Happy Valentine's Day

Check out our fun on Valentine's Day!

Just Dance!

With the yucky winter weather, we aren't able to go outside and run around like we would like to! Instead, our favorite activity is DANCING! We pull up Wii Just Dance videos on YouTube and dance along! This is an activity you could do at home too on those days you are cooped up inside! It is a great activity for the whole family. Even if you don't have a Wii, you can watch the videos on any computer or tablet and just get dancing!

Here are some of our favorites:

Run! Run! As Fast As You Can!

We enjoyed our last day before winter break by baking!

We made gingerbread men in our classroom!

We followed a recipe to mix up the dough to make sugar cookies. Then we rolled and cut them out and then popped them in the oven!

BUT!

When we went to the oven to take them out, they were gone! They had run away!

We had to run around the school and see if we could find them. Miss Bonnie told us she saw them running down the hall and when we got back to our classroom, there they were!

The T/TH kids had to leave to go home and got to bring their new gingerbread friends home. In the afternoon, everyone else decorated them! They were yummy!




Here is a cute YouTube video of the Gingerbread Man story/song to watch at home!  

Here are children at a school for the Deaf acting out the story!
 

Gingerbread Night 2013

We had a great Gingerbread House Family Night this week. We got our own graham crackers, milk carton (for the house) and candy to decorate the house anyway we wanted! We were very creative and we had fun seeing our friends and working together with our families!

Here are some pictures from our night:



The other day we talked about why the Gingerbread Man doesn't want to cross the river by himself. We wondered what would happen if he went in the water. We had a few guesses, and then we tried it out ourselves. We each took a cookie and put it in the water and talked about what happened!

See what we had to say:

We Have Butterflies!

Check them out!

 

End of the Year Sing

As promised, I videotaped our sing today so even those who couldn't make it can see what a great job the kids did!

We did:
Slippery Fish
Un Pulpito (Slippery Fish in Spanish)
ABC Disco
Spanish ABCs
One Small Voice

The kids did a fabulous job even performing in a gym full of people!


AM
   

PM
 

Bug Hunt

This afternoon we went out in the field around the school to hunt for bugs.

We found:
-a little flying gnat type bug on a leaf
-a teeny spider
-a huge (by my standards) spider

JTT found the spider after VERY carefully looking in a hole. Though I have a very difficult time around spiders (EEEK!) I put on my big girl boots and helped him catch it. He ran away scared and left me alone!

We also had a blast blowing dandelions! 

Waiting for Butterflies

Our caterpillars have now each turned to a chrysalis!

At the end of last week our caterpillars finished eating and eating. Then they crawled to the top of the cups, hung upside down in a J shape, and their bodies began to change. We learned after they are changed it is called a "chrysalis". Although, in the book The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle, the caterpillar builds a cocoon, we learned that butterflies change into chrysalides (the proper plural form of the word).

Moths build cocoons around themselves. A butterfly caterpillar's body changes and hardens and it is called a chrysalis. After they had changed for 24 hours, Miss Stephanie carefully lifted them out and hung the disks they are hanging from to the side of the butterfly garden. Now we wait about a week for our butterflies to come out!
 

 
Check out Miss Erin signing the story The Very Hungry Caterpillar

Surprise Police Visit

We had a surprise visit last week!

One day during work time, someone knocked on our door, and it was the Bartlett police!

Miss Stephanie had tweeted to them about getting stickers for us. They gave us a surprise visit with police badge stickers!

The sign for "Police"

Planting Seeds and Bulbs

We started exploring the stages of how a plant grows!

We planted two types of plants: lima bean seeds and gladiola bulbs.

We talked about the things plants need to grow: sun and water. We talked about how we could help the plants with those things. We have been giving them water with the spray bottle. And we put them in the window for sun!

We are excited to see what starts to happen with the plants and roots from the things we planted!

Do you have any plants at home? The U-46 Give Me Five Facebook shared this idea for growing seeds!
http://www.pbs.org/parents/crafts-for-kids/sponge-sprouts/?utm_source=pinterest

Being the Mailman

This week we decided to support the US Postal Services.

We have been talking about Community Helpers and this week we focused on mailmen. Each student wrote a letter to his/her parents. We talked about the different vocabulary words such as: letter, envelope, and stamp.  We practiced writing the word "Dear" at the top of the letter.

One afternoon we took a walking fieldtrip to the neighborhood mailbox.We had a lot of fun talking about the process: drop letter in mailbox, mailman picks it up, mailman brings it to the post office, mailman brings to your house.

I am trying out a new slideshow website. Let me know how it works for you!

Puzzle Teamwork

We worked together one afternoon to put together a puzzle as a group! We did a great job working with each other!

Make a video - it's fun, easy and free!
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Shaving Cream Fun!

We have had some fun with shaving cream a few times in the last few weeks!

Shaving cream is a great activity with kids because they get a great sensory experience! We practiced writing names, writing letters, writing shapes, and just having fun!

Make a video - it's fun, easy and free!
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Dance Party Friday

We thought a great way to celebrate the last day before winter break was to have a Wii Dance Party with Miss Erin's class! We also had visitors from the Teacher Mentor Program! They enjoyed getting out of their office to dance with us!

We learned that you can hook a Wii up to a Smartboard and were so excited to try it! We ended up having trouble with the sound and will need to work on that. BUT we did discover Wii Just Dance Disney videos on YouTube! We had a lot of fun all dancing along following the movements. This is definitely going to be our new indoor recess activity!

Have a great spring break!


 

 We also had another dance party in the afternoon right at the end of the day!



Some of our favorite videos are here if you want to dance along!  

Reading and "Interpreting"

Today my students were reading books for the Pearson Foundation WeGiveBooks.com Read For My School campaign.

On their own they decided to take turns "reading" and "signing". They said "I will sign"! To me it seems like they are taking turns "interpreting" for one another, but we don't really use that word much at this age.There are three different clips on the video. Check out their facial expressions! That is apparently how I look when I read to them! The last clip makes me laugh because clearly that is how he thinks I look when I sign!

We love the We Give Books site because it is just like reading a "regular" book. It doesn't read to you, so kids get the opportunity to "read" by making up a story based on the pictures. This is a great skill to have!






P.S. Don't forget to read books for the campaign this week so we can earn books for our school!

We Give Books

WeGiveBooks.com is a fabulous website that we love for reading children's books for free online. You just create an account and can read as many books as you want! They are having a campaign now teamed with LeapPad called Read For My School. Every book you read on the site between now and April 5th will be counted! A school needs at least 25 books read to start earning books.

We started reading today and had a blast! 

What can you do?
Step 1: Login or create a free account, make sure to pick our school as the school you want to donate to!
Step 2: Start reading!
Step 3: Share with others if you want!

You can sort books by age or by genre. You can also put in search terms of favorite themes!

FAQ

Q: How do I make sure that my child's school is getting credit for the books we're reading on We Give Books?

Make sure that you enter your school's state and select the correct school name and city on the registration page so that we can track the number of books that your school reads and earns.
Once the reading begins on March 19, read a book to begin giving books to your school. You can always check the number of books that your school has read and earned by visiting your user profile on We Give Books. 

Q: Is there a limit to the number of books each member can read?

There is never a limit to the number of books that an individual can read, or re-read on WeGiveBooks.org. Participants are encouraged to read as many books as they'd like from our free online library of children's books.

 

Q: When will books be delivered to school districts?

We will make every attempt to deliver books by the end of the current school year.

 

Q: What is We Give Books?

We Give Books is an online initiative of the Pearson Foundationn that combines the joy of reading with the power of helping others. We Give Books helps some of the world's best and most inspiring literacy organizations spread the word about their work while providing free books to the young people these organizations support.

We Give Books offers families and educators an easy and engaging way to encourage children to become motivated readers and lifelong givers.

For more information or questions about Read for My School and We Give Books, please contact us at WeGiveBooks@PearsonFoundation.org.

 

 

10,000 Hours to Reading Success

Jen from Teach Mentor Texts, who read to us on World Read Aloud Day, posted an amazing post on her blog about how much time we as teachers and parents spend reading every day with kids. It is incredibly well written and powerful and I wanted to share with you all!

And I Would Read 10,000 Hours Post

I suggest reading it and then coming back here....

...Now that you are back:

The gist of it:
-It takes about 10,000 hours of practice to master something
-If we want kids to master reading, they will need 10,000 hours of practice.
-If a child reads for 20 minutes a day, it would take 82.2 years to become a master. 82.2 years?!?! 
-If we hope for mastery in 10 years, that would mean kids need 164.4 minutes a day (2.75 hours) of reading practice. 

Is your child getting that? 

In our full day class, we have about 30 minutes of "book" time every day where the kids read independently, they read with one another, they read to us, or we read to them. It all depends on what they choose that day. We also read at least 2 books at about 10-15 minutes each. So in class we have about 50-60 minutes of reading each day. If a child chooses the library or listening center during Work Time (centers) then they would have more time. Also, if they don't go outside, the kids get another 10-15 minutes of reading at the end of lunch. We also do literacy activities with letters and sounds and I think that time counts with young kids. So, let's say they get about 75 minutes a day of reading at school. That would mean they need another 90 minutes a day at home. That is an hour and a half. 

The T/Th students get about 15 minutes a day. When they choose the library during work time or we do a literacy activity that day, they get more. But for the sake of numbers, they need 150 more minutes every day! That is 2 and a half hours!

Is your child getting enough reading time at home every day?
What can you do to help that? 
What can I do to help you?

It is important to remember in Early Childhood that reading can include your child looking at the pictures in a book independently, sharing with a sibling or friend, making up a story about pictures in book, hearing a story read aloud by an adult, talking about letters that he/she sees in the environment, making up rhyming words, or even talking about letters and the sounds they make. 

Take a few minutes to think about how much time your child spends every day on reading activities. How much is it? Is it close to 90 minutes? If not, think about what else you can do. Let me know if I can help.

Going on a Treasure Hunt

Another favorite song that we have been singing throughout our Pirate Unit is "Going on a Treasure Hunt" by Jack Hartmann. It is like "Going on a Bear Hunt" only we are looking for treasure. You will have to watch the whole song to find out if we find it or not!

World Read Aloud Day

Wednesday, March 6 was World Read Aloud Day. To celebrate, Jen from Teach Mentor Texts came to visit our class and read us a story. Jen is a hearing itinerant in our district. This year instead of being a hearing itinerant, she is working for the Teacher Effectiveness Initiative Office and Teacher Mentor Program. Jen is amazing, smart, and has limitless energy. She is also a National Board Certified teacher! Her blog is a fabulous place to  learn about books for kids of all ages!

She posted about WRAD day on her blog here.

You can see Jen talking to us about the story here:

And then she read the story! Miss Erin participated as her puppeteer! Miss Stephanie recorded the story. Jen knows sign, so Stephanie got to take a break!

During the afternoon, we got to together to read another dragon story. This time Miss Erin read the book and Miss Stephanie signed it. We had fun talking about dragons on World Read Aloud Day.

Did you do anything for WRAD?

Miss Erin also posted about it here.

What Do Pirates Say?

We have had some other pirate fun this week!

One of our favorite activities during work time was listening to things pirates say on the Smartboard. Miss Stephanie recorded herself saying "pirate phrases" and it helped us think of things to say during play. Towards the end of the week we each took a turn saying a pirate phrase. Now if we want to listen to pirate phrases, we can hear our own words!

Other things you will see in the video:
-drawing treasure maps (We each made a treasure map and they are available during pirate play)
 -pretending to be pirates going on a treasure hunt
-practicing pirate phrases

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Questions to ask your child:
-What do you use a map for?
-What does a pirate say?
-How do pirates get treasure?