Special Visitor

We were busy again in Germany today.  We added hair and beards to our nutcrackers and hung them in the hall, we added glitter to our Christmas lights, ate a ginger snap from Germany and then wrote about what it tasted like.  We made a poster about it and hung it with our gingerbread men from yesterday.  Next week we will graph the colors of our nutcrackers' jackets for one of our morning math centers.  We will also sort and make patterns with bows and add presents and ornaments to Christmas trees.  It should be fun!

We had three special visitors today.  My sister, brother- in- law and my kindergartner Gann came by for a visit. Gann did not want to leave and spent the afternoon with us.  We watched Rudolph during rest time today.  A special treat from Kathy the Elf.  She left us a box of Christmas movies and popcorn.  What a special treat!

Hallo from Germany

We had a good flight to Germany today.  We flew over the ocean and raced a few dolphins and then we flew over snow capped mountains.  When we landed we went straight to a bakery where they needed help icing gingerbread men.  We helped them out and ended up with some great looking gingerbread men!

After lunch we added a square present to our Christmas shape books and even got to add a bow on top.

When we got back to the room after PE it was time to make our nutcrackers.  The children did a fabulous job following directions and working together.  Their nutcrackers turned out very cute.

Holiday Travel

I hope your child was not too jet lagged this afternoon from our quick trip to Holland today.  We began our Christmas Around The World unit and visited Holland on our first stop.  We learned that Sinterklaus visits the children of Holland in a boat loaded with packages.  The children collaged a picture of that scene today.  We also learned that children in Holland leave their shoes out, instead of stockings, for Sinterklaus to leave treats in.  Since we were in Holland we left our shoes in the hall during rest time and when we woke up there were treats in them.  It was very exciting! 

We also began working on our Christmas Shape Books.  Today we added a diamond ornament to our book.

Kathy the Elf has been visiting us every night and leaving us messages.  Last night she added eyes to our Mr. Potato Head.  We get to add a piece when we are following directions and are "caught" being good.  We are trying to make him complete so we can have a PJ/ movie party the last day of school before Christmas break.  I'm sure your child will keep you updated on our progress!

Our next "trip" will be to Germany on Thursday.  Fun, fun!!

Field Trip Fun!

  After the initial disappointment that we were not going to the movies with popcorn and Cokes the children really enjoyed their trip to Children's Theater.  The performance was just for us.  They know how special your children are!  Our elf  Kathy asked us to tell her friends there that she said "hi".  Of course the children remembered.  When we got back to school we found kisses all over our rug.  I think Kathy the Elf's friends had already told her how great the class was at Children's Theater.  It was quite a  treat!!  To go with the neat Christmas tree Kathy brought us this morning we finished our trees that we painted yesterday.  The children free painted them, cut them out and decorated them today.  They really brighten our room!

Big Surprise!

This morning as we gathered on the rug for calendar time we noticed a red and green linking chain and a little stuffed girl in the rocking chair.  There was a note she had written (with very poor handwriting according to the children) to us on our Daily News board.  It said:

  Dear Friends,

   I am here to help you get ready for Christmas.  I will help you count the        days.

  Love,

  Kathy the Elf

We were not sure what to do with the linking chain.  After a lot of discussion and looking at our December calendar we figured out there are 13 days of school left until we get out of school for Christmas.  At the end of each day someone who has had a great day with no behavior problems will get to tear a link off.  We will then add a link for each day we are at school in December.  We will  be able to compare the lengths of the chains and use them to measure different items in the room.  We can't wait to see what Kathy the Elf does next!

We also free painted Christmas trees today.  Tomorrow the children will cut them out and decorate them.  We will hang them up with the adorable elves the children made yesterday.  Our room is beginning to look very festive!

Don't forget tomorrow is our Children's Theater field trip.  We will be seeing the Elves and the Shoemaker.

One Little, Two Little, Twenty Little Indians...

You may have dropped of girls and boys this morning at school or the bus, but I am returning Indian Braves and Princesses to you this afternoon!  They were so excited to wear their gear today: Indian t-shirts, headbands and necklaces.  We were lucky to go outside for recess and were able to take some cute pictures on the playground which I will post this weekend.

I hope all of you have wonderful Thanksgiving!  Thanks for all you do to make our class a success.

GOBBLE, GOBBLE!!!

WHEW!

This has been quite a day.  All my little Indians have been busy getting ready for our big day tomorrow.  We made colorful macaroni necklaces in many patterns, traced and cut out feathers for our headbands, worked on  reading color words and sponge painted our Indian shirts.  They look great!  We also completed the final page of our Thanksgiving books.  They are precious.  I know you will want to share them with your families over the holidays.  Our room looked like it had been hit by a tornado many times today, 

but it is finally back together. YEA!!

Tomorrow we will have a special Thanksgiving snack reminiscent of the first Thanksgiving.  We still have apple cider form our Apple Day Celebration that has not been opened.  We will also have peanuts, popcorn and possibly pumpkin bread too.  It won't be a huge feast, but it will be delicious!  

Ask your child about the new Thanksgiving songs we learned today and to sing our Indian chant for you.  

They love them all.  

Gobble, gobble!!

YUM!!

 The lunchroom staff prepared their annual Thanksgiving feast today and it was delicious!  The children really enjoyed it too. 

Today we tied our shirts with rubber bands to get ready to tie dye.  The children are excited to see what their shirts will look like on Monday.  We learned a fun Indian chant and talked about how their parents will send them to school as girls and boys on Tuesday morning and will be surprised to see Indian Braves and Princesses return in the afternoon.  As you can imagine there were lots of "what if" questions that followed!

If you have not sent in your Children's Theater permission slip yet please do so tomorrow.  THANKS!

New Math Centers

This morning we added a new addition to our morning routine.  Up until today when the children arrived they have put their backpacks up, written their name and placed it in a pocket chart.  Next, they place their typed name in another pocket chart pocket based on the beginning sound of the picture in that pocket.  For example, one of the pockets may have a picture of an alligator in it.  All children whose name begins with an /a/ sound place their typed name in that pocket too.  This is to encourage their recognition of beginning sounds.  Soon we will begin the same process with last names.  

 Today we began having math centers following our welcome to school activities.  Every day each table will complete one math center activity that will be rotated during the course of the week to each table.  This week the children are tracing and cutting out a turkey and then adding up to 8 feathers to their turkey.  During writing time they will write "My turkey has __ feathers" to go along with it.  As a follow up to our feather decorating for our huge turkey outside of our room the children are graphing the different colored feathers.  They are creating patterns on their Indian headbands.  Finally, they are counting and writing numbers on a turkey sheet.  They really enjoyed this new addition this morning.  I think it is a great way to continue to reinforce our math curriculum during a busy time in our day when notes are being returned to me, attendance and lunch count are taken, and other housekeeping jobs are taken care of in our classroom. 

I'll keep you updated on all of the fun and learning that occurs!

Goodbye Rain!

We were so excited to go to the playground today.  The children definitely needed to run around!  Hopefully the rain will stay away until after Thanksgiving. 

Today we worked or our Thanksgiving books and completed a page about the houses pilgrims lived in long ago.  The children "built" houses with Popsicle sticks and added roofs, windows and doors to them.  According to the finished products pilgrims had great landscaping!  The children also wrote about their rain paintings from yesterday.  The children chose different colors to put on their paper and let the rain do the painting.  They all look really neat.

Please send your early dismissal form in asap for Friday.  Thanks!

Fall Festival

Thanks to all of you for your generous support of the Fall Festival.  Rumor is that it was the best one ever.  I believe it!  Check out all of the cute pictures from the day.  Have a great weekend!

Think Central

We have a very exciting link that will be added to our class page and of course given here for our reading program.  It is called Think Central and can be accessed at: by clicking here.  The site allows your child to see all of the stories we read at school along with books that they can read, or begin to read, on their own.  You will also be able to print practice sheets from the workbooks we use at school along with additional practice pages.  We will take a tour of the site once our projector is in, but if you want to go ahead and "play" with it on your own that will be great. 

When logging in it will ask you for the state, school system and school.  You must fill in these blanks or it will not log you in.  There is a box underneath the school name box that asks if you want it to remember that information.  I would check remeber here to make things easier in the future.

Your child's login is their first (or the name they go by) and last name with no spaces and the password trucks.  It does not matter that everyone has this information.  There is no individualized data entered that will affect your child's progress.

Please let me know what you think of it and have fun!

Weekly Reminders

Don’t forget the Fall Festival is this Friday, November 12^th.  If you have not already sent in money for tickets or an armband please do so by Wednesday.  If the children do not have money for the Fall Festival they will not participate.  They will watch a movie with Mrs. Carlisle during our festival time (8:15 – 10:15).

Thanks to all of you who have sent in candy and prizes.  We still need a lot of both so if you have not sent any in we would greatly appreciate it!

Also, we still need one more volunteer for our booth during the 12:45 – 2:45 shift.  If you are available please let me know. 

The children did a great job disguising their turkeys for Thanksgiving.  They loved sharing them this morning.  We are now writing about them and will display our writing alongside our turkeys.

Don’t forget to send in a plain white t-shirt by Wednesday.  We are going to make a special Thanksgiving shirt with them.

Please let me know if you have any questions about anything.

Great Day!

We had our best day of school yet today!  The children got stickers for great behavior in P.E. and several were able to go to the treasure box at the end of the day.  They also did a great job with their letter sounds today.  Please continue working with your child on letter sounds at home.  Using flash cards and asking for the letter and the sound is a great way to practice.

Thanks to those of you who have volunteered for the Fall Festival next Friday.  We still need at least three more volunteers to help that day so please let me know as soon as possible if you can help.  Thanks also to those of you who have sent prizes in for our booth.  Once again if you have any left over Halloween candy you would like to get rid of we would be happy to take it!  Finally, remember we do not have school next Thursday so try to get your armband/ ticket money in by Wednesday so it's all taken care of Friday morning.

Notes Home

This afternoon your child is bringing home three blue notes.  One is a permission slip for our December 2nd field trip to Children's Theater to see "The Elves and the Shoemaker".  These productions are always so well done.  I know the children will love it.  The permission slip should be returned by Friday, November 19th.  We asking for a donation of $7.00 to help cover the cost of the trip.

The second note is asking you to send an old white t-shirt that fits your child in by next Wednesday, November 10th.  We will be using these for a special Thanksgiving project.  If the shirt is stained it won't matter because I will be tie-dying these after the children have wrapped them in rubber bands.

Finally, there is a note about our fall festival that is next Friday, November 12th.  Our class is in charge of the "Go Fish" booth.  We need to accumulate around 700 prizes for the booth.  Candy, bubbles, Dollar Store finds all make great prizes.  We also need workers for our booth.  Please let me know if you can help out.

Today we finger painted giant turkey feathers for our turkey that will go up in the hall in a day or two.  Tomorrow the children will add a little glitz to their feathers.  They are very excited about that!

I think all of the Halloween sugar kicked in today!  I've had a very chatty bunch.  I reminded them that they need to listen and follow directions the first time today.  Maybe by tomorrow it will kick in!

We Voted!

We had several elections in our room today.  The children had to place their favorite color in the ballot box when they arrived this morning.  We counted and graphed the votes together and the winner was...GREEN!  Later in the morning we raised our hands to vote for our favorite farm animal.  Horses won by a landslide.  We have also been reading books this week about elections and political offices.  The children had a lot of fun voting and were very excited to learn the outcome of their elections.

Our "Turkey Disguise Homework Project" is due Monday, November 8th.  Please visit the following link to see examples by another class.  This should be a fun project for you and your family.  You may use any materials you choose, but please keep in mind they need to stay disguised for two weeks.  In other words the more glue the better!  Please let me know if you have any questions.

The Fall Festival is Friday, November12th.  Our class is responsible for the fishing booth.  If you are available to work a shift for our class please let me know.  We will need the booth covered all day long..  We also need prizes for the booth.  If any of you want to get rid of leftover Halloween candy please send it in.  It would make great prizes.  Dollar Store goodies are also welcome.  Thanks!


Turkey Disguises

Back on Track, At Last!!

We have had a great two days getting back into the swing of things in kindergarten.  Thanks to all of you for your understanding and get well wishes the last couple of weeks.  I think we are all ready to charge ahead now and find out what is next in kindergarten.  This week, of course, we are having fun celebrating Halloween.  Yesterday we made some very cute witches and today we made treat bags for them.  These witches are very particular and only like treats that begin with a /w/ sound.  The children filled their bags with watermelons, wagons, windows, watches and little witches.  They are hanging on the wall outside our room and look very festive.

Our new star word for this week is like.  The children are already very familiar with this word because of its popularity in our Daily News.  Therefore our updated Star Words include: I, a, my, the, am, like, to & go.  When you also consider the letter sounds we have discussed including /at/ words the children are reading several words.  Look for them as you are reading nightly with your child.

Fabulous Fire Prevention Friday

Today kindergarten students visited with the Leeds Fire Department in the gym to discuss fire safety and prevention.  Sparky the Fire Dog (who according to Andrew is not real, just a dude dressed up in a costume) and a Ghost Buster visited with them to share important information.  I am sure your children will be ready to share lots of fire tips with you over the weekend.

Don't forget our fun farm field trip is coming up next Wednesday.  The children are so excited!  We have been talking about the farm and working on a farm vocabulary list and a farm book about the animals on the farm.  They are really enjoying this unit.

Have a GREAT weekend!

We have been really busy this week with end of the nine weeks assessments.  You will receive the results as part of your child's report card which will go home on the 14th.  We will then go over those assessments and your child's DIBELS scores during our conference on the 19th or 20th.  I know some of the other kindergarten teachers have already sent their DIBELS scores home, but I really prefer to go over them with you so you understand exactly what they mean.  Conference times will be coming home Friday.  I will schedule them between 3:15 - 6:00 on those two dates.  If one of those dates is not good for you (or neither is) please let me know.  I am also happy to meet at 7:45 if that is a better time for you.

The children have a substitute today because I am at a technology meeting.  They will also have one next Tuesday - Thursday.  I will be at an ARI meeting those days.

We are discussing the farm at school on preparation for our field trip next week.  They are really excited about the field trip.  We have it marked on our calendar so we always know how many more days we have to go before the trip.  Thanks to everyone for sending their field trip permission slips back.

Don't forget the book fair continues through Friday.  The children have had a lot of fun shopping. I can't wait to do some for our class.  Happy Reading!

Field Trip Information

Our Baker Farm field trip is coming up on the 13th of October.  If you have not yet returned your child's permission slip please do so tomorrow.  Your child will not be able to go on the field trip without a signed permission slip.  Also, if you did not return your lunch request form today please do so tomorrow.  They will need to order the food for our trip soon so we need an accurate number.  Drinks will be provided for the trip so please do not include one in your child's lunch.

Next week we will begin studying the farm to prepare for our trip.  This is a fun unit that the children really enjoy.

Today we began blending sounds together to make words.  We talked about the "at" family and sounded out words in that family.  Try writing a few "at" words like cat, rat, mat, flat, bat and sat on  a piece of paper and sound them out with your child.  They were very excited to be reading the words!

Letter Sounds

Today we worked more on our patterning in math and letter sounds.  Beginning letter sounds are our main focus at the moment.  The more you can work with your child on this the better.  You don't need anything other than the two of you to get started.  When you are in the car, taking a walk, waiting for an appointment or even when your child is in the tub you can ask them what sound they hear at the beginning of words.  Any words with any beginning sounds will work.  You can begin with familiar words like names of friends, relatives and stores and move on to any word you can think of.  This is critical to their reading development.  The more practice the better! 

Patterns Everywhere

Today in math we worked on patterning.  This is something we do every day during calendar, but today the children were given opportunities to create patterns with objects in the classroom.  This is a fun activity that they can easily do at home with different cereals, M&M's or other candies, or just a piece of paper and a few crayons.  This is a skill I will be testing them on for the first nine weeks report card.  Please work with them on  this at home.  Thanks!

Topsy Turvy Monday!

Our room was a mess for a while this afternoon!  We needed a new program installed on our computer and in order to do so we had to move the student computer across the room so we would have an Internet connection.  This had to be done when the children came back from P.E.  They were very helpful by sitting quietly for me.  I really appreciated it!

Beginning tomorrow the children will be able to visit the computer during literacy centers and free choice centers.  I know they will really enjoy the sites that I have selected for them.  I will put links to some of the sites up so you can check them out and visit them with your child from home sometimes.

We are getting another for our computer in a few weeks and we would love more.  If you or someone you know has one they would like to donate that would be great!  A printer would also be wonderful to have so they could print their work from time to time.  Just let me know!

This week we will be discussing the letter Aa, which means we will begin blending letter sounds to make words.  Very exciting!!!

If you have not already done so please read the post on "Our Apple Day Glog" and visit the site.  There are lots of cute pictures and videos from Apple Day last Friday on the Glog for you to see and share.

Our Apple Day Glog

Please click here to visit  Our Apple Day Glog .  A Glog is an online poster that contains pictures, video and text that you can design for any topic.  They are a lot of fun to make and best of all it's free!  This would be a fun rainy day project for you and your child.  If you ever make one please share it with me.  I hope your weekend is going well.  See everyone Monday!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JOHNNY APPLESEED!

We had so much fun today celebrating Johnny Appleseed and apples!  We began the day with calendar time as usual, but the rest of the day was very special.  Instead of only having a few children share for Daily News all of the children were able to share their favorite kind of apple.  Best of all we could all read the news!

We then began our apple centers.  The following stations were set up for the children: match the number of seeds in an apple with the correct number, make patterns using small apple cut outs that have the letters we have studied on them thus far, a sight word memory game, making stained glass apples to hang in our windows, and a page in our Johnny Appleseed book.  Felix's mom came in today and helped with an art activity where the children made an apple core.  They are really cute!

Seth was our first Big Dog of the Week and his mom was our Mystery Reader today.  She read one of Seth's favorite books and answered questions about Seth.  The children enjoyed interviewing her!

We really enjoyed tasting different apple treats.  We had apple pie, apple juice, apple cider, apple cookies and apples of course!  We tasted red, green and yellow apples and dipped them in caramel dip, cinnamon caramel dip and apple butter.  The children all tried everything and most of them ate every bit of their treats.

Thanks to all of you who sent something in to make our apple day a success.  We even have a few leftovers for extra snacks and treats.  Pictures of the day will be posted on Monday so please check back and see how much fun we had today.

Mark your calendars now for our next special day on Wednesday, October 20th, the 50th day of school.  We will have a special 50's Day Celebration dressing like the 1950's and listening to the golden oldies.  We will explore the number 50 and celebrate the half-way to 100 mark.  More information will be coming soon!

Tomorrow is Johnny Appleseed Day!

We cannot wait for Johnny Appleseed Day tomorrow.  We made cute hats today that look like the pot Johnny wore on his head.  We will get to wear them tomorrow.  We listened to some new letter sound songs today from Dr. Jean.  She is one of our favorite artists.  One is cause Letter Aerobics.  We got quite a workout!  As you read with your child and point out letters ask him or her what the letter sounds is. Everyone needs help with this.  It will help them so much as they begin to sound out words to both read and write.

Thanks to everyone for all of the goodies you have sent in for tomorrow.  We are going to have a GREAT day!!! 

This Week

The Reading Binders are coming home today along with the children's red folder.  In their red folder you will find a yellow note from the counselor and a blue note from me about apple day on Friday.  There is a list of items on the apple note that we would love to have for our celebration Friday.  If you can send something in that would be great!  There are a lot of choices for the big day.  Please send them in by Thursday (even though the note says Wed.).

Your child's first homework assignment is coming home today too.  These will be coming home now whenever your child returns one after three days (at least) of working at home.  This is an excellent way to review letters and sounds at home and to reinforce the ones we have introduced at school.  Please take the time to work on this with your child on a daily basis.  The more reinforcement the better!  Your child will get a special treat when they return their homework.

Please remember PTO is tomorrow night at 6:30.  There will be some great information about Dibels testing and our reading program presented at the meeting.  Hope to see you there!

Great Week!

We had a great week at school this week!  The children really seem to be settling in to our daily routine and the expectations of our classroom.    They have really enjoyed our apple study and learning about Johnny Appleseed. I will post pictures Monday of the precious Johnny's they made today.  They did a great job following directions!

I am in the process of setting up my desktop computer and moving files from my laptop to it.  Because of this I did not send our regular weekly reports today.  They will be coming home again next Friday.

Have a great weekend!

Hooray for Math Books!

We received our class set of math workbooks today.  The children were so excited!  I gave then a few minutes to look through the book before we tore out our first page.  We had to look at pictures and decide which object did not fit in with the other pictures.  Sometimes it was because of the color of the object and sometimes it was the object itself.  The children did a great job!  They will not be bringing the math book home, but will bring completed pages home that have been torn out of the book.  I will have it available during our conferences for you to look through.


Great job on the reading logs last night!  The children were excited to share what they have been reading at home.  Keep up the good work!

Look What We Did!!

Our new clothespin name center.  The children clip the letters in their name 

above the letter on the name card. 

We made a block tower by working together and listening to positional words.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Building Johnny
Appleseed's house for our books.

We had a lot of fun today as you can see!

Apple Math

We had a lot of fun working on our apple math today!  This week we are studying positional words and this math activity gave us an opportunity to show how much the children are learning.  The children were asked to color blue above a crease in their paper and green below.  They were then asked to place the tree trunk in the middle of their paper.  Next, they were given green paper that they had to cut in to a round shape for the leaves and glue it on the top of the tree trunk.  They were then asked to glue apples on top of the leaves.  Finally, they were asked to cut out a basket and place it on top of what they had colored green, next to the tree and fill it with apples that would be glued on the top of the basket.  They then counted the apples in the basket and wrote the number on their paper.  They were great listeners, mathematicians and artists during this activity!  I will upload a picture of the finished product to our blog tomorrow.  Stay tuned!!!

Johnny Appleseed

Today we began our unit on apples and I introduced Johnny Appleseed to the children.  They love his name and that he wore a pot on his head.  We began illustrating our books on Johnny Appleseed and will continue working on them through next week.  We are working on creating a list of words to describe apples.  They used some great descriptive words today.  We will continue adding to our list tomorrow.  We are also going to be illustrating a book called "The Little Red House With A Star Inside".  This will be one of their pocket chart stories during our literacy centers.  They will also be solving name puzzles, stamping their names and our list of Star Words.

Please continue reading to your child every night.  I am working on their reading binders and hope to send them home Wednesday for the first time.  Please review them with  your child daily.  The binder will be compiled of poetry that they are familiar with and should be able to read to you or with you.  You will also include the name of the book(s) you read with your child each night.  This will become a very special part of your day when, hopefully, your child will share about our day at school and impress you with their reading.  Make sure to point out the following Star Words when reading with your child.

                                                          Star Words
                                                          
                                                       I    a    my    the

Class Newsletter

Please follow the following link to our September 13th Weekly Newsletter:

Sept. 13th Newsletter

Busy Days

We have concluded our Nursery Rhyme Unit and will begin our Apple Unit next week.  Your child will be bringing their Nursery Rhyme Book home next week for you to keep at home.  Please review the rhymes with your child.  It is a great way to work on their reading skills, even if you are doing most of the reading.

We are continuing our letter of the day study as well.  Today we searched for Uu's in our names and daily news.  Next week we will complete our letter of the day study and will have an alphabet celebration next Friday.  It will be a lot of fun! 


Congratulations to Emma Grace our first Star Student!  She attended a  Star Student party on Wednesday complete with playground time and slushes ~ What fun!!!  Everyone is working hard to be the next one selected.  Good luck to all of you!!!

New Centers

Today we began working at  new centers to help the children become even more familiar with the letters in their names and their friends' names.  They put name puzzles together for themselves and classmates, looked for the letter Rr in their names.  We also got the Play-Doh out to form letters on letter mats and sorted letters A-E printed in many different fonts.  This is an important skill that will help them to immediately recognize letters regardless of how they look.

Tomorrow I will be sending home information for our first Scholastic Book order.  Please look through the selections with your child to find the perfect book.  If you need any suggestions don't hesitate to ask.

Class Update

Our class web page on the LES site has been created.  There are pictures of your precious children, a copy of our weekly report, discipline information and a copy of our schedule to get us started.  I think you will find this a great way of keeping up with our class and things we are working on (like our first nine weeks star words).  Please check this site frequently for important updates.

LES Mrs. Trucks' Class
I hope you are all enjoying a great long weekend.

Surprises this Morning

This morning when the children arrived they found a new brightly colored floor mat in our circle time area.  The rug that had been there has definitely seen better days! 

We are already to letter Pp in our letter a day study.  Today the children completed a following directions pizza activity by themselves, painted a purple Pp on pink paper, and made a long list of p words.  Try pointing out Pp words and making the /p/ sound with your child over the long weekend.  I think they will have a lot of fun and discover Pp is a popular letter!

The Scarecrows Are Here!

We don't have to worry about crows on the kindergarten hallway this September.  Our class has created some very cute scarecrows to scare them away.  Please stop by sometime this month to see them hanging in our hallway.

We had a very good day at school today and learned a lot about the letter Oo.  We painted an octopus O, practiced writing Oo's and learned about words that begin with Oo. 

We read the book Kelly In the Mirror.  Kelly does not think she looks like anyone in her family.  Her parents think her brother and sister look like them, but no one says anything about who she looks like.  Kelly finds some of her mom's things from when she was a little girl including a scrapbook.  She finds a picture of her mom that looks just like her.  That makes Kelly feel very special. We talked about who people think we look like.  I showed them a picture of my family's three new kittens.  They are brother and sisters, but look nothing alike.  This can be true for humans too! 

Scarecrows are Coming!

This is our month to decorate the large bulletin board at the end of the Kindergarten hallway.  We made shape scarecrows today that will hang there throughout the month of September.  Even though the same materials were used they all look very different.  The children did an excellent job following directions as we worked on our scarecrows this morning.  I am very proud of their hard work!

Monday Message

Today we talked more about the letter Mm and the sound it makes.  We looked for it in our names, in the daily news, in "Little Miss Muffet" and in other words printed in our room.  We had a visit from the library ladies today and read several good books.   Tomorrow we will be working on shape scarecrows for our big bulletin board in the hall. 

Happy Birthday to Jakell!!  He brought everyone a treat bag for his birthday that is coming home with them today.  Thanks Jakell!!

Fabulous Friday

Today our snake in the hall gained 21 little snake friends.  The children painted stripes on their papers and then added S's that looked like snakes to their papers.  They were all very creative with their stripe patterns.

We also graphed M&M's to celebrate the /m/ sound. They did a great job sorting, counting and graphing their M&M's.  Of course eating them when we finished was the best part of all!

Have a great weekend and enjoy looking at your child's "I" sentences and partner writing that are coming home today.  Don't forget to ask your child about their work.  There are many stories behind it I promise!

Ssssssssss is for Snake!

We had a busy day at school today looking for Kk's in our Daily News and in each others names.  Jakell is our only classmate with a K in his name.  It was his big day!  We also read the book Something Special that we took a picture walk of yesterday.  Our predictions were correct!  The raccoon in the story, Sam, had trouble finding something special that he was good at, but when he finally did everyone was very excited.  Ask your child about the story tonight.

During centers we made a long list of great Ss words and a long snake.  We had a snake parade into the hallway where we laid him down on our way to P.E.  When we returned he had slithered down the hall, up the wall and froze into an Ss shape on the wall outside our room.  Everyone was very surprised!

P.S.  Look for all of the Ss's in this post with your child.  Have fun!!

Wednesday, August 25th

Today we looked for and discussed the letter Jj.  We have several friends whose names start with Jj in our class.  We went on a picture walk in the book Something Special.  We looked at the pictures and predicted what is happening in the story.  Tomorrow we will read the story and see if our predictions are correct.

During our center time today we completed a "Jack and Jill" page for our Nursery Rhyme books and looked for J's in the rhyme.  We also "read the room".  This is done by using a pointer and looking for and reading familiar names, letters, numbers and words that are throughout our room.  Other centers included blocks, books, and shape pegs.

As you can tell we had another busy day at school!

Thanks!

I was so glad to see all of you at our orientation meeting tonight!  I hope I was able to answer any questions that you may have.  Please feel free to email me anytime at ctruckskindergarten@gmail.com

There is one additional bit of info I forgot to mention that your children may have mentioned... The Yippee Clippee.  The children are trying to earn paper clips by doing what they are asked to the first time, or with no reminders.  For example, walking "hip & lips" ( a finger on your lips and a hand on your hips) in the hallway and sitting "criss-cross applesauce" during circle time will earn a clip for you.  Once you have ten plain clips you may turn them in for a colored clip and a visit to the treasure box.  This can happen any day so there is always  a chance of a reward.  The children have really responded well to this and are very excited when they earn a clip.

Remember to look for the first 9 weeks objectives and your reading log in tomorrow's red folder.

Welcome to Mrs. Trucks' Kindergarten Class!