Learning About Kindness

Parents:
Shortly after the hurricane this summer I found a baby squirrel that had lost its home and its family. Knowing this was not a pet I found a great wildlife refuge who cares for sick and homeless wildlife.  Upon arriving there I was amazed with what the folks do for the animals.  I explained this story to the kids and they too thought it was pretty neat!  We are, after all, learning about the importance of kindness in kindergarten. :)
In order to help out these little creatures we are going to begin collecting supplies for them beginning Monday, Novemeber 28th - Thursday, December 22nd.  We will incorporate our collection into math and graph and count our supplies as they begin to increase.
I spoke to the folks @ http://www.evelynswildliferefuge.org/
and they need the following and yes, it must be exactly these items/brands:
Bounty Paper Towel-easiest to tear when you are holding an animal in one hand
bird seed- brand doesn't matter
sunflower seeds- UNSALTED
Gerber Baby Food(brand specific)- Stage 2 sweet potatoes,green beans, mixed vegtables, spring vegtables
peanuts- in shells, unsalted
suet- They said it is the cheapest at the Commissary for those of you that can go there.
We have a gigantic holiday stocking to fill and we are excited to start counting!
You may also bring your kindergartener there to see all of the neat animals that are being rehabilitated.
Please E-mail me if you have any questions.
Thank you for making learning fun!

Thanksgiving Centers

Today our Rainbow Valley friends enjoyed interactive activities that were all about Thanksgiving Then and Now. Thank you to all of our parent volunteers who helped to make today a success!

WORD MASTERS

Congratulations to all of our kindergarten friends who have learned their first set of sightwords and have become word masters. If you don't know about Word Masters ask your child.


The children are enjoying posting their name on the Word Master Wall for all to see.


Please remember to have your child practice his or her sight words as often as possible. I will be assessing the second set of sight words after the holiday break.
 

Making Connections

We have been reading the story I Love My Hair and discussing things that we love about ourselves.  I always ask the children to try to make connections to the stories that we are reading because it will help them to comprehend the story.
Here is a perfect example. One of our friends loved the part that read, "The beads click to the rhythm of my walk, helping me remember what we are going to buy." 
Reading is thinking and our kindergarten friend sure was thinking!

Learning Is Fun!

Our Rainbow Valley Friends have been learning about retelling, practicing Turn and Talk, and writing about things they love about themselves.
We read two really great books to help us learn.
Pumpkin, Pumpkin and I Love My hair.
This week we also enjoyed SPARCH where we learned more about Fall and Apples.  The  students created a really colorful art project. 
Ask your child about their learning fun!

Retelling to a partner

Mrs. Ward teaching SPARCH

Following directions

Describing how a pumpkin grows.

I asked, "How are you like a pumpkin?"

Thank You Veterans

Today we learned about Veteran's Day.  Ask your child to share what they learned.

Hands on Learning in the Lab

Today was our first visit to the science lab and it was a success!  
Our Rainbow Valley friends learned all about their senses. They made lots of really neat observations while experiementing at the different stations. Please ask your child to share what they learned.  If you were wondering why your child came home with his or her snack it is because we ate snack in the lab.  One of the stations involved eating popcorn. :) 

Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

Learning, learning, and more learning!

This was a fabulous week in Rainbow Valley.  I throughly enjoyed returning to work.

• This week we started our unit on Pocahontas and Powhatan.  Please review the Pocahontas book that came home today with your child.  Ask them how Pocahontas was a friend to the Jamestown Settlers?
• In writing we worked on sounding out our words.  It is important that when your child is writing he or she is at least writing beginning letter sounds to match their pictures.
• Many guided reading groups this week enjoyed learning two new reading strategies for when "We get stuck on a word." They are: Look At the Picture and Sound it Out. Please encourage your child to try these strategies often.

Word Wall/Sight Word

What's A Word Wall? and Sight Words

A word wall is a systematically organized collection of words displayed in large letters on a wall or board in our classroom. It is a tool designed to promote group learning.  A word wall consists of words that children frequently see when reading and use when writing.  Each week words are added to help children appropriate spelling and sight word recognition skills.  Some words help children learn rhyming word families (at, hat, fat, cat, etc.), while others do not follow phonetic spelling patterns.The purpose is to help children learn to spell high frequency and vocabulary words as they begin to use the words in their daily writing. 
Please remember to review sight word flash cards with your child as often as possible.
You may want to play games with the sight words to make learning fun.
Hang the words on a wall and ask your child to say the Flashlight, flashlight poem (we practice this when working on our sight words) and shine a flashlight on the word.  Encourage your child to use the words in sentences.  (Verbally or if they are ready have them write their sentences.)
Your child can chat or sing their words.
Create a SIGHT WORD JAR.  Add sight words to the jar and have your child pick a word and chant it. 
Post the words in various rooms in your house and say, go to the _________room and tell me the word.  Or what was the word in the ___________?

Here is a websites that you can download game boards from and create your own game.  Your child could write in their own words!  :)
http://www.kellyskindergarten.com/Games/GamestoMake/games_to_make.htm

Literary Pumpkins

Rainbow Valley won 1st Place for the Literary Pumpkin Contest!!!
http://www.wvec.com/news/slideshows/Literary-Pumpkins-created-at-John-B-Dey-ES-in-Va-Beach-131850843.html

November News