Newsletter 10/29

READING Theme – Colors All Around
Our new alphafriend is Reggie Rooster and he helps us remember the sound for r. We especially like his jazzy song.
We used many big books and read alouds this week for our reading work. Brown Bear Brown Bear, What Do You See? was reread this week. We practiced reading the color words and worked on matching the character card with the color word and naming word of the animal. We used the small books titled The Pumpkin and Look at Me to build reading fluency. These books use a patterned text. What great readers we have! They are learning to use the pictures and beginning sounds to help figure words out.

MATH
Addition and subtraction number stories were introduced. The children used concrete material to represent and solve addition and subtraction stories. We were learning to distinguish between joining and take-away stories.
What could be better than reviewing colors and shapes by playing Color & Shape Bingo? We reviewed number names 10 – 20 by playing the Teen Swat game. Those flyswatters become pretty accurate when swatting the number called for. It’s amazing that learning can be such fun!
Symmetry was introduced this week. We did a fold-and-cut symmetrical shape paper. We explored whether our bodies and faces are symmetrical.
Estimating was introduced. It is important to be able to estimate or determine about how many objects there are sometimes. An estimate is a “smart guess” and we are practicing that skill.

SCIENCE/SOCIAL STUDIES
Pumpkins and Halloween were the focus of the week. We weighed and measured a pumpkin and learned all about the life cycle from seed to pumpkin. They each used “kindergarten writing” to tell what they would do with a pumpkin. How many seeds does the pumpkin have? As we cleaned out the pumpkin we put the seeds in groups of 10 and then counted by 10’s. Ask your child how many seeds we counted!
Pam Holz was back in our classroom this week and talked to us about bats. She has a wealth of information and we always learn a lot from her.