It's Cold Outside

Good Afternoon,

I'm looking at the clock and thinking, "I have to go get my girls from daycare."  Then, I am looking outside and thinking, "I think I'll spend the night here!"  So, I'll procrastinate with a blog post and then head for home :)

This morning we re-read the story, Little Quack.  We also talked about the word, plot.  The plot of the story is what happens in the beginning, middle and end.  Ask your child to tell you about the plot of Little Quack.  We also talked about what the plot would entail if we were to write a story about getting ready for bed!  With February and dental health month beginning tomorrow it was refreshing to hear how many children mentioned teet brushing and "fleecing" (flossing)!

We had SMART time today.  It was good that we got the time to move, since there was no outside recess today.

In math, we went "fishing" for attributes of our classmates.  We had blonde hair fish, striped shirt fish, hooded shirt fish, rainbow fish, boots fish, etc.

We also solved some number stories on our white board and even did a beginning division problem!

This afternoon we started a project for Groundhogs Day, which is coming up on Saturday.  We talked about the Groundhog seeing his shadow and drew pictures of ourselves in the winter and in the spring. Tomorrow we will make the groundhog part of this project!

Tomorrow is our all-kindergarten Wood Day!  We have three fun wood-related projects for the kiddos to work on throughout the morning!  It's going to be an exciting day!

Stay Warm!

Love,
Mrs. Huettl

Little Quack

Good Afternoon!

Yesterday's post will be included today, with kindergarten registration last night, there was no time to post on the blog!

Yesterday we worked on our new poem for our poetry notebook, "Row Your Boat."  We also added the beginning R,r sound to our word chunks that we have hanging up on our wall!

In math we practiced using the ipads as a slate.  Mrs. Huettl asked questions and we had to follow these steps:
1)Listen
2)Think
3)Write
4)Show
5) Erase
6) Get Ready to Listen Again

We intended on using the app, Show Me, as you saw in the newsletter, but found the app Doodle Buddy to work much better for our purposes.

In the afternoon we did a Valentine themed art project to hang in our windows.  Lots of cute owls!

Today we worked in four different centers.  We sponge painted Little Quack and used our popcorn words to write two sentences about our painting.  These are hanging up in our south facing windows!

We explored the math tool, geoboards.  We made it through with only one flying rubberband :)

For word work we had to blend words and color in mittens that represented the picture.

We worked on the starfall website again this week.

In math, we introduced the Attribute Blocks.  We worked together as a team to sort the blocks in several different ways:
1) shape
2) number of sides
3) color
4) size
5) thickness

This afternoon we finally had the chance to write in our journals again...it's been awhile!

Please remember that the temperature is going to be dropping dramatically.  Send warm clothing with your child!

Thanks so much!

Love,
Mrs. Huettl

Yay for Snow!

Good Afternoon!

Finally a little bit of snow to play in!  We sure had a great time at recess.  Many friends worked together to make snowmen and snow-monsters!

This morning we searched for the -an chunk in our paper decodable readers.  We also brainstormed other words that are in the -an word family.

During math, we talked about the subtraction symbol and used a subtraction stick to move counters off of our math mats to show how we subtracted.  Try asking your child some concrete subtraction number stories at dinner tonight!  "How many chicken nuggets will be left if you eat two more?"

This afternoon we worked with sawdust and wood shavings.  We explored different properties and even soaked them in a cup of water.  We learned that when wood gets water logged, it no longer floats!

On Friday last week, we celebrated Daniel's 1/2 Birthday!

Ellie was the kindergarten AR winner last week!

We also watched the San Diego Zoo Panda Cam and wrote about actions the pandas were doing. (So, we used verbs in our writing!)

I hope you enjoyed your weekend and are able to spend a little bit of time outside in the snow with your child!

Love,
Mrs. Huettl

Pictures!

Here are pictures from today.  I will have to do the narration of our day later, but I wanted to get these pics up for you to see!

Thanks!
Mrs. Huettl

2nd Half!

Wow!  We had an exciting day today!  Too bad we were missing 6 of our friends!!!!

This sums up the reactions when students came into the room today:

We were so excited to see some furniture moved, new toys, and new table spots!

We added a vet's clinic to our dramatic play area:

We switched out all of our table toys for new ones:

We added a train area:

And...our sand table is now full of beans!

This afternoon we went to the Dodge Nature Center to make paper.  It was chilly out, but we were still able to pick up some pieces of nature on our way into the building.  Ask your child to explain the paper making process.  Here are some pictures to spark their memory:

We will be bringing our nature paper home eventually.  We have to let it dry first :)

We also had new word work options today as well, I will take pictures and explain them in Friday's post.

With all our excitement, we did still manage to introduce our new amazing words and build some background knowledge about panda bears before we read our story tomorrow!

Stay warm tonight!

Love,
Mrs. Huettl

We Have Grown!

Good Afternoon!

Today was a special day-for many reasons!

We celebrated Freya's 6th Birthday!

We celebrated Rosa's 1/2 Birthday!

Mrs. Huettl assessed students throughout the day today to see all the growth we have made this quarter!  I am so proud and excited to share with you both on the upcoming report card and our conference next month.

We worked in 4 different centers today and started making a garden mural, which we will post pictures of when it is done.

We had an assembly this morning and watched a jump roping team!  Mrs. Huettl even double dutched!!!

This afternoon we worked in our journals, did a little more assessing and had lots of birthday treats!

Tomorrow is the last day of our 2nd quarter!

See you in the morning!

Love,
Mrs. Huettl

Calculators!

Good Afternoon!

We had a high-energy day in kindergarten!  We worked hard this morning reading The Big Hit on starfall.com.

We also brainstormed some adjectives, the ones in purple were about a ball that we tossed around the room and then ones in blue were about a waterfall.

During math time, we explored the calculators.  We pushed all the buttons, pretended they were phones, cash registers, you name it!  Then we got to work and practice pushing certain buttons and discussed how the numbers look a little different because the calculator uses all straight lines.  We also figured out how to enter in the number 10, since there is no 10 button.

This afternoon we worked in our journals, trying to add in some adjectives and enjoyed each others company during choice time.

Tomorrow, Mrs. Huettl will be pulling students to assess for the second quarter.  We will have a guest teacher for the morning.

See you tomorrow!

Love,
Mrs. Huettl