Last week of Kindergarten!

Wow! Your Kindergarten student is now ready for first grade! It was a privilege to be able to work with you all! 

In order to keep preparing for 1st grade, here are a few helpful tips for summer...

Reading

Below are links to book lists at different levels. Reminder: The reading level that is listed on the report card is your child's instructional level, which means they are able to read books one level lower independently. 

Levels C-I

Levels H-M

Here are some reading and writing choices! 

• Read 20 minutes out of your book bag/box
• Have a family member read aloud to you or take turns reading to each other
• Look at the writing you’ve done lately and set some goals.  Write them down and keep them next to you when you write 
• Write a book recommendation for a friend or family member
• Call a family member and tell him or her about your reading or writing goals
• Help write a grocery list 
• Write a poem for someone
• Read book reviews online and make a list of “must-reads”
• Find a friend and read the same book.  Set goals and make a plan to chat 
• Have a “reading marathon” - gather up a bunch of books, magazines and or newspapers, and read until you need to stop
• Spend time writing a mystery/fantasy/historical fiction/sci fi/realistic fiction story
• Draw a picture and write labels and give it to a friend or family member
• Make a comic strip
• Read a video game “cheat” book
• Read and follow the directions for a game
• Research something for your family 
• Write a letter to convince someone to do or think something
• Write a survey question and ask people their opinion and then use this in a piece of writing
• Read and follow a recipe
• Write a “how-to” for someone in your family or a friend
• Reread your favorite picture book
• Read a story to a sister or brother 
• Read a story to someone on the phone
• Write a play 
• Take a scene from your book and write a script 
• Write a letter to a friend or family member that lives far away
• Write questions and interview someone.  Take notes during your interview!
• Plan a trip (real or made-up) by researching places to go, things to see, and how you’ll get there
• Read to a pet or stuffed animal

Math Ideas

• Games with subitizing cards. 
• Top it. Split a deck of cards with different dot patterns on them. Player 1 and Player 2 will both lay a card down.  Then, they will determine which player’s card is greater. The player with the greater card will get both of the cards. If the players lay cards with the same number of dots, they will flip another card to see who has the greater card. 
• Subitizing Game: To play, you need two players. a game board and tiles/counters to cover each of the subitizing patterns on the board. Once the board is covered with tiles, player 1 points to a tile and player 2 lifts the tile for one second. Player one then has to say how many dots they saw. If they get it correct, they keep the tile, if not the tile is replaced. Player 2 then has a turn. this continues until all tiles are removed, the winner is the person with the  most tiles at the end of the game. Here is a link to a gameboard. 
• Use playing cards to play Memory. They will pick a card with a number 1-10. Then they will need to find the partner to ten. 
• Here is a link to a five frame computer game. 
• This website has TONS of helpful links. Keep in mind that adding, subtracting, and structuring within 10 will help your child be ready for First Grade! 

Thank you for a GREAT year at New Directions. Have a fantastic summer! 

May 30-June 2

Few reminders: 

• Please return any school books that you may find around your house. 
• Please turn in your field day form letting us know if your child will take hot or cold lunch! 
• If you have any Box Tops, please turn them in by Friday, June 2nd. 

Upcoming events:
G 5/30 Go Team! Wear your favorite sports gear
O 5/31 Odd/crazy sock day
O 6/1 Orange Colors
D 6/2 Dads and moms (dress like your parents)
B 6/5 Backwards clothes day
Y 6/6 You’re so bright (wear sunglasses)
E 6/7 Extra bright clothes/Last Day of School-11:30
June 11: Timber Rattlers Game 1:00

A peek at our week: 

Reading:  Our book clubs have been a HUGE hit! I love walking around the room and hearing the students acting out pages, making their voices match the character feelings, and giggling through it all. They are really getting to know their books and characters well in this playful way. At the end of the week, we will celebrate by acting out our favorite books. It will be quite the show! 

Writing:  ATTENTION! Writing boot camp is back in Room 82 this week! Writers will be reminded of all the different genres they learned about this year and choose what they would like to write about each day. Writers will goal set and use the charts from the entire year to make their writing great! 

Math: We will explore measuring and comparing this week using inventory bags. The inventory bags are Ziploc baggies filled with an assortment of materials and different number materials. We will rotate through the following centers:

• Inventory bags: The kids choose a bag of items and then count and record the number of items they found.  They also need to check the counting strategy they have used to determine that.  
• Comparing Inventory Bags:   For this activity children will compare 2 inventory bags by dumping them on a divided tray and then organizing and comparing the contents of them.  They then will fill out a sheet that uses comparing words to record their findings.
• Ten Stick Measuring:  Each child needs to build a 10 stick with unifix cubes and will be using it to measure items around the room and find and record things that are longer and shorter around the room.  They should draw/write more than one thing on each side of the paper.  
• A______is longer than a_____________ :   kids are using colored pencils to make comparison drawings of objects they know and then   (Ex.  A ruler is longer than an eraser). There are also a_________is shorter than a__________ pages for them to complete, they can staple together all of the pages they make into a booklet.  

Word Study:  We've been using our word study time to write a class book. As we write together, students practice making sure their writing has: 

• Sight words written correctly
• Vowels
• Uppercase letters at the beginning of the sentence
• Lowercase letters for the rest
• Punctuation

Keep working on all of these skills this summer! 

Science: The scientists will think about the following questions:

• What do you know about balls? 
• What do you know about ramps? 

Then, we will use that knowledge to think of own experiment to do. They will use the scientific method to observe, think of a question, make a hypothesis, test the experiment, and share what you learned. We will share what we learned by making videos of the ramps we build and tests we run.

May 22-25

Hi K families!


Few reminders: 

• Please turn in your field day form letting us know if your child will take hot or cold lunch! 
• If you have any Box Tops, please turn them in by Friday, June 2nd. 

Upcoming events:
May 22: Family Night
May 26: No School
May 29: No School
May 30: Sportswear Day
May 31: Crazy/Odd Sock Day
June 1: Wear Orange
June 2: Dress Like Your Parents Day
June 5: Backwards Clothes Day
June 6: Sunglasses Day--Field Day and Mini-courses
June 7: Wear Bright Clothes/Last Day of School-11:30 Dismissal
June 11: Timber Rattlers Game 1:00

A peek at our week: 

Reading:  Kindergartners will be starting book clubs this week! These book clubs help us to learn more about characters and what is happening in the story. Kindergartners explore characters and stories by acting out. Here are the most important parts to remember when acting out books:

• Make your reading sound smooth (not. choppy. like. a. robot.)
• Check how your character is feeling! 
• Make your voice match the character's voice 
• Make your face and body match the character's 
• "Pop out" important parts of the book

Writing:  It's editing week! We will use our editing checklists and work with our partners to give suggestions and compliments. After making sure we have said all we want to say and drawn pictures that show many details, our writing will be ready to be published! First, writers will check to see that they have a beginning, speech bubbles, feelings, and an ending with a big action or feeling! Then, we will pay special attention to our sight words, punctuation, and upper and lowercase letters. I can't wait to send home true stories for you to enjoy!

Math: In order to get ready for the end of the year assessment, students will play a variety of math games for practice! Here are some of the games:

• Speed.  This card game helps students practice the number that comes before and the number that comes after a given number. 
• We will practice adding and subtracting within ten using a ten frame and bingo dotters. 
•  Using a dice within a dice (which we call baby dice), students will quickly add the two numbers they see together. Then, they will compare their number to their partner’s to determine which is greater.
• Students will play five frame Go Fish. Using five frames will help students to visualize adding and subtracting within five. 

Word Study:  We will continue to review all the Kindergarten sight words. We will especially focus on transferring this work to our reading and writing! 

Science: We will rotate through the following centers:

• We will watch videos and look at pictures of balls and ramps. Then we will draw blue prints for when we make ramps. 
• We will use paper tubes, wood, and bouncy balls to observe and explore.
• Scientists will be given Marble Works materials to build, observe, and take notes on what we notice.

May 15-19

Happy Mother's Day to everyone! Thanks for sharing your awesome kids with me this year:)

Woah! It's the last full week of school. I always love to take some time to reflect on the growth of the students at this time of year. The amount of knowledge and skill building that happens for these young learners in just one year never ceases to amaze me!

Upcoming events:
May 22: Family Night
May 26: No School
May 29: No School
June 6: Mini-courses and Field Day
June 7: Last Day of School
June 11: Timber Rattlers Game 1:00

A peek at our week: 

Reading:  We will continue acting out our books with a partner.  We will learn that readers think “How does this character feel right now?” and then make their voices, faces, and bodies match that feeling. Also, when readers come to a part where a character doesn’t say anything, they can think, “What might the character say in this part?” and then look closely at the pictures to help imagine those words. By acting out our books, we will develop an even deeper understanding of characters in our books. Partners will retell the story after reading each book. 

Writing:  Writers will learn that illustrations are a HUGE part of true stories because they show how characters feel and act.We will try using bold print or capitalized words to emphasize important words in our writing. Toward the end of the week, writers will be reminded to study their pictures and tell in words important details like feelings, setting, and actions.

Math: We will discuss the last lessons for unit 5 which focus on measurement; specifically, length, width, height, weight and capacity. We will be reviewing all the content from the unit and taking the unit test at the end of the week!

Word Study: We will use the next couple weeks to review all the Kindergarten sight words. Students have fully acquired a sight word when they can write it in a sentence with automaticity. We will work on writing sight words without peeking at the word wall! 

Science: We will rotate through the following centers:

• We will watch videos and look at pictures of balls and ramps. Then we will draw blue prints for when we make ramps. 
• We will use paper tubes, wood, and bouncy balls to observe and explore.
• Scientists will be given Marble Works materials to build, observe, and take notes on what we notice.

Our KAT celebration was so much fun! Here are a few pictures from the Super Hero centers! 

May 8-12

Here are a few events happening for us this week!

• We will listen to a presentation about the summer reading program at the library. It's a fun way to keep reading all summer long:)
• We look forward to celebrating the amazing job we did on our Knowledge-A-Thon on Friday. We will be celebrating our SUPER learning by going through a super hero obstacle course in the gym.

Here is the link to our school's May newsletter.

Here is the May lunch menu.

The NDLC Facebook is almost to 500 likes. Are you one of them? If not, follow us here! It is a great way to keep informed. You will often see photos of different class and school activities that your child is involved in.

Upcoming events:
May 10: Bike to School Day meet at The Recyclist at 7:30
May 22: Family Night
May 26: No School
May 29: No School
June 6: Mini-courses and Field Day-more information to come!
June 7: Last Day of School
June 11: Timber Rattlers Game 1:00

A peek at our week: 

Reading:  We will start a new unit on characters this week! We will start to learn the ways you can ‘meet’ the characters in our books. Some ways to do this are to pay attention to the title, cover, and setting. We will also take picture walks and think about the feelings our characters have. By the end of the week, we will be focusing on the changes in character feelings. 

Writing:  Just like readers, writers will learn to make sure that their writing looks right, sounds right, and makes sense! Our minilessons will also be focused on checking words in their writing to make sure they look right. Writers will search for and edit any incorrect sight words. We will use vowels charts to ensure that each word has a vowel. Finally, we will use blend charts (sh, ch, th, etc.) and alphabet charts to make sure we are getting the right sounds and letters in our writing.

Math: Last week, we learned to play speed! This card game helps students practice the number that comes before and the number that comes after a given number. We also call this the +1 or -1 strategy. Ask your child to teach you how to play. Here are some other fun ways to build fluency with adding and subtracting!I especially like the game called Build a Tower. Some of the games may be too challenging, but feel free to choose the games that would work best with your learner.

Word Study: Students have been exploring long and short vowels during our word work time. We talk about different vowel teams. Vowel teams are two vowels that work together to make the long vowel sound. As you are reading, go on a hunt for different vowel teams! Some of the vowel teams we have been talking about are: ee, oa, and ai. You may also find vowel-consonant-e words such as like, twice, bike, ride, cute, etc.! You'll be amazed on what your young learner can find!

Science: Our inquiry continues as we ask ourselves, “How can we make a ball?” We will use many different materials to try to create balls. We will look explore balls that were cut in half to decide what we should use when we are making them. Later in the week, we will introduce ramps. We will watch videos to build our knowledge and visit the gym to do tests on a large ramp.

May 1-5

Happy Funky Friday! 

Upcoming events:
May 4: Action Figures/Sci Fi Day
May 22: Family Night
May 26: No School

NOTES: 
Teacher Appreciation Week - May 1-5
Help thank our teachers for their hard work. Provide an item for lunch or snacks during Teacher Appreciation Week.  Click on this link to sign up.  Thank you for your support!

A peek at our week: 

Reading:  Readers reread for many reasons! They read the first time to solve tricky words. They can read a book again to make their reading smooth! Then, they can read it a third time to post it funny, interesting, or important parts that they would like to share with their partner!

Writing:  After working hard during boot camp to make our writing easy to read and to write more sentences in our books, writers are ready to tackle true stories! We will start to brain storm by making book covers to help us hang onto our ideas. As readers, we know that we can take a picture walk to understand how a story will go. We will use that idea and quickly draw the pages of the book before we write. It's like a writing picture walk. Then as we think about writing the words, we will say them out loud and ask ourselves “does that make sense?” before writing.

Math: By the end of the year in Kindergarten, students are expected to be fluent within five. This means, they need to be able to add and subtract equations with numbers 5 or less with automatically. This week, we will be working hard to build fluency by doing flashcards and playing games like Addition Crossout.  Here is a copy in case you want to play at home:

Word Study: Here is a link with helpful information about sight words. It also contains a list of 100 frequently encountered sight words. If you feel like your child has a firm grasp on our sight word list, use words from this list! 

Science: Now that we have a better understanding of the characteristics of balls, we will start exploring what they can do! We will explore bounciness on different surfaces, discuss how different balls make different sounds as they bounce, and measure how high they can bounce. Then, at centers, students will test

• The bounciness of each kind of ball (counting the number of bounces)
• How much effort it takes to move it (using a straw to blow)

April 24-28

Upcoming events:
April 28: Funky Friday (dress as silly as you want)
May 4: Action Figures/Sci Fi Day
May 22: Family Night
May 26: No School

NOTES: 
Teacher Appreciation Week - May 1-5
Help thank our teachers for their hard work. Provide an item for lunch or snacks during Teacher Appreciation Week.  Click on this link to sign up.  Thank you for your support!
Fang Reading Program: 
Remember to turn in any Fang forms that you have not turned in already! We are still accepting any and all bases. :)

A peek at our week: 

Reading:  Readers learn to be problem solvers! Even when they get to unknown words in their books, they can use lots of strategies to figure out a word. Here are some of the ways we solve words:

Writing:  ATTENTION! Writers will be having a writing boot camp this week! As we head into the last part of the year, we will push ourselves to do what strong writers ALWAYS do: make writing easy to read and write more and more. We will make our writing easy to read by making sure we have a vowel sound in every word and checking to see words are on the line and sentences have spaces. In order to write more, writers ask questions to add more sentences to the page and set goals of how much writing they can get done in a day.

Math: Here are a few highlights of what students will be doing in math this week:

• Telling, retelling, and writing equations for addition and subtraction stories
• building partners of 10 in many different ways to build fluency
• Practicing showing partners for 7-9
• Building numbers 1-20 with different tools and looking for patterns within the model

Word Study: It is important for Kindergartners to keep practicing sight words so that they can read and write them in a snap. One way we have been working on that in our room is to practice writing sight word sentences. For example, I would say "I like to play with my dog." Students would them practice picturing each sight word as they try to write it automatically. 

Science: Students have been LOVING our research on balls and ramps so far. After looking at videos, books, and pictures, we have come up with three questions to guide our inquiry:

• What makes a ball move?
• What is the ball made of? 
• How are balls the same and different? 

This week, we will begin hands on exploration. Students will explore the characteristics balls and what factors affect movement.