May 2-6

We are in the final stretch of Kindergarten! Wow, how time flies! A new monthly homework calendar is coming home Monday. Remember to send those back to school each Friday so that we can celebrate the reading and writing that is happening at home! 

 On Tuesday, I will be administering the PALS assessment to students. As you may remember from the beginning of the year, PALS focuses on literacy concepts/skills such as letter sounds, beginning sounds, word identification, and so on. It will be exciting to document student growth! 


Upcoming events: 

• May 3: PALs Testing
• May 12: Family Night--Please return your form by Friday if you plan on attending! 
• May 13: KAT Cookie Decorating Celebration
• May 23: Family Event at the Kaukauna Public Library
• May 26: Half Day--Dismissal at 11:30
• May 27 and 30: No School
• June 1: Field Day--Stay tuned for more info, but if you are thinking about volunteering and will need a background check, please let us know ASAP!  Thanks!
• June 2: Last Day of School--Half Day for Students

What’s happening in Kindergarten this week?

Reading: Readers will explore poetry this week! Reading familiar poems and songs helps students to build fluency and expression while reading. We will talk about the rhythm and phrasing while reading familiar poems. Students will also add more poems to their poem binders to prepare for our celebration at the end of the week! 

Writing: Now that we are off and running with true stories, we will talk about adding a setting into our stories and studying how writers can get ideas from other authors. We will use the story, Knuffle Bunny, to help us figure out how to become even stronger writers. Writers will discover how to add an ending and a captivating beginning to their stories. Finally, writers will add feelings to show and tell how they felt. 

Math: A big idea in math this week is shapes. We will practice drawing, creating, and naming different shapes. Students will also work on shape orientation and characteristics. We will rotate through the following centers: 

• Students will build shapes using play doh, pipe cleaners, straws, etc. They will write down characteristics of the shapes they build. 
• Students will practice listening skills by listening to short videos on the ipad. The videos will tell the students the position of shapes. The students will then move foam shapes to the position that they heard. For example, the hexagon is above the triangle. 
• Mathematicians will use dice and cubes to build, compare, and order numbers. 
• We will practice adding and subtracting within ten using a ten frame. 

Word Study: Our sight words are: they, first, next, last.  These words will be extremely helpful in our true stories in Writers Workshop.   

We will be working on these endings in our sorts: ip, ig, and ill. 

Here are our sight words. 

Science: Our inquiry continues as we ask ourselves, “How can we make a ball?” On Tuesday, we will use many different materials to try to create balls. We will look explore balls that were cut in half to decide what we should use when we are making them. Later in the week, we will introduce ramps. We will watch videos to build our knowledge and visit the gym to do tests on a large ramp.