T-shirt Update Number 3!

Gold star for kindergarten parents!  Thank you so much helping out with tshirts!  I recieved more shirts and tie dye today!  Here what we still need:

-3 children's shirts size 10/12
-4 children's shirts size 6/8
-1 tie dye kit (if possible, the Tulip One-Step Tie Dye Kit in "Moody Blues."  If not, then any single tie dye or tie dye kits that have turquoise/aqua)

Another Brain Break Video

Since I am a blogging fool today... here's a brain break video of the kids dancing/singing to Boom Chicka Boom. :)  Enjoy!

Class shirt update!

I received some shirts today! Thank you, thank you!

Here's what we still need:

10 medium

4 large

Tie dye (5 bottles of turquoise/blue, navy or aqua. I'm going for any shade of blue). If they do not have the individual bottles or the moody blues set, any tie dye kit that has blue would work). That Walmart closest to me did not have the Moody Blue tie dye kit- I looked last night! I'm going to try target too.

Community Events and Coin Sorting

The Edmond Library is having another Read with Dogs event! You and your child can go to the library on October 1st from 6:30-7:30 and read with dogs :)

This week we were planning to do a lesson on Tuesday about sorting coins, but we had to push it back! We did it today and, coincidentally, it tied in with our reading lesson very well!

In reading, we practiced categorizing things and sorting. We sorted objects and people into groups based on places we read about in Miss Bindergarten Takes a Field Trip. We sorted them into a bakery group, a post office group, a fire station group, and a library group.

When we did our coins activity, we focused on "attributes" of the coins. We looked at color, size, pictures on the heads and tails sides, and the edges (bumpy/rough or smooth). Here are some pictures of the kids sorting their coins. Thank you for sending in coins and egg cartons! Because some of the coins came in while I was gone, I was unsure who to return them to! I apologize and promise to use leftover coins for our "general snack fund." If you brought some in and would like them returned, please shoot me an email! I let each child count out at take home 5 coins. 

And here are a few more pictures from centers today. I am just so impressed with how hard they've been working!

Sully works on sight words at clothespin words. 

Audrey is at environmental print graphing. 

Pictures from this week

Wow! It has been a busy week! We've started going to the computer lab (the children get better and better at logging themselves in... Pressing Ctrl+Alt+Delete is no easy task when you have tiny hands and are just learning your letters!) and the library.  We had school pictures yesterday and had our first substitute teacher this morning! (Mrs. Taylor was wonderful! Thank you, Mrs. Taylor!)

In addition to all those things, we also began our true "literacy block." That's just fancy teacher talk for reading. Did you know that between reading and writing, your child is receiving 120 minutes of daily literacy instruction? Impressive, right? 

This week, I phased out the "play" centers during out reading center time. (Play centers, like blocks, home living, etc., are still available during free time- they are five, after all!). You'd think the kids would be bummed, but they didn't even notice! The children were so excited to try out their new centers- no one said a word about the missing play centers!  During center time, the children have the time and space to work on activities that will help them become better readers. They may choose to work in small groups or individually. During this time, I work with small groups at my "teacher table" to practice reading new books and  learn/use reading strategies. Here are a few quick pictures I snapped this week of the kids working in literacy centers: 

Presley, Sawyer, and Elli take turns reading this week's poem together at "Read the Room."

Elena and Katie work at the computers.

Brian at Sight Word Work

Clayton stopped to check out what Scott was up to. This week our Great Expectation for living was that "We will cheer each other on to success." Good job practicing Great Expectations, Clayton!

Soona and Trevor work together at the Pocket Chart center. We are looking at Environmental Print this week. It's shocking how even young children that can't read will recognize logos and associate it with the product! We are using a poem this week to practice sight words, but the children get to fill it in with the logos of things they like.

Paige works at the rhyming center, sorting pictures into the different rhyming "houses." 

Karson and Cameron read "Splat the Cat" at the listening center, then fill out a reading response page.

Sully practices writing her friend's names at the dry erase center.

Deakon works on beginning sounds with the letter stamps.

Clayton works on sight words at "Say it, Build it, Write it."

Brooklyn practices letter recognition and alphabetical order at the ABC stamps.

The kiddos are doing so great! With pictures yesterday, and me being out today, our schedule has been funky! Sawyer asked me after a story today, "Can we do some more work?" We are back to business as usual tomorrow!

Here are some important announcements and upcoming events:

We have parent teacher conferences starting next week. I can't wait to meet with everyone!

Our class will go to the book fair on Tuesday from 8:40-9:10. I have sent home information about available books in Thursday Folders. 

Today the children checked out their first book from the library. Please remind your child to be careful with the book and keep it in their special book pocket when they aren't looking at it. Books are due back on next Thursday.  The children were so excited to pick out their own book!  It was adorable.

Calling for all box tops! I am turning them in on the 3rd. We have tons, I'm hopeful we will in! (If we don't, my dad has already committed to a pizza party. I haven't told the children- shhhh!)

If you ordered scholastic books, they should be here any day! Next  time I will set a deadline on orders so that I can get them to the children faster. I'm sorry it's taken so long! 

Homework books are starting tomorrow! The children are super excited to read to their families! Please take a few minutes and read the sheet titled "Emergent Reading" that is in the homework folder. I hope it will help you! 

One last thing- we have a wish list of items for the class. I would like to make the students a class tshirt before the Walkathon. The students will get to keep the tshirts! I need the following items:

-White cotton tshirts (children's sizes)

     - 7 small

     -10 medium

     -4 large
-Blue tie dye.  This is available at walmart- Here's a link to what I am going to buy:  http://www.walmart.com/ip/Tulip-3-Color-Moody-Blues-Tie-Dye-Kit/17299925  I'm going to use the turquoise and navy blue. It says that it makes 8 shirts but the directions lie.  This is not my first tie dying rodeo.  I will need 5 of these kits.  If a few people could pick up one or two, it would help lessen the load tremendously! 
 

If any grown ups want matching shirts for our field trip at the end of the year, feel free to send in a white cotton tshirt, too! They are going to be awesome. You'll want one. :) I'll update the list as I get shirts so we don't end up with 50! 

Thank you for all you do! You have such great kiddos- that doesn't happen by chance :) 

Week 3

Another successful week on the books! I'm enjoying getting to know the children better, they are such great little people :) I enjoyed reading their All About Me pages, and they loved sharing them. Thank you for taking the time to help your kids fill them out!

This week, I administered the DIBELS tests to all of the children. DIBELs stands for Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills. These tests are nationally recognized and will be administered three times this year. At this time in the year, we administer two of the tests- First Sound Fluency (FSF) and Letter Naming Fluency (LNF).  While these scores will not predict your child's future reading ability, they help indicate where your child might need additional support in becoming a reader. When we meet for Parent Teacher Conference night, I will have your child's scores available to you. We also administered the STAR early literacy test, which students take independently on computers. Those results will also be available at parent teacher conferences.

This week we worked on recognizing the letters A-M. We read the story "The Little Engine That Could," and "Thank You Mr. Falker." I had not read "Thank You, Mr. Falker," and it was quite a tear jerker! It provided a great opportunity, though, to talk about empathy and how people learn differently. 

Our comprehension strategy focused on plot. We worked on recognizing the characters, problem, and solution in the story. These are also things you can talk about after reading a book to your child.

Thank you so much for completing and getting your child's homework back to school. Working on these basic skills at home will help your child tremendously. I create most of these worksheets myself,so it is very relevant to what we are doing in class. If your child is having trouble with the homework, or if it is taking longer than about 5-10 minutes per page, please let me know! This work is not intended to be a frustrating activity for either of you! 

In math this week, we worked on comparing and representing numbers in ten frames. We made "Name Frames," but putting the letters of our name in a ten frame. Then we counted to see how many more letters we needed to make ten.

The children are doing a wonderful job with learning their rituals and routines. Afternoons are a little tough (we're working on our stamina!), but they are doing wonderfully.

The children also got to check out our new library! It is beautiful. They will begin checking out books soon! We can also use the computer lab soon- Woo hoo!

I hope you have all had a wonderful weekend! In order to feel empathy (as we talked about in literature), I caught the cold that's being passed about :) I'm feeling better just in time for Monday! We will be going over safety procedures, like using tissues and washing hands, to help us stay safe during germ season :) I hope all your little persons are getting plenty of rest and staying healthy!  See you tomorrow!

Pack Pals, and Guest Readers, and Fall Fun Fest- Oh, My!

Today was a super fun day in kindergarten! While Miss Cramer participated in the kindergarten Professional Learning Committee (PLC- where we talk data, share lessons, etc), the kiddos got to have Guidance with Mrs. Hill, then music with Mrs. Workman! It was a two for one! After that, Paige's mom was our guest reader. We love guest readers! Then our Pack Pals, Spencer and Lindsey, came to visit. The children practically mauled them on the playground :) Here are some pictures:

(Sawyer is in his football stance!) 

(All of the balls were a hit on the playground- thanks!)

To top off a fun filled day, PTO held the Fall Fun Fest tonight. I am in awe of the PTO (and all the parents at school!). It is such a humbling thing to see so many people coming together for the benefit of children. It's truly wonderful. Also, it was lots of fun! :) 

Here are some pictures I took: 

Monkeying around :)

Kindergartener in training!

Hayley won a fish!

Looks like Kinzie and Sawyer are bringing home new family members, too :)

Thank you to everyone who helped make today's events so much fun! :)

Developmental Writing Stages of Children

 Stages of Writing Development

Stage	Example
Preliterate: Drawing uses drawing to stand for writing believes that drawings / writing is communication of a purposeful message read their drawings as if there were writing on them
Preliterate: Scribbling scribbles but intends it as writing scribbling resembles writing holds and uses pencil like an adult
Early Emergent: Letter-like forms shapes in writing actually resemble letters shapes are not actually letters look like poorly formed letters, but are unique creations
Emergent: Random-letters or letter strings uses letter sequences perhaps learned from his/her name may write the same letters in many ways long strings of letters in random order
Transitional: Writing via invented spelling creates own spelling when conventional spelling is not known one letter may represent an entire syllable words may overlay may not use proper spacing as writing matures, more words are spelled conventionally as writing matures, perhaps only one or two letters invented or omitted
Fluency: Conventional spelling usually resembles adult writing

Here's a great website with more information about early writing:

http://destinationkindergarten.blogspot.com/2010/10/can-play-dough-help-my-child-be-better.html

Some writing from today...

This week we read "This is the Way We Go to School." We learned about different modes of transportation that children use to get to school all over the world.

Today in Writer's Workshop, the children decided how they might like to go to school. I took pictures of a few of their pieces: 

A double decker bus!

"I am in a car."

A horse and buggy!

"I am in a vaporetto."

(We watched a video about the waterways in Venice, Italy today! A vaporetto is boat used in Venice to transport people)

"I am in a new car."

Horse would be a nice way to travel!

In a van.

Ellery doesn't want a regular bus- she wants a big one!

"I am riding a horse and buggy to school."

I am so proud of the kiddos! They are working really hard to apply their knowledge of letters and sounds to writing! I don't expect correct spelling- it's much harder to think of words and "sound them out" than to copy words. We will work harder on "book spelling" later in the year :) 

Check out the post on the developmental stages of writing. You can look to see where your child falls in the spectrum!