Spill Five Beans

During math, we learned a new game called Spill Five Beans. Students play the game in pairs and take turns tossing five double-sided bean counters. They then count how many red beans they ended up with and both partners record the number on their paper. Play continues until students have filled three columns. This game helps students build one to one correspondence when counting, number combinations to five, and number formation. 

Welcome to Kindergarten!

We have had a wonderful start to our school year! We are spending lots of time getting to know each other and the routines and expectations of our classroom and school. I am very impressed with how well all of the children have transitioned into kindergarten! I am sure you've noticed they are a bit more tired than usual, as the demands of the day can be a big change for children. They are handling these changes very well and I know we will have a fabulous year together! I've tried to take lots of pictures so that you can see all of the fun we have been having together! On the very first day of school, we read Look Out Kindergarten, Here I Come! and we discussed our emotions on the first day of school. We then graphed the results. I was thrilled that most students were happy or excited about our first day together!

Last week, our introductory unit centered around the story of the Gingerbread Man. We read several versions of the story and compared their characters, settings, and endings. We also did several gingerbread projects to learn about various materials in our classroom, such as markers, scissors and glue. We ended the week with a hunt around the school for our giant gingerbread cookie, who decided to take us on a tour around the school because he didn't want us to eat him!

We read several versions of the gingerbread story and thought about the characters, setting, and ending.

We made a home for the Gingerbread Baby!

We did a Gingerbread Glyph involving coloring, cutting, and gluing.

Our finished Gingerbread Glyphs!

The sneaky Gingerbread Man led us on a hunt from our classrooms to the cafeteria....

to the Nurse's Office, to the Music and Art rooms, the Library, the gym...

and we finally cornered him in Mrs. Locke's office!

At the end of our unit, we voted for our favorite story.

Mapping Unit

Last week, we wrapped up our unit on mapping. We spent time learning about map features and why maps are important. We read the book Me on the Map and created our own version of the book, which helped us to understand our place in the world. Our favorite part of the unit had to have been the culminating activity, when we found a pirate map and followed the map to find some special treasure!

We worked as a group to build a town out of blocks and then drew maps of our towns.

Pirates on the move!

Shiver me timbers!

Seed & Sample Day

On Friday, we were lucky enough to be a part of the annual Seed and Sample Day here at H.C.S. This day provides students the opportunity to sample a variety of foods grown right in the school garden outside of our classroom windows! We then helped to plant spinach and marigolds, which will eventually be transplanted to the garden. What a fun way to kick off our plant unit!

Fun with Dr. Seuss!

We spent a wonderful two weeks engaged in an author study about the amazing Dr. Seuss. Students were so excited to read and reread these popular books. We started our unit by reading a biography about Dr. Seuss and learned some interesting facts about him. Throughout the unit, we had theme days and got to dress up and focus on one Dr. Seuss book each day. We were also lucky enough to see an amazing performance of The Cat in the Hat at the Flynn Theater! Even though the unit has ended, students are still begging to read Dr. Seuss' books....and some are beginning to read them to themselves, too!

Students work on putting the words of our Dr. Seuss poem in order.

Students go fishing for red and blue sight word fish on One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish day.

Students identified the main characters and the setting in The Cat in the Hat.

We graphed whether we were wearing silly socks or not on Fox in Socks day.

   

 On Green Eggs and Ham day, we rewrote our own version of the book and also opened green eggs with CVC words inside of them. 

Our directed drawings of The Cat in the Hat.

 

We became Thing 1...and 2....and 3....and 4.....

Kindergarten Teachers 1, 2, 3 and 4 on Twin Day!

Enjoying our Dr. Seuss movie and our "Hop on Pop-corn!"

We voted for our favorite Dr. Seuss book....Fox in Socks was the winner!

Meet Miss Rushton!

We are so fortunate to have a student intern from the University of Vermont working in our classroom this semester. Jill Rushton, a junior education major from Springfield, Vermont, will be in our kindergarten class on Tuesdays (half day) and Thursdays (full day) as a part of her program. We are all enjoying getting to know Miss Rushton. Please feel free to stop by and welcome her to H.C.S. if you get a chance!

May the Force Be With You!

On Friday, we wrapped up our exciting unit about force and motion. Throughout this unit, students had the opportunity to be scientists and investigate how things move. We asked questions like scientists do, we made predictions, we observed, and we made conclusions based on what we saw. We started our unit by creating a schema chart, thinking about what we already knew about force and motion. We read many informational texts and added to our chart as we learned new information throughout the week. We did several experiments, including a Toy Truck experiment, where we tried to move a toy truck with a metal ball, a rubber ball, and a foam ball, as well as Surface Safari (thinking about friction), and Roll or Slide? Our culminating event was the Shoe Box Car Derby, held on Friday afternoon. Families were invited to work together to create a shoe box car. The hope was that students would incorporate what they had learned during our unit as they designed and built their car. I was so amazed with the impressive cars that students brought to school and we had SO much fun at the derby! I hope you enjoy these pictures of the Shoe Box Car Derby!