Weekly Update 11/22

 Thank you to all who came to celebrate and to all who donated items for our Thanksgiving Feast. The students had a great time eating, celebrating, and playing games!

Next week is only 2 days and we hope you have an enjoyable time with family during the long weekend. 

Important Dates:

11/27-11/29: Thanksgiving Break- No School

12/16-18: Early Release days

12/18: Kindergarten Gingerbread Hunt

12/19-1/3: Winter Break -No School

1/6-1/8: Early Release Days/Parent-Teacher Conferences

Check out what we learned this week:

Spalding:                                              

We continue our journey in learning our phonograms. We have learned phonograms 1-50. Please focus on these nightly, as they greatly help their reading progress. It is always fun when they start recognizing 2- or 3-letter phonograms in their books. We also learned, so, no, now, man as new sight words. Please continue to encourage your scholars to use the phonograms they know to sound out spelling words. They can write notes or create stories. 

Literature:

We continued reading Mrs. Piggle Wiggle, where we read the chapter The Slow Eater Tiny Bite Taker Cure where a little boy takes minuscule bites of his meals and then becomes so weak he can hardly stand. He then learns to eat more so he has the energy to do the fun things at Mrs. Piggle Wiggle's house. We also continued with Fables reading The Tortoise and the Hare. The hare learned to not boast so much, and that slow and steady wins the race. we said that throughout the week while completing our different worksheets and projects so that we did our very best work.

Math:

We continued our unit of making and breaking numbers. We have practiced breaking up numbers through ten using the vocabulary "part" and "whole" and slowly have introduced what a number bond looks like and how it works. The students are working to understand that we can break up a number (whole) into two smaller parts. We have practiced this concept using our fingers, pictures, and manipulatives. They have taken an interest in showing different ways to decompose numbers. This concept will serve as a strong foundation as they learn addition and subtraction in the near future. 

History: 

This week, the children enjoyed continuing to learn about the first Thanksgiving. We learned how difficult the first year in the "New World" was for the Pilgrims; without Wampanoag's help, they would not have survived. The children learned about all the trades available during the 17th century, including Farmer, Miller, Spinner, Dressmaker, Tailor, bricklayer, and carpenter, to name a few. The children saw examples of the tools people used back then and how they differ from what we use today. We also learned about the Declaration of Independence and why the American people.

Science:

We continued learning about the needs of living things, and now we are including animals! The students understand that animals are living things, just like plants. We discussed that animals need water, food, and shelter from their environments to survive and how these needs are met based on where they live. We then grouped animals we could find outdoors, thinking about their similarities and differences. While they understand that food is one of the things they need to survive, we started to explore the different types of eaters. They may be herbivores, carnivores, and omnivores. We discussed that an herbivore eats plants, a carnivore eats animals, and an omnivore eats both. We made predictions about different animals and which of the three types of eaters they are. We compared our predictions to the facts we read about them.

Weekly update 11/15

The children did an amazing job with the concert! It was so great to see all of their smiling faces! They were so proud of their accomplishment. Thank you for making it such a memorable night!

 Important Dates:

11/20: Kinder Thanksgiving Feast

11/22: Jeans and Spirit wear day

11/27-11/29: Thanksgiving Break- No School

12/16-18: Early Release days

12/18: Kindergarten Gingerbread Hunt

12/19-1/3: Winter Break -No School

1/6-8: Early Release Days/Parent-Teacher Conferences

Check out what we learned this week:

Spalding:                                              

We continue our journey in learning our phonograms. We have learned phonograms 1-50. Please focus on these nightly, as they greatly help their reading progress. It is always fun when they start recognizing 2- or 3-letter phonograms in their books. We also learned, so, no, now, man as new sight words. Please continue to encourage your scholars to use the phonograms they know to sound out spelling words. They can write notes or create stories. 

Literature:

We continued reading Mrs. Piggle Wiggle, where we read the chapter The Radish Cure. A little girl does not want to bathe and grows radishes on her body because she is SO dirty. We also continued with Fables reading The Dog and his Bone. The dog learned it is more important to be happy with what you have than to be greedy and want more. In grammar, we continue to practice hearing a story and retelling it. We also are continuing to focus on how to write complete sentences.

Math

We continued our unit of making and breaking numbers. We have practiced breaking up numbers through ten using the vocabulary "part" and "whole" and slowly have introduced what a number bond looks like and how it works. The students are working to understand that we can break up a number (whole) into two smaller parts. We have practiced this concept using our fingers, pictures, and manipulatives. They have taken an interest in showing different ways to decompose numbers. This concept will serve as a strong foundation as they learn addition and subtraction in the near future. 

History: 

This week, the children enjoyed continuing to learn about the first Thanksgiving. We learned how difficult the first year in the "New World" was for the Pilgrims; without Wampanoag's help, they would not have survived. The children learned about all the trades available during the 17th century, including Farmer, Miller, Spinner, Dressmaker, Tailor, bricklayer, and carpenter, to name a few. The children saw examples of the tools people used back then and how they differ from what we use today. We also learned about the Declaration of Independence and why the American people.

Science:

We continued learning about the needs of living things, and now we are including animals! The students understand that animals are living things, just like plants. We discussed that animals need water, food, and shelter from their environments to survive and how these needs are met based on where they live. We then grouped animals we could find outdoors, thinking about their similarities and differences. While they understand that food is one of the things they need to survive, we started to explore the different types of eaters. They may be herbivores, carnivores, and omnivores. We discussed that an herbivore eats plants, a carnivore eats animals, and an omnivore eats both. We made predictions about different animals and which of the three types of eaters they are. We compared our predictions to the facts we read about them.

Weekly Update 11/8

  Important Dates:

11/11: Veteran's Day - No School

11/12: Music Concert at Higley Center for the Performing Arts 

11/20: Kindergarten Thanksgiving Celebration: See email for details

11/22: Spirit Wear Day, Treat Friday, Birthday Book Club

11/27-11/29: Thanksgiving Break- No School

12/14-15: Early Release days

12/15: Kindergarten Gingerbread Hunt

12/19-1/3: Winter Break -No School

1/6-8: Early Release Days/Parent-Teacher Conferences

Check out what we learned this week

Spalding

With our busy week, we still had many things to learn. We have learned phonograms 1- 47 so far. We continued working with our /er/ family phonograms using "Her first nurse works early" and practicing our hand movements and cues. This week's new sight words were can, see, run, and the. Keep reviewing the cards at home. Choose 10-15 each night so that the scholars can be confident in using them to begin writing words on their own. 

Literature

This week, we continued to read Chapter 4 of Mrs. Piggle Wiggle. Mrs. Piggle Wiggle helped solve a case of selfishness with her crazy, wacky ways. We continued talking about Fables and how they have lessons or morals for us to learn. We heard the story The Grasshopper and the Ant, where the grasshopper only wanted to play while the ants stored food and prepared for winter. When winter came, the grasshopper was cold and hungry while the ants were ready. We also talked about how it compared to the story of The Little Red Hen. We talked about how it is important to do homework and chores before playing or doing fun things. We also discussed Veteran's Day by reading a story and learning why we celebrate this holiday. In poetry, we heard the poem Diddle, Diddle Dumpling, a silly poem. We also spent time in grammar, talking about phone numbers, and learning that 911 is an emergency number. We sent home a paper for you to help your scholar practice remembering important phone numbers. 

Math

This week the students started to explore how to make and break numbers. We used a lot of hands on manipulatives to understand that a number can be decomposed of two other numbers. We practiced finding the parts to the whole in a group. We would then practice the sentences 2 and 3 make 5 or 5 is 2 and 3. We challenged their minds and asked for them to think further and identify more than one way to break apart a number. This is a crucial foundation for the scholars' number sense and we will spend a lot of time honing in this skill.

History

The children have so enjoyed learning about the First Thanksgiving. We have learned about the differences between the life of a pilgrim and the lives we live today. The children were so interested in seeing a typical bedroom of a pilgrim family and how it differs from their own. One significant difference they noticed was no toys in the bedrooms. Pilgrim children usually played simple games like marbles or 'churning butter,' where they spun around until they fell. While the names have changed over the generations, some of the games we play are similar to that of the pilgrim. 

Science

We only had one day for science this week, so we checked on our growing plants and discussed a plant's life cycle. It was interesting to see that both seeds which were given water grew, but the seed in the darkness grew taller and stayed a whitish yellow, while the seed in the sunshine grew leaves and turned a dark green. We also took time to dissect and investigate a lima bean seed, learning about the seed coat, the seed embryo, and how it will become the new seedling.

Weekly Update 11/1

 Important Dates:

11/11: Veteran's Day - No School

11/12: Music Concert at Higley Center for the Performing Arts

11/20: Kindergarten Thanksgiving Celebration: See email for details

11/22: Spirit Wear Day, Treat Friday, Birthday Book Club

11/27-11/29: Thanksgiving Break- No School

12/16-18: Early Release days

12/18: Kindergarten Gingerbread Hunt

12/19-1/3: Winter Break -No School

1/6-1/8: Early Release Days/Parent-Teacher Conferences

Check out what we learned this week

Spalding:

We had fun this week learning many new phonograms. We learned a new phrase to help remember them: "Her first nurse works early." We even learned how to use our fingers to help remember how they are spelled since they sound the same. We added four new spelling words: a, it, is, she. We will continue to review Rule 4 each time we see a vowel at the end of a syllable. 

Literature                                                  

We continued reading Chapter 3 in Mrs. Piggle Wiggle this week, learning about "the answer-backer cure". Mrs. Piggle Wiggle had a creative idea using a bird to help the girl learn to be kind and respectful with her words. We also read the fable Lion and the Mouse, where we saw that even small creatures can do important things and that you should always try to help someone if you can. For weekly poetry we talked about the longer version of Mary Had a Little Lamb.  In grammar, the full-day students worked on understanding how to use pronouns such as she, him, her, he, them, they, etc. We read a story and practiced using the correct pronoun as the teacher read. 

Math

The scholars finished their unit on comparing numbers this week. We have compared groups physically, pictorially, and abstractly (numerals). Of course the students had the most fun with the hands on manipulatives, but they became well versed in understanding the concept when looking to the numbers alone. The Scholars also practiced finding one more or one less than a given number within 10. We practiced using complete sentences with vocabulary such as: "5 is one less than 6" or "One more than 8 is 9". This would be a great area to practice randomly at home. Try asking "What is one more than 5?" and see if they can defend their answer. 

Science

As we continued our Unit on the Needs of Plants and Animals, we went back to our experiment with the food coloring to discover how roots and stems receive water. It was fun to see the colored lines going up the carrots and celery. We also role-played a trip to the Sonoran Desert and Tallgrass Prarie! We boarded our airplane as we learned about the climate of the desert and how plants survive there. We discussed how plants receive the things they need even in such a dry climate like the desert. We then traveled to the Tallgrass Prairie and discussed how the climates in these two environments differ. We noticed the amount of sunlight and rain each domain receives. 

History

This week we continued our unit about different Native American tribes. The children enjoyed learning about the Native groups from the southwest and learned how Rugs are made by the Navajo people, and learned about Totem Poles from the Northwestern tribes.