ask me about thursday, august 31, 2023

​

Today we started our day by studying the different ways children around the world get to school.  I didn't tell the children that was how the photographs were the same, but after they studied the photographs and talked to their partners, they came up with the idea.  The backpacks gave it away!  Ask me to tell you which way I would like to go to school.  If they tell you they would like me to drive them home on a bus, please tell them that is not in my job description!  I'm going to accept it as a compliment.  I'm not sure what triggered it but this was an idea they came up with at dismissal today!
We read the story This School Year Will Be the Best, by Kay Winters.  In this story, the narrator tells us what will make this year the best.  Most of the ideas were very silly!  Then, the children made a wish for their kindergarten year.  I told them it had to be something they hope happens at school.  You will see their wishes at Back to School Night.  
We talked about the words exactly the same, almost the same or similar, and different.  These words will be used in math in some of our work with Really Great Reading.  We studied these items and used these words to talk about what we noticed.  Ask me to tell you about the keys using the words exactly the same, almost the same, or different.  (None are exactly the same!)

The children went to P.E. today so they probably have a lot to tell you about that!  Ask me to tell me the name of my P.E. teacher!
We read a beautiful book called The Golden Rule, by Ilene Cooper.  This book introduces the Golden Rule through a discussion a little boy and his grandfather are having as they walk.  They see the Golden Rule written on the billboard and the little boy asks what that means.  The grandfather tells the little boy about the Golden Rule and shares that the Golden Rule is shared in different cultures and religions around the world.  He shares their version of the Golden Rule.  The grandfather also talks about how important it is to use your imagination to think about how someone else feels when you do something to them.  This is a great beginning for learning about empathy, so I told them children about that word and that making good choices is easy when you think of others.  What is tricky is stopping to think before acting so it's important to learn self control and how to identify and handle big feelings.  These are the things we will be focusing on in our Social/Emotional learning this year.  Ask me to tell you the Golden Rule.  If you are looking for a great book for your family or as a gift, this is a great choice.  I think it might have been at the PTA Book Fair last year, so if it's something you're interested in you might want to see if it's there this year too! 
In math we sorted pictures and math manipulatives.  We started to try and work as a group to sort together, and we were close, but some children still wanted to sort their on their own.  We will do more sorting tomorrow in our Math Tubs when we come back from lunch.

Have a nice evening!
​Miss Wolfe​
​