Today we began a unit of study about folktales and fairy tales. We passed The Talking Fish and shared our favorite fairy tales. This was so interesting! There were many misconceptions about what a fairy tale is, and many children did not have a favorite. Not to worry! We will be reading many folktales and fairy tales over the next few weeks. Today we read a traditional version of The Three Billy Goats Gruff by Paul Galdone. The we read a story called The Three Billy Goats Fluff, by Rachael Mortimer. This story had the same characters and plot, but with a few twists. The Billy Goat Fluff brothers' mother is in this story. We noticed she felt empathy for the troll who lived under the bridge. She too had trouble sleeping, but not because billy goats' hooves are loud when they cross the bridge, but because her billy goat children kept waking her up at night. Ask me to tell you the creative way the billy goats mother solved the problem for the troll! We continue to check in on the eaglets from time to time. They are getting really big and changing so much from those two little balls of gray puff we first watched. We talked with a buddy about how they have changed. We noticed their talons are getting very big, dark feathers are coming in all over their bodies, their beaks are darker and bigger, and they are moving around much more. Their parents leave them in the nest alone more, and the eaglets are getting very curious. We have noticed them up against the nest railings looking out sometimes. They still are babies though. We notice that as soon as they are done eating, they fall asleep. Today we voted on which names we think are best for the eaglets. People sent in suggestions for their names and now people can vote to help choose their names. Here is the data on our voting. Ask me to tell you about this graph. If your family would like to vote to name the eaglets, you can visit https://www.facebook.com/FONArboretum/app/303561899745219?brandloc=DISABLE&app_data=chk-
Have a nice evening! Juliet
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Today we started talking about Earth Day. We studied some beautiful photographs of coral reef, then we watched this video about how the coral is dying because of the impact of humans on our Earth. We will be talking about how the choices we make every day have an impact on the Earth, animals, plants and us. In Writing Workshop, we looked through the animal resources we have in our room. We chose topics for our animal reports we will be working on over the next week.
Have a nice evening! Juliet We started our day off with a great assembly. Dr. Recess came to teach the kids new games for recess. He followed up by staying for recess to help kids with the games he taught. Ask me to tell you about the games I learned and which one is my favorite. We read a story today with multiple meanings called Yaks Yak: Animal Word Pairs, by Linda Sue Park. This story is beautifully illustrated with whimsical pictures depicting the animals acting out the verb made from their name. Each page also had the definition of the verb, so since no one in the class knew what it meant to yak, we had the definition in the book, as well as a childhood story from me because my dad said that word all the time!
In math, we worked in math stations playing games to practice addition and subtraction, as well as learning a game to practice knowing what two numbers together make ten. I forgot to send out reminders for field trip permission slips, so tomorrow please check your child's folder and see if you have a permission slip and/or money to send in for our trip. Enjoy the beautiful warm weather! Juliet We had a nice visit with Mrs. Kanter this morning. We talked about Stop, Think and Do. This is a strategy to use when making choices. We stop, think about good and bad choices, then choose the right one. Ask me to show you the paper I brought home that shows a choice I made recently. We visited the Science Fair today. We were very impressed that four children in our class participated, and that two even collaborated with a partner on their project! We had our scientists tell about their project. I was so impressed with their description of their projects, and their classmates were excited to hear about what they did. I know this is something extra to already busy schedules, but I am glad we four students participate! Today we read Tops and Bottoms, by Janet Stevens. This story is about a lazy bear and a tricky hare. We talked about character traits as well as the choices and consequences that Bear made. Ask me to tell you about how Hare tricked Bear. We also came across an unexpected multiple meaning word. We were talking about how the choices Bear made helped Hare make a good profit. While I was pretty sure most students would not understand the word profit, I asked. The answer I got was for the word prophet. "A prophet is kind of like a god in our religion" was the answer I got!
Have a nice evening! Juliet Today we read a poem we read a few months ago about ducks. Today, our purpose was to find words with multiple meanings or homophones. Ask me to find the words with multiple meanings and tell you at least two meanings for the word.
Ducks Ducks are lucky, Don’t you think? When they want to Take a drink, All they do is Duck their bill. (Doesn’t matter If they spill.) When they want to Take a swim, All they do is Dive right in; And they never Seem to sink. Ducks are lucky, Don’t you think? We also read a story about ducks. The story Just Ducks, by Nicola Davies, is told by a little girl who has ducks that live near her. The book also includes captions to the watercolor pictures that give more information about mallard ducks. We learned what a drake is, what ducks are doing when they dabble and why you see them upended sometimes. We also learned about why preening is important to ducks. Ask me to tell you what preening means! We have also had a mini unit of study about nutrition. We learned about why it is important to know about the food groups. Today we read a story by Bernard Waber called Fast Food! Gulp! Gulp! We have a better understanding of what fast food is and why we need to limit how often we eat it. We made lists of junk food and healthy food. In math, we practiced counting back 1 and 2. Many of the students practiced subtracting by playing a subtraction game. Ask me to tell you what I did in math stations today. I hope you get a chance to get outside tonight to enjoy the beautiful weather! Juliet Today we began learning about life long ago. We looked at and played with some toys and games for long ago. We practiced playing jacks, tabletop nine-pins, catch ball, tiddly winks, shut the box, pick-up sticks, quoits, and we built with Lincoln Logs. Friday we will play again, this time keeping track of points. Most of these games can involve math, so we will add this in to our games now that we are familiar with the parts of the game. Check us out playing with toys from long ago: We read an inspiring story this afternoon called The Red Bicycle, by Jude Isabella. The story is about a red bicycle that a boy, Leo, has saved his money for by doing jobs for neighbors. We talked about choices he could have made with his earnings, but instead he set a goal of buying a new, red bicycle. As Leo grows, he becomes too big for his bike. He wants to give his bike to someone who will love it as much as he did, but everyone he knows has a bike. The lady in the bike shop tells him about an organization that sends bikes to countries who need bicycles to help the people who live there. Ask me to tell you what happens when the Leo donates his bike.
Have a nice evening! Juliet Today we had a Mad Science Assembly called the Marvels of Motion. We learned about Newton's Laws of motion and basic understandings of movement. Ask me to tell you about the assembly! Today we also finished our Informational Text Shared Writing book. We are very excited to share this with you. We used many different sources to gather information about bald eagles including books, photographs, videos, an online encyclopedia and an eagle expert from the DCEaglecam.com. We included text features to highlight important information. Ask me to tell you about bald eagles and our eagle book. Remember, there is no school for kindergarten students on Monday and Tuesday due to Kindergarten Orientation.
Have a wonderful weekend! Juliet Today we studied this photograph and thought about words that describe the feelings we have when we look at this scene. We thought of many adjectives to describe the scene as well. Everyone agreed this photograph was very peaceful and calm. We noticed many interesting things in the photograph as well. Ask me to tell you about this picture. We read this poem today. We talked about the interesting words the author chose to use in this poem. We looked at words that end with y, and found out the y makes the long e sound at the end of these words. We also thought of words that that began with fr and dr.
I Like It When It's Mizzly I like it when it's mizzly and just a little drizzly so everything looks far away and make- believe and frizzly. I like it when it's foggy and sounding very froggy. I even like it when it rains on streets and weepy windowpanes and catkins in the poplar tree and me. by Aileen Fisher Today in math we worked more with addition and subtraction story problems. We are working hard to read and listen to find out what the problem is asking so we know whether it is a joining together problem, addition, or a taking apart or missing part problem, subtraction. We practiced writing the algorithm that went with the problem. We reread our eagle book today and matched photographs to the text. It was hard to decide on photographs because we love so many of the pictures we have been looking at! Our book is almost done! We will be adding a contents page and glossary today. We will share a copy tomorrow online once it is finished! We read a book called T.L.C., by M.H. Clark. The story is about a little girl who is trying to give her mom what she said she needed; TLC. But the little girl doesn't know what she meant by TLC, so she gives her many things, like a Tropical Ladybug Collection. Ask me to tell you some of the other things the little girl gives her mom. In the end, the little girl's mother tells her what she needs is Tender Loving Care. You would have been so proud to hear how each child in the class was able to share one way they give their parents tender loving care. I was so impressed not only by their answers, but also by how well they listened to each other and did not repeat anyone else's answer. Every answer was different! Have a nice evening! Juliet Today we continued to work on our informational text about eagles. We watched a short video that shows eaglets testing out their wings and hopping from branch to branch, just like we were told about by one of the eagle experts from the DC Eaglecam. We looked at our charts and organized our information into sections of the book. We came up with headings for each section, then worked together to compose the words for our text. We also read a book today about Dr. Jane Goodall. We read Me...Jane, by Patrick McDonnell. Dr. Jane celebrated her 82nd birthday this week. This book shared how Dr. Jane became interested in animals, and her dream to someday go to Africa. Dr. Ask me to tell you what Dr. Jane did as a little girl to find out about how hens lay eggs. Here are a few pictures I took today during playtime. Enjoy! Juliet Today we used the facts we researched about bald eagles to write the text of a big book we are writing as a class. We sorted the facts into topics and wrote headings for the pages. Students used the notes on our research collection sheets to share sentences for the book. Tomorrow we will choose photographs to go with the information we put in our book. Ask me to tell you three facts about bald eagles.
We did a spelling check-up to see how we are doing learning to spell the 44 kindergarten word wall words. I will be sending home a list of tricky words your child is still working on so they can practice at home too. They will have a list at school too so they can practice spelling those words during literacy stations. Students who already are spelling the 44 words will have challenge words to work on. We listened to a story today called Doris's Dinosaur, by Rosemary Wells. The story had a good lesson about being different or doing different things. Ask me to tell you what Doris's problem was and how she learned that being different is okay. Have a peaceful evening! Juliet |