October 15, 2010

Wild Learning in the Kindergarten Jungle

*Heart word of the week: like

*We continued with our pumpkin theme this week.  We focused on the life cycle of a pumpkin and also learned some of the different parts of a pumpkin.  We learned that the stem is also called a peduncle.  The outside skin is called the rind.  The lines down the sides are called the ribs.  We also learned that the circle on the bottom of the pumpkin is where the flower used to be and is called blossom end.

*We did some pumpkin measuring this week.  We measured the circumference and we measured how many cubes tall our pumpkin is.

*Our Farmer's Market opened this week during our community centers.  We practiced sorting, counting, being farmers, being buyers, etc. with this center.

*At our fine motor center (building hand and finger muscles) we had a sunflower and used tweezers to pick the seeds out.

*Some of our other centers included: pumpkin smelling play-doh, bricks, Mr. Pumpkin Head (like Mr. Potato Head), art, and corn in our science table.  

*Our focus book for the week was called, Picnic at Apple Park.  With this book, we practiced recognizing the story structure (beginning. middle, and end).  We also worked on identifying the setting.

*In writing, we wrote stories about pumpkins using our heart word, the.

*We learned a new center this week called, Which Bug Will Win?  With this center, we are practicing counting, comparing, and graphing.  We also practiced sorting bugs this week by some of their different qualities.