Kinder-Whale Tales Dear Kinder-Whale Families, I hope you all have had a wonderful weekend! Once again, THANK YOU so much to everyone who came out to our Open House! We had a very great turn out, thanks to all of you! It was amazing to see our little Kinder-Whales giving you a tour of the classroom while teaching you all about the things that we have learned throughout the school year! They have certainly learned so much and I am so proud of each and every one of them! Please read all about how we got ready for Open House on the RIGHT side of the weekly news, under RECAP! Featured above in this week's news is a slideshow of one of our End of the Year projects. The students were asked to come up with a fun fact to teach an incoming Kindergartener (students in TK and new students) something that they have learned this year. We reviewed how back in September, we learned all about apples and Johnny Appleseed. In October, we learned all about pumpkins and its life cycle. We also learned about spiders, the parts of a spider, and the different types of spiders. In November, we learned about how some people celebrate Thanksgiving. We also learned about different community helpers, including firefighters, police officers, doctors, librarians, etc. In December, we learned about holidays around the world. In January, we learned about Martin Luther King, Jr., and we made New Year's Resolutions. We also learned about polar bears and what they can do or have. In February, we learned about groundhogs and Groundhog's Day. We also learned about presidents, and more specifically all about George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. In March, we learned about Spring, and St. Patrick's Day. In April, we also learned all about the weather, clouds, water cycle, and rainbows. Please take a look at the pictures and read the captions to see what they came up with! SEAL Unit: Pushes and Pulls We spent most of our week between preparing for Open House and learning more about our new SEAL unit on Forces. This week, we also got new seats! To help the students use the new SEAL vocabulary terms in daily conversation, we also got new table names. On one side of the table name tag is the new word, and on the other side is the definition. The red table, formerly the Cumulus table, is now the Force table. A force is a push or pull. The orange table, formerly the Cirrus table, is now the Speed table. Speed is how fast or slow something is. The yellow table, formerly the Stratus table, is now the Position table. Position is where someone or something is. The green table, formerly the Fog table, is now the Motion table. Motion is movement, or how something changes position. The blue table, formerly the Stratonimbus table, is now the Friction table. Friction is a force that slows something down. The purple table, formerly the Cumulonimbus table, is now the Gravity table. Gravity is a force that pulls you down to Earth. We will continue to practice, review, investigate, and learn more about these new terms in the remaining days of school! SEAL: Narrative Input This past week, we read a new story called, Newton and Me by Lynne Mayer. In this story, a boy and his dog named Newton play together and investigate the forces of motion. As we read the story, students were asked to pay attention to all of the forces (pushes and pulls) that they hear about in the story. During the first read aloud, students listened carefully and looked at the pictures. In the second read aloud, word/dialog bubbles were added to the pictures. At the beginning of the story, Newton drops a ball on the boy's face, waking him up. He pulls on his clothes, and they run out the door to play. The boy notices that when he rolls the ball to Newton on the grass, it doesn't get very far. However, when he rolls it on smooth ground, it rolls faster and farther. This reminded the students of friction: There is more friction on bumpy grass and less friction on smooth ground. If he places the ball down and doesn't move it at all, it stays in place (position). Then Newton and the boy decide to play with a toy truck. If they don't move it at all, it will stay in place (position), but if they give it a hard push, it is put into motion (change in position). The boy and Newton try to push his dad's car. They point out that it is too heavy for them to push (weight). Later on, Mom wanted some rocks, so the boy loads up his wagon with them. He tries to pull his wagon filled with rocks, but it is too heavy. He gets help from his dad. His dad pushes while the boy pulls. Later on, Newton and the boy decide to go for a bike ride. The wind pushes him forward. Once it is time to go home, he starts to go uphill, which was really hard, especially with the wind now pushing against his chest. But going downhill, he goes really fast. He has to drag his feet on the ground to slow down (friction). At home, the boy and Newton play one last game of tug of war. When they both pull at the same time, nothing happens (equal force), but when Newton pulls harder, it causes the boy to fall down. At the end of the story, Newton and the boy review how pushes and pulls are forces of motion. Sorting: Pushes vs. Pulls: The Kinder-Whales looked at different pictures of pushes and pulls, and categorized them. Then they labeled each picture as a push or a pull. Students discussed why something is a push or pull, depending on if it is being moved away from you (push) or towards you (pull). They did a fantastic job! Then the students came up with other things that they can push and/or pull. Sight Word: Look Our sight word of the week was look. The Kinder-Whales practiced spelling and writing the word. Next they practiced using the word in sentences with our substitute teacher, Mrs. Ferris. Please see below for a few sentences that the students came up with! Goldilocks and the Three Bears! While I was out, Mrs. Ferris read the students the story of Goldilocks and the Three Bears, retold by Jan Brett. The students identified the characters: Papa Bear, Mama Bear, Baby Bear, and Goldilocks. The students also identified the setting: At the Three Bear's house in the woods. Then the students practiced retelling the story and discussed what happened first, next, and last. The students did a wonderful job of sequencing and putting the pictures in order to retell what Goldilocks did first (tasted the porridge), next (sat on their chairs), and last (slept in their beds). The Kinder-Whales also had a lot of fun creating the character puppets to help them retell the story to the class. The students had so much fun with the story, that we read a few other versions of the story, including Goldilocks and the Three Dinosaurs by Mo Willems, Goldie and the Three Bears by Diane Stanley, a pop up book version of Goldilocks and the Three Bears, and The Three Bears by Byron Barton. The students did such a wonderful job of retelling the story that we decided to act them out! Please see below for a few videos of the students acting out the story. We still have 2-3 more groups to go next week, so that everyone can have a turn! Goldilocks: Marissa Papa Bear: Ahmed Mama Bear: Shannon Baby Bear: U'ilani Goldilocks: Anthony Papa Bear: Brody Mama Bear: Denise Baby Bear: Mia Goldilocks: Boa Papa Bear: Pranav Mama Bear: Annie Baby Bear: Aashni | Reminders & Updates Next Week:
RECAP: Open House: Because you have all seen what the students have been learning through all of the pictures shared with you during the weekly news updates, I decided to make our Open House more interactive! To prepare for Open House, the Kinder-Whales were super excited to create a project where you would have to guess which one is theirs! They drew self portraits, along with a few of their favorite things. Were you able to guess which one you child drew on the first try?! :) SMILE! The students could not stop laughing when I showed this to them. I told the students that you all would try to guess which smile belongs to them. A few of the students were sure that you would guess their smile right away (because of missing teeth, etc.), while others claimed that you would never guess which smile was theirs! How did you do?! Dear Family... The students have become such amazing, strong writers over the school year. They used their best guess spelling to write a letter to you to say thank you, to share some fond memories, and to let you know that they will always love you! On the back, there was space for you to write a letter back to your child and to draw a picture, too! We ran out of time on Friday, but we will read the letters next week! Thank you for participating in this activity! :) Perfect Practice Makes Perfect! I had a teacher who said practice does NOT make perfect, because if you are practicing incorrectly, then it will not be perfect. Instead, he would always say, PERFECT practice makes perfect, meaning that you would have to practice it correctly for it to be perfect. The Kinder-Whales were told that they would be the ones to take their parents/families around at Open House. They practiced reading aloud their Weather Book with 5-10 other students in the class. Then they practiced reading aloud the letters that they wrote to all of you. Step Up to Talking! After reviewing the long list of things that we have learned this year, all of those topics were put into a basket. The students were challenged to pick out a topic from the basket, and then "teach" it to the class, using the sentence frames that we have used during Step Up to Talking:
Open House Shared Pictures! Thank you to everyone who sent me pictures of our Open House! Please see below for a recap of some of the activities that we had going on in Room 8! Photo Booth Fun! The photo booth was a big hit! Unfortunately, I was unable to get a picture of every family that came to our Open House. Please send me any pictures you have if you have not done so already! TIP: To enlarge the picture, right click and click Open Image in New Tab. Talent Show! On Friday, we enjoyed Spangler's Talent Show! The students loved the songs, dances, skits, jokes, karate show, beat boxing, and the diversity of talents showcased in the talent show! The performers ranged from first grade - sixth grade. Please see below for an adorable video of one of the acts put on by a first and second grader! After the talent show, we talked about how next year, the Kinder-Whales can participate in the talent show, too! Thank You! Thank you so much for all of your wonderful support over the school year. We only have 12 more days of school left! Time flies! As always, please let me know if you have any questions or concerns. Have a terrific evening and an amazing week ahead! Please leave a quick comment with a fun fact or your child's favorite thing that they have learned about this year! Best wishes, Mrs. Lorenzana |
5 Comments
Mohamud
5/15/2016 07:25:14 pm
Ahmed favorite thing he learned this year is that some spiders could eat birds.
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Stephanie
5/15/2016 08:34:49 pm
Marissa has learned so much this year, but I think she's enjoyed learning about clouds, or weather in general, the most. She's always commenting on the different clouds she sees.
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Sonali Acharya
5/15/2016 09:10:50 pm
Aashni learned so much this year and I am really happy to see that she learned to read all by herself quite effortlessly.. All thanks to you Mrs Lorenzana.. She likes everything she learnt the whole year but her favorite part is the song for Father of our Nation.. She sings it all the time. And also she loved learning about weather, clouds & rainbows..
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Kyla
5/16/2016 09:58:57 am
U'ilani has loved all that she has learned so much she was unable to choose a favorite. She talks about the clouds and the weather most, she even checks the weather on my phone when she's deciding what to wear.
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Jennifer
5/17/2016 11:30:01 pm
Shannon has learned a lot this year. Her favourite topic among all is learning about rainbow, especially how rainbow is formed.
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Mrs. LorenzanaKindergarten Teacher at Spangler Elementary Archives
June 2016
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