Friday, January 29, 2016
Buddy Project
We met with our fourth grade buddies today for a special project. We made snow people out of Venn Diagrams! Buddies compared different foods, colors, sports, and activities they like and ended up doing a lot of writing too...using some of the sight words we have been practicing. It certainly was a fun way to end a busy and exciting day! They may be the only snow people we are able to make for a while since it's going to be so warm next week!
January 29, 2016
Dear Parents,
We had a wonderful Fish Day today! The students enjoyed visiting all the different Kindergarten classrooms to complete various fish projects. All the fish projects are now displayed in our hallway…making our own beautiful aquarium. Make sure you check out my blog post to see some exciting pictures from this very exciting day! We were very appreciative that Mrs. Arokiaraj, Mrs. Shannon, Mrs. Sargent, and Mrs. Barkley were able to join us as volunteers!
We met with our Fourth Grade Reading Buddies this afternoon to work on a special project. We made snow people out of a Venn Diagram. Using some of our sight words, we wrote about and compared things that we like! The students had a great time getting to know their partners better and ended up doing a lot of writing too!
We have an exciting week coming up next week! We will have a special Superfish Presentation on Monday from the Burlington Science Center. We will learn a lot about the sea creatures we will see at the aquarium.
We are excited about our trip to the New England Aquarium on Tuesday! More information will be going home on Monday but students will need a bagged lunch and drink. Everything should be completely disposable. We will eat snack before we leave. Chaperones should be here by 8:35am and will be riding the bus with us. Thanks in advance to Mrs. Joshi, Mrs. Sargent, and Mrs. Ohol for their willingness to join us as chaperones.
Friday will also be an exciting day. Our school has been working on a school wide puzzle where classes can earn CARES coupons for positive behavior. Our class contributed several pieces to the puzzle, which revealed a special prize...Pajama Day! Our school will be having a Pajama Day this coming Friday, February 5th!
We will be going to the Library on Wednesday. Please remember to send your child’s library book back before then so they can take out another book. Also, please be sure to return all the class books as soon as you have read them at home so other students can borrow them. These are the books with the class list on the back.
We have been working a lot with uppercase letters in Fundations as well as tapping out words. I have also been teaching the students how to sign each letter with sign language. We have learned letters A-J so far. You will have to see if your child remembers any of the signs!
We have been spending a lot of time on writing this past week, especially writing persuasive/opinion pieces. We have been focusing a lot on leaving spaces between words, using upper- and lowercase letters appropriately, and including ending punctuation. We also have spent a lot of time encouraging students to go back and read what they have written to make sure they have all the words they are trying to write.
The students finished their House for Hermit Crab books this week and will start reading them to the class before taking them home next week. We use the book to reinforce the months of the year and several sight words, including in, the, saw, and a. Please have your child read his/her book to you when it comes home and frequently even after that, pointing to the words as he/she goes.
The list of students’ names for Valentine’s Day went home this week. We will be celebrating Valentine’s Day on Friday, February 12th by opening our valentines and having an extra snack. Students are invited to bring two snacks from home that day, one for the morning and one for the afternoon.
Our class will be participating in Wee Deliver, a schoolwide post office system from February 5-12. Students can mail letters and pictures to students in other classrooms by addressing envelopes and putting a sticker in the corner for a stamp. Students always enjoy writing to their siblings, friends, neighbors, and former teachers. You can also participate if you would like. You can write a letter to your child, address it, and put a sticker in the corner and drop it into the post box outside our main office. Our classroom address is 115 Aquarium Drive, Burlington, MA 01803.
I hope you all enjoy the weekend and hope you are all looking forward to more snow next week! Don’t forget that Winter Vacation will be February 15-19.
Melanie Duncan
PS...Please be sure to send lots of winter clothes with your child for recess (snowpants, boots, hats, mittens/gloves, jackets, sweatshirts, scarves, etc.). We will go outside if the temperature is above 20 degrees. It is also helpful if you can help your child practice putting everything on independently and taking it all off independently too. You can probably imagine what it's like getting 14 Kindergarten students ready for recess in the winter time! Please also label each piece of clothing with your child's name. You may also want to leave a spare set of clothes in your child's backpack or at school in case anything gets wet while playing outside.
Also, don’t forget to keep practicing the sight words and addition fluency facts at home! The more practice the better!
We had a wonderful Fish Day today! The students enjoyed visiting all the different Kindergarten classrooms to complete various fish projects. All the fish projects are now displayed in our hallway…making our own beautiful aquarium. Make sure you check out my blog post to see some exciting pictures from this very exciting day! We were very appreciative that Mrs. Arokiaraj, Mrs. Shannon, Mrs. Sargent, and Mrs. Barkley were able to join us as volunteers!
We met with our Fourth Grade Reading Buddies this afternoon to work on a special project. We made snow people out of a Venn Diagram. Using some of our sight words, we wrote about and compared things that we like! The students had a great time getting to know their partners better and ended up doing a lot of writing too!
We have an exciting week coming up next week! We will have a special Superfish Presentation on Monday from the Burlington Science Center. We will learn a lot about the sea creatures we will see at the aquarium.
We are excited about our trip to the New England Aquarium on Tuesday! More information will be going home on Monday but students will need a bagged lunch and drink. Everything should be completely disposable. We will eat snack before we leave. Chaperones should be here by 8:35am and will be riding the bus with us. Thanks in advance to Mrs. Joshi, Mrs. Sargent, and Mrs. Ohol for their willingness to join us as chaperones.
Friday will also be an exciting day. Our school has been working on a school wide puzzle where classes can earn CARES coupons for positive behavior. Our class contributed several pieces to the puzzle, which revealed a special prize...Pajama Day! Our school will be having a Pajama Day this coming Friday, February 5th!
We will be going to the Library on Wednesday. Please remember to send your child’s library book back before then so they can take out another book. Also, please be sure to return all the class books as soon as you have read them at home so other students can borrow them. These are the books with the class list on the back.
We have been working a lot with uppercase letters in Fundations as well as tapping out words. I have also been teaching the students how to sign each letter with sign language. We have learned letters A-J so far. You will have to see if your child remembers any of the signs!
We have been spending a lot of time on writing this past week, especially writing persuasive/opinion pieces. We have been focusing a lot on leaving spaces between words, using upper- and lowercase letters appropriately, and including ending punctuation. We also have spent a lot of time encouraging students to go back and read what they have written to make sure they have all the words they are trying to write.
The students finished their House for Hermit Crab books this week and will start reading them to the class before taking them home next week. We use the book to reinforce the months of the year and several sight words, including in, the, saw, and a. Please have your child read his/her book to you when it comes home and frequently even after that, pointing to the words as he/she goes.
The list of students’ names for Valentine’s Day went home this week. We will be celebrating Valentine’s Day on Friday, February 12th by opening our valentines and having an extra snack. Students are invited to bring two snacks from home that day, one for the morning and one for the afternoon.
Our class will be participating in Wee Deliver, a schoolwide post office system from February 5-12. Students can mail letters and pictures to students in other classrooms by addressing envelopes and putting a sticker in the corner for a stamp. Students always enjoy writing to their siblings, friends, neighbors, and former teachers. You can also participate if you would like. You can write a letter to your child, address it, and put a sticker in the corner and drop it into the post box outside our main office. Our classroom address is 115 Aquarium Drive, Burlington, MA 01803.
I hope you all enjoy the weekend and hope you are all looking forward to more snow next week! Don’t forget that Winter Vacation will be February 15-19.
Melanie Duncan
PS...Please be sure to send lots of winter clothes with your child for recess (snowpants, boots, hats, mittens/gloves, jackets, sweatshirts, scarves, etc.). We will go outside if the temperature is above 20 degrees. It is also helpful if you can help your child practice putting everything on independently and taking it all off independently too. You can probably imagine what it's like getting 14 Kindergarten students ready for recess in the winter time! Please also label each piece of clothing with your child's name. You may also want to leave a spare set of clothes in your child's backpack or at school in case anything gets wet while playing outside.
Also, don’t forget to keep practicing the sight words and addition fluency facts at home! The more practice the better!
Fish Day
Fish Day was a huge success! The students enjoyed visiting all the different Kindergarten rooms to make lots of different fish and other sea creature projects. All the projects are now on display in our hallway, which now looks like our very own Francis Wyman Aquarium! It was fun making projects of all the different sea creatures we have been learning about! We especially want to thank Mrs. Shannon, Mrs. Sargent, Mrs. Arokiaraj, and Mrs. Barkley for their willingness to help today! We are getting very excited to visit the New England Aquarium next week!
Friday, January 22, 2016
January 22, 2016 Newsletter
Dear Parents,
The children are certainly learning quite a bit about sea life! Their aquariums are on the back wall and they have made octopuses and sea turtles and have learned many interesting facts about them both. You should ask them how many legs an octopus has and about where the sea turtle lays her eggs!
We are getting excited to go to the Aquarium on Tuesday, February 4th. More information about the trip and what the students will need will be going home the day before we go. It should be a fun trip!
We will be having our Fish Day this Friday, January 29th. Students will get to travel to all the different Kindergarten classrooms to complete various fish and other sea creature projects. We are still in need of parent volunteers from about 8:45-10:15am that morning. Please let me know if you are interested.
We enjoyed a presentation from the Burlington Science Center on Tuesday. Miss P. taught us some neat facts about the animals in Jan Brett’s The Mitten and even brought in two hedgehogs for us to observe and even touch!
We will be celebrating Valentine's Day on Friday, February 12th by passing out Valentines. Please don’t attach any candy or other edible items to the Valentines. If you would like to send something, pencils or stickers make great alternatives to food. I will send a list home with students next week for students to use to write out their valentines. Students can also bring a special snack from home to eat in the afternoon on Valentine’s Day. They will need a morning and an afternoon snack that day.
The students continue to write in their journals. We continually encourage them to write on their own in their best guess spelling and not to be afraid to make a mistake. We have started a unit on persuasive writing. The students are trying to convince me to get a class pet! We will be talking a lot about features of good persuasive writing. I plan to have them help me try to persuade Mr. Duncan that we need a minivan!
We have been practicing our letters and numbers but it never hurts to have them practice at home too. The more they write numbers 0-20, the easier and more natural they will become. The teen numbers are particularly challenging so those are great numbers to practice. We have finished a topic in math on subtraction and are now working on decomposing numbers (i.e., 7 is 3 +4, 5+2, 6+1, etc.). I will be sending home addition flash cards for you to practice with your child. Children are supposed to be fluent with these facts by the end of Kindergarten, which means they should be able to say the answers in less than 3 seconds. I will try to send those home by next week.
We started our guided reading program last week. Guided reading enables children to practice reading strategies with the teacher's support in small groups. This is just the beginning. It helps your children to become more and more comfortable with text. It’s amazing how far they have already come since September!
Progress reports will be going home on Monday. I have included an example of a guided reading book that I use with the students in the progress report folders. It will help give you an idea of the instructional level your child is reading at in case you are looking for books for them to read at home. Our next scheduled conference isn’t until March, but feel free to email or call me if you have any questions or concerns with the progress report. We can certainly set up a time to talk on the phone or meet in the classroom to talk.
Have a great weekend!
Melanie Duncan
PS...We went to the library this past week and several students had overdue books. We won’t go again until Wednesday, February 3rd but I would encourage your children to return their books as soon as they are done with them so they can take out a new book during our next visit to the library.
Wishlist items: Play dough, large brown paper bags (with and without handles), small brown paper bags, small and large paper plates, Q-tips…..Thanks!!!
The children are certainly learning quite a bit about sea life! Their aquariums are on the back wall and they have made octopuses and sea turtles and have learned many interesting facts about them both. You should ask them how many legs an octopus has and about where the sea turtle lays her eggs!
We are getting excited to go to the Aquarium on Tuesday, February 4th. More information about the trip and what the students will need will be going home the day before we go. It should be a fun trip!
We will be having our Fish Day this Friday, January 29th. Students will get to travel to all the different Kindergarten classrooms to complete various fish and other sea creature projects. We are still in need of parent volunteers from about 8:45-10:15am that morning. Please let me know if you are interested.
We enjoyed a presentation from the Burlington Science Center on Tuesday. Miss P. taught us some neat facts about the animals in Jan Brett’s The Mitten and even brought in two hedgehogs for us to observe and even touch!
We will be celebrating Valentine's Day on Friday, February 12th by passing out Valentines. Please don’t attach any candy or other edible items to the Valentines. If you would like to send something, pencils or stickers make great alternatives to food. I will send a list home with students next week for students to use to write out their valentines. Students can also bring a special snack from home to eat in the afternoon on Valentine’s Day. They will need a morning and an afternoon snack that day.
The students continue to write in their journals. We continually encourage them to write on their own in their best guess spelling and not to be afraid to make a mistake. We have started a unit on persuasive writing. The students are trying to convince me to get a class pet! We will be talking a lot about features of good persuasive writing. I plan to have them help me try to persuade Mr. Duncan that we need a minivan!
We have been practicing our letters and numbers but it never hurts to have them practice at home too. The more they write numbers 0-20, the easier and more natural they will become. The teen numbers are particularly challenging so those are great numbers to practice. We have finished a topic in math on subtraction and are now working on decomposing numbers (i.e., 7 is 3 +4, 5+2, 6+1, etc.). I will be sending home addition flash cards for you to practice with your child. Children are supposed to be fluent with these facts by the end of Kindergarten, which means they should be able to say the answers in less than 3 seconds. I will try to send those home by next week.
We started our guided reading program last week. Guided reading enables children to practice reading strategies with the teacher's support in small groups. This is just the beginning. It helps your children to become more and more comfortable with text. It’s amazing how far they have already come since September!
Progress reports will be going home on Monday. I have included an example of a guided reading book that I use with the students in the progress report folders. It will help give you an idea of the instructional level your child is reading at in case you are looking for books for them to read at home. Our next scheduled conference isn’t until March, but feel free to email or call me if you have any questions or concerns with the progress report. We can certainly set up a time to talk on the phone or meet in the classroom to talk.
Have a great weekend!
Melanie Duncan
PS...We went to the library this past week and several students had overdue books. We won’t go again until Wednesday, February 3rd but I would encourage your children to return their books as soon as they are done with them so they can take out a new book during our next visit to the library.
Wishlist items: Play dough, large brown paper bags (with and without handles), small brown paper bags, small and large paper plates, Q-tips…..Thanks!!!
Wednesday, January 20, 2016
Mitten Names
We have been practicing writing our full names this week. The students wrote their first and last names on mittens to help decorate our room for a chilly week at school!
Octopus Project
Did you know that an octopus has eight arms instead of legs or that an octopus has a beak to open its favorite foods (crabs and shellfish) and a siphon to help it jet through the water and squirt ink? Did you know that an octopus can live in a tin can, change colors, and lay over two thousand eggs? The students enjoyed learning all kinds of interesting facts about the octopus this week and wrote about them in their journals and even made their own octopuses in the art area. Octopuses sure are amazing!
Guest Reader
Mr. Magee, one of the Physical Education teachers at FW, read our class a story during our visit to the library today. It was a special treat!
Tuesday, January 19, 2016
Hedgehog Show
We had the amazing priveledge today to attend the Hedgehog Show with Miss P. from the Burlington Science Center. We learned some neat facts about the animals from Jan Brett's The Mitten. We learned about their habitats and how they protect themselves and we got to meet two real hedgehogs, Penny and Pearl. Some of the students evened dared to touch their pointy quills!
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