Sept. 12-16

We just completed our first full week of kindergarten!  It has been a busy week!

Language Arts:  We finished Jolly phonic sound book two.  As they come home, have your child repeat the actions to go along with the sound.  Our sight words were "a" and " the."  Notice the sight word poems that come home.  We practiced reading those all week and raised our thumbs as we heard and read the sight word.  We continued our exploration of shapes through literature this week by reading many shapes books including  A Bear in a Square and The Shape of Things.  We made a small book about shapes and worked with partners to create a scene made up of all types of shapes.  We also read the book I Read Signs.  We made a response book and went on a shape walk in and around our school.  We read the book Officer Buckle and Gloria and talked about the importance of rules. 
We are beginning to learn about Daily 5, our management program during guided reading.  This week we practiced Read to Self.  The students know that the teacher's responsibility is to work with a small group. Their list of responsibilities is much longer.  If they follow the expectations, they are being independent.  some of the expectations are  Eyes on Book, Stay Still, Zero Voices, and Build Stamina.  We started reading for 3 minutes and have successfully worked our way to 6 minutes.  We will continue to lengthen our time until we reach 15 minutes.

Math:  Shapes have been our main focus.  In addition to reading many books, we have played a Shapes by Feel game, a listening game with a song, explored tracing with templates, and created pictures with shapes.

Social Studies:  Our Citizenship Cool Tool this week was I Can Problem Solve.  this is a process for solving a problem.  1.  Stop and Cool Off (we talked about different ways)  2.  Talk and Listen (Use I Messages - I feel ___ when...) 3.  Think of Ways to Solve the Problem  4.  Choose the Idea You Like Best!
We spent some time talking about what anger looks and feels like.  We discussed the anger thermometer....annoyed...irritated...angry...furious...enraged.  We know that it is important to control our anger and that most of the time it is not appropriate to go high on the anger thermometer.

Notes:  Thank you to all who could make it to curriculum night.  If were unable to attend, please look into your child's backpack where you can find a large ziplock full of resources and materials.  Please look over and let me know if you have any questions.  There are many upcoming May Watts events, including the optional Reflections program.  Please refer to any emails sent directly from May Watts or check the May Watts website calendar.

Have a great weekend!