that you could find at the library. I have not had a chance to look at all of the books on the list, but it was put together by media specialist. It's a resource if you're interested.

Click here for a list of recommended titles by level.

Here is another list.

Safety Town Videos

 

 

Videos from top to bottom:

Top- Students are gathering on the bleachers to review what we learned that day.

Middle: A glance at the town before the students arrive.

Bottom: Students receiving directions upon arrival.

Videos

I learned how to upload vidoes to our website! Yes, it has taken me until April and was pushed to the bottom of the to do list for far too long. I hope you enjoy them! Thanks to those of you who have sent me videos from our K events! If you have other videos/pictures and you would like to share them on our website just email me at daughertya@fultonschools.org.

 

International Night

 

 

Book Character Parade in October

Safety Town: The Town

The most exciting part of Safety Town is in the gym. There is a mini town inspired by Roswell. Students spend half of the time walking around as pedestrians. They learn about crosswalks and get an up close view of the buildings.

School Family Update April 1st

Math
Last week students reviewed skills and took their unit 5 assessment. The assessment was created by the county and is 23 pages!!! So....it's going to take some time. I am assessing in small groups so I can see how students are solving the problems, and I can read it aloud.  You may have noticed lots of adding and subtracting worksheets going home. This provides them extra practice to solidy their skills. It also helps us see if students are confusing signs or off by one sometimes or frequently. When students complete the worksheet, they have an opportunity to choose a math game. Some math games are:
- Best friends of ten memory or go fish
- War: Students solve the equation on the flashcard and whoever has the larger number wins.
- Finding the missing number and writing the equation on white boards.
I will continue to work on the Unit 5 assessment with students. It will be completed by the end of the week and you will receive a copy in the signed papers after spring break. While I am assessing, students will be at centers. They will go to to each day and rotate to ten throughout the week. A very similar set up to our literacy centers. The 10 math centers for this week are: Activboard, war, slide & count, best friends of ten, adding & coloring worksheet, +/- bookmarks, bingo, domino addition, subtraction cup game, and story problems.

Social Studies
We started our personal finance unit last week. Students learned the vocabulary needs and wants. Needs are things people have to have to live: food, water, clothing, and shelter. They illustrated six needs and six wants. They enjoyed the wants side! Students learned the importance of spending money on needs before wants. Third graders are also learning about economics and made items to sell. On Thursday, we went to this store and students got to make choices on how they wanted to spend their eaglets. A big toy, a few little toys, or a combination. Any leftover money was put back in their pocket and saved for next week.
This week, we will continue our finance unit. The vocabulary terms we will discuss are saving, spending, sharing/donating. They will create a mini book that they will share with the class on Friday and take home.

Reading
Students brainstormed words that began with the letter q. We noticed that pattern that most q words contain qu, except qtip! At creation center, students painted with qtips. They were very creative. At ABC, students filled in the missing sight word from sentences. Students also reviewed sight words using apps on the ipad. We read leveled readers in small groups and worked on phonics skills.

This week is the letter u. On Friday, we will watch Ms. Jones' class perform a Q and U wedding. Students will visit literacy centers and review reading skills in small groups. I am noticing a lot of growth in students' reading abilities. I will reassess everybody's reading levels with the Fountas and Pinnell series in April. I am noticing a lot of students trying to skip words they dont' know in our leveled readers. Please review how important it is to try tricky words. Students can sound it out, look at the picture, look for chunks, get their mouth ready, reread, and think about what makes sense.

Writing
Students completed their final draft of their letters about not littering. A copy of this rubric will come home in signed papers next week. The expectation for persuasive writing is stating an opinion sentence first and two reasons to support the opinion. Students should stretch words and get most sounds in the word. Students should be using capitalization and punctuation.
This week students also started illustrating their All About Me books. We will be illustrating our books all week and will be ready to share them with you at our Author's Party the Monday after Spring Break at 8am.