Week of December 12 - 16

Dear Parents,

Last week was jam packed with a lot of exploring and learning.  We began a new book in our phonics series, Six Kids, and sounded out words with the “short i.”  We completed Chapter 3: Matching and Counting in our math workbooks, ending the week with an opportunity for the scholars to show what they’d learned. Everyone did very well!  We also learned about the similarities and differences with different parts of our earth (mountains/hills, rivers/oceans, and valleys) and created a fabulous model of the forms with colored construction paper and glue.

Lessons This Week...

We will continue (and complete) reading Six Kids this week and further explore “short i” words.  Three of our spelling words concentrate on this sound (him, with, fix). Our fourth spelling word, “at,” brings us back to the importance of the “short a” sound. We will be creating another flip sound book - we have made three so far. Please expect to see those come home around Winter Break. Continue to find new ways to practice the words with your scholars (car trips, night time routines, morning rituals, etc.).

We have completed List 1 of our sight words and this week are starting on List 2.

We will start Chapter 4: Numbers 0-5, supplementing our workbook pages by making counting books (shown by example through literature read in class - see Book Club suggestions below).

We will complete the first part of our Earth Science lessons by reviewing what we’ve learned (and created with our models) and discussing characteristics of a desert (versus valley).  We will talk about local landforms and make observations about the earth around us by walking around our school (weather permitting!).  We are going to spend the remainder of the week reviewing our five senses.

Book Club

I hope you are having fun perusing the titles I’m linking below and finding new adventures to take with your child*.  Here are some more book titles for you to look through (I’m linking these to Amazon as I know they are less expensive here and perhaps you can get a shipping deal. We’re busy people - so I hope this makes life just a tick easier):

The Baker's Dozen: A Counting Book Count! by Denise Fleming Whoever You Are by Mem Fox Scribbleville by Peter Holwitz Honey Baby Sugar Child by Alice Faye Duncan The Peace Book by Todd Parr A, My Name Is Alice by Jane Bayer In the Tall, Tall Grass by Denise Fleming "A" Was Once An Apple Pie by Edward Lear and Suse MacDonald

(Brought to you in part by The ABCs of Literacy. Yay! $7.96 on Kindle! Easy as that...)

* If you’d like me to research books with certain themes, please let me know.

Holiday Festivities

Santa Clause is coming to our farm on Wednesday, December 14th. We will also be having our Holiday party in class that afternoon at 11:30 a.m.. Please sign up to bring something, if you are able.  

Our Winter Recital is on Friday, December 16th. Kindergarten, along with Ms. Melissa’s Pre-Schoolers and Ms. Denise and Ms. Sandy’s Pre-Kindergartners, will be singing especially for you!  The concert starts at 2:30 p.m. in Room 2. 

Winter Break is from December 19th - January 2.

“Cold” Season

No Getting Sick! A lovely dream... but, in that ever-glorious battle to keep everyone healthy so we can continue to have fun and learn together, I’ve been emphasizing with the children the importance of hand-washing, covering our mouths when we sneeze/cough, eating healthy, and getting plenty of rest. With that in mind, our rest time bedding should be washed weekly so I’m sending home blankets, etc. on Fridays for you to wash and return Mondays. We can also wash them at school, too. With a whole-hearted effort to keep the germies at bay, please pack a fitted crib sheet for your child to keep at school.  Rest time is from 12:00-1:30 p.m. and is a wonderful opportunity for each scholar to “turn off” and recharge batteries for the remainder of the day.

As Always...

If you have any questions, comments, or concerns please feel free to email me, stop by the classroom, talk to Ms. Diane, or leave a comment on our blog.  Please become a “follower” of our blog and “like” our school’s Facebook page, if you haven’t already done so.

Have a terrific week!

Mrs. Stuhr

Week of December 5 - 9

Dear Parents,

What a great start to the month of December! The scholars and I had a glorious time this week creating “short a” sound words, cutting and pasting letters onto a card and reading the words they made (van, man, ran, fan, etc.).  We worked on Chapter 3 (Matching and Counting) in our math book and learned about “more” and “less” to count objects.  We also explored our five senses in order to observe the world around us with more accuracy.  Throughout the week, each scholar completed worksheets in a packet I put together for them. They all did a great job - please look for the completed packet when it comes home on Monday.  The students also made snowmen that will displayed in our front hallway this Holiday season.  Each child designed clothing, etc. for a snowman.  They are so cute! Enjoy!

Lessons This Week...

This week in phonics, we are moving past “short a” and onto “short i.” We will begin a new book in our phonics series, “Six Kids.” As such, we will be making words and playing rhyming games to get familiar with the sound. Accordingly, two of our spelling words this week have this sound - “fit” and “pin.”

Our sight words this week (the other two spelling words), “but” and “had,” will become very useful to us as our reading skills improve.  We will use the word “but” to show comparison and talk about “had” in terms of what we possess. *When you are studying the words with your scholar this week, pay special attention to how he/she writes the “b” and “d” in these words. We want to make sure they not only see the difference in the letters, but understand the different sounds attached to each.*

In math, we will be completing chapter 3 and taking our “test” on Friday. This week, we will be interacting with counters (small objects) to be able to see when things are more and/or less. 

I’m very excited for our science lessons this week. We are starting our Earth Science curriculum and will be discussing mountains, rivers/oceans, valleys, and deserts. As we learn a new concept each day, we will be creating a “scene” of landforms. I can’t wait to see how they turn out!

Manner and Classroom Management

We spent some time last week learning about manners. Each scholar drew a picture about what he or she thought good manners looked like. I wrote their thoughts down and then each scholar came up with his or her own discipline strategy if he or she was ever in a situation where good manners were not being used.  They really understood the concept and challenged themselves with appropriate restrictions.  As the children are getting older, exploring the boundaries between classroom versus playground behavior, I think this new management strategy might hold them even more accountable for their actions.  

Also, based on the book How Full is Your Bucket? For Kids by Tom Rath, on Monday we will be implementing another management strategy, too.  Each scholar will be given a jar (we are going to refer to it as their “bucket”) with a certain number of “drops” in it.  For every good action, students receive a “drop.” For every not so smart action (silly choices, I call them), a “drop” gets taken out.  Our goal is to have our bucket overflowing, for that just makes life all the better...

If you have any questions about either of these strategies, please do not hesitate to contact me. Ms. Diane knows all the ins-and-outs of this, too, if you need some clarification when you pick up your child in the evening.

Holiday Festivities

Santa Claus is coming to our farm on Wednesday, December 14th. We will also be having our Holiday party in class that afternoon. This time, we are going to do a lunchtime party. Details will be posted our our classroom clipboard this week.  

Our Winter Recital is on Friday, December 16th. Kindergarten, along with Ms. Melissa’s toddlers and Ms. Denise and Ms. Sandy’s Pre-Kindergartners, will be singing especially for you!  The concert starts at 2:30 p.m. in Room 2. 

Book Club

Okay, this isn’t a “club” per-se, but I still want to share with you books I think your children will enjoy... so here are some more books for you to peruse - - 

Whoops... first thing's first, though - don't just take my suggestions... as a parent of an emergent reader, you MUST buy this (includes lists of AMAZING titles - quality words, quality literature):  

The ABCs of Literacy: Preparing Our Children for Lifelong Learning by Cynthia Dollins, EdD

Okay, onto some suggestions...

How Full is Your Bucket? For Kids by Tom Rath

Red Sings from Treetops: A Year in Colors  by Joyce Sidman

Owl Moon by Jane Yolen

Never Smile at a Monkey by Steve Jenkins

Miss Rumphius by Barbara Cooney 

Once a Mouse... by Marcia Brown

Dreams by Ezra Jack Keats

Interrupting Chicken by David Ezra Stein

Always Room for One More by Sorche Nic Leodhas 

We could be a club, though. I’ll come up with a catchy name...

As Always...

If you have any questions, comments, or concerns please feel free to email me, stop by the classroom, talk to Ms. Diane, or leave a comment on our blog.  Please become a “follower” of our blog and “like” our school’s Facebook page, if you haven’t already done so.

Have a terrific week!

Mrs. Stuhr

... and Santa Claus visits on Wednesday, December 14th

Week of November 28 - December 2

Dear Parents,

Happy Thanksgiving from our farm to yours! We had a wonderful time last week creating some art work. I hope they brighten your home this holiday season...

Thank you to everyone who participated in our Boats That Float presentation last Wednesday. Each boat was so unique and ... floated! Very cool. Special thanks to Kinder and Jeff Butler for bringing hot chocolate and treats for the kids.  Truly appreciated!  Expect to see another family project after winter break. 

This week, we’re jumping back into our academics.  We finished reading Max and have started Sam and Al. I continue to be in awe with how the scholars are approaching their reading. Their enthusiasm to learn something new keeps my energy level as high as a 5-year old! 

Coupled with our reading, we will be doing a lot of rhyming activities and word decoding this week. Please continue to find opportunities at home to reinforce these concepts (“I spy” car games, grocery store treasure hunts, laundry matching, etc.). 

In math, we are going to start picking apart numbers to add and subtract them. We again will take the concept of “seeing” numbers in a different way... a hand’s on approach.  Also, the scholars are having a great time tackling each page in their workbooks. Please keep an eye out for the “note home” each time we start a new chapter. This page, directly from our workbooks, gives you an idea what we will be learning.  You can also refer weekly to the right column on our blog for a brief explanation.  Right now, we are completing one chapter every 2-weeks. We end each chapter with a “test” and I am thrilled with how well everyone is doing! I hope you have enjoyed seeing the results! 

In keeping with the idea I had a few weeks ago to give you some reading suggestions, here is a new list of some great stories to share with your scholars:

The Amazing Bone, William Steig

Blueberries by Sal, Robert McCloskey

The Man Who Walked Between the Towers, Mordicai Gerstein

Nobody Rides the Unicorn, Adrian Mitchell

Old Turtle, Douglas Wood

One Fine Day, Nonny Hogrogian

Raising Dragons, Jerdine Nolen

Strega Nona, Tomie de Paola

More to come... just in time for the holidays!

In Science, we will continue to explore the idea of making observations in order to see the world in a different way. Expect to see homework concerning this topic for the next few weeks.

As Always...

If you have any questions, comments, or concerns please feel free to email me, stop by the classroom, talk to Ms. Diane, or leave a comment on our blog.  Please become a “follower” of our blog and “like” our school’s Facebook page, if you haven’t already done so.

Have a terrific week!

Mrs. Stuhr

Boat that Floats Presentation (Optional)

Week of November 14 - 18

Dear Parents,

Well, the weather has definitely changed and our classroom is buzzing with Fall activities... 

Last week we donned our scientists’ caps and starting making observations about the world around us. We will continue these observations this week  and even go into the science lab for a demonstration on sinking and floating (and making observations accordingly). 

Starting on Monday we will begin reading Max, our first phonics reader in the short vowel series.  We are going to pay attention to the rhymes and patterns to help us form words. We will also be doing exercises with our new sight words.  We will be doing a lot of “looking for clues” in our reading.  This involves looking at pictures to help us figure out the text.  This is a very important exercise to work on at home as well during your nightly reading time. Some fantastic books with quality pictures are

Corduroy by Don Freeman, Giraffes Can’t Dance by Giles Andreae, The Little House by Virginia Lee Burton, Kitten’s First Full Moon by Kevin Henkes, Joseph Had a Little Overcoat by Simms Taback, Snow by Uri Shulevitz

(such an incredibly shoooort list (for now). There are so many wonderful books out there! I will add more and more and more as the school year continues...)

This week, we will finish reviewing our alphabet letters. We will continue to work daily with their sounds to build even bigger words!  Please continue to work with your scholar to stay fresh on the letters, how to write them, and what sound(s) each make.

Also throughout this week we will continue to look at “patterns” in our math workbooks. By midweek, we will go onto “movement” and learn how to follow directions with left and right.

As Always...

If you have any questions, comments, or concerns please feel free to email me, stop by the classroom, talk to Ms. Diane, or leave a comment on our blog.  Please become a “follower” of our blog and “like” our school’s Facebook page, if you haven’t already done so.

Have a terrific week!

Mrs. Stuhr

Week of November 7 - 11

Dear Parents,

Last week was a lot of fun! Thanks for coming to our Costume Parade and for your help making our class party on Monday a success. It’s always fun to use our imagination and play with the ideas of Halloween... my hat’s off to the students for their bravery with all our games. 

Speaking of bravery, the scholars did an outstanding job this week listening to sounds and building words.  We will continue to play our phonics games in class (see last week’s post) to prepare us for reading.

This week’s spelling list has FOUR words. I’m adding three new sight words and one word we’re learning in Max (see below). Also, we’re are almost done reviewing our alphabet letters. This week we’ll be doing P, Q, R, S, T... yes, one letter per day!  

Drum roll please... This week marks our first leap into beginning reading! We are starting a phonics series that has been around since the 1970’s. It’s a great tool to help the scholars hear sounds, implement sight words, and build rhyming words.  Our first book is Max, from Series A (short vowel sounds). Working with a partner, we will read this book throughout the week with the goal of learning to read the whole thing by ourselves. 

We are beginning Chapter 2 in our math workbook. My original thought was to do a chapter per week, but I think we’ll go slower and do a chapter every two weeks (and pick up the pace in the last half of the year). In terms of our number recognition, we’ve started to explore the concept of counting by two’s and putting things in pairs.

Thanksgiving Project (OPTIONAL)

In this week’s homework packet is the project assignment for the month of November. It is due on Wednesday, November 23rd (the day before Thanksgiving vacation).  It’s a family project that I hope you’ll have fun completing. 

To incorporate physical properties of matter into Thanksgiving (because, really, what holiday of giving thanks would be complete without it?), we are going to build the Nina, the Pinta, or the Santa Maria!  In class, we are going to learn about how boats float (i.e. the bigger the boat, the more it holds). Your assignment is to build a boat that 1) holds three Thanksgiving objects of your choice and 2) floats!  See the assignment for more information (like the “optional” clause!) 

As Always...

If you have any questions, comments, or concerns please feel free to email me, stop by the classroom, talk to Ms. Diane, or leave a comment on our blog.  Please become a “follower” of our blog and “like” our school’s Facebook page, if you haven’t already done so.

Have a terrific week!

Mrs. Stuhr

Week of October 31 - November 4

Dear Parents,

Happy Halloween! Our Costume Parade in on Monday at 10:00 a.m. If you drop your child off around 8:00 a.m., we suggest he/she comes in regular clothes. The kids will have a chance to change before the parade. Please do pack, though, a change of clothes for your child (especially if you think he/she might get uncomfortable in a costume for the whole day).  Our party is at 1:30 p.m., but if you’d like to stay with us after the parade, we’ll be doing Halloween activities for the remainder of the day. Come celebrate with us!

On Tuesday, with my little glimmer of hope that the Halloween buzz has worn off, we will jump into an exploration of sounds and patterns. This week, we are going to begin our lessons on Phonemic Awareness (i.e. hearing and manipulating different sounds in words).  We will spend Tuesday-Friday playing games that give the scholars an opportunity to hear and play with words as sounds and groups. For example, we will solve rhyming riddles like this:

“You need me to play baseball. I rhyme with hat. What am I? BAT.”

We will learn songs that isolate sounds, like this:

“Twinkle, twinkle little word. What’s the new word to be heard? If I take off the first sound, what new word will now be found? Take the /F/ right off of FARM. Now the new word sounds like __________ (ARM).”

And, we will learn to blend sounds to make words by playing games like Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes, like this:

The word BUG would be /b/ (head), /u/ (shoulders), /g/ (knees). 

These activities will lead us into next week when we start to read decodable books during class. Decodable books are comprised of words that are easily sounded out (e.g. “Bill has a big ham.”). I’ll write more about it next week and explain what we’ll be doing. In the meantime, keep reading and pointing out words in books to your scholar... Continue to play rhyming games in the car or while you wait in line at the grocery store... Have fun exploring sounds and building words!

This week we will also be starting Chapter 2 in our math workbook: Patterns and Movement. We will build patterns with Legos and picture cards and look for patterns we see around our school. In terms of “movement,” we will be discussing “right” and “left” and as we make observations about the world around us.

P.S. The scholars are doing a FANTASTIC job studying the sight words! In two weeks, we will be adding one more word to the Friday spelling test, a decodable word from our week’s reading.  I hope my study cards are useful. If you’d like any help or suggestions on how to study and/or memorize the words, please slip me an email or stop by the classroom. 

As Always...

If you have any questions, comments, or concerns please feel free to email me, stop by the classroom, talk to Ms. Diane, or leave a comment on our blog.  Please become a “follower” of our blog and “like” our school’s Facebook page, if you haven’t already done so.

Have a terrific week!

Mrs. Stuhr

Book Worm Bag

Parents,

I still have not received all the Book Worm Bags back from two weekends ago, so unfortunately I cannot distribute the bags to the scholars this weekend.  If you have a bag out, please return on Monday. I'll send home reminder notes next week...

In the meantime, please check your child's backpack for this weekend's School-Home Links worksheet. Along with reading this weekend, this is a fun activity for you to do together.

(or print here and complete)

Of course, the Book Worm Bag and the Links worksheet are optional... But they are an awesome way to stay fresh and focused for school.

I hope you are enjoying the books that are coming home. I think they are a great collection of some early reading material. The Links worksheets follow how a child learns to read. We are now entering the "Learning to Track Print" phase of the worksheets. In other words, learning to read from left to right and recognizing words.

Have a great weekend. I'll update our blog shortly with next week's activities.

Sincerely,
Mrs. Stuhr

Week of October 24-28

Dear Parents,

What a wonderful first week learning our sight words! The students put in such a lovely effort to their classwork, and I can assume at home as well, to learn the three words. It was very evident on their spelling tests. I was very pleased... and so were they!

Along with our phonics excitement, we also had a great week exploring the numbers 8, 9, and 10. We talked about those numbers in terms of what they “feel” like and we solved math problems - adding and subtracting our way to some fun and interesting results.

This week we will be adding three new words to our “high frequency word” list and beginning our first math workbook.  Our week looks like this:

1.  Phonics 

• review letters K and L (practice our penmanship and word building skills)
• learn about and memorize spelling for HE, A, and I (spelling practice test on Wednesday and test on Friday)

2.  Math

• begin Harcourt Math workbook, Chapter 1: Sorting and Classifying (sorting objects that are alike in some way)

3.  Science

• learn how to describe an object by the material it is made out of and their physical properties 

Halloween Party

Our Halloween Party in on Monday, October 31st. While our party doesn’t officially start until 1:30 pm, here is the schedule for the afternoon’s festivities:

10:00 School-wide Costume Parade*

12:00 Lunch

12:45 Story and Art Project

Our Party Begins!!!

1:30 Relay Games

2:00 Tactile Story

2:30 Decorate Halloween Cookies

*Parents are welcome to stay with us after the parade and through lunch. If anyone would like to bring special treats, etc. during lunch time, feel free. Our party begins at 1:30 after the kids have had a chance to digest their food and rest a little (with a story and an art project).

Thank you for those of you who signed up to help during the party:

Game Helpers (1:30-2:30)

Lisa Stacey

Danielle Biel

Bringing Edible Decorations for our Cookies

Ji Sun Stetson

Christine Coles

Danielle Tew

Lisa Stacey

Party Volunteers (1:30-3:00)

Heidi Downen

Troy Stacey

If you have the afternoon off work, please join us... we’re going to have a spook-tacular time!

As Always...

If you have any questions, comments, or concerns please feel free to email me, stop by the classroom, talk to Ms. Diane, or leave a comment on our blog.  Please become a “follower” of our blog and “like” our school’s Facebook page, if you haven’t already done so.

Have a terrific week!

Mrs. Stuhr

*** Homework is due Friday, October 28th (not 27th)

Week of October 17 - 21

Dear Parents,

Thank you for a very successful  Parent/Teacher Conference week. I truly enjoyed sitting with you and discussing your child’s base knowledge and talking about where we go from here.  If you have any lingering questions, please email me, ask Ms. Diane, or stop by the classroom. 

Starting... now! you will see a real shift in our academic focus. We will continue to review the letters of the alphabet and numbers 0-10 (with a goal of 30), but we are also going to start learning sight words and begin to interact more with numbers (adding and subtracting).  

Please note the new layout of our blog. The columns on the left and right highlight the spelling words for the week and our math concept for the week. Please review this information with your scholar in conjunction with the work due in the homework packet.  In the footer you will find the polls, archives, and followers. There is a new poll for you to answer, as well!

Sight Words

In 1948, Dr. Edward W. Dolch comprised a list of 220 high frequency words that we find in the English language. This Dolch List is still used today in classrooms across the United States to help beginning readers.  The words on the list are called “sight words” and/or "high frequency words" and they make up 50-70% of any general text. Most of the words can not be sounded out and therefore must be memorized.  It includes pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions, and verbs. There is a separate list of 95 nouns which students learn as well.  

For the rest of our school year, we are going to focus on the words that have been isolated for Kindergartners to learn. Each week, we will memorize 3-5 words and have a spelling test at the end of the week. During the week, then, our scholars will be responsible for memorizing the given words and be responsible for writing them correctly when I read them out loud during our test. Our first spelling test is on Friday, October 21st.

The column to the left of our blog has the first three words for this week. As you can see, these three are VERY common when we read. During the week, we will be incorporating these three sight words into our daily practices, giving your child every opportunity to see how these words operate.

If you have a chance to research the Dolch List, please pay attention to the Pre-Primer and Primer word lists. As an aside, we will begin to read more of author Jan Brett during the year, and I will be posting her Dolch List on the News Bulletin Board in our classroom so that you can see what words are coming up. Jan Brett is a lovely artist... so I’m using her lists specifically, just because they’re pretty. 

Mathematics

To begin to learn more about the numbers 0-30, we will start to manipulate those numbers for better understanding. Starting next week, we will be working out of an actual Kindergarten math workbook. Everyday will be a different math lesson and the completed workbook will come home, graded, on Fridays. The homework assigned for the week will reflect that work. 

Jumping Ahead 

Starting in December, we will explore some beginning reading. This will consist of decodable books - short (very short!) books that have words the scholars can “sound out.” We are going to set aside some reading time in class for us to learn to pronounce the words in the book.

Business as Usual

Of course, we will continue to do what we do best: learning a new concept and exploring it through art, science, and history. Expect to see some cool art projects come home and new family activities to do for homework. I will be assigning a new big project in November that will be due right before Thanksgiving break. 

Halloween Party

On Monday, I will post a sign-up sheet for our Halloween Party on our classroom's clipboard.  Halloween falls on a Monday, unfortunately, so I hope you are able to participate in some way...

As Always...

If you have any questions, comments, or concerns please feel free to email me, stop by the classroom, talk to Ms. Diane, or leave a comment on our blog.  Please become a “follower” of our blog and “like” our school’s Facebook page, if you haven’t already done so.

Have a terrific week!

Mrs. Stuhr

Week of October 10 - 14

Dear Parents,

I had a lot of fun spending some quality time with the students last week while I assessed each on his/her skills.  I learned some fascinating information about each child and, most importantly, realized with great pleasure that we have a classroom filled with talented, unique scholars.  But, of course!

I hope you enjoyed seeing the art projects we completed last week as well. Some are on our classroom windows and some came home. We took the “assessment week” as an opportunity to explore new techniques such as mosaics, paper tearing, and drawing from different perspectives (like laying on the ground). A photo of us in action is posted on our TCFS Facebook page, if you have a moment to check it out.

Also, we’ve started to read Charlotte’s Web, by E.B. White, in class. As a treat, when we complete the book, we’ll watch the movie. Look for our art projects that show our comprehension of the story.

This week, we’re back in the swing of things with our academics. Picking up where we left off, we are going to explore:

1. Phonics - Letter G and H
2. Math - Matching Numbers and Building “6”
3. Language Arts - Reading books that remind us of the letters G and H and completing art projects to increase our comprehension level
4. Visual/Performing Arts - Creating more expressions in our Movement Journal

There is homework this week, due Friday. And a Book Worm Bag will come home on Friday, due Monday.

Parent/Teacher Conferences

As some of you have heard, I am out sick Monday and Tuesday - returning Wednesday. My sincerest apologies for having to reschedule some meetings. Thank you for your understanding and flexibility.

This is what I plan to discuss with you during our meeting:

The “results” from my assessments, some insight I’ve gathered into your child, homework, social life, and behavior.  I look forward to talking about how I can support you in making your child’s Kindergarten year a success. 

As Always...

If you have any questions, comments, or concerns please feel free to email me, stop by the classroom, talk to Ms. Diane, or leave a comment on our blog.  Please become a “follower” of our blog and “like” our school’s Facebook page, if you haven’t already done so.

Have a terrific week!

Mrs. Stuhr