Check out our cute hats! Each hat should have had 100 stickers and drawings between the 10 strips of paper! I must say these were the cutest hats I saw yesterday!! It is hard to believe we are 100 days smarter!!!
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
100th Day of School was SO FUN!!
Check out our cute hats! Each hat should have had 100 stickers and drawings between the 10 strips of paper! I must say these were the cutest hats I saw yesterday!! 
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
Field Trip Tomorrow...
I wrote the wrong time on your Homework page for our field trip. We are walking to Hillcrest at 8:00 for the 8:30 show. Please dress your child in warm, comfortable clothes!!! Thanks!
Monday, January 25, 2010
"J says /j/, /j/, JUMPROPE!!"
We added a jumprope to our letter J on the authentic alphabet today. Every child got a chance to jump rope...some were more successful than others, but we all had a great time. Here are a few snapshots--my camera ran out of battery so I don't have a picture of every child. I hate that I could not get all of thier pictures because they sure were funny!! Ask your child about their jump rope experience today!!
Katlyn has been practicing at home!
LaDarius is getting after that jumprope!
Alyssa shows us a little "skip-step" jumproping style!!
Katlyn has been practicing at home!
LaDarius is getting after that jumprope!
Alyssa shows us a little "skip-step" jumproping style!! Friday, January 22, 2010
Not such good news...
This short week has been a tough one for many of our students. I am sure it did not help that I was out for two days, but we need to fix some issues before they get out of hand. Please read through the following and discuss with your child. I would like to begin next week normally, and have a much better week!!
1. Toys at school?!?!? This is a new development--kids are bringing LOTS of different toys to school and wanting to play with them throughout the day. This distraction will not be tolerated. Here is your child's warning...I will begin taking up toys if they are out of backpacks during the school day--including unpacking and packing up!!! I plan fun activities throughout every school day so toys are really not necessary!!
2. SillyBands--same as the toys...I do not care if your child WEARS SillyBands to school, but if they are playing with them, I will take them up.
3. Not completing Big 4 and work throughout the day?!?!?!?!?! All of a sudden, children are taking FOREVER to complete work that did not used to take as long. Kids are playing, talking, and not paying attention. We have got to FOCUS!!!! I have tried to tell the kids that the quicker they complete their work, the faster they get to do the fun stuff. Please encourage your child to do their best!!
Our children have so many expectations, and I am expected to teach them. We are now having required math assessments every 9 weeks--multiple choice tests for your 5 and 6 year olds. That is in addition to the DIBELS assessments in the fall, winter, and spring. Kindergarten is no longer "play time" or "getting ready for school!" It is school!! I promise I am doing my absolute best to make this experience fun for your child, but they have to stop playing so much and get the work done. They are doing an awesome job on these assessments, I just don't want to have to fuss or take away toys that should not be here anyway!!
As always, thanks for your support!! Let me know if you have any questions!!
MM
1. Toys at school?!?!? This is a new development--kids are bringing LOTS of different toys to school and wanting to play with them throughout the day. This distraction will not be tolerated. Here is your child's warning...I will begin taking up toys if they are out of backpacks during the school day--including unpacking and packing up!!! I plan fun activities throughout every school day so toys are really not necessary!!
2. SillyBands--same as the toys...I do not care if your child WEARS SillyBands to school, but if they are playing with them, I will take them up.
3. Not completing Big 4 and work throughout the day?!?!?!?!?! All of a sudden, children are taking FOREVER to complete work that did not used to take as long. Kids are playing, talking, and not paying attention. We have got to FOCUS!!!! I have tried to tell the kids that the quicker they complete their work, the faster they get to do the fun stuff. Please encourage your child to do their best!!
Our children have so many expectations, and I am expected to teach them. We are now having required math assessments every 9 weeks--multiple choice tests for your 5 and 6 year olds. That is in addition to the DIBELS assessments in the fall, winter, and spring. Kindergarten is no longer "play time" or "getting ready for school!" It is school!! I promise I am doing my absolute best to make this experience fun for your child, but they have to stop playing so much and get the work done. They are doing an awesome job on these assessments, I just don't want to have to fuss or take away toys that should not be here anyway!!
As always, thanks for your support!! Let me know if you have any questions!!
MM
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Sorry that I have been out...
Hey Parents! I have been hit with a double whammy...I am used to being "pregnant sick," but I have had a bad sinus infection and the crud the last few days. So, we will not have a sight word assessment this Friday. I apologize for not being there Tuesday to get them out to you. I will be back tomorrow, and everything will be back to normal--enjoy the break from sight words this week. Thanks for understanding!!
Thursday, January 14, 2010
Needed items...
Hey Parents! I need a few supplies for some learning activities. If you can send them, I would really appreciate it!!
-gummy worms
-Cheerios
-a flashlight (I will return this when we are finished!)
Thanks!
-gummy worms
-Cheerios
-a flashlight (I will return this when we are finished!)
Thanks!
WAY TO GO!!!
I am so proud of our class! 100% of our kids benchmarked on the Winter DIBELS test yesterday! I have never had a class with these kinds of scores!! You will be proud of your child's scores as well...they are coming home today on a blue piece of paper. Please sign and return that paper to school tomorrow.
There were two new assessments given yesterday: Nonsense Word Fluency (NWF) and Phonemic Segmentation Fluency (PSF). Here is a brief description of these tests.
NWF--students are given a page of "short-vowel" words to read. For example, the test will look something like this:
vut wac tik jun rog rab
and students are to sound out and blend the words together. (There is more space between the words, but when I publish this post, it squishes the words back together...your child will be able to easily distinguish between the nonsense words!!) You can see that these are not "real" words; that is why this test is called Nonsense Word Fluency. But, it does do a great job testing to see if your child has a good phonics foundation.
PSF--students are given one-syllable words that they have to break into as many sounds as they can. For example, if they were given the word "sat," they would say, "/s/ /a/ /t/."
Again, I am super-proud of our progress and cannot wait to see how far we can go this semester!! Please let me know if you have ANY questions!! Thanks for all of your support!!
There were two new assessments given yesterday: Nonsense Word Fluency (NWF) and Phonemic Segmentation Fluency (PSF). Here is a brief description of these tests.
NWF--students are given a page of "short-vowel" words to read. For example, the test will look something like this:
vut wac tik jun rog rab
and students are to sound out and blend the words together. (There is more space between the words, but when I publish this post, it squishes the words back together...your child will be able to easily distinguish between the nonsense words!!) You can see that these are not "real" words; that is why this test is called Nonsense Word Fluency. But, it does do a great job testing to see if your child has a good phonics foundation.
PSF--students are given one-syllable words that they have to break into as many sounds as they can. For example, if they were given the word "sat," they would say, "/s/ /a/ /t/."
Again, I am super-proud of our progress and cannot wait to see how far we can go this semester!! Please let me know if you have ANY questions!! Thanks for all of your support!!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)