May 27, 2011

Wild Learning in Kindergarten

-Continue reviewing heart words so your child can read and spell them correctly.

-The reading strategies we worked on this week included rereading and using the illustrations when we do not understand something.

-In writing, we started creating a fiction book about pirates looking for treasure.

-During our math time, we practiced solving addition and subtraction problems.

-A few of our community centers this week had a pirate theme to them.  At our art center, we made telescopes out of paper towel tubes.  In dramatic play, we reenacted a pirate song about someone looking for treasure.  We also made our own treasure maps.

May 20, 2011

 

Wild Learning in Kindergarten

-We are all finished with heart words.  Review old heart words!

-We read some dinosaur books this week and practiced asking questions to ourselves to help us better understand the story.  We also worked on distinguishing between fantasy and reality while we read the dinosaur books.

-As a class this week, we wrote a fiction story about a lost caterpillar!  We practiced brainstorming, using transitional words, and creating a story that has a beginning, middle, and end.

-In math, we were introduced to two new math centers.  One math center gives us "blue prints".  From these "blue prints", we have to build a 3-D creation.  The other math center works with pattern blocks.  We have to manipulate the pattern blocks so they all fit together and fill one large shape.

-Our science time focused on learning about some of the body parts of butterflies.  We also learned about some of the functions of those body parts.  One of our favorite activities was acting out the life cycle of a butterfly.  While we were a butterfly, we were able to apply some of the information we learned about butterfly body parts.

-Many of our community centers continued to follow our butterfly theme.  We really enjoyed our art center!  We cut out a butterfly, painted one side of it, folded it in half and discovered that it made the exact same design on the other side!

-On Thursday, we played a little game to learn that Mrs. Matulis is having a boy!  Afterward, we enjoyed a special blue treat!

May 13, 2011

Wild Week of Learning in Kindergarten

-Last heart word of the week: where

-The reading strategy that we focused on this week was categorizing.  We practiced thinking about how to group things together.

-During our writing time, we did a variety of activities.  As a class, we practiced using the words "first", "next", "then", "last", to write about the life cycle of a butterfly.  Also, we added some writing to our butterfly garden.  We made labels and speech bubbles to teach people what is in the garden.

-For math, we added a new center called, Frog Jump Measuring.  We jump like a frog and measure how far we were able to jump.

-In science, our focus this week was learning more about caterpillars.

-Our community centers were once again full of butterfly activities.  One of our favorite activities was making a caterpillar out of grass seed, dirt, nylons, and pipe cleaners.

-This week, we also had the opportunity to work in the garden!

May 6, 2011

Wild Learning in Kindergarten

-Heart word of the week: me

-The reading strategy we focused on this week was asking ourselves questions while we are reading.

-In math, we finished up making and solving our frog and toad story problems.

-For science, we began our unit on butterflies.  This week, we focused on the life cycle of a butterfly.  We also created a butterfly garden within our classroom.  We constructed plants and flowers.  We also made all the different stages of a butterfly and hung them in our garden.

-Our community centers were full of butterfly activities.  In our butterfly garden, we acted out the life cycle of a butterfly.  We also practiced retelling some butterfly books in our butterfly garden.  Another highlight from our centers this week was observing our caterpillars.  We enjoyed checking them out with magnifying glasses and writing about them in our butterfly journals.