Interviewing our principal, Mrs. Frischmann!

It was so much fun learning about what our principal does and what tools she uses! We look forward to interviewing more school helpers! 

September 28,2015

Happy Monday!

What an amazing week we had learning with Brianna! I am excited to use all my new learning in the classroom to support and encourage our students to keep growing! I keep hearing from substitute teachers and other teachers in the building that this group is so sweet and hardworking!  We have a great bunch in room 82!

Upcoming events:

·         October 9: Homecoming- Wear Black and Orange and Crazy Hair

·         October 9: Homecoming Parade

·         October 16^th: Math Morning

·         October 20: Grandfriends and Goodies Family Night-Tell your grandfriends to mark their calendarsJ

·         October 22-23: No School

·         October 27th: Field Trip to Heckrodt Nature Center

PSC News

·         Did you know? The PSC gives a Birthday Book to each NDLC student during the school year. Make sure to ask your child about it near their birthday (or half-birthday)!

·         Join us! The next PSC meeting is Monday, October 5, at 6 p.m. in the school library.

·         Questions? Email NDLC.PSC@gmail.com

WHAT’S HAPPENING IN KINDERGARTEN THIS WEEK

Reading: This week we will be having a celebration to mark the end of our first reading unit. Students have worked so hard to learn to retell their old favorite storybooks using the exact words from the book, sounding like the characters, and using connecting words to keep the story going. We have also done some amazing work in our learn about the world books. Students said everything they could about what they were learning on the page and worked with a partner to say how the pages of the book went together! I can’t wait to see how they continue to grow as readers!

Writing: We are now writing true stories! Students will learn to plan their story across pages, add more details in pictures and words, and add speech bubbles to their writing. At home, you could help your child generate ideas to write about! Practice telling the story orally and asking questions to add more details. This helps students to write more vivid stories. We will practice story telling at school since kids need to be able to verbalize ideas before they can write them!   

Math: There are four new centers this week:

1.     Students will sort pictures that show different quantities of animals. The pictures show groups of 2,3,4,or 5 animals. After sorting, the students will draw their own pictures that they can sort.

2.     Students will use unifix cubes that link together to compare numbers. They will use language such as “Five is more than three because the five tower is taller than the three tower.  

3.    We will play the Hidden Number Game with a partner. Partner 1 chooses 4 cards from a deck of 1-10. He/She places them in counting order and flips one card over. Partner 2 decides what the hidden number is. They flip the card over to check!

4.    Students will practice forming numbers using an app on our classroom iPads.

Word Study: We have four stations that students rotate around throughout the week.

1.     In a game called “I have, Who has”, students will identify letters and/or their sounds. One student will have a card that says, “I have ‘A’. Who has ‘F’?” The student with ‘F’ will say “I have ‘F’. Who has ‘M’?” And so on.

2.    Students will play Boggle to work on letter recognition and simple sight words.

3.     Students will use highlighters to identify certain letters on a page. Page one will ask the students to highlight all of the ‘A’s they see and so on.

4.    Sand writing: This week, the students will use the sand boxes to continue to write the letters in the alphabet as well as sight words (words that occur frequently in the books they will begin to read).

Social Studies: After learning about who the different school community helpers are, we will start to interview some of these helpers to learn exactly who they are and what they do at our school. We will be conducting interviews with Mrs. Geoffery (our school nurse), Mrs. Mitchell (our Administrative Assistant in the office), and Mrs. Frischman (our principal) Then, the students will create books based on what we learned! I am excited to start this projectJ

As always, if you have any questions or concerns, please don’t hesitate to call or e-mail.

September 21

Hello Kindergarten Families!

I can’t believe we are in the fourth week of school already! The Kindergarteners have been doing a great job trying out the strategies and skills they learn in the minilessons!

Brianna Pralitsis, our staff developer from New York, will be joining us at the end of this week. There will be a sub in our room for parts of the morning on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday so that I can partake in staff development with Brianna. She will also be doing some work in our classroom with the kids. This is very exciting for our school! There is so much to learn from Brianna and I can’t waitJ

Upcoming events:

·         September 22^nd: No School

·         September 24^th: Family Night—Hot Dogs and How to Help

·         September 26^th: Simon Cheese Fundraiser

·         October 16^th: Math Morning—this date is different from the original one sent out—make sure you mark your calendarJ

·         October 27th: Field Trip to Heckrodt Nature Center

PSC News

·         Information on Saturday’s Simon’s Cheese fundraiser comes home Monday. You MUST use a flyer for NDLC to receive credit for your purchase. Need more for family and friends? Print them from ndlccharter.org/parents/parent-school-committee.php or pick some up at Thursday’s Family Night. See you at Simon’s Cheese!

·          Can you help? We need parent hosts at Saturday’s fundraiser to help greet customers, open doors, and be personal shoppers. Volunteer slots are one hour long – the fundraiser runs from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Sign up now at http://vols.pt/vt9rHf.

·         Learn more about the Parent-School Committee and how you can help at Thursday’s Family Night. Whether volunteering your time and talents, saving BoxTops and Labels or signing up for fundraisers, our success depends on YOU!

·          Join us! The next PSC meeting is Monday, October 5, at 6 p.m. in the school library.

·         Questions? Email NDLC.PSC@gmail.com

WHAT’S HAPPENING IN KINDERGARTEN THIS WEEK

Reading: This week in Reader’s Workshop, the students are working on retelling and saying more and more of the story. We will also learn to use special connecting words, such as then, after, and, & later, to connect the words of a story. Students will focus on words and lines that are repeated by characters in our story so that we can use the exact same words when we retell the books! Towards the end of the week, we will focus on pointing to words in the book that we can read already! This will set students up for the more conventional reading that is coming soon!

Writing: Our writing shifts from writing informational stories to writing true life stories this week. Today, we used a checklist to make sure our informational writing had everything it needs! On Wednesday, I will introduce narrative, or true story, writing to the class. On Thursday, they will do an on demand writing. That means, the students will have the entire writing block to write a true story without my coaching. This allows me to see what they are already doing as writers and figure out what they need to push their writing forward! I am excited to read some of their true stories!

Math: Students will rotate through 4 math centers after a minilesson each day. The minilessons will focus on adding/subtracting, writing numbers 1-5, and comparing numbers 1-10, and shapes. There are four new centers this week:

1.     We have been reading Anno’s Counting Book in math to focus on numbers 1-10 and count the number of items on each page. Students will create their own counting book.

2.    Students will use a comparing mat to show which number is more and which is less.

3.    Students will work with a classmate and counting chips to find the different partners of numbers 1-5. For example, 3+2 and 4+1 are partners of 5.

4.    Students will sort shapes based on different attributes. They could look at the number of edges, number of corners, straight sides, etc.

Word Study: We have four stations that students rotate around throughout the week.

1.      Salt writing: Students will be writing letters in boxes filled with salt.

2.    Students are working with puzzles that match lowercase letters with their uppercase partner.

3.     ABC Busted!: In this game, students pick a card out of a bucket. They tell the group which letter is written on the card. When someone picks up the card with the sticker on it, they are busted! Everyone puts their cards back into the bucket and start over.

4.    Students are using stamps to match uppercase and lowercase letters.

Social Studies: This week, we will begin our School Study unit. Throughout the unit, we will be exploring who the community helpers are in our school and conducting interviews to learn more about what they do! We will be learning about interviews and planning what kinds of questions we are going to ask our school community helpers.

As always, if you have any questions or concerns, please don’t hesitate to call or e-mail.

Thanks,

Molly Santkuyl

(920) 766-6116 ext.3387

Kindergarten Teacher

New Directions Learning Community