DEAR PARENTS:
BAD NEWS!!!! THE KINDERGARTEN TEACHERS ARE SADDENED THAT OUR ANNUAL TRIP TO CHINATOWN SUNSET PARK, TOMORROW - FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 26, 2010 WILL BE POSTPONED DUE TO THE BAD WEATHER CONDITIONS. WE HAVE BEEN ADVISED THAT THE DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION MAY CANCEL ALL TRIPS AND BUSES BUT WOULD NOT BE ABLE TO TELL US UNTIL 6 P.M. TONIGHT OR EARLY TOMORROW MORNING. THE RESTAURANT – PACIFICANA – ADVISED US THAT THEY WOULD NEED TO KNOW WHETHER WE WOULD BE COMING TO THE RESTAURANT BY EARLY AFTERNOON BECAUSE THEY WOULD HAVE TO STAFF THE RESTAURANT. IF WE WERE NOT ABLE TO MAKE IT TOMORROW, WE WOULD BE RESPONSIBLE FOR PAYMENT. WE WOULD RATHER BE SAFE THAN SORRY SO WE HAVE DECIDED TO POSTONE THE TRIP AND WILL RESCEDULE AT A LATER DATE.
IN ANY EVENT, IF WE DID GO TOMORROW, WE WOULD NOT BE ABLE TO TAKE OUR WALKING TOUR OF THE CHINATOWN NEIGHBORHOOD BECAUSE OF THE SNOW AND WOULD BE MISSING OUT ON A LOT OF INTERESTING SEA CREATURES – TURTLES, CRABS, ETC. THIS IS SOMETHING THAT THE KINDERGARTENERS LOVE TO DO.
WE HOPE THAT YOU UNDERSTAND AND WILL LET YOU KNOW THE NEW DATE AS SOON AS WE RESCHEDULE. ANYWAY, HAPPY NEW YEAR - 4707 – YEAR OF THE TIGER! THANK YOU FOR ALL YOUR SUPPORT.
FONDLY,
MS. GRAHAM
PS: I AM GOING TO TRY TO RESCHEDULE FOR FRIDAY, MARCH 12TH. OUR PARENT HELPERS FOR CLASS K-207 WILL BE:
ANTONIO'S MOM
QUINN'S MOM
EMERSON'S MOM
KEITH'S MOM
LILY'S MOM
MATTHEW SMITH'S DAD OR MOM
ROSHI'S DAD
SIMONE'S DAD
DAVION'S MOM
PSS: ALSO I WANTED TO LET YOU KNOW THAT WE DID NOT HAVE OUR PIZZA PARTY TODAY EITHER!!! THIS WAS DUE TO THE FACT THAT MS. MILLEDGE AND I COULD NOT GET THE MULTI-MEDIA ROOM. THE CHILDREN KNEW THIS YESTERDAY BUT I GUESS DID NOT TELL SOME OF THEIR PARENTS. SORRY! THIS PARTY WILL ALSO BE RE-SCHEDULED IN MARCH.
Thursday, February 25, 2010
Saturday, February 20, 2010
WELCOME BACK EVERYONE!!!!!
Dear Parents:
I am sorry that it has taken so long for me to post on my blog but I could not get into the blog for a few days and had to figure out what was going on.... Anyway, when things work, it is wonderful but when things break down....boy... it is extremely frustrating. I am happy to be up and running again. So.... Happy Chinese New Year....Happy 100 Days of School....Happy Valentine's Day and I hope that you all had a Happy Vacation Week!!!! I have missed all your children and cannot wait to see them on Monday.
Before we left on vacation, I told the children that the day that we come back from our vacation - Monday - is the 100th day of school. Well….actually…. if we did not have a snow day… it would have been. SO MONDAY IS NOT THE 100th DAY OF SCHOOL BUT IS THE 99th DAY OF SCHOOL. THE 100TH DAY OF SCHOOL IS ON TUESDAY. So that will be the day when we will celebrate our 100th day!!!! As I have originally told you, we will celebrate the 100th day with a PAJAMA PARTY. So the children will be allowed to wear their most comfortable pajamas to school on Tuesday. We will celebrate by reading many of our sleepy time books. It will be a fun day with a lot of fun activities. I cannot believe that it has been almost 100 days. Do you believe it? Your children are doing amazing work and have matured so much these last 98 days. As a teacher...it makes me so happy to see all of them love school and enjoy every subject and to be reading and writing and doing difficult math problems everyday. The children in Class K-207 will certainly be ready for the rigors of 1st Grade. We have been doing a lot of work on our math curriculum getting ready for the 100th day. We made links with construction paper and the children figured out that it would take ten links to get to 100 if each link was 10. The links are inside the classroom for all to see. We also worked on the question - How many hands does it take to get to 100? The children of Class K-207 painted their hands and grouped by 5's (fingers) to find the answer. Do you know how many group of 5's make 100? Come look at the painted hands on the wall outside our classroom. We also read the book - Emily's First 100 Days of School by Rosemary Wells and learned the song - 100 Bottles of POP on the Wall. Our shared reading is a poem this week is entitled 100 days and it is to the tune of Ten Little Indians. We looked at some the 100 objects that your children brought into class and counted them by 5's and 10's. We will continue doing this next week so….if you haven’t brought in the 100 objects, you still have time to do this next week. We are going to be looking at our straws on Monday. We will notice that they are grouped by 9 tens and 9 ones and that on Tuesday - our big day - our straws will be grouped as 1 one hundred - 0 tens - and 0 ones. Very exciting stuff!!!
I would like to remind you that the Kindergarten Classes will be going on a walking tour of CHINATOWN SUNSET PARK on Friday, February 26, 2010 and will be having lunch at Pacificana Restaurant, located at 813 55th Street, Brooklyn, NY. We will be having an authentic Chinese lunch and will be seeing the Lion Dance. The children will be leaving the school around 9:40 a.m. and will walk around the Chinatown neighborhood – if the weather is appropriate - where we will see many live creatures – turtles, crabs, etc. Lunch is scheduled for 11:30 a.m. This is the Year of the Tiger - 4707. Have a healthy appetite. The food is very good. Even though we were supposed to only bring 5 parents, I have included additional parents to come along - since they have not been on trips with the class before. I will let you know who the lucky parents are next week. As parent helpers, this goes without saying, that we need to watch all the children in the class and not just our own. Thank you in advance.
Here is an overview of what your child is learning this month.
Reading Workshop: This is a new unit of study where the children are story detectives. They are noticing and defining patterns in their texts and using these patterns to help them read their books.
Writing Workshop: This is also a new unit called How-To Books. How-To Books are types of procedural writing. Each of your children will be a teacher this month and into the next month! It empowers the children to get them to think about what they know how to do really well. I have had a mix of How-To's so far. They are all hilarious. Please have a conversation with your child about all of the things that he or she knows how to do, make or play! It is important that you child be able to teach us how to do or make something step-by-step.
Bed Time Stories: Our Winnie-the-Pooh study has been a great success so far! Pooh has met a lot of new friends. The children are so excited about this unit.
Word Study: We are learning so many sight words. The children have received a list of the word walls and will need to know these words both in their reading and writing processes. Ask them about the Word Wall Fairy who visits our class sometimes!
Shared Reading: We are reading Big Books and the children are getting familiar with all the sight words and patterns. It is really exciting.
Social Studies: We finished our Beautiful Stuff unit. Our Beautiful Stuff self portraits are currently on the bulletin board outside our classroom. Please stop by and take a look….They are amazing. We will be starting our Playground study with our staff developer, Rene Dinnerstein, in early March. It goes without saying that Class K-207 is very excited about this new unit!
Math: We are skip counting by 2s, 5s and 10s. We are playing addition Top It with our classroom playing cards, playing Math Bingo and are working on not-so-easy math word problems. We are very busy in math!!!
That is all for now. As always, if you have any concerns or questions, please do not hesitate to contact me. Check out this great literacy website: www.starfall.com. The children love it.
Fondly,
Ms. Graham
PS: Also on Thursday, February 25th, Class K-207, together with our Class Buddies, Class 4-304 (Ms. Milledge's Class), will celebrate our winning of the Penny Harvest with a Pizza Party in the Multi-Media Room. The Time of the party will be at 2:10. I will be decorating the room during my prep at 1:20. If anyone would like to come and help out, that would be great. The school is supplying the pizza for our classes. The parents in Ms. Milledge's class will be supplying the plates, etc. I am requesting our parents supply the drinks. If anyone could supply a bottle of juice, etc. on Thursday afternoon, it would be greatly appreciated by me and Ms. Milledge. Thank you in advance.
I am sorry that it has taken so long for me to post on my blog but I could not get into the blog for a few days and had to figure out what was going on.... Anyway, when things work, it is wonderful but when things break down....boy... it is extremely frustrating. I am happy to be up and running again. So.... Happy Chinese New Year....Happy 100 Days of School....Happy Valentine's Day and I hope that you all had a Happy Vacation Week!!!! I have missed all your children and cannot wait to see them on Monday.
Before we left on vacation, I told the children that the day that we come back from our vacation - Monday - is the 100th day of school. Well….actually…. if we did not have a snow day… it would have been. SO MONDAY IS NOT THE 100th DAY OF SCHOOL BUT IS THE 99th DAY OF SCHOOL. THE 100TH DAY OF SCHOOL IS ON TUESDAY. So that will be the day when we will celebrate our 100th day!!!! As I have originally told you, we will celebrate the 100th day with a PAJAMA PARTY. So the children will be allowed to wear their most comfortable pajamas to school on Tuesday. We will celebrate by reading many of our sleepy time books. It will be a fun day with a lot of fun activities. I cannot believe that it has been almost 100 days. Do you believe it? Your children are doing amazing work and have matured so much these last 98 days. As a teacher...it makes me so happy to see all of them love school and enjoy every subject and to be reading and writing and doing difficult math problems everyday. The children in Class K-207 will certainly be ready for the rigors of 1st Grade. We have been doing a lot of work on our math curriculum getting ready for the 100th day. We made links with construction paper and the children figured out that it would take ten links to get to 100 if each link was 10. The links are inside the classroom for all to see. We also worked on the question - How many hands does it take to get to 100? The children of Class K-207 painted their hands and grouped by 5's (fingers) to find the answer. Do you know how many group of 5's make 100? Come look at the painted hands on the wall outside our classroom. We also read the book - Emily's First 100 Days of School by Rosemary Wells and learned the song - 100 Bottles of POP on the Wall. Our shared reading is a poem this week is entitled 100 days and it is to the tune of Ten Little Indians. We looked at some the 100 objects that your children brought into class and counted them by 5's and 10's. We will continue doing this next week so….if you haven’t brought in the 100 objects, you still have time to do this next week. We are going to be looking at our straws on Monday. We will notice that they are grouped by 9 tens and 9 ones and that on Tuesday - our big day - our straws will be grouped as 1 one hundred - 0 tens - and 0 ones. Very exciting stuff!!!
I would like to remind you that the Kindergarten Classes will be going on a walking tour of CHINATOWN SUNSET PARK on Friday, February 26, 2010 and will be having lunch at Pacificana Restaurant, located at 813 55th Street, Brooklyn, NY. We will be having an authentic Chinese lunch and will be seeing the Lion Dance. The children will be leaving the school around 9:40 a.m. and will walk around the Chinatown neighborhood – if the weather is appropriate - where we will see many live creatures – turtles, crabs, etc. Lunch is scheduled for 11:30 a.m. This is the Year of the Tiger - 4707. Have a healthy appetite. The food is very good. Even though we were supposed to only bring 5 parents, I have included additional parents to come along - since they have not been on trips with the class before. I will let you know who the lucky parents are next week. As parent helpers, this goes without saying, that we need to watch all the children in the class and not just our own. Thank you in advance.
Here is an overview of what your child is learning this month.
Reading Workshop: This is a new unit of study where the children are story detectives. They are noticing and defining patterns in their texts and using these patterns to help them read their books.
Writing Workshop: This is also a new unit called How-To Books. How-To Books are types of procedural writing. Each of your children will be a teacher this month and into the next month! It empowers the children to get them to think about what they know how to do really well. I have had a mix of How-To's so far. They are all hilarious. Please have a conversation with your child about all of the things that he or she knows how to do, make or play! It is important that you child be able to teach us how to do or make something step-by-step.
Bed Time Stories: Our Winnie-the-Pooh study has been a great success so far! Pooh has met a lot of new friends. The children are so excited about this unit.
Word Study: We are learning so many sight words. The children have received a list of the word walls and will need to know these words both in their reading and writing processes. Ask them about the Word Wall Fairy who visits our class sometimes!
Shared Reading: We are reading Big Books and the children are getting familiar with all the sight words and patterns. It is really exciting.
Social Studies: We finished our Beautiful Stuff unit. Our Beautiful Stuff self portraits are currently on the bulletin board outside our classroom. Please stop by and take a look….They are amazing. We will be starting our Playground study with our staff developer, Rene Dinnerstein, in early March. It goes without saying that Class K-207 is very excited about this new unit!
Math: We are skip counting by 2s, 5s and 10s. We are playing addition Top It with our classroom playing cards, playing Math Bingo and are working on not-so-easy math word problems. We are very busy in math!!!
That is all for now. As always, if you have any concerns or questions, please do not hesitate to contact me. Check out this great literacy website: www.starfall.com. The children love it.
Fondly,
Ms. Graham
PS: Also on Thursday, February 25th, Class K-207, together with our Class Buddies, Class 4-304 (Ms. Milledge's Class), will celebrate our winning of the Penny Harvest with a Pizza Party in the Multi-Media Room. The Time of the party will be at 2:10. I will be decorating the room during my prep at 1:20. If anyone would like to come and help out, that would be great. The school is supplying the pizza for our classes. The parents in Ms. Milledge's class will be supplying the plates, etc. I am requesting our parents supply the drinks. If anyone could supply a bottle of juice, etc. on Thursday afternoon, it would be greatly appreciated by me and Ms. Milledge. Thank you in advance.
Thursday, February 4, 2010
BEAUTIFUL STUFF
Dear Families:
I am so excited to announce that our "Beautiful Stuff" self-portraits are up in the hallway for all to see. The children did an amazing job in portraying themselves with odd materials. I am so impressed.
To a young child, the world is full of materials to touch, discover and explore. To find, collect, sort, and use materials is to embark on a special kind of adventure. For adults, gathering materials means rediscovering the richness and beauty in natural, unexpected, and recyclable objects that are all around us, but not often noticed.
One way to rediscover our own creative impulses is to see possibilities in materials. Children possess a natural openness to the potential of materials. When adults become aware of this process, they find ways to watch and listen to children. Children and adults become collaborators as they discover, collect, sort, arrange, experiment, create, construct, and think with materials. The goal is to allow children to become fluent with materials – as if materials were a language.
K-207 enjoyed learning with our “Beautiful Stuff” and created these wonderful self portraits. Please stop by and take a look. We would love to share our Art with all of you. Enjoy!
Fondly,
Ms. Graham
I am so excited to announce that our "Beautiful Stuff" self-portraits are up in the hallway for all to see. The children did an amazing job in portraying themselves with odd materials. I am so impressed.
To a young child, the world is full of materials to touch, discover and explore. To find, collect, sort, and use materials is to embark on a special kind of adventure. For adults, gathering materials means rediscovering the richness and beauty in natural, unexpected, and recyclable objects that are all around us, but not often noticed.
One way to rediscover our own creative impulses is to see possibilities in materials. Children possess a natural openness to the potential of materials. When adults become aware of this process, they find ways to watch and listen to children. Children and adults become collaborators as they discover, collect, sort, arrange, experiment, create, construct, and think with materials. The goal is to allow children to become fluent with materials – as if materials were a language.
K-207 enjoyed learning with our “Beautiful Stuff” and created these wonderful self portraits. Please stop by and take a look. We would love to share our Art with all of you. Enjoy!
Fondly,
Ms. Graham
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
