Practicing our syllables and beginning and ending sounds at Morning Meeting!
We have made our way through A, B, C, D, E, F, and G...and a million other things this year! It's November and I am thrilled with the progress this class has made. It's going to be Thanksgiving before we know it and then Winter break. I'm looking forward to seeing you for our conferences, and sharing all your children are learning. Most importantly, I have gotten to know each child and seen their amazing kindness and special abilities. This class is incredibly positive and excited about all we are learning.
We attended an all school group project art show for Dia de los Muertos, in collaboration with the Lower School and the Early Childhood children. It was amazing to see the different pieces come together to create a beautiful collage of art by three year olds to nine year olds.
Literacy:
We are learning about the great artist, Van Gogh, and have been talking about his life as a story. It increases comprehension when the children are asked to make predictions and discuss characters and their lives as well as their attributes. Sequencing with our stories ie There was an Old Lady who Swallowed a Pie helps children with first, next, then, finally and beginning middle and end. We continue to learn the different sounds the vowels can make and use flippy dolphin, one of our reading strategies to use the other sound(s) when the first one doesn't make sense. We are also using chunky monkey to cover parts of longer words to be shorter chunks that make sense to then put together with the other chunk.
Math:
We have been working on those tricky teen numbers and the one to one correspondence of moving manipulatives or a pointer for each number. We have also been working on our vertical writing of numbers using the white board. We played whole group number Bingo and wrote each number as it was called.
Fine Motor:
We created our own "The Starry Night". We used pastels and paint pens first and then painted over them with water colors. We discussed the foreground and the background and all of the different elements of the painting. I loved that the children noticed the houses with lights on, and some chose to make their houses "sleeping" with the lights off. We have a classroom of artists.
We have been making Thanksgiving Day pictures using glitter and cut out turkeys. We will begin working on our Grandparents and Special Friends Day projects next week. I hope you will have someone visiting so the children may show off their hard work. It's such a fun day for everyone.
November 15th is the middle school fundraiser, so go do some holiday shopping and let your children come have some fun! It's from 6-9 and is a great time for JK to get to know the wonderful middle school kids and teachers!
Social/Emotional:
We have been playing our, "Yes Please and No Thank You" game. We pass around Thanksgiving foods and take turns either taking them or asking a friend. It's great practice for holidays where extended family and friends are around.
We have been discussing different feelings and ways and words to use when expressing our feelings. JKers often get frustrated because they don't know or cannnot quickly access the correct language. Practice and role play are great for this.
Have a wonderful weekend!
Ms. Massey
