Ms. Concannon's Kindergarten: Hello December

A look at our learning...

Fundations: this week we learned the name, sound and correct letter formation for lowercase x and y. We only have TWO LETTERS IN THE ALPHABET LEFT TO LEARN! YAY!

Please use the verbal prompts below when helping your child form these letters:

x-slant down, slant back

y-slant down, slant baaaackkkk

Slant down letters can be tricky for some kiddos. If you notice this is tough for your child, I'd suggest some activities that support crossing the midline. There are SO MANY activities that work on this skill. Click here to see a few. Even just having them stand up (without a pencil) and making the "slant down" motion with their arm across their body is good practice.

Shared Reading: we read the books Day and I pick up this week. We learned how to do "buddy reading" with familiar texts. This will become a new weekly routine. One person is the "teacher" and the other is the "reader." Then they switch. This allows all students the chance to read the familiar text and work on the concepts such as: pointing to words when we read, monitoring on known words (being able to locate and read spelling words quickly that are in text, even if we don't know all the words in the text) and discussing what we read. In the pictures below your child is participating in buddy reading.

New spelling words of the week:

There will be 3 words that week due to them being similar.

Writing Workshop: our main focus continues to be writing a story (sentence) by sounding out/stretching out our words. If they are writing about walking their dog, their story shouldn't just say "dog," but rather something such as "I took my dog on a walk." That may be spelled something like this "I tk mi dog on a wk." Check out a couple examples from some of our classmates. This is similar to what your child's writing should look like at this point in the year.

I cleaned out my garage. There was leaves.

I went to the beach. It was sunny.

I went to the swimming with my family.

I build a fort. It was a fun day.

Math: we are becoming teen number experts! Between singing our "Numbers in the teens start with a 1" song daily and regular morning work activities that involve teen numbers, we have greatly improved! I'm so proud of their hard work! Not only can they recognize the teen number, but are getting very good at understanding and explaining how it is a group of 10 and some left over.

This week we also worked on representing numbers in many different ways and learned a new number/counting game called "Spin a Number."

Holiday fun: Jack is back! One of Santa's helpers has been visiting my classroom since 2011. He loves seeing all the things the kindergarteners are learning and reporting the kind things he sees to his "boss" Santa Claus! The kids were excited to meet him this week and they all assured me they would be showing Jack only the BEST things to report to Santa! 😀

Friday craft & Reindeer cam: it's time to take the turkeys down and bring in the reindeer! Our room is feeling very festive. Speaking of reindeer, we found Santa's security camera at the North Pole and are able to watch his beautiful reindeer throughout the day! Sometimes we even get glimpses of Santa himself! So exciting! You can watch at home too. Check it out here. There are times that Santa will read a story, and most are times we aren't in school, so you can enjoy it at home with your family. Enjoy these magical moments with your little ones, they are only young once and it goes by so quickly. I try to bring as much magic and joy as I can into their lives during the school day. As they grow older, they may not remember when they learned certain letters or how to count, but they will remember these magical moments.