Monday, October 9, 2017



Hi JK Parents!

This week provided us with many opportunities to learn about pumpkins as we celebrated with our first Pajama Party!  

Literacy:  We read many stories about fall and the farm, and pumpkins, including:  Five Little Pumpkins, Barn Dance, The Grumpy Morning, Meet the Dogs of Bedlam Farm, Funny Farm, The Biggest Pumpkin Ever, Owl Babies, Colors of Fall, Froggy Learns to Swim, and Tops and Bottoms.  We met in reading groups and looked for familiar letters and practiced their sounds.  We took picture walks trough books and hunted for letters and letter groups.  The children are all making great progress with their Handwriting Without Tears sign in each day.  Ask your children to show you their writing using lower case letters in their names.  We have all transitioned away from writing in all caps and are learning to only capitalize the first letter of their names.  

Math and Science:  We talked about the different crops on a farm and which part of vegetables we eat-the tops or the bottoms, after reading the story Tops and Bottoms.  We studied different crops and how they grow, and categorized each group into root vegetables and leaf and other "top" vegetables.  We played number bingo and practiced writing the 1 first in our teen numbers.  We measured and mixed ingredients to make pumpkin muffins, talking about the consistency and the changes that take place to the ingredients as they are baked.  We also talked about less and more and practiced story problems as a group for addition and subtraction.

Fine Arts:  We are making Five Little Pumpkin pictures as we practice our rhyming gluing and writing.  We are also writing and illustrating our stories and response to reading each month.   We created October calendars and counted the numbers as the children decorated pumpkins or jack-o-lanterns.  We will be completing observation drawings as a center, ongoing.  It's nice to track the progress through the year of the details they begin to include as they notice more and are able to translate those details to their drawings.  

We talked about friendships and being a part of the JK family and what that means.  We will study the lifecycle of a pumpkin this week and create a class book.  We will also travel to The Grove for our first JK field trip of the year!  We will also be studying the great artist Van Gogh.  

Be sure to wear your Roycemore shirts tomorrow and to bring your $15 cash for the pumpkin lane and the bus fee.  

Have a great week!

Ms. Massey