Thank you for the quick responses for our Halloween Party. We have enough treats to make a special snack for the children. If you wanted to volunteer an item, don't worry we will have a special Christmas project and a Valentine's Day Party too! We do not dress up in our costumes for the party. It takes a long time to get the children changed, and I don't want anyone to lose any pieces.
This week we started talking about pumpkins. We read Pumpkin, Pumpkin to learn about the life cycle of a pumpkin. We read a Let's Find Out! magazine also. We also read some fictional stories like Spookley The Square Pumpkin.
In Reader's Workshop we talked about retelling a story. The story we used was Goldilocks and the 3 Bears. We used a chart to help us remember what happened, we looked at pictures, and we also acted it out with props. I loved watching the students use different voices for the characters and remember all the details. Ask your child to retell the story for you. You can also do it with stories at home using dolls, puppets, or make your own characters using paper. The more chances students have to retell, the better their comprehension will be.
We are going to start using Words Their Way to help students with phonics skills. The students completed a spelling inventory this week. I used the inventory to sort students into groups to work on skills like letter identification, beginning sound, final sound, medial vowel sound, and consonant digraphs. Each week, your child will be focusing on a particular skill and given opportunities to practice the skill each day. At the end of the week, we will check their progress.
In math, we continued to work on counting on. I also assessed the students on adding one more object to a group. The goal is for students to add one more and tell how many without recounting. I was happy with how the students did. We also used a scale to compare the weight of various objects to a small pumpkin. The students completed sorting activities using Halloween erasers, table scatter, and other small objects. At home you can sort with cereal pieces, cars, Littlest Pet Shop toys, etc.. Try to encourage your child to sort the same object in more than one way: color, size, and shape are just a few ideas.
This week's popcorn words are he and she. We talked about the letter Pp. Try going on a scavenger hunt to find things that start with p.
Progress Reports will go home next Friday. Have a great weekend!
