week of October 3

Mrs. Borden and Mrs. Jones’ Nifty Newsletter (week of October 3)
Homework:
Monday: ½ sheet and reader
Tuesday: ½ sheet and reader
Wednesday: ½ sheet and reader and Handwriting
Thursday: ½ sheet and reader and practice talent
For those helping with the Fall Festival, there will be a second meeting at the Mine Shaft in Ashland. The meeting starts at 6:00 pm.
In Phonics, we are learning the letter Tt like in Tent. In a few weeks, we will be practicing our very first Phonics reader, “Hot, Hot, Hot” that will have words that we can blend and sight words. To celebrate our letter Tt, we will be having a “Talent Show” on Friday. It will be held in our own classroom and the children can perform their very own talent. We have had anything from joke telling, cheerleading, reading, to karate, singing, and dancing. It is just something simple and short and everyone gets a star for participating!
Our new Reading story is “Dig, Dig, Digging” and it is about how machines help people. We will be working on classifying and categorizing and this is our last story In our unit, “All Together Now”.
In Math, we will continue to work on AB patterns like in our Math Meeting. We will also be working on graphing like we did with our apples this past week. Please continue to work on numbers 1-5, both writing them and counting. We will also be working on naming shapes by their attributes and sorting them.
Your child might come home with more papers on certain days than others. There will also be some papers that are marked and some papers that are not. The daily Phonics and Math will be looked at and checked to make sure that the directions were followed and they tried their best. Several times a week, there will be morning work that isn’t checked but correlates to either the letter or the theme going on at that time. There will also be groups of papers coming home after we complete one of the center rotations. They are only checked to make sure that they are handed in and worked on the concept. Centers relate to the various concepts we are working on such as word work, science, math, art, and writing and are completed independently while they are waiting to be called to work with the teacher in small group.
Please continue to check our blog under the North Schuylkill Website, Homework Helpline, Borden, J. That will contain not only this week’s information, but past posts in case you are looking for information on a particular subject. Keep up the great work!

Week of September 26

Mrs. Borden & Mrs. Jones’ Nifty Newsletter (Week of September 26)

Homework
Monday-1/2 sheet & Reader/sight words
Tuesday –1/2 sheet & Reader/sight words
Wednesday-1/2sheet, Reader& Handwriting
Thursday-1/2 sheet & Reader/sight words

We will celebrate learning the letter H with a Hat Day on Friday, September 30!

There will be a Fall Festival Meeting on Wednesday, September 28 at 6:00 at the Mine Shaft for anyone who would like to help with our Fall Festival. Clearances are needed to participate in school on the day of the festival. If you do not have clearances but would still like to help in the preparation it would be much appreciated.
Our Phonics letter next week is the consonant H as in hat and hippo. We will apply our first phonics rule that we began this week and begin to sound out words.
Rule: If a vowel is followed by a consonant, the vowel is short, and we code it with a breve.
Example: cat log sit tug wet
We will also identify initial sounds and separate words into compound words.
This week our Reading story is “Julius” and we will be discussing how people and animals work together. The Comprehension Skill is character.

**Great job to everyone who did their reading this week. We really saw the progress when we were working in small groups this week. We are going to attach an envelope to everyone’s folder. In the envelope we will store the reader for the week along with our sight words. This way nothing will get lost going back and forth. Please continue to sign and comment each night.**

In Math, we will act out story problems, identify describe and compare circles and rectangles, and order numbers 1-5.

Next week we are celebrating Johnny Appleseed Day with books, activities, and crafts. We are asking that you please send in one apple with your child as soon as possible. It can be any size and any color. We will use the apples to investigate, sort, graph, compare and contrast, and to make applesauce.

We attended the Homecoming Pep Rally in our Gym this Friday! Go Spartans!
As the weather starts to get cooler, we ask that you write your child’s name in their coat. Many Kindergarten students have the same coat and are having a hard time to keeping track of their own.

Please continue to help your child practice their 4 digit computer number. This will help them log into their computer quickly and give them more time to work.

Don’t forget to check our blog on northschuylkill.net under Homework Helpline, click on Borden, J.
Monday will be Day 4. Our special will be Gym. Don’t forget your sneakers.

School store began this week. If students want to purchase anything from the school store they need to do so before entering our classroom in the morning. By the time we get the money from their folders, the school store is closed. Please remind your child in the morning before sending them to school.

week of September 19

Mrs. Borden and Mrs. Jones’ Nifty Newsletter (week of September 19)
Homework: Please practice Decodable Reader all week with someone at home
Monday: Counting practice and big and small/ decodable reader
Tuesday: Syllables and First and Last name/ decodable reader
Wednesday: Color Practice and Gg Handwriting/ decodable reader
Thursday: Lowercase letter practice/ decodable reader

This week, we will be painting in Art class. If you would like to send in an old T-shirt that your child can keep in his/her cubby for the year, please do so by early next week. It would be helpful to have this old shirt to put over the nice school clothes when we do messy projects throughout the year. Thank you!
In addition to the old T-shirt, if you didn’t yet send in a spare set of dress code clothing for your child to keep in the cubbies, please do so. They will all be sent home at the end of year, but it is handy to keep a spare set in case of an accident, spilled food or drink, or mud from outside. This would save parents a trip to the school to bring in clothes if any of that would happen.
In Saxon Phonics, we are working on the letter Gg like in Goat. We have already learned the letter Ll and the letter Oo and now we can put all of the sounds together to make our first word, log. We will also be coding short vowels in words. The rule in class is, “if a vowel is followed by a consonant, then the vowel is short and we code it with a breve”.
In Saxon Math, we are working on sorting by color and shape. We are also working on counting to 10 and one to one correspondence to 10. We are also working with pattern blocks and reviewing an AB pattern. We also do Math Meeting every day and review months, days, the date, and how many days we have been in school.
In Reading, our new story is “Miss Bindergarten Takes a Field Trip”. We will be talking about community helpers and different people that work in our communities. We will continue to review setting and characters and retelling the story.
Please don’t forget to label coats, bookbags, lunchbags, and other accessories. Since the mornings are getting a bit chillier and it might get warm by recess, many children take off their coats outside but forget to take them inside. This would ensure that your child would get his/her coat back in the event that it is left outside.
The class in collecting “Capri Sun” drink pouches after the students finish them at lunch and snack. They then will go home with one of the students that has a cousin with Juvenile Diabetes. Capri Sun makes a donation towards Juvenile Diabetes for every drink pouch handed in. If you would like to send in any empty Capri Sun juice pouches we will make sure that they go with that student.
Mrs. Borden and Mrs. Jones would like to send a big Thank You and Great Job to all of the parents and families of our students. The forms that were sent home have been completed on time, homework has been completed and signed, and the envelopes with money have been labeled correctly. The class is doing a great job following rules, walking quietly in a line, completing their work, and being great citizens. We thank you for your continued involvement and participation in your child’s Kindergarten year. Please write a note or send an email if you have any questions or need any additional information. Thank you so much!

Week of September 12

Mrs. Borden & Mrs. Jones’ Nifty Newsletter (week of September 12)
Homework
Monday- ½ sheet (sentence) and decodable reader
Tuesday- ½ sheet (colors) and decodable reader
Wednesday- ½ sheet (counting & shapes) and decodable reader
Thursday- ½ sheet (capital letters) and decodable reader

*Due to the cancellation of school this past week, the Luau has been moved to Friday, September 16. Please dress in your Luau outfit that day.*

Please continue to help your child practice their 4-digit computer number. This will help them log into their computer quickly and give them more time to work. They also need this number for lunch.

Decodable readers will begin to come home next week. They should be kept in the plastic sleeve inside your child’s folder. The reader should be read nightly and someone should sign off on the paper attached. This could be a parent, grandparent, older brother or sister or friend. When it comes home on a Friday the book is yours to keep. We will also practice during small group time in school. Students with all four signatures will receive a small treat on Fridays.

The following sight words were introduced so far: the, is , I, am, have and love. These will also be placed in the plastic sleeve for practice.

In Reading, we will read one of Mrs. Borden and Mrs. Jones favorite stories, Plaidypus Lost. We will talk about how we live, work and play together. Our reading skill will be sequence.

~In Math we will continue to work with counting bears, pattern blocks, and linking cubes. We will also practice counting to 5 with 1:1 correspondence, creating an AB color pattern, identifying most and fewest on a graph, and using positional words and phrases: over, under, on top of, behind, in back of, in front of, beside, inside, and outside. Students should practice writing the numbers from 0-9 while singing the number writing verses on their practice pages. Our first math assessment will be identifying the 4 basic shapes; circle, square, triangle, and rectangle. Take some time over the weekend to review them at home.

~Our Phonics letter for this week is “Oo” as in octopus. The letter Oo is a vowel and has 2 sounds. We will focus on the short sound, but will also introduce the long sound that “says its own name”.

~Our Kindergarten class has begun a science unit called Trees. We will observe and compare the trees in and around the schoolyard. We will adopt a tree as our “class tree” to watch throughout the seasons. We’ve been learning about the tree parts; roots, trunk, branches, and leaves. **Your child may come home with lots of information and questions about trees and their parts. You can join in the tree study by taking your child for walks in your neighborhood to observe trees and to compare how they are alike and how they are different. See which trees lose their leaves in the fall and which keep them all year? Look closely at the leaves. Do the trees have buds, flowers, fruit, or seeds? You might notice things about trees that you never thought about before!!!

~This week our class met their 4th grade Reading Buddies from Mrs. Fey’s homeroom! Boys and girls were matched up with 4th graders to listen to stories and eventually practice their own reading skills. Be sure to ask your child about his/her buddy.

~The School-wide Book Fair will also take place in the Large Group Instruction Room next week, September 12-16. Information was enclosed in your child’s folder. **Parents will be able to shop and/or browse with their child on Monday night from 4-7 p.m. if interested. Kindergarten will be shopping in school on Tuesday, September 13th. (Monday, September 19th will be a make-up day as needed.)

Don’t forget to check our blog on northschuylkill.net under Homework Helpline, click on Borden, Jessica.

The PTO meeting is scheduled for Monday evening at 6:30.

Monday is Day 4. We will have Gym. Don’t forget your sneakers!!!

Have a great weekend!

Week of September 5

Mrs. Borden and Mrs. Jones’ Nifty Newsletter (week of September 5)

Homework

Tuesday – Homework signature page & First name practice page
Wednesday – Circle Capital and Lowercase Letter page & L Handwriting page (Please have your child complete the front and back of the handwriting sheet to the best of their ability. Please also have them write their name on the top.)
Thursday - Trace & Color shape page

There will be no school Monday, September 5. Have a great holiday weekend!

Monday is Day 1. We have Art.

All About Me Tees will start to come home. These are posters that need to be filled out and returned so that the children can share facts about themselves with the class so they can get to know each other better. You will have two days to complete the poster, so if your poster comes home on a Wednesday, it will be due on Friday. You and your child can be creative when completing this project, use pictures, stickers, crayons, etc.

We had so much fun on our “Chester Chase” this week. We tried to find Chester the Raccoon from “The Kissing Hand”. He lead us on a chase to find the important places in our school building, but had to return to his book after leaving us a cookie treat. We will continue to read theme books to welcome us to Kindergarten and to school.

Academics next week include: Saxon Math, we will be working on numbers 1-5 and working with the manipulatives and materials that we will be using throughout the course of the year. Saxon Phonics, we will continue to work on the letter Ll so that we can write it, make its sound, identify it, and identify words that begin with the letter. The Phonics newsletter that is coming home to explain the program is very important, please keep it as a reference for the entire year of Kindergarten. Sight words that we will be working on include the and is. Please ask your child about these words and if they can find them at home or in the community.
We began Reading with the story, The Little School Bus this week. Watch for your Family Times newsletter to come home with details about our upcoming story and skills we will be working on in Reading. Please review the Amazing words, the ordinal numbers first, second, third, fourth, fifth and sixth, letter recognition of letters Aa, Bb, Cc, Dd, and Ee, the story element “character”, and the high frequency words I and am.
Thursday is the Luau for Kindergarten only. It is our very special activity for completing our first letter in Phonics. More information will come home early next week.

Friday is Picture Day. Please dress your child in dress code approved clothing and send in your picture forms and money. If you need a picture form, please let us know as soon as possible so that we can get one home.

A Few Reminders

Your child needs a drink and a snack every day. There are several children that have had no snack or had a snack and no drink. Please bag their snack separately and label it “snack”. If your child’s snack requires a fork or spoon, please send it. We do not keep these in the room.
Please discuss with your child if they are buying a lunch and what they should choose. We’ve had a few children order lunch because it sounded good, but they really had a packed lunch.

Please send a change of clothes to be kept in your child’s cubby incase of accidents or messes.

Put your child’s name on everything. Many students have the same backpack, lunch bag, coat etc.

Every Friday of the school year is Spirit Day! This is optional. It is done to promote school spirit and enthusiasm for our sports teams. The children are allowed to wear any North Schuylkill t-shirt and uniform bottoms.
We thank you for your continued involvement and participation in your child’s Kindergarten year. Please write a note or send an email if you have any questions or need any additional information. Thank you!