News from the Jungle

Friday, the children participated in a fun gingerbread activity. We have been reading several versions of the gingerbread man stories. The children had to think about whether the gingerbread man could have made it across the river by himself. The children stated their opinion and then made predictions about what they think the cookie would look like after it got wet. Next, we placed a gingerbread cookie in a tub of water and watched what happened to the cookie. Next, we were going to decorate and eat some gingerbread cookies, but they ran away (just like what happened in a story we read called Catch that Cookie).The gingerbread cookies left us clue that led us on a scavenger hunt around the school until we finally found the cookies! We brought the cookies back to class and decorated them. Then we all took just one bite and graphed how many of us bit off the arm, leg, or head. We tallied our data and then enjoyed the rest of our cookies! This was a very fun activity for everyone!

Upcoming Events

12/15  3-5 Family Workshop Night (The first 50 families to turn in participation slips)

12/16 Kindergarten Goods and Services Activity 2pm

12/19 – 12/21 Candy Gram Sales ($1 per candy gram)

12/21 Late Start – 9:40am

12/22 PBIS Party – Movie Theater (in school)

12/22 Holiday Party (more information coming home soon)

12/23 Pancake Breakfast & Polar Express Day – Wear Pajamas (more information coming home soon)

12/23 – 1/8 Winter Break

1/9 BACK TO SCHOOL!

Agenda for the Week

Letters: This week we focused on the letters Mm and Oo. We talked about the sounds they make, brainstormed things that begin with each letter, and spent time practicing the proper formation of each letter. These letters will show up on next week’s homework for a handwriting review.

Reading/Writing: We wrote about the gingerbread man. We read several different versions of the gingerbread man story and we came up with our own version with our own characters. The children also practiced writing using transition words first, next, last to tell how we can be good listeners.

Please continue to have your child practice writing at home. Here is what I am looking for in class:

Uppercase to start the sentence

End punctuation (. ! ?)

Finger spaces between words

Does the sentence make sense? Are the words in the correct order?

Does the picture match the words?

Did you stretch your sentence? (Is there a noun, adjective, and verb?)

Math: We began learning about measurement in class. The children learned that there are many different tools we can use to measure objects. The children even practiced measuring items in the classroom and played a few measurement games.

Please continue to practice counting by 1’s, 5’s, and 10’s to 100 with your child at home. Also practice counting to 30 by 2’s (2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12, 14, 16, 18, 20…..).  Other activities you can practice at home are using tally marks to count objects, identifying 2D/3D shapes around the house of community, and really making sure your child has good one-to-one correspondence when counting (this means that they touch each object as they are counting and count all objects correctly).

Continue practicing addition at home. This can be done while eating a snack, at the grocery store, or while playing outside. They just have to count two groups of items and add them together

Social Studies: We continued learning about the concept of needs and wants. This week we did a cut and paste activity where the children had to identify what the picture was and if it was showing a need or a want. Then they had to glue the picture in the correct column on a t-chart.

Science: We continue to learn about push and pull. The children completed a cut and paste T-chart activity, where they had to cut out pictures of objects being pushed and pulled and sort them on the T-chart under the words “push” and “pull.”

Housekeeping Items:

Please make sure reading books are placed back in the green book pouches each night and returned to school every morning.

Please make sure to record the reading that you do with your child each night on the reading log in the homework.

The easiest way to get ahold of me during the day is through my email at dimitrm@dearbornschools.org. If the children are working independently on a task, I can easily check my email and send a quick reply.