Block Play

Photos will be added to the shutterfly site tomorrow of some great block play!  Here is a great description of everything we learn when playing with blocks.
Blocks - What are we learning? Also, please remember to FOLLOW the blog with the google friend connect option to the right! --------->

Parent Observation Calendar

See the date you are signed up for an observation here if you are signed up for October or November.

Nature, Nests, and Mr. N!

We had a busy week in room 115!  We learned about the letter N and met Mr. N.  We sang his song many times and noticed many words with the letter N in them! 

Monday and Tuesday included practice with the new letter, as well as meeting Mr. N!

Wednesday, we got outside to enjoy the last of the warm late-Summer weather! 

Thursday, we were busy learning about shapes and creating our own mice out of shapes! 

Friday, Mrs. Zieger read Leaf Man by Lois Ehlert to the morning classes and we all went outside on a leaf hunt for great leaves to use for our own leaf men!  It was a great way to spend the first day of fall!  Check out the photos on the shutterfly share site here.  We also celebrated a special friend’s birthday in our morning class.  Happy birthday, Alexander!  The afternoon class also went on a leaf hunt and created their own leaf men.  We also enjoyed the school-wide celebration assembly.

Finally, there was a mix up with the AM/PM folders today.  Some students may have received the wrong list of friend’s names – I am so sorry!  I will re-send them next week once they are straightened out.  (Things got goofy when they were printed and cut and I thought I went back to fix all of them, but missed some!)

Have a wonderful weekend, everyone!

Newsletter for the week of September 19th

September 19-23, 2011

AM Mat Man 09.22.11

Click here to view this video

We love MAT MAN!

The afternoon class today welcomed Mat Man to our room.  Check out his song and how we put him together here:  (Pardon my singing!)  :)

PM Mat Man 09.21.11

A BIG thank you to Mrs. Norton for generously donating a mat man set to our K4 classes, as well as other wonderful Handwriting without Tears resources.  We are beyond thrilled to introduce these tools to the children and help them develop great handwriting skills early in life without the frustration! 

Our first few weeks of school....

We've had so much fun! Watch the video and listen to the song we sing as we get to school each day.

Our Wonderful Week!

Our first full (five day) week flew by!  On Monday and Tuesday, we read Chicka Chicka Boom Boom and enjoyed the song and short video.  We made a delicious coconut tree snack with graham cracker “trunks,” granny smith apple “leaves,” and raisin “coconuts.” 

On Friday, the morning classes had a great time playing red light, green light in the gym with Mrs. Zieger’s class.  We practiced running, walking, and even crawling during this game!  On Friday afternoon, the PM class had gym in our classroom.  We moved to a new song – A Walking We Will Go from Greg and Steve.  It was lots of fun walking, stomping, skipping, hopping, sliding, and even tip-toeing!  At the end of the day, we got to go to the special celebration assembly where we sang Happy Birthday to the birthday kiddos, watched awards being given out, and even received a SPECIAL treat (chex mix and juice boxes!)  At the end, we had an all-school karaoke to a few songs.
This week, we also started a new behavior chart in our classroom.  Students will start the day on blue (Being safe, respectful, and responsible.)  They can move up to purple if they are really going above and beyond (helping others without being asked, etc.)  If they make bad choices, they can move down to orange (Uh, oh! Make better choices!), yellow (think about it.) or red (call/contact home.)  We have used this for two days and have already seen an improvement in some behaviors.  If the students end the day on purple, they receive a sparkly sticker on their clothespin.  When they receive 5 sparkles, their pin will be moved to a special board showcasing their amazing behavior. 
 

Next week, we will be working on recognizing and writing our names, singing the alphabet, and we will even meet our first Letter People letter – Mr. N! 

Weekly Newsletter

Here is this week’s newsletter.  Tomorrow’s newsletter will be the last printed newsletter.  Please let me know if you need it printed!  Thank you for saving trees!  :) 
September Newsletter 9.12-9.16.11

Teaching (and learning!) Self-Control

My husband shared an interesting article with me this evening about how children acquire new knowledge.  He was intending it for me to read and relate to our 11-month-old daughter, but the following excerpt relates well to the four- and five-year-olds!

Teaching Self-Control

Aamodt and Wang also emphasize the importance of teaching your children self-control from an early age.

"This is really critical because there are so many things parents want to do when they read parenting books," he says. "They take steps to teach their children math or reading ... but a big thing we can do for our children is to do the best to foster the development of self-control and willpower. Self-control and the ability to restrain impulses is associated with success at every age, whether it means being able to read at age 4, or being able to restrain impulses at a later age, or even what your peers think of you in high school. At all of these ages, willpower and self-control is a stronger predictor of academic success than IQ."

When children are young, they can learn self-control by focusing on any fun activity — whether that means studying martial arts or playing with dolls and planning a make-believe tea party.

"It gives the child practice at planning and organizing a series of topics to achieve a desired goal," says Aamodt. "When you're planning a tea party, you can't be acting like a fighter pilot. You have to be acting like a lady having a tea party. So pretending is one of the earliest types of exposure most kids get to planning and organizing their actions. And the more you practice that, the better you're going to be at it."

Making sure your child has fun while learning self-control is vitally important. Aamodt and Wang recommend, for instance, telling your child to pretend he or she is protecting a castle instead of just saying, "Stand still."

"Taking advantage of a child's natural sense of fun is a terrific way to instill these things," says Wang. "This is not the kind of thing that works well if it's forced. It can be something as easy as pretending to guard the castle or playing a take-turns game where you say, 'I'm going to draw an ear on this piece of paper, and when you see an ear, then it's your time to listen. And if you see a mouth on this other piece of paper, then it's your time to talk.' So all of these things can be done in very simple ways — in ways that are often fun — and the more fun it is, the more likely the child is to pay attention for a longer period of time. These things are fun, they don't cost money, and anybody can do it."

Read the entire article here.

Weekly Newsletters

Our newsletters will be found on our website after this week in an effort to conserve paper.  Please notify me if you need to receive paper copies.
Thank you!
September Newsletter 9.5-9.9.11

Our busy week!

We were a busy bunch in Room 115 this week.  We practiced using new math and literacy toys (manipulatives.)  We also had our first gym class and went to the school playground for the first time.  On Friday, the afternoon class was able to be a part of the school-wide PBIS celebration.  Mrs. Barber won $25 to spend on the classroom in a staff drawing, too!  (This will be useful for some new play dough toys!)

We give a great, big

to everyone who has generously donated items to our classroom! 

Here are a few photos from the week:

		September 5-9th, 2011 VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

We are still working on sitting quietly when others are talking, as well as walking quietly when in the hall.  We will be starting more academic work next week with a focus on the letters in our names, Chicka Chicka Boom, Boom, and the difference between letters and numbers.
Enjoy the weekend!

Classroom Wish List

A few items we are looking for…

• Miscellaneous buttons
• Clothespins (wooden, please!)

Items will be crossed off once they are fulfilled and new items may be added in the future! 

We appreciate any and all donations.

Spirit Wear!

Click the photo to order spirit wear, or type the URL into your web browser.  Orders must be placed by Friday, September 16th.

PIN Night Powerpoint

Welcome to k4!

View more presentations from Amanda Barber.

This week, we are learning…