3rd Grade Buddies...

From Buddy Meeting

Each month we have the opportunity to work with our 3rd grade buddies in our character education lessons. As a school each grade has teamed up to provide lessons in a unique way to teach character education and bully prevention. The children and teachers look forward to this time each month because it gives a great learning opportunity for the children to work together. This past Friday the children learned about respect and teamwork. The children worked together as a team to carry a unifix cube on a popsicle stick across the gym floor. I heard a lot of the children using great communication and having to figure out how to work with the height difference and also the length of each child's steps. It was great to watch and the children discussed afterward about how they had to use teamwork to make it work!

Computer Learning...

From Center Learning

We have been working hard in the classroom and we have been using our mini-laptop computers to help our learning. The children have been doing an awesome job working together and helping each other out. It is amazing how quick the children learn to operate computers and the technology. In addition, I love watching them help each other once they figure out something new. We have been using the computers to help us with some of our math games. I love the site: http://www.illuminations.nctm.org/ and http://www.abcya.com/. We started working with the computers with the program "Paint Brush" to allow children to get use to how the computer works and how to use the "track pad" because we do not have a mouse. I think adults have more difficulty with computers than these wonderful kindergartners.

News...

Week of March 21...

The Kindergarten Hopper

Experiments...

We read the book "What Scientists Do?" to learn about scientists. We just started to learn about observations and how to make observations. We are reading the book "My Five Senses" to help us learn about what we use to observe. Today we learned about our sense of sight and hearing. The children observed how gobstoppers change in water. The children loved watching the gobstoppers change color and seeing the water change. I heard a lot of the children asking great questions and making predictions. In addition, the children learned scientists write and draw about what they see and do. Once the experiment concluded they had to record what they saw. It was a lot of fun...I am looking forward to our experiment on Friday where we will utilize all of our senses.

Weekly News...

Week of March 14:

The Kindergarten Hopper

Voice Thread...

We have been having lots of fun this week with our story writing and ways to share our stories with everyone. We have used the Flip Video to post some of them on our You Tube Channel, but the other day I was able to learn a new web 2.0 tool of Voice Thread. I have played with it this week with some of the children and their stories. Here is Ethan's story about a "Boy Race." Our fantastic stories will be hanging up throughout the room and in the hallway for everyone to enjoy as they walk by. I cannot tell you how proud I am of these children for working so hard on these stories. We figured out today we have worked on them for 3 days (which in Kindergarten that is a long time)! We are also working on a culminating project of our science unit on the seasons of the year. Check back next week to see how it all turns out! While you wait enjoy Ethan's story...

Story Writing...Oh My...

I have to say what an amazing week it has been in writing! This week we began discussing simple stories with a beginning, middle, and end. The children had to draw a 3 picture story and then add words and/or sentences to describe the pictures. I was amazed how hard the children worked and the stories they were able to write. This week the focus was on choosing one topic and drawing the 3 pictures to tell the story on the topic. Next week, we will delve further into story writing by choosing one topic and taking the one topic to sequence even further by making it cohesive. Since this was the beginning of story writing I decided when I was talking with the children, I concentrated on making sure they were only writing on one single topic and having them think about first, second, and last. I hope your child has mentioned this to you at home because it was a wonderful sight to see in the classroom. If you have not checked out our You Tube Channel (www.youtube.com/mrstahlkindergarten) please do as you will see a few stories uploaded. In addition, here are some pictures of the children working hard...

Weekly News...

Week of March 7...

The Kindergarten Hopper

Drama Fun...

From Drama Reading

This week in our Read Well small groups the children practiced their fluency by reading one of their favorite passages. The children in their group created a headband to depict the story they were reading. Last week we saw two of the four groups and this coming week we will see the other two groups. It was a lot of fun watching the children perform their stories. It was also a great chance for children to practice their fluency, voice level, and confidence. I had a blast and watching the children's faces I believe they had a blast too!

Puppet Learning...

Through generous donations we received puppets for our classroom to aid in our literacy learning. We are using the puppets to help retell stories we have read and also to make-up our own stories to write about. We began using the puppets yesterday to begin our story telling. It was exciting to see the children interacting and telling stories with the puppets. The children then had a chance go off and write about their storytelling. It was fantastic to see the early stages of this new type of learning! Check back in later in the next week to see some of the writing products!