Mark Those Calendars!
- November Parent Gathering: Wednesday November 9th 6:30-8:30(-ish) at Bass Pro
Gardening: Revamping our compost and searching for worms with Julie!
Shop. We have the hamburger or pizza buffet and there is a full bar! I am looking forward to spending time with you and we have 14 people coming, so far!
- FIELD DAY: Thursday November 10th (11:30-12:00 for kinder). Join us as we raise money for our school’s field trip fund! (FYI: T-shirts for this event become the field trip t-shirts we will wear for the year. Thanks!)
- Veteran’s Day: NO SCHOOL on Friday November 11, 2016.
- Field Trip #3: Thursday November 17th, Seymour Marine Lab in Santa Cruz
- Parent Ed Workshop: Join teachers Thursday November 17th 6:30-8:00pm to learn about various topics of interest from Reggio-based learning to what math in kindergarten looks like. It’s all a workshop format and we’re hoping to do 30-45 minute workshops so parents can explore at least 2-3 different topics.
- Thanksgiving Break: NO SCHOOL on Monday November 21-25.
- Field Trip #4: Wednesday December 14, 2016. We’re taking the Light Rail to Christmas in the Park in San Jose. Also, our class has sponsored a tree to decorate! If you’d like to help us trim our tree on Tuesday November 22nd, please let Arielle know. We need HELP and…Christmas cheer! (Arielle Kurtze, Field Trip Coordinator a.kurtze@gmail.com)
- Community Snack Schedule: This week is the Ramam Family. Please, use the snack signup genius here to sign up for a week to bring snack. Let the Snack Coordinator Kudsana (kkizaraly@yahoo.com) know if you need special accommodations. And a BIG thank you to the Coscarart family who volunteered last week!
- FUTURE Parent Meeting Dates: Wednesday Nov 9th (Thanksgiving Dinner at Bass Pro Shop), Wednesday Dec 14th, Wednesday Jan 25th, Skipping February (short month, too many conflicts), Wednesday March 22nd, Wednesday April 26th, Wednesday May 24th, and Wednesday June 14th.
- Thank you! I just wanted to say thank you for making my first of many 29th birthdays to come super special! 🙂 I was so touched by the flowers, cards, balloons, pastries, and gift cards. “My cup runneth over,” because I couldn’t feel more loved!
Birthday Memories!
Reminder: Protocol for pick-up on Wednesdays:
• I will not be there for check-out. Other teachers do not typically stay, either, because
Thanks Nakiya for reading to the group AND practicing comprehension questions!
yard duty is responsible for children after 12:30pm. I was staying until children were used to the lunch/recess routine.
• Parents/Caregivers: You are responsible for finding your child on the playground/blacktop, if he/she has not yet come back to the silver benches. Please, return to the message board outside the classroom, near the gate, to SIGN-OUT your child on attendance list. There, he/she can grab his/her lunch.
• After care kids: After care kids will go straight to the atrium from the double doors inside the gate AFTER the 1:10pm bell.
Halloween Celebration!
Weekly Highlights
- Kid Photographers: I gave my camera to the children more this week and so you’ll
Halloween Monday was a BLAST!
notice the angles and focus of many photos are from their perspective. They took pictures of what was important. So, we have about 300 photos -BUT- it’s really interesting what they wanted the viewer to see!
- Read-alouds: Children who are capable of performing read-alouds asked to read to their peers, and their renditions of the spooky Halloween collection I have were AMAZING!
- New Student: Byron has settled into our classroom like a duck to water, and we are happy to have him!
- 1-on-1 Reading: I began taking kids 1-on-1 to practice reading and working on sight words during Quiet Time. It’s been going well so far! I can take about 2-3 kids a day.
- Handwriting: More practice with handwriting without tears and beginning to use lined paper.
- Story Workshop: We started a new Story Workshop using lined paper to help them
Correcting silly sentences!
write more legibly and we talked about word spacing. We had a fun discussion about how important the space and the punctuation (the period) were in sentences. We made some pretty silly sentences without spaces or punctuation which helped them understand the necessity for them!
- Phonics Talk: We talked about what digraphs and brainstormed words with digraphs. (Digraphs are made of separate letter sounds that make one distinct sound when blended that doesn’t sound like either letter, really.) We looked at ch, sh, th, and wh. We also played charades and sounded out the spelling of the animals we acted out!
- Art Enrichment: We did thankful corn using legos as “circle stamps” in fall colored paint to make the kernels. Children wrote what or who they were thankful for on lined paper strips. It was a fun exercise to have them define what being thankful is (which was: “being grateful for what you have or happy you have what you have.”) See their beautiful work hanging in the literacy center!
- Math- 100s Chart & Patterns: We talked about the 100s chart and examined it together this week. Children used magnifying glasses to find patterns they saw, which included the 10s column, similar number endings, odds and evens, and more! Then, the numbers ran away! So, they worked in pairs or independently to investigate what happened and find the “missing” numbers on the blank squares in the “missing numbers
Quentin was serious about finding those missing letters!
poster” I made copies of (teehee). Later that week, we talked about ABA, ABB, and ABC patterns through clapping and with colored dot visuals. Children were given a preview of their project next week with beads and pipe cleaners to make patterned corn for Thanksgiving!
- Science Enrichment: Properties of water continued as children experimented with how to make an ice cube melt slower- foil, styrofoam, or a plastic bag with air? Many children played around with the idea of “insulation”, experimented with ice and salt with colored water, and made their own experiments with dry erase menus. They also learned the idea of HEAT TRANSFER with the help of a fun skit! Children played the role of a human, heat, and an ice cube. We tried to visualize what happens when we touch an ice cube. We don’t “get cold” so much as we “lose heat” – when we transfer our heat to the ice cube it melts as a result and we shiver because we have less heat! It was hilarious watching them dramatize that concept!
- Kinder Sing: This week we did an ode to the American pastime of baseball, in honor of the World Series ending. We sang “Take Me Out To The Ball Game” and “Go Cubs Go” (since the Cubs won…for the first time in 108 years!) Other songs included, “This Land Is Your Land”, “Can’t Stop The Feeling” (Kidz Bop version), and “Together On Monday.”
- Halloween Celebration: Children had an absolute blast in the kinder pod exploring the different options – GIANT jenga, pumpkin ring toss, bean bag toss, slime making, spider hat making, halloween hunt in water beads to find prizes, a science sensory area, a ‘guess how many candies’ station, and a pumpkin decorating station. The kids wore tags to keep track of where they’d been, and adults checked off stations as they went. It was so much fun to see them exploring! THANK YOU TO THE PARENTS WHO PLANNED THIS AMAZING CELEBRATION!
- Buddies: We went to our buddies’ classroom and completed a buddy booklet with them. This activity helped them bond more with their big buddies and find what they had in common! It was really sweet to see them interact with each other. Afterwards, they played on the playground together.
Buddies!
Emergency Parent Sub Protocol:
You are responsible for finding your OWN sub. Do not expect Deepa, our classroom coordinator, to handle that. Also, parents are not allowed to pay other parents for shifts (because it’s volunteering). Instead, you may swap shifts or offer to cover for someone else on another day. Please follow the steps, below:
- Please send an SOS email out to the class on the yahoo group, CCing me.
- After sending the email, please call through the emergency sub list, below.
- Follow up with me regarding who I can expect in your place. I plan activities based on the parent support available for each shift. Your absence can completely throw off curriculum plans. Please be responsible and respectful with your shift. Thank you!
- Jennifer Coscarart (Tuesdays 2nd shift & some Thursdays)
- Doreen Stitt (Tuesdays 2nd shift & some Thursdays)
- Akiko Fukuhara (3rd shifts) 408-614-9793
- Angela Henshall (Thursday 2nd shift)
- Christine Ging (always around Thursday morning, though I may be in Rm 12)
- Lonnell Graham (408)-836-0385
- David Ramos (408) 393-4456 (Thursdays after 1pm)
Kate's Rm 7 Kinder Class: Exploring Who We Are 1 Day at a Time! 