Mrs. Borden & Mrs. Jones’ Nifty Newsletter (Week of October 1)

Our new letter in Phonics is Pp as in pig and pajama party! We will work on unblending consonant sounds, naming letters, their sounds and sight words. Our pajama party will be held the following week on Friday, October 12. More details will follow.

New decodable readers will come home in the plastic sleeve of your child’s folder each week. Please allow your child to read to you then sign each night Tuesday through Thursday. If your child brings it back on a Friday signed they will receive a reward. Also, continue to practice the sight words in the envelope. New words will be added each week.

In Math we will continue to work with AB patterns, act out story problems, identify ordinal positions, cover designs with pattern blocks and sequence daily events.

Our new Reading story is Dig Dig Digging. We will discuss how machines help people work together. We will practice the skill classify and categorize.

Thank you to everyone that sent in an apple for our Apple themed week. We sorted, graphed, tasted apples as well as made applesauce. It was delicious!! What a great way to celebrate Johnny Appleseed’s Birthday! Next we will begin a Fire Safety Unit. We will tour real fire trucks on Thursday morning and learn many important safety tips.

There will be a Fall Festival meeting on Thursday, October 4 at 6:00 in the pavilion behind the Elementary school.

If you did not send your Fall Festival money in yet please send in $3 as soon as possible. The Fall Festival will he held on Thursday October 11^th.

As the weather starts to get cooler please send your child to school with a coat.  We go outside for recess everyday (unless it’s raining) and some students have been complaining that they are cold on cooler days.  Also, please write your child’s name in their coat.  Many Kindergarten students are having a hard time keeping track of their coats.

The School Store opened this week.  Kindergarteners may only shop on Mondays.  Students do NOT come to the classroom before shopping so it’s important that you explain to your child where their money is and that they need to stop before coming to our room. 

There are still a few students who do not know their 4 digit ID number.  It is very hard to go through the lunch line, log on the computers, and check books out of the Library when they don’t know their numbers.    

October is Breast Cancer Awareness month and in an effort to promote awareness students are invited to wear pink every Thursday during the month of October. Students may wear Spartan t-shirts, even though it is not a gym day, as long as it is pink.

There is no school Monday, October 8^th.

Monday is Day 5. We will have computers. Don’t forget library books for Wednesday and sneakers for Gym and Friday.

week of Sept. 24

Mrs. Borden and Mrs. Jones’ Nifty Newsletter (week of September 24)

Homework:

 

Monday: ½ sheet and Sight word envelope and apple

Tuesday: ½ sheet and Sight word envelope (last call for apples)

Wednesday: ½ sheet and reader and Sight word envelope

Thursday: ½ sheet and practice talent

For those helping with the Fall Festival, there will be a second meeting at the pavilion at the big playground at NSE.  The meeting will start at 6:00.

Please send in 1 apple on either Monday or Tuesday with your child for our Johnny Appleseed activities.  We will sort the apples by size and color, graph them, compare and contrast them, hear stories about apples and complete different centers using apples and apple materials.  Our culminating activity will be making applesauce from the apples and using our 5 senses to describe our treat.

Lunch menu changes are as follows: Wed. September 26: Toasted cheese and tomato soup.  Fri. September 28: Pierogi bake

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!

We now know the sounds of L, O, G, and H.  Please review letters and sounds as much as possible.  Please also practice the sight words that are in the envelope that is located in the middle of your child’s folder.  We only add new sight words after they are introduced and practiced in class.

Our new Reading story is “Julius” and it is about how animals and people work together.  We will be working on identifying character and working on nouns.  The definition that we will use is: A noun is a person, place, or thing. 

In Math, we will continue to work on naming shapes, sizes, and colors.  Please continue to work on numbers 1-10, both writing them and counting objects as well as counting as high as you can.

We introduced the “at” family.  The words that we used so far are: bat, cat, fat, hat, mat, pat, rat, sat.  Rhyming words will be worked on all year, so feel free to rhyme all of the time!

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.

School store will be opened starting on Monday.  Mondays are the only day that Kindergarten can shop.  If you are sending money with your child, please make sure that they know you are sending money for the school store because they must purchase items as soon as they get off of the bus.  If you put the money in their folder, we do not get it until homeroom and the store is closed by then.

Please make sure your child is wearing a coat or jacket if the weather is chilly.  We do go outside for recess as much as possible.  As long as it is not raining, we try and get outside for fresh air.  It has been getting cooler each day and it is still cool at 11 when we got out to recess.

Homework

Monday – Practice counting to 25 sheet & My name is Sheet & Sight Word Flashcards

Tuesday – syllable sheet & sight word flashcards

Wednesday - Draw 2 objects for each color sheet & Sight word flashcards

Thursday – lowercase letter typing sheet & Sight word flashcards

Anyone interested in helping with the Fall Festival is invited to a meeting on Thursday, September 20 at 6:30 at the Pavilion behind the Elementary School. The fall festival will be held Thursday, October 11.

Our new phonics letter is Hh as in hat. We will celebrate learning the letter H with Hat Day on Friday September 21.  Students may wear their favorite hat that day!

Sight Word Flashcards will be coming home on Monday. Please practice daily and keep them in the plastic sleeve in your child’s folder. We will add sight words as we learn them.

In Math we will sort by color, create graphs, compare sets of objects, act out story problems, and identify, describe and compare circles and rectangles. We will also test on how far the children can count. Please practice counting at home too.

In Reading we will read Miss Bindergarten Takes a Fieldtrip.  We will talk about how we live, work and play together.  Students will learn how to classify and categorize.

Please help your child practice their 4 digit computer number that is enclosed in their folder. This is their lunch number and will help them log into their computer quickly and give them more time to work.

Check your child’s folder daily and remove all papers from the “Left” at home side.

Please make sure that your child’s name is on their coat, backpack and lunch box.

Monday will be Day 5. We will have computers. Don’t forget sneakers for Friday’s Gym class.

Have a Wonderful Weekend!!!

week of September 10

Mrs. Borden and Mrs. Jones’ Nifty Newsletter (week of September 10)

Homework:  please complete ½ sheet nightly

 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 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 5 and one to one correspondence to 5.  We are also working with pattern blocks, tedding bear counters, and linking cubes 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 “Plaidypus Lost”.  We will be talking about sequence of story events as well as characters and setting.  We will continue to review retelling the story along with author and illustrator.

Please don’t forget to label coats, bookbags, lunchbags, and other accessories.  If the mornings are 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. 

There has been a change made with regard to the book fair schedule. Instead of the book fair taking place throughout the entire week of September 10th-14th, students will have a preview on Monday, September 10th. The preview for each homeroom class is five minutes long in order to accommodate everyone in one day. They obviously will not be able to purchase books during the preview, but will have the opportunity to purchase them at the evening sale which will run from 4:00-7:00 P.M. that same evening.

Please see attached note for information regarding the Kindergarten Fall Festival.

On Monday, there will be chicken patty not chicken rings for lunch.

A great big cheer goes out to Ms. Shearn, our occupational therapist, who came to present all about her job for the letter Oo.  She not only had lots of fun activities, but helped us make a wonderful bulletin board that is on display outside of our classroom.  Ms. Shearn did an Outstanding job!

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 5

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

 

There will be no school Monday, September 3. Have a great holiday weekend!

 

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 and move on to letter Oo, so that we can write it, make its sound, identify it, and identify words that begin with the letter. 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.

Friday is Picture Day. Please dress your child in dress code approved clothing and send in your picture forms and money.

 

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!