Letter from teacher
Dear Parents.
Welcome to the new school year. I look forward to getting to know your children and all of you. It is my goal to provide an environment where learning is exciting and intriguing, where all are encouraged to be motivated and to reach their full potential as learners. A partnership between the school and family is one of the indicators of a successful school year and it is my hope that we will develop that relationship of authentic partnership and that you will feel that we are all on this new learning journey together. I may be a little biased, but I strongly feel that kindergarten is one of the most important grades in a child" school career because we are building the foundation for the rest of their school life. Please know that in this partnership you can stop in at anytime, you do not need an appointment. You can also let me know if there are days that you would like to come on a regular basis. There are so many ways to help at school or from home. To begin our year together we will work on creating a sense of community in our classroom, building relationships, establishing trust, and creating avenues of communication. Our classroom environment will invite thinking, build inquiry skills, and a space for thoughtful and engaging dialogue as scientists, historians, mathematicians, artists, and writers. We will explore and exchange ideas about books, research, art, ideas, and questions. The curriculum is based on the standards set by the State of Colorado for kindergarten students and on benchmarks to gauge their performance and proficiency within these standards. Your child's achievement will be measured in a variety of ways using students and teacher generated rubrics, portfolio entries, learning stories, and formal teacher written assessments. The portfolio entries are clear indicators of the child's growth throughout the year. We will be participating in activities that include the theory of Multiple Intelligences so that every child can reach their full potential. On the PPSEL school website you will find a link to our kindergarten classrooms site. On our site you will find children's words and work, teacher observations, pictures of classroom and/or fieldwork activities, and things you can work on with your child at home (new sounds, words, etc.). Each class will also post their Learning Targets, which give both you and your child a clear picture of what the intended learning is for the classroom work. The children will be presenting their work to you at scheduled meetings. These presentations may be in the form of an author';s party, a play, a gallery night, or a presentation of research. We hope that you will be able to attend these to support our young learners. I are so excited to begin this new year and truly looking forward to building a learning community that includes your children, your family, and myself as teachers and learners If you need to contact me, you can reach me by e-mail at the following: kate.wilson@ppsel.org or you can leave me at message in the school office.
Thank you,
Miss Kate
Class Information
All Day Kindergarten News
August 30,2010
Important Information
Mrs. Notsch’s class will have PE on Tuesdays and Wednesdays
Miss Kate’s class will have PE on Mondays and Thursdays
Please make sure your child has gym shoes (tennis shoes) and a water bottle on those days. Children who do not have appropriate shoes are asked to sit out due to safety concerns.
Expedition
This week we will be exploring Japan. On Monday we will have a special guest speaker who is from Japan. We will also be comparing and contrasting how children play in Japan and how we play and look at different types of toys. We will be making fans, and learning how to write in Japanese and we will hear Japanese stories, on Thursday we will be making a folding paper picture holder. Please send in four photographs of your family, your pets, etc. for this project. The pictures will need to be cut so please do not send in photos that you do not want to be cut. A photocopy would be best for these. The picture holder will be sent home when it is completed.
Phonics
We are working on the letter “C” this week and continue to work on pre reading skills. We are also learning some sight words and continue to work on word families. The children will be working at their individual level, so if your child is learning their letters and sounds that will be the focus, if they are beginning to put sounds together we will begin to do that and start the reading progress. Please continue to work with your child at home by reading to them every night.
Reading Comprehension
We will continue to work on schema and expand by looking at text-to-text connection and text to world connections as well as text to self-connections.
Writing
The children are reading as writers and everyday we have a writers workshop. We are working on how writers get their ideas in these workshops. We are also writing everyday and children are learning to “stretch” out sounds in words. At this age children write by using phonetic spelling. This is just what they should be doing as developing writers. As we study sight words and word families they will be able to write these with proper spelling. We will also begin to use a word wall for our expedition words and some other common words.
Math
We will be counting in several different ways and graphing our results. We will also be working with pattern blocks and exploring shapes.
Thank you so much for all your support.
August 15,2010 Miss Kate’s Crew Kindergarten News
Pajama Party
Next Friday we will have a pajama party; the children earned this by filling our crew jar. We are adding fuzzie wuzzies by following our crew promise, being kind, helping one another, and helping others learn by following directions and working quietly. Please have your child wear appropriate pajamas, since we will play on the playground nightgowns are not appropriate. Thank you for your help in this regard.
Reading
We are working on phonics and on comprehension strategies. We are working with Zoo Phonics, Explode the Code, and Multi-sensory reading. I hope you will see a year of growth in this area.
We are also exploring word families.
In comprehension work we are focuses on making connections in the books we read at circle. This is called schema and you may hear your child talk about text to self, text to text, and text to world connections.
We do reading centers from 8:15 to 9:15 a.m. everyday, please feel free to stop in anytime you are free or would like to help.
Math
In math we will continue to learn about patterns and are also covering shapes and learning to write numbers.
Writing
We use Six Trait Writing for primary to learn about the writing process. We use writer’s workshops to teach these traits. I have been so pleased that the class is able to stay on tract during writer’s workshop and work quietly on their own writing for 20 to 30 minutes everyday. We are getting there.
We are also reading like writers in the morning and exploring how writers get their ideas and we are also looking at voice in stories.
Character Traits
I am always so thankful for the opportunity to teach kindergarten, it amazes me when I see the children reach out in acts of kindness towards one another. I have observed children playing nicely, sharing, and being problem solvers. Our crew promise is up and we are reminded to use this everyday.
Book Orders
I will be turning in book orders next Friday, if you are ordering from both catalogues you only need one check made out to Scholastic for the total of both.
Thank you Thank you Thank you for sharing your wonderful children and for all the help and support your have provided.
|
