2 Short Weeks!

Hello! The past two weeks were short and sweet. But we crammed in a lot of fun activities!

Before Easter Break, Kindergarten learned about the Indian holiday Holi (pronounced like ‘holy’). This Spring holiday celebrates the rebirth we see in nature and focuses on acceptance and inclusion! It is celebrated with a big parade where people throw colorful powders made from flowers and make themselves into a rainbow! We read the book Festival of Colors by Khabir & Surishtha Sehgal to learn about this holiday. Then we did a little experiment with markers, napkins, and water. We colored napkins and then sprayed them with water to watch how the colors bled, spread, and mixed with each other to make something different and beautiful! Students had so much fun waiting for the final results.

For Easter, we read about the story of Jesus’ crucifixion. We also watched some videos that explained why we paint eggs and do egg hunts on Easter and why we celebrate with an Easter bunny! Both eggs and bunnies are symbols of new life, just as Jesus rising from the dead was a start of a new life for all of us.

In Science, we made diagrams of plants and labeled them! We have been talking about how plants are affected by the weather and how some plants survive better in some climates than others. To connect to weather, we also read the book Cloudette by Tom Lichtenheld which is about a very small cloud which finds her own purpose providing water to a small pond for frogs! This then led into a conversation about animal environments, which we will continue learning about in the next couple of weeks!

In Math, we are working on breaking apart numbers 11-20 so that we can use them for addition and subtraction problems! Students have been creating their own Math problems for each other to solve (and me, LOL!). This chapter is very much a review, and just a chance for students to strengthen their skills of counting up to 20 fluently. Soon we will be working on learning about money and time!

In Reading, we have been working on reading words with consonant blends — two consonants next two each other in a word that make distinct, individual sounds. Sometimes we say these blends quickly so it’s hard to realize they are two separate letters making two separate sounds! But with practice it will get easier and easier! Tapping out words and doing so quickly has been our big focus lately in order to become more automatic with the skill. Students also reviewed sight words, and worked on coming up with their own sentences in their journals using sight words. We really are trying to have students remember their rules of capitalization, punctuation, and spacing when writing sentences as well.

This week we also had another visit from Ms. Byron, our school guidance counselor! Kindergarten is still talking about naming their feelings, especially anger, and learning how to recognize those feelings on other people’s faces.

We also welcomed a new student this week, Izaiah! So excited to have a new friend in our room.

Please don’t forget to sign up for parent-teacher conferences which will be on Thursday, April 15, 2021. That will be a half-day of school so that we can have our virtual conferences all afternoon and evening.

Feel free to let me know if there are any questions or concerns you have. Have a wonderful day!

 

Love,

Ms. V 🙂

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