Fall is in the air. This week the kindergarteners explored fall and leaves. Did you know the job of the leaf is to make food? Did you know that leaves don’t really change color? They just stop making so much food, so the other colors show through. This week we learned all about how leaves grow, their job, and why they change color. We went on a walk to look for signs of fall and to collect leaves. We used those leaves for a little exploration and experimentation. We also created a new class book about a squirrel that visited us while we ate lunch outside. Finally we created a dancing leaves picture with our arm and hand as the tree trunk and branches and painted dots as the leaves.
Monday:
No School- Teacher Workshop
Tuesday:
Happy October! There was a lot of excitement in the Kindergarten classroom this morning. Not only did we get new calendar pages in our binder, we got new toys. Ms Torborg changed out all of the toys. We now have tractors, a barn, animals, fire trucks and a fire station along with new blocks.
Right away in the morning, we went on a nature walk. Our goal today was to look at the different trees and signs of Autumn around us. We each started with a clipboard, paper, and pencil. During our walk, we would stop to look around us. We had to try to find the items on our paper like leaves, twigs, squirrels, etc… Each time we found one, we would cross it out. We also collected leaves along the way for a project. We collect many different leaves. They were different colors, sizes, and shapes. We saw trees with brown, yellow, red, orange, and purple leaves. Many trees still had green leaves.
In reading, we reviewed our letters and letter sounds. Then we turned our focus to the letter Yy. We watched a letter y video, identified words that started with the /y/, and practiced writing both capital and lowercase Yy.
During theme, we learned all about leaves. We found out the job of the leaf is to make food for the tree. In fall, there is less sunlight for the leaves to make food. Plus the tree is getting ready for the long winter and doesn’t need as much food. Since it is not making food, the leaves change color and die. Then the wind blows them off the tree. The tree will make new leaves in the spring when the tree needs to eat again.
In math, we completed page 9 in our number book after singing our song and air writing our numbers.. Then we collected some data on the leaves we collected in the morning. There were five different stations we had to complete with our leaf. First, we had to draw and color a picture of it and then determine its size. Next, we measured our leaf using the connecting blocks both the length and the width. After counting the number of blocks we used, we recorded our number. At our third station, we recorded how many pennies it took to completely cover our leaf. First, we covered it. Then we counted the pennies. Finally, we recorded our answer. At our fourth station, we had to predict if our leaf would sink or float and then test it. At our final station, we had to label the different parts of the leaf. We found out that since we all had different leaves, we had different information on our paper.
At the end of the day, our buddies came down to get us and we headed back up to their room. They showed us the different landforms they created and taught us a little information about each one.
Wednesday:
We started our morning out with the story, I’m Not Scared…I'm Prepared. The students in the class learn about the SHEEP, SHEPHERD, and WOLF. The students are the sheep and the teacher is the shepherd. The teacher will protect the students just like a shepherd protects their sheep. (We have heard this analogy before. Jesus is the good shepherd and we are the sheep. We need to listen to him and do what he says.). The story taught us what to do if a wolf or intruder enters our school. We would follow our ALICE training. A- Alert, L-Lock Down, I-Inform, C-Counter, E- Evacuate First, we focused on E - evacuate. We talked how we would evacuate from our room and where we would go. Then we practiced it. We practiced going out the side door and meeting at our special spot (Father’s front steps). Then we worked on L - locked down. We located several different spots in our room where we can hide and still jump up if we need too. Once we get in our spot, we find something we can throw at the intruder if they get in our room.
In reading, we reviewed our letters and letter sounds. Then we turned our focus to the letter Rr. We watched a letter y video, identified words that started with the /r/, and practiced writing both capital and lowercase Rr. Next we reviewed all of our sight words then we were introduced to our new sight word is. After using our new word in a sentence, we worked together as a class to read our new book, Fall Colors. We had to use the pictures and the beginning letter sounds to help us figure out the hard words. We also made a class book. Ms. Torborg started by telling us a story. It was about a squirrel’s visit. It started out with our class eating lunch outside one day because it was so nice. When we were eating, a squirrel kept coming closer and closer until it finally got close enough to grab something from us. Our job was to figure out what the squirrel stole from us. We each met with Ms. Torborg so we could write our words. Then we illustrated our story. We had to draw a picture to match the words and color the picture of the squirrel on our page.
In religion, we talked about trusted people. On the front of our booklet, were pictures of different people who trust and follow Jesus. There were 2 saints we have already talked about St. Francis of Assisi and St Theresa of Calcutta. We reviewed their stories and discussed how they trusted God. On the next page, we identified people in the picture of a school that we can trust. We also talked about people in our school we can trust. On the final pages, we identified people in our life we can trust and drew a picture of them.
Thursday:
We started reading with the Better Alphabet Song just like every day since the beginning of school. We sing our Better Alphabet song 2 times a day! Next we listened to our Nn song, identified words that began with the /n/, and practiced “air” writing the letter n. Then we practiced writing our capital and lowercase n’s. We were also introduced to rhyming words, listened to a rhyming word video, and tried to identify different words that rhyme. Then we listened to the story Fall Mixed Up. Actually, we listened to it 3 times. The first time Ms. Torborg read the story as the author wrote it. The second time, we tried to identify all the mixed-up things. The third time we listened to the story, we tried to identify the different rhyming words. Next, we worked with the -am word family. We picked different consonants to put in front of the letters am. Then we worked together to sound out the word and determine if it was a real word or nonsense word. Once we each had a turn to pick and letter and create a word, Ms. Torborg read through all of the words. We determined that all of the words rhymed!
In math, we completed our calendar binder. Since we won’t be at school tomorrow to complete our calendar, we added some of our data to our calendars sheets for tomorrow today. Next we worked on describing shapes. First, we worked as a class to describe a shape Ms. Torborg had on her card. We identified what it looked like, the number of sides, the number of corners, etc. After working together for a while, we partnered up. We each got a shape card. Our job was to describe our shape to our partner. Then we played a subitizing game, Find It! Today we played the game by ourself. The goal was to cover every square of the game board. First, we rolled a dice and identified the number on it. Then we had to find a square on our board with the same number of dots and cover it. Throughout the day, we created a fall tree with dancing leaves. We determined that if you lay under a tree as the leaves are falling they look like they are dancing through the air. Ms. Torborg started us off by tracing our arm and hand. This became the tree trunk and branches. We had to cut it out and glue it on a big piece of white paper. Then we cut out and glued the words on the top “Fall leaves are dancing.” Finally, we used our fingertips to create leaves on our paper. We dunked our fingertips in paint and put dots all over our paper. We added green, red, yellow, orange, and brown leaves. We ended our time with a coloring sheet. We had to read the color word on each leaf and color it that color. We used the color words on the wall for help. We just had to match the letters.
Friday:
Marathon Day!
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