Oct. 26, 2010

Today was Red Day! We read the book, "Red is Best". We made our own red books that we can read ourselves. We read the story "Sophie got Angry...really, really Angry." Then we brainstormed ways that we can calm ourselves down if we are angry. We made pictures. On one side we wrote the word "Mad" in red and then drew something that made us mad. ON the back, we wrote in blue or green the words "Not Mad" and we drew something that calms us down. We had our hearing tested with the nurse. Our new letter was Gg. We had indoor recess. In art, we finished painting our sunflowers. In Writer's Workshop, we read a book called "When I Get Bigger." Then we wrote about what we want to do when we get a little bit bigger. We learned how to spell the word "see".

Oct. 25, 2010

We started our colors and shapes unit today. We read the book called "My Crayons Talk". Then we drew a picture showing what our crayons would say. We learned about the square today. We made a puppet and went on a square hunt. We also made patterns and pictures with squares. We went to gym today. Our new letter was Uu. We wrote about our long weekend in Writer's workshop. We read "Mouse Flies a Kite" in shared reading. We started to read our first chapter book. We read chapter one, The Real Hole, in the book "Two Times The Fun" by Beverly Cleary.

Fall Art Stations-Dot Painting Fall Trees

We used dot painters to create fall trees.

Fall Art Stations-Sponge Painting

We used square sponges and fall paint colors to create fall trees.

Fall Art Stations-Leaf Rubbings

We used crayons and leaf rubbing stencils to create fall leaf creations.

Fall Art Stations-Watercolor & Crayon Fall Trees

We used crayons to draw a fall tree. Later, we added the color for the leaves using watercolor paints. Our fall trees are beautiful!

Oct. 15, 2010

Today we had music and library. We read a fall nonfiction book. We drew a fall tree using crayons(we used these drawings later in our fall stations). We had read to self time. The pouches came home today with 3 new letters Hh, Ee and Bb. We had fall stations this afternoon. They included sponge painting fall trees, dot painting, watercolor painting and leaf rubbings. We had a fun day!

Oct. 14, 2010

We celebrated Jay's 6th birthday. We had real firefighter suits out during playtime. We read 2 books about fire safety. One was "Firehouse" the other was "Firebears". One was filled with facts, a nonfiction book, the other was a story, a fiction book. We wrote and illustrated a giant thank you card to the fire fighters. We drew a picture of our favorite part of the fire station. Most picked Mrs. Milow getting wet. We talked about the letter Bb today. Bowen and Blake start with Bb. In art, we drew and painted sunflowers. We used math cards to play flip and write the numeral. We made fall trees by tearing and cutting construction paper in fall colors.

Fire Station Field Trip Oct. 13, 2010

We had a great time at the fire station. We went in the ladder fire truck and the rescue fire truck. We got to see lots of other fire trucks too. We got to squirt the big fire hose. Mrs. Milow got a little wet. We learned about checking our smoke detectors. We also talked about making a safe meeting spot at home where we would meet our family if there were a fire at our house. We talked about crawling out of the house if there is smoke. We were told never to hide if the smoke detector goes off. We are supposed to get out and stay out! We should not look for favorite toys or go back in for favorite toys. We learned that we should be doing fire drills at home too. We watched Firefighter Wayne get all dressed up in his fire suit. He crawled around us so that we could see what a firefighter might look like at our house. We had a fun day at the Rockford Fire Station!

Tues, Oct. 12

We went to the computer lab to finish our testing. We did the Math 2 test. Scores for the computer tests will be available soon. We had music today. We practiced "Read to Self" today. It was so fun to see all the kids reading around the room. In Writer'sWorkshop, we reviewed our jobs during writing time. Two kids wrote with Mrs. Milow today. In Math, we introduced telling time. We practiced moving the hands around the clock. We talked about the minute and the hour hand. We practiced telling time to the hour. We even learned how to write the time. We read a book called "Firehouse". We talked about the field trip tomorrow.

Monday, Oct. 11

We went to the computer lab to take the Math 1 test. We used the story "Flower Garden" for the 3 ways to read a book lesson. The 3 ways are 1. Read the Words 2. Read the Pictures 3. Retell the Story. After reading the story "Flower Garden" 3 ways, we drew pictures to tell the most important part of the story. We talked about the letter Hh. We finished our Gingerbread Man stories in writers workshop and started new stories. We did stations in gym. We finished our number packet. We played roll and write. We talked about Christopher Columbus. He sailed the ocean blue in 1492.

Gingerbread Man Week

We had such an exciting week looking for the gingerbread man. We read the story "Gingerbread Man" on Monday. On Tuesday, we made our gigantic gingerbread man and brought him to the kitchen. We met the kitchen staff, saw the big ovens and mixers. We also got to look inside of the enormous refrigerator and freezer. On Wednesday, we went back to the kitchen to pick up our gingerbread man....but he ran away. He left us a note to check the office. We went to the office to find him. We saw Ms. Petersmeyer's office, Ms. Nelson's office, the copy machine, and the teacher's mailboxes, but we didn't see the gingerbread man. After meeting the office staff, we found a clue to look in the library. We found books, kids, library helpers, but no gingerbread man. We found a clue to look in the nurse's office tomorrow. On Thursday, we looked in the nurse's office and then we had to go to Galaxy Kids Club. We walked upstairs to check out the 1st and 2nd grade hallway. We also checked out the 3rd, 4th and 5th grade hallway. We had to wait until Friday to go to the speech room and we finally found him in Mr. Eliason's music room. During the week, we read different versions of the gingerbread man story including one about a Gingerbread Girl. We made headbands. We made a map of the places we went. Finally, we got to eat him!

Oct. 5

Today we used a recipe to make our gigantic gingerbread man. We also made little ones. We got to help "read" the recipe. Each student got to come up and help add an ingredient or help stir. We also added the "magic" part of the recipe at the end. We hope he does not run away! We visited the lunch room where he will be baked after school. A recipe will be coming home soon for you to make gingerbread men at home. We read another version of the Gingerbread man book. We talked about how they were the same and how they were different. We had music today. We practice making a steady beat. We had computer today. We practiced how to use the computer. We also practiced how to answer questions to help us get ready for the reading and math tests that we will be taking soon. We went into the gym to learn about the fundraiser that P.I.E. is sponsoring starting today. Information about this should be coming home soon.

Sunflower Day

We had so much fun on sunflower day. We started the day sharing our sunflowers and our sunflower stories. We noticed the differences in our sunflowers...some were big, some were small, some had yellow petals, some were brown, some were different colors...there were many different sizes and colors. Everyone had a sunflower to observe because some people brought extra to share. We also spent some time looking inside the sunflower. We also tried to get the seeds out. That was a fun activity. Many kids brought baggies of seeds home to plant for next year. We read a nonfiction book about sunflowers and how they grow. We were the illustrators for a book about sunflowers. After drawing the pictures for each page, we read our story using picture clues. We painted a picture of a sunflower using a real sunflower as our inspiration. We labeled the parts of our sunflowers on our paintings. We also added real sunflowers to the middle of our sunflower heads. We made sunflowers as tall as we are during. Each student glued leaves on the stem to match how old he/she is right now. We are going to hang up our paintings and tall sunflowers in the hallway. I have lots of pictures I hope to post soon. It was a great day!

Oct. 4, 2010

We did our favorite movement song-The Freeze during morning meeting. We talked about a new letter...the letter Oo. We talked about it being an important vowel. We sang the vowel song. We read a story called the "Flower Garden". It was about a little girl (with Dad's help) making a special surprise flower garden for her mom. We talked about surprises we have done before. We read the story "The Gingerbread Man". We retold the story using picture clues. In writer's workshop, we made cards for Mrs. McLearen, our helper in kindergarten who has been gone for a week. In gym, we played Buzz Off. We practiced writing the numbers 5 & 6. We also played a dice game called "Dot the Dog". We went outside on a leaf hunt to end our day.