The End of October...Wow!

Our Unit of Inquiry has led us to look very closely at Causation.  Two classes made popcorn and two groups made applesauce.  What great learning opportunities to allow our Explorers the stage to have a wonderful conversation on the topic and get their minds wondering about how other things were formed!  We expressed our appreciation for one another by sharing in these snacks as well (of course).

We have also spent time learning how we could express ourself using salad.  We know it is a twist, but knowing that eating salad in kindergarten isn’t a first choice, we became Expressive Risk-takers!  Even though we were risk-takers, we did learn three respectful ways of not choosing an ingredient for our salad. We noticed that by observing our friends choices we could tell a lot about their likes and dislikes.  Making this connections to other areas in our day been great for all of us to see!

Friday morning we enjoyed a visit from the Eco Explorers (Metroparks) as they gave us a wonderful lesson on Seasons.  We really enjoyed their visit! 

Our week ended with our OUTSTANDING Book Character Parade.  Our huge thank you to all!  The Costumes were amazing!  Each Explorer came up and presented their book and were able to thoroughly explain which Learner Profile their character best represented and why.  It was so exciting to hear them truly articulate this.  Not to long ago they had never heard any of these terms. They sure are growing fast!!! 

 

Thank you also to the families that came out to help us parade to Cleveland State.  CSU sure pampered us with goodies.  They are such a wonderful part of our family!

Special Notes:

• No school Friday for Kindergarten
• Please send in all conference notes for preferable times so we can try to accommodate everyone.
• We have noticed some parents coming by to visit during the day and wishing to then have a conference about their child’s progress.  As much as we would love to stop and visit it just isn’t possible.  Please schedule a time to conference with your child’s teacher so we can give you our fullest attention and our students.  Thank you!

A Busy, Busy Week!!

Another fast week is in the books.  Once again we are never certain where the time goes.  Our days are filled with lots of fun and learning.  What more could we ask for?

In math we are sorting and measuring.  Here we are measuring our feet with cubes.  We made lots of fun connections as we compared our feet to those around us and other items in the class.

In Writing we had to put together a sentence that was all jumbled up.  Our Explorers are so knowledgeable!  They were quick to point out clues such as capital letters and punctuation.  They even remembered to space as they glued their sentence down.  Great thinking!

Cleveland’s Vision Center came by for a visit this week. We met Avenue an amazing Seeing Eye Dog, learned all about Beeper Ball (Did you know they even have a World Series for Beeper Ball?), special clocks, how to learn the Braille alphabet, and so much more.  This was a fun lesson that tied directly into our Unit of Inquiry, How We Express Ourselves.

Another part of our unit, is all about how we use food to reflect our culture and traditions.  Ms. Mendez did a great lesson using food from her country, Puerto Rico.  Our risk-takers, sampled guava paste, fresco cheese and a cracker.  They  expressed their feelings of each food on a personal reflection form.  We noticed how they even cheered on those students who were more reluctant to try.  They are all so caring!!

 We cannot even begin to explain how proud we were of all our Explorers on our trip to the Art Museum this week!  They were respectful, curious, attentive and most of all curious!  We had a great time learning all about Children in Art and took a couple side trips along the way.  A perfect day!  We are hoping to go back to see the new Chinese Exhibit.

 First in Math is a great addition to our math curriculum.  You child, if they haven'd done so already, will be coming home with a username and password that will allow them to enjoy this fabulous website at home.  In the K2 World section, there are lots of fun activities to explore.  Pundi's Puzzle has already been a big hit!

THANK YOU TO EVERYONE for making our Fall Festival such a fabulous success!  It was a beautiful day made perfect by being able to spend time with everyone.  Who tried those unusual purple and white carrots?  I know we had a lot of risk-takers that did.  Way to go!!

Fall Festival

We are very excited to see everyone at the Fall Festival on Saturday!  


Remember the fun starts at 11:30.

Imagination Playground!

Thank you CSU for purchasing the best playground equipment ever!  We love it!!!

Our Imagination Playground consists of lots of foam shaped pieces that allow the children to be creative with each and every day.   So much fun!!

So many "Ohhhhs and Ahhhhhs" were expressed.  We are sure all of Cleveland heard the excitement. "Where do we even begin?"

 Problem solving at its finest!

Look at our helicopter!!!

We Are Growing So Fast...

It seems like just last week we were focusing on the basics of being in school: walking in line, finding the restroom, managing the cafeteria lines and lunches and now we are reading, writing, and working together beautifully! We are very proud of our Explorers!

Here are pictures to recap the last 2 weeks:

 We used "magic" paper and paint to write our Chinese numbers.

We sure had a lot of reflections about our field trip to the North Chagrin Nature Center.  

A big THANK YOU to Vision First for coming to check our eyes!  Going on this special van and seeing the doctor was very exciting.

We have been using the iPad to help us with a lot of different skills.  Here we are building words...

We participated in Read for the Record.  Children all over the United States read Llama Llama Red Pajama on October 6. 

Click here for more information: Read for the Record Information

 While on our field trip we saw a Wooly Bear Caterpillar.  The Explorers' excitement prompted a lesson on life cycles and a fun snack (crackers, cream cheese, raisins and carrots).

Basketball Jones came to visit and provided great fun along with a lesson about doing your best and never giving up!

Last week we started our next Unit of Inquiry-How We Express Ourselves.  This unit will look at the various ways expression occurs (talking, singing, dancing, painting clothing, food facial expressions,…), adaptations of people with various disabilities and how our expressions help people understand us.

Picture day was a nice day to see how our young Explorers express themselves with their choice of clothing.  Everyone looked beautiful!

We will be introducing Wonder Journals this week.  This journal is a special place for your child to record something he/she is questioning.  Recording their wonders is a great opportunity for the children to express their thoughts and have a fun record for years to come. *Did you think your child would be this far into writing by October? Kindergarten is so exciting!

                                                                                       Teacher: "I wonder what this could be?" 

Student Response, "It is a pumpkin watermelon.  Just look at it."

Special Note:  Early Dismissal will be this Wednesday at 1:30.

Thinkers

We are Thinkers!

We apply thinking skills to solve problems.

We use creativity to solve complex issues.

We make reasoned, ethical decisions.

This tree sparked great conversation among our inquiring, thinking Explorers.  After observing the tree for a bit, the questions and student posed answers provided a fantastic conversation!  Ask your child what they think about this fascinating tree.  We will continue our conversations next week.  Truly a unique piece of nature!

 Mountain

In Mandarin we were introduced to the characters that are used for writing and how they evolved over the years.  It was really neat to learn that the Chinese do not use letters like we do (making connections), but use characters that represent a picture.  We sure used our thinking skills to figure out their meanings!

Fire                                                     Child

We began wrapping up our First Unit of Inquiry, Who We Are.  The students evaluated a variety of pictures depicting people doing common things around the world.  Although we do similar things, we have realized that we do it in our unique way (different materials used, clothing, buildings, etc).

Kindergarten began an extra class Friday…Karate!  It is something we all do as a class (yes, their teachers too).  We learn about stranger danger, being kind to friends, self-control and basic moves. 

This Thursday, we will be going to the North Chagrin Nature Center for a Who Am I? nature class.  It will be interesting to see the characteristics and habitats of the various animals and make connections to what we learned in our Unit of Inquiry (Who We Are). 

Also, this week Vision First will be coming to conduct vision screenings.  THANK YOU for taking the time to complete the permission slip.  It is a fabulous program and one our kindergarteners really do enjoy.

SPECIAL NOTE- Book Character/Learner Profile Celebration will be on October 28^th

All students are invited to choose a character from a favorite book and dress as that character on October 28^th. Students will come ready to share which Learner Profile best represents the character they chose.  

A lot of creativity and cooperation went into creating this masterpiece.  The explorers actually asked that I take a picture.  We love their pride!