Last Day of Kindergarten!!!

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Can you believe it?  Wow!  Where did the year go?  I can’t thank you enough for sharing your kinder with me this year.  It has been such a pleasure to be part of their journey!🙂

The LAST DAY OF KINDERGARTEN was so much F-U-N!!! 

FRIENDSHIPS:  We read books that highlighted how special each kinder is, we celebrated the friendships we made and remembered many of the things we did this year in kindergarten. ALL of the kinders have grown and matured this year in school. That needed to be celebrated and it was a wonderful way to end our time as a class family. The kinders also had fun looking at their Kindergarten Memory Books. These books are filled with pages of work that they completed along with some special surprises.  I hope that as you look through your child’s book you will be filled with memories of the time spent in kindergarten. 

THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU FOR SHARING YOUR KINDER WITH ME!! I feel so blessed to be part of your kinder’s schooling. I am so grateful for your support and encouragement that you have shown this year. It was a privilege to spend my days with your kinder.  They are so precious and special.  I feel very honored that you entrusted me to care and teach them this year.  They have grown so much….both in height and maturity.  🙂  I know that the friendships the kinders have made will blossom as they continue to learn at Georgetown. 

The kinders filled their backpacks this week with things that they have used in school this year and a few fun extra things.  When there is a rainy day or when your kinder says “I don’t know what to do!”, encourage them to complete pages in their math workbooks, write more stories, read books, write to 100 and beyond and create a list of popcorn words they know.  Continue to foster their love of learning, even in the summer months by using their Home Learning Bags and the clipboards and markers that came home today.  

End of year Report Cards will be mailed home on June 11.  Typically your kinder’s next year teacher is on this report card.  This year the district will be waiting to give out this information until later in the summer.

Lots and lots of love,  I really do love your kinders! (Can I still call them that now that they are first graders?) Have a fabulous summer!  Mrs. Bohl :)

News of the Week—June 1-3

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This week we put a bit of fun into our last days of learning together.  

POPCORN AND MOVIE DAY:  On Tuesday, you should have heard the cheers that filled our classroom when the kinders found out that we would be having a popcorn and movie day. WOW! 🙂  We enjoyed tasting 3 different flavors of popcorn….plain, caramel and cheese after sorting the various flavors.   The class results showed plain is yummy but caramel and cheese were the favorites.  We also incorporated learning into playing a popcorn math related game such as; POPCORN MATCH UP.

 

KINDERGARTEN OLYMPICS GAME DAY: Wednesday morning the kinders had SO much fun playing games…Olympic style.  Thank you so much for those who donated supplies and games for this morning fun!  Please see the previous posting for pictures.

BUBBLE DAY:  On Thursday, excitement was heard when the kinders found out that they were allowed to chew BUBBLE GUM in school!  Oh, my goodness! 🙂 I think that our neighboring friends could hear us. (gum is not allowed, so what a treat!!)  We chewed & chewed & chewed before some actual bubbles were made by some kinders. We talked about how you can blow a bubble before we tried. We made these cutie pie kiddos and created a graph that shows if we like or do not like to blow bubbles. We even watched a video of how bubble gum is made in the factory.  Of course we had to relate it to math….it is school!!! The kinders popped up when they heard that math time was going to be playing a math addition game using gum balls. Practicing adding numbers this way is fun!  Listening to a story or two filled out this fun day.

WRITING:  The kinders learned what a bucket list is and have been excited to create their own summer bucket lists.  They wrote a list about PLACES TO GO, THINGS TO DO, FOODS TO EAT and FRIENDS TO SEE Get ready to read what they have on their “bucket list” next week.  Some of the lists are quite long.  I think that you will stay busy this summer. 🙂

SUMMER LEARNING : The end of the school year can often bring LOTS of anxiety in children.  My goal  has been to help the kinders feel proud of their accomplishments this year and celebrate our time together.  So while we have been having enjoying some fun activities during our last days together, the focus is on how much we have grown.  This week we read a book that to explain how the kinders can keep their brains active and continue learning during the summer.   In your kinder’s folder this week, there was a Summer packet. This packet contains literacy, writing and math activities that your kinder can work on over the summer. Happy Learning!!

TIME WITH OUR 5th GRADE BUDDIES:  We spend some time on Wednesday afternoon with our buddies by enjoying a popsicle and playing on the playground together.  We wish them well as they move on to the middle school next year.

TOMORROW, JUNE 4 IS THE LAST DAY OF KINDERGARTEN!  IT IS A FAST FRIDAY…..KINDERS WILL BE DISMISSED AT 12:15PM.

Kindergarten Olympics tomorrow

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Just a reminder that tomorrow, Wednesday, June 2 our kinders will be having a morning of Olympic fun!  It looks like the weather is going to cooperate! Thank you all for the donations and supplies!!  We can’t wait to make this a fun memory for your kinder!! Here are a few things to remember for tomorrow:

  • Dress your kinder in clothes and shoes they can run and play in.  *Gym shoes at school can be used!
  • Be sure to send in a water bottle for your kinder.
  • Send in 1 snack for the a.m.  We will enjoy a donated Olympic-themed snack in the p.m. 
  • Check your kinders extra clothes bag…one of our events may be a little wet…shhhhh

News of the Week—May 24-28

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POPCORN WORDS:  A week of review!

Hooray for the U.S.A!  This week the kinders learned about our most popular American symbols.

First, we learned what a symbol is (it is a picture that stands for something). Next, we practiced identifying some common symbols for popular spots such as Dairy Queen, Target, Jet’s Pizza, etc.  Then we looked at some American symbols like The White House, The Capital, Air Force One, etc.

 After reading a non-fiction book and watching an informational video about each symbol, the kinders labeled parts of each symbol and choose 1 interesting fact to write on their paper. It was fun to make a craft relating to the symbols too.

Fun facts about the Statue of Liberty were:

  • it was a gift from France
  • it is made from copper
  • she is called “The Lady of Liberty”
  • she holds a torch in one hand and a tablet in the other.

  

Fun facts about the White House were:

  • the President lives in the White House
  • John Adams was the first president to live there
  • You need 570 gallons of paint to paint the outside. 
  • It has 132 rooms, 35 bathrooms 3 elevators, a swimming pool, movie theatre, a bowling alley
  • some rooms are named after colors like The Red Room, The Blue Room.

  

Fun Facts about the Bald Eagle were:

  • they have sharp talons
  • they build their nests high in trees near water
  • they eat fish.
  • they are the national bird of the United States of America

Fun Facts about the Liberty Bell were:

  • it cracked the first time it was rung
  • it is made from copper and tin
  • it hangs from a wooden yoke.

Fun Facts about The American Flag were:

  • it has 50 stars and 13 stripes
  • it has many names like “Old Glory”
  • it is red, white and blue.
  • Betsy Ross sewed the first flag in 1776

We talked about what it means to be patriotic and what we do to show patriotism. Examples were wear red, white and blue, hang a flag, say thank you to veterans, say the pledge.  At the start of each day, the kinders are learning to recite the Pledge of Allegiance by standing tall, still and straight. They have learned what those very special words really mean and what sacrifices the men and women of our country made for our freedom. We THANK them so much!!! Be sure to have your kinders teach you some cool and interesting facts about ALL of the American symbols we have studied.

We had a RED, WHITE  and BLUE snack today

 

 

LITERACY/PHONICS: We practiced identifying ending sounds, H brothers, middle (vowel) sounds and unscrambling sight words.  We also read some books that included popcorn words. It was fun to do a crossword puzzle and word search too.

MATH: We worked on addition, subtraction, number order and teen numbers that had an American Symbols theme.

The kinders once again dipped their toes into doing some first grade math by learning about odd and even numbers.   We used EVEN STEVEN and ODD TODD to help us understand this math concept better. ( I would love to take credit for this fun game but alas it came from this fabulous website called First Grade Parade.)  This is what we did….   

First, I told the story that Even Steven LOVES things to be fair among his friends.  Everyone always needs to have the same amount.  It is all about being fair! 🙂  However, Odd Todd does not care if friends get a different amount.  It fact, he LIKES that! 🙂  We chose a number between 1-20 and a kinder counted out that many “crackers” (mini unifix cubes). We decided who would get the “crackers”…EVEN STEVEN or ODD TODD. Then, a kinder placed the “crackers” ,one at a time, onto each hand until the cubes were gone. This was a great way for the kinders to visually see if the “crackers” were equal or not equal.  Finally we decided if we were correct in our choice.  Were the “crackers” divided fairly in each of EVEN STEVEN’S hands or was there a different amount in each hand that ODD TODD would like?

READING: The kinders LOVED retelling books that we have read by acting them out again this week.  We acted put  Goldilocks and the Three Bears by James Marshall. Each kinder was able to practice being an audience member and actor/actress (if they wanted too).

BIRTHDAY CELEBRATIONS: We began celebrating end of May and summer birthdays.  Happy Birthday to everyone and thank you for the birthday treats!!!

UPCOMING DATES:

*Monday, May 31––NO SCHOOL  Memorial Day

*Tuesday, June 1–MUSIC. Please have ALL donations for Kindergarten Olympics at school

*Wednesday, June 2—GYM. Kindergarten Olympics

*Thursday, June 3––ART  If your kinder would like a sack lunch from the lunch service, please email me or write a note by Thursday, 6/3

*Friday, June 4—RECESS. Fast Friday (Early Release) 12:15 p.m. Dismissal.  LAST DAY OF SCHOOL!!!

Kindergarten Olympics

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The kindergarten teachers are planning to have a “modified” Kindergarten Olympics (fun games) for your amazing kinders on Wednesday, June 2!  We are looking for some help with making this event “extra special” for your kinders.  If you are interested and would be willing to donate an item to our Kindergarten Olympics, please check out our Olympics Sign Up link:

 Kindergarten Olympics.

News of the Week—May 17-21

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POPCORN WORDS:   PLAY. AWAY. TODAY. UP

MATH:  The kinders did a fabulous job being “office workers” while taking their last math test.  I am so impressed and proud of how hard they have worked to learn these math skills.  Their math tests came home this week.  We will continue to review math skills for the rest of the school year. 

The kinders did a bit of first grade work and were introduced to learning about the parts of a clock and how to tell time to the hour.  They learned that a clock has two hands—one short and one long.  The short hand tells the hour, the long hand tells the minutes.  They really enjoyed practicing using their own clocks before completing a worksheet.  We also did more practice with showing teen numbers by tens and extra ones.  On Friday we played FACE OFF, an addition game with a partner.  What fun!

WRITING:  The kinders continued to write and write more small moment stories…all by themselves.  They are doing a great job drawing pictures and writing words to tell about a one time, one event in their life.  They worked hard to think about how they may have felt during this time and included that feeling in their story.  Some of those feelings were: happy, sad, excited, scared. They did their best work! We ended the week reading our own writing – each kinder reading their story to Mrs. Bohl.  Way to go, kinders!

READING: At the beginning of the week, we noticed that characters can remind us of other characters in books.  For example, in Little Critter’s I Was So Mad and Llama, Llama mad at Mama, both of the main characters were upset. We are having a lot of fun reading and asking questions that help us make connections to characters. Later in the week the kinders were introduced to how characters perform in a Reader’s Theater.  In order to get really good at our parts we practiced…

  • taking turns reading the script
  • sounding like real characters when we read
  • watching for punctuation
  • using our face and body to become the character

Then we took turns to act out one of the characters in the story The Pigeon wants a…

LITERACY/PHONICS: We worked on these skills….

  • learning that every syllable has at least one vowel
  • making more words in the -ay word family (play, lay, hay, say, etc)
  • identifying the H brothers
  • listening for vowels in words
  • identifying words that begin with BL or ST blends
  • finding pictures that have the R blend 
  • listening to story and drawing a picture of our favorite character

A fun way to end the week by making a fun summer treat on Friday. 

REMINDERS

  • Bring 2 snacks each day to school and a water bottle with a spill proof lid please. Now that the days are getting warmer, we are getting a little more thirsty during the day.
  • Return take home books on Wednesday.  We are collecting all books for summer inventory.

UPCOMING DATES

*Monday, May 24—STEAM

*Tuesday, May 25—MUSIC

*Wednesday, May 26—GYM; Return TAKE HOME BOOKS

*Thursday, May 27—ART 

*Friday, May 28–STEAM  CELEBRATING AMERICA––wear red, white and blue

*Monday, May 31–NO SCHOOL  Memorial Day

*Thursday, June 3–If your kinder would like a sack lunch from the lunch service, please email me or write a note by Thursday, 6/3

*Friday, June 4–Fast Friday (Early Release) 12:15 p.m. Dismissal.  LAST DAY OF SCHOOL!!!

***Have a FABULOUS weekend. Another nice weekend to be outside. Mrs. Bohl