Friday, March 4, 2011
So I think spoke to soon when I stated that the cold weather was behind us. Well soon enough it will be. We had a short week in the Pre-K class and have we have just begun our dinosaur and measurement units. English all the time in the class is going very well and the students rarely make any mistakes. Our next goal will be to use proper English when inside the classroom, with an emphasis on proper grammatical sentences.
Since our class is getting bigger we are have now separated with the kindergartners with library and P.E. Our library is the same but our P.E has now switched to Fridays. I have posted the new daily schedule with a few rearrangements below (click on it to enlarge). Due to many circumstances that arise daily this is just a rough timeline.
Sports day will be March 12th at 8:00am in the field behind the school. The students will be put into certain teams and therefore need to wear a certain colour of shirt. Please remember to bring enough water and if necessary sun screen. It should be over by 12:30 and there will be a few food vendors selling lunch and snacks.
Name Team and Colour of shirt they need to wear
Kristopher, Vincent Green Team
Jerrick, Nathan Blue Team
Noah, Duncan, Ashley Red Team
Next week I will be sending home the word rings again. Please practice them with your child. For the new students I have altered them with only a few words. The idea of the word rings is to add a new word a week. These words make up over 25% of all reading. That is why we call them high-frequency words. We have introduced them as words of the week, they are on our word wall and word rings. It is more effective to know these words quickly then to move on to more difficult words. Knowing these words gives the emerging reader confidence and encourages him or her to feel like a reader. Learning these words can begin once the child can recognize many of the letters. The child should also be able to follow “word by word” when they begin to read. To encourage learning these words, you can try some games.
Sports day will be March 12th at 8:00am in the field behind the school. The students will be put into certain teams and therefore need to wear a certain colour of shirt. Please remember to bring enough water and if necessary sun screen. It should be over by 12:30 and there will be a few food vendors selling lunch and snacks.
Name Team and Colour of shirt they need to wear
Kristopher, Vincent Green Team
Jerrick, Nathan Blue Team
Noah, Duncan, Ashley Red Team
Next week I will be sending home the word rings again. Please practice them with your child. For the new students I have altered them with only a few words. The idea of the word rings is to add a new word a week. These words make up over 25% of all reading. That is why we call them high-frequency words. We have introduced them as words of the week, they are on our word wall and word rings. It is more effective to know these words quickly then to move on to more difficult words. Knowing these words gives the emerging reader confidence and encourages him or her to feel like a reader. Learning these words can begin once the child can recognize many of the letters. The child should also be able to follow “word by word” when they begin to read. To encourage learning these words, you can try some games.
*Write the words on cue cards, put them on the floor and jump on them while saying them.
*Use a dollar store fly swatter to swat the words, while saying them.
*Play a hide-and-seek game, hunting for the words. Student love searching for letters and words in the classroom.
*Have your child write the word in paint or on a white board.
Have fun and speak to me if you would like some more reading and writing strategies.
What we did in our centres this week.
Literacy Centres
1. Fishing game with lower and upper case letters.
2. Acrostic name game with writing or pictures.
3. Computer story “Dino Train”
4. Making books about Dinosaurs.
Math and Science Centres
1. Measuring string with blocks.
2. Measure the room using small blocks.
3. Making 3D dinosaurs using Lego.
4. Card game “Go Fish”
Reminders and Notices
1. Please refrain from sending toys to school.
2. Please bring back “Aa, Mm” books.
3. March homework will be sent home March 7th.
4. P.E will now be on Friday afternoons.
5. Sports Day will be March 12th at 8:00 am
6. Making pottery will be April 13th during the school day, please bring in your money..Like always, if you have any questions or concern you can always write me an email or come by and speak to me in person.
Anyone who stops learning is old, whether at twenty or eighty.
Henry Ford
Cheers
Braedon
