Sunday, January 28, 2018

Winter Activities, PAX & More!

We had a busy week in Kindergarten this week! It was our first full week in a while so we were able to get through a lot. We worked hard in Literacy Lab, worked on new winter themed workstations, wrote about winter and shared with our reading buddies, worked with Mrs. Phillip on our PAX lesson for the week,  practiced tracing our shapes, got to enjoy playing outside, completed a Teach Town lesson, and read stories about Groundhog's Day, Winter & More! Take a look below for more details on our busy and fun week!

Mrs. Arnold worked with students on identifying the beginning sound in words & sounding different words out.
Students worked hard on their iReady lessons this week as well.
In the listening area, the students listened to Tacky the Penguin and then fed the penguin the sight word fish.
Mrs. Roland worked with students on rhyming words, sounding words out, and guided reading.
Students worked with me on guided reading and vocabulary words.
I taught the students a few vocabulary words, we defined them, then they wrote a sentence using each word and drew a picture. Below you can see the students wrote "I search for my bookbag".
"The Soil is brown" & "I grow up".
We also practiced reading a basic guided reading book called "Paint it Purple".
We have been working on some new workstations as well. The students are working on the tablets tracing letters, identifying beginning sounds of pictures, counting objects using one-to-one correspondence, and more.
We also have a math write the room activity where the students have to find the snowmen cards around the room, count how many objects there are, and write the number next to the matching picture. The students have really enjoyed this activity!
Using this felt book, students practice various activities such as matching color words, counting using one-to-one correspondence, and more. You can also see Jade below working on our snowman one more, one less. The students have to find which number comes just before and after the number on each snowman, cut it out and glue it in the appropriate square. 
We discussed things that Winter is, things we can do, and winter things we like. Then we cut them out and glued them as follows. Winter is: fun, cold. I can: ski, build a snowman. I like: hot chocolate, snow. 
We discussed why the students like winter, they wrote about it and drew a picture to match their sentence. I wrote the example sentence "I can play in the snow". We discussed the important things to include in their sentence and a checklist to mark them off such as using capital letters, finger spaces, period at the end, writing neatly, and drawing a picture to match.
Laylah wrote "I like building snowmen".
We also wrote a story about this snowman by sounding out the words as best as we can. As you will see in their writing, the students might not have all words spelled correctly. Sight words should be spelled correctly but otherwise, they will write it phonetically (how it sounds). My sample says "My name is Sneezy the Snowman. I like to go ice skating.".
Jenna wrote "My name is Jeremy the Snowman. I can skate.".

Jade wrote "I am Frosty. I like ice skating.".
Lilliana wrote "I am carrots. I like to jump.".
Jaelynn wrote "My name is jack. I like to go to the ice skating rink.".
Mrs. Phillip came to work with us on our PAX lesson this week. We have been working on being PAX leaders and eliminating spleems (talking when we shouldn't be, making noises, touching others, running, etc.). I taped these PAX cards at each student's seat in order to remind them to be a PAX leader. While they were working, Mrs. Phillip went around and pointed to the green thumbs up (for PAX behavior) or the red thumbs down (if there was a spleem they needed to fix). The students responded very well to this and she said we were the best class that she worked with all week! We will continue to work hard making PAX leader choices.
While Mrs. Phillip was observing, the students were working on a shape sorting activity where they had to cut out and glue each real life examples next to their matching shapes.
Below you can see the students enjoying a Granny's Wacky Prize for being PAX leaders. For this one, we got to laugh as hard as we could for 20 seconds!
The students shared their winter writing with their Preschool Reading Buddies.
We also practiced tracing and drawing shapes.
The students greatly enjoyed being able to play outside for recess for some of the week!
Our TeachTown lesson for the week was "Take Deep Breaths to Stay Calm."
We read stories about winter, hibernation, and the 100th day of school.
We also read about Groundhog's Day which is coming up next week!
Thanks for checking in! Stop back next week to see what fun things we are up to next.

Have a great week!
Mrs. Brittany Garrabrant