Weekly Update-October 27, 2017

What a busy week we had this week talking all about the way we help our families at home as well our STREAM unit on Pumpkins. STREAM stands for Science, Technology, Religion, Engineering, Arts and Math. Each grade at BSS completes two units per year and this year our Fall unit was Pumpkins. We chose various activities pertaining to pumpkins that met the different criteria of these categories and had so much fun doing it. Who knew building gates with Lincoln logs for the 5 little pumpkins was engineering?? Or that carving out our class pumpkin to examine the insides and count the seeds was both Math and Science? We thought we were just having fun!!

We didn’t just have fun all week, we did serious work too. The letter we focused on this week was the letter Hh. We worked on writing it in small groups as well as coloring in pictures that begin with it to help our fine motor skills. We also worked on building it with our wooden blocks on the rug. We also worked on independently writing it the writing table if we chose to. Each child works at their own pace and we encourage them to do so.  It is amazing to watch them learn something new and really love it!

During small groups we worked on identifying and recognizing uppercase and lowercase letters, segmenting words into their onset and rime and we worked more with syllables and compound words. We are really doing a great job with it. We also worked with identifying small groups of numbered items without having to count them. This was tricky at first but we really got the hang of it! We talked about the many different ways we can make various sets of the number 4 using both fingers and concrete items. They were really impressed by the fact that they were adding like “big kids” do.

Even though it rained this week we had plenty of time to play in the classroom. We got extra time to play in the sensory table which is full of Halloween themed items, we played with balls at the train table and we even got extra time in the dramatic play area. We made the best of being stuck inside!

Have a great weekend!

Building a gate for "5 Little Pumpkins"

Carving out our class pumpkin, learning about pulp and seeds!

Loving the light table!

Our class Jack-O Lantern! We all took turns guessing how many seeds we thought he had inside....347!!!

Some Halloween fun at the sensory table this week! Making patterns and sorting spooky things with friends

Working on counting

Morning fun building!

More pictures coming soon!

This past week...October 16, 2017

Our focus this week was on the question: How do family members care for one another? When we read our classroom poem about families, we learned one way families are alike is that they show they care by sharing responsibilities.  Mommy was feeding a younger sibling, while Daddy was making dinner and older Brother was feeding and walking the dog.  Everyone can do something to show they care!

We invited our school nurse, Mrs. Lannigan, into our classroom as a special guest.  She spoke to the children about caring for one another and safety.  The children enjoyed her visit very much.  We decided as a class to work together and write a personal thank-you letter to Mrs. Lannigan.  The children then ‘hand-delivered’ it to her office. What a great experience of showing caring and kindness within our school community!

During Literacy circle and Small Group time this week, we focused on onset and rime.  Children were asked to look at a picture (and then the word) and listen to the funny way the teacher would say the word.  Then together combine the different parts to form the word. For example, boat /b/ - oat = boat.  As the week progressed, the children engaged in two and three syllable words as well.  They really got excited as they were successful in figuring out each word.  We also worked on the Letter Bb and the Letter Ee.

During Math circle and Small Group time this week we reinforced the concept that when counting, the last count (number stated) tells us how many. We also focused  on one-to-one correspondence and counting.  Everyone wanted to engage in this activity as we used candy corn pieces as counters! What a great opportunity for us to make the connection that just like the three colors of

the candy corn are one, there are three persons in the Holy Trinity.

All three are God, yet together they are One.  

Story time book this week was Oonga Boonga, by Frieda

Wishinsky.  Baby Louise won’t stop crying.  Many family members

try to cheer her up, but only her big, brother Daniel has success.

Hope you have a chance to get outside this weekend and enjoy this beautiful weather!!

We love our school nurse!!

Fun with friends in the Math Center

Building letters on the rug

Fall Counting

Ipads with Mr. Hall!

We had Art in the Art room this week! So fun!

Being creative in Art class!

Puzzles are always fun with a friend

Working on numbers and counting

We love when Mr. Hall comes!

Open art time! Happy Fall!

Enjoying the nice Fall weather while we can!

Playing family in the Dramatic Play

Here's a peak at what we have been up to....

Pumpkin Craft

Working on some writing with our white boards

Hard at work at the Writing Center!

Our first iPad class was so much fun!

We love iPads!

Fun in the garden!

Collecting Sunflower seeds in the garden

Math Circle on the rug

Taking care of the babies in the kitchen area

Weekly Newsletter October 13, 2017

What a quick week we had this week! We hope everyone had a nice long weekend together! This week we began our unit on Families. Our question of the week was “Who is in your  family?” We talked about how God made all of our families special and we even did some graphing  to show different aspects of our family. We made a graph showing how many of us have a sibling, about how many older/younger siblings we had, and about how many people live in our house. We did a great job! We really love counting!

Our literacy unit this week really focused on syllables. We worked on clapping out the syllables in our concept words as well as other words we decided upon as a class. We really enjoyed clapping out each others names too. We sorted them by number of syllables and realized that many of us have names made up of 2 syllables! It was so much fun! We also worked on identifying some uppercase and lowercase letters. We used our whiteboards and practiced writing some of these letters as well as working on writing our names. We really liked the whiteboards. We will have to take those out again soon!

This week the letter we worked on was the letter Ff. We worked on writing it with the help of the “Crayon Song” and by using “Mat Man” to remind us that F is made up of a big line and two little lines. We even used our wooden Handwriting Without Tears blocks to create the letter Ff on the rug as well as other letters. We are really coming along with our letters and our crayon grip! Our coloring in the lines is pretty amazing too! Everyone is so proud of themselves when they realize they are holding their crayon correctly or stayed within the lines. It is such a great thing to witness!

During center time, the kitchen area was quite popular with the addition of the baby dolls. We all seemed to love playing family, taking on many different roles. We also enjoyed building with lincoln logs, playing at the sand table and making pretend pumpkins with play dough.  We enjoyed  talking

about the season of Fall and even made a fall tree to talk  about the many different  colors we see this time of year. They are beautiful and will be coming home soon!

This week we talked a little bit about Fire Safety as well. We talked about some of the things we can do if we are ever caught in an emergency too.

On Monday we will be welcoming two new students to our class, Leo and Mallory. We are so excited to meet our new friends!

Have a nice weekend! See you Monday!

Weekly Newsletter- October 2,2017

Together this week the focus was on the question: How do friends get along together?  This question opened up a lot of conversations relating to our feelings.  We learned about what it means to feel sad,  feel happy or even angry! We discussed how all people (even Moms and Dads and Teachers) have these feelings.  They are all normal and natural.  But, we also talked about what do we do with these feelings, especially when we are upset.  The children shared some experiences about when they were having these feelings and what they could do about them.  The children also shared some time with a partner and as a feeling was named, each of the children would face their partner and show (on their face) what that particular feeling looked like.  This was a fun and engaging activity everyone seemed to enjoy!  It is important to remember that because our feelings oftentimes influence our behaviors, it’s helpful if we can have some strategies in place to deal with these feelings in a positive, productive way.

During Literacy circle and small group time this week we focused on taking apart words and then putting them back together.  (In other words, breaking down words into syllables by clapping them out while speaking.)  The children enjoyed listening and clapping and then offered their own two syllable words as the week progressed.

We also worked on learning that big letters are called Uppercase letters and little letters are called Lowercase letters.  Then we played a number of sorting games, deciding which letters were Uppercase and which were Lowercase.  The children loved helping each other!

During Math circle and small group time this week the focus was on sorting by different attributes.  The children sorted objects by color, size and one child even sorted animals by their tails!

During Story Time this week the book was Matthew and Tilly,

by Rebecca C. Jones which focused on the importance of

friendship and forgiveness.

One of our open-ended art activities was learning how to

sponge paint! What a wonderful way to explore the

artist within each of us!

                               Have a wonderful weekend!