Weekly Message: January 9

Welcome back! We hope your winter break was refreshing and full of quality family time. The kindergarten students were happy to be back. This week we drew in our journals about our break and what we did during the time away from school. We also started on some winter art, with help from our grade ¾ buddies, by ripping masking tape and preparing to make a "Tree in Winter", inspired by the beautiful rime frost covered trees we had at the beginning of the week. It was wonderful watching the students help each other and build relationships across grade levels.  

Our learning from this week: 

Math: 

We are continuing to practice using our numbers 1-5 and be able to recognize them "at a glance." We played a couple of math games this week, including "Garbage" and a dice rolling game. We have also begun explorations of size and shape. 

 

Literacy: 

We have learned letters Aa, Mm, Ss, Tt and Pp. A handout for the letter Pp and words will be sent home on Monday for your student's blue at home practice folder. Please take a look and keep the folder at home with you. If you have some downtime, or extra moments, you can review our heart words and the words that we have been learning at school. This helps reinforce what we are doing and will help your child be able to recall more of what they are learning.  


Social/Science: 

We were scientists observing our outdoor environment. We felt the snow and looked for evidence of movement in the snow. We asked and answered questions like: Is it fresh or packed-down? Do we see where animals have been? How can we tell? Can we pack the snow? Why won't it stick together. We also observed the thick frost earlier this week and discovered that it is called "rime frost."


Alien In-line Skating: 

We had an amazing start to our skating program. The children learned how to put on equipment, how to stand up, how to fall safety and how to move in various ways around the gym.  We talked a lot about how we expected skating might be challenging and worked on our "Growth Mindset."  We reminded ourselves that when things are hard and we feel frustrated our brains and bodies are doing a lot of learning.  We called this "The Learning Space".  In the gym, we realized falling was a positive thing, for it gave us more opportunities to practice falling safely and to practice standing up.  During skate days it is helpful to wear stretchy clothes but not too bulky so that we can slide our knee/elbow pads on.  Having slightly taller socks helped us tuck in our pants.  Children are welcome to bring their own helmets, but they are also provided with the rest of the gear.  

   

Reminders: 

  • Alien In-Line is on Monday and Wednesday this coming week (Jan. 12 & 14.) 
  • No School for Kindergarten Friday, Jan. 16 and Monday, Jan. 19 (Summit Kids is open for full day sign up, if you would like.) 


-Best, 

Ms. Madeline Kinnear












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