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

Blog Update for Week 7

Parents, 


Our blog will be updated tomorrow. I will post this week's Parent/Teacher Conference schedule along with it.


Please also keep an eye towards the top, right corner of this webpage. I will be adding a new survey and will be looking forward to your responses.


Sincerely,
Mrs. Stuhr

Week of October 3 - 7

Dear Parents,

Thank you for coming to school for our Ya Ya Box presentation on Friday, September 30th. The scholars did such a fantastic job sharing their unique personalities. I was especially touched by how much time and effort was put into each box.  Truly, thank you for making the boxes a meaningful experience for your children. We’ll keep the finished products in the classroom for a week so the kids can show them one-on-one to their friends. They’ll come home at the end of the week for you to keep (I’ve had mine for three years now... it’s turned into a fun time capsule, of sorts!).

Assessment Week

As discussed on Friday, this week in class there will be no formal instruction.  As this is the week before our Parent/Teacher Conferences, I will be utilizing the next five days to assess each student so that I’m well prepared to discuss your child during our meeting. 

I will be assessing each scholar on the following information (some oral, some written):

- Letter and sound recognition

- Rhyming

- Number recognition and counting

- Shapes and colors

- Social behavior

- Oral communication & story retelling

- Concepts of Print (information about books)

Please do not feel you need to “prep” your child for this assessment. Each student has a beautifully distinctive way of expressing what he/she knows already. This is not a “pass” or “fail” situation - this is an opportunity to gather information so that we can all learn this year.

Lesson Plan for the Week

What you can expect this week, though, is a lot of organized fun. Most public schools in our area are on vacation this week, but we are not.  Our school is open and still a learning environment.  We will be doing some science projects, art lessons, singing and dancing, along with watching some educational programs and reading some fascinating books.  A few students from our After School Club will be joining us this week and they will each be presenting a lesson to our scholars as well.  But, I will say, if you needed to schedule a dentist appointment or a well-appointment with your pediatrician, this would be the week to do it. Please let Ms. Diane and me know if your child will be late or needs to leave early, so that I can schedule my assessments accordingly.

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