SK with Ms. Jo-Anne & Mr. KneeBone Kindergarten News 

Hi!

Can you believe that yesterday, Friday April 12th was a Snow day??????

We had 10 friends at school (since the buses were cancelled) and we had a good day despite missing the rest of our class! We had French, computers, gym, outside play, indoor play and the day ended with a viewing of The Lorax! We will get back into our program on Monday! Let’s hope for…NO MORE SNOW!!!!

 Early this week, one of our students brought in a worm first thing in the morning!!! How exciting! So as a class, we decided to clean out the popcorn table,  (thanks to Will and Alivia who did this for us) and put wet soil inside the table for the worm.

So the next day, Wednesday, I brought in some worms (2 dozen) for the students to respectfully play with. Squeals of delight and “scientific conversation” was heard as the children played with the worms, talked about the worms and vocalized their questions. We decided to make a “Worm Question chart” and on Thursday, Mr. Kneebone and the children explored the answers to the questions.

Some of the children’s questions were the following:

Are worms boys or girls?

What do worms eat?

What if worms break in half? What happens?

Our worm questions

 I brought in some worm books from the library and we have been learning all about worms! I love this type of learning! So much hands-on exploration, all from an inquisitive student who was just bringing in a worm on a rainy, spring morning! This is “inquiry based learning” at its best! Love it!

worm cake!

Oh ya! Worms!

Chick news…

We are still waiting for our incubator, fingers crossed it will arrive this week!

That’s all for tonight!

Thanks for reading!

Looking forward to some spring weather on Monday! Looking forward to seeing all the children then!

Happy Weekend!

Love, Ms. Jo-Anne

Hi!

What a beautiful, sunny Monday day we are having today! I hope you had a lovely weekend with your family! The children are happy to be at school today and we have had a lot of fun!

Our day began with our morning question and message and the children began talking and writing about their hot news! The children just love sharing their hot news with their friends and are really doing a fantastic job writing their ideas out! Once the children completed this, they played at our classroom centres. Some of the children completed their art work and their daffodils are quite beautiful.

We just returned from gym class where the children have been exploring different gym equipment in our “Spring circuit”. We are learning to skip rope, maneuver the hoola hoops using our hips, legs, arms or neck, throw a frisbee and ride a scooter board around an obstacle course. The children are beginning to develop their skipping rope skills. This is difficult but with a lot of practice, they are improving. If you have a skipping rope at home, take a few minutes to watch your child skip rope!

Skip, skip, skip!

 News about our chicks…

We were supposed to receive our chick eggs tomorrow but unfortunately we will not be beginning exciting activity yet. Our incubator that we used last is broken  so we are now waiting for our new incubator to arrive . Ms. Shirley has generously bought us another incubator! A big thank-you Ms. Shirley and Mrs. McAtamney in the office for ordering this for our school.

Once our incubator arrives, I will get our chick eggs from “Farmer Wayne” and we will begin our 21 day journey into hatching eggs. I have explained this to the students but I wanted to inform you as well. This is an exciting topic and such wonderful learning experience,  I can’t wait to begin this!

Estimation Jar…  Show and Tell

Our estimation jar activity is going well. The children are bringing in very interesting items fo rus to estimate such as marbles, pretzels, cheerios, macaroni, toy cars, marshmallow bunnies to name a few! Just a reminder to please have your child return his or her activity page with the information about his jar. (This is the second page that was attached to the estimation jar information package that was sent home a few weeks back). Thank-you for your support with this!

How many marbles?

Here are a few pictures for you to enjoy!

painting and creating at the paint centre

We love Dr. Seuss!

Writing words centre

Love,

Ms. Jo-Anne

PS…Please please send extra clothes back to school!

PSS…Happy birthday to Brian!!!

Hi!

I hope this email finds you enjoying your Thursday! It is so nice to see the sun today and it is feeling a tiny bit warmer! I hope it gets warmer soon!

Please continue to dress your child for the weather. We recommend sending your child with splash pants (or snowpants on cold days), rubber boots, tuques, mittens or gloves and warm jackets for the time being. Please pack extra mittens and socks in your child’s backpack for wet days.

Extra Clothes for school

We are sending home your child’s extra clothes on Friday (tomorrow). Please refresh and return to school on Monday April 8th. Please include: lighter pants, shorts, a t-shirt, long sleeve shirt, socks and underwear. That way we are prepared here for any water or bathroom accidents that sometimes happen.

Thank-you for  your cooperation with this!

Take care,

Ms. Jo-Anne and Mr. Kneebone

PS…I will send an update blog soon with pictures and stories soon!!! I’ve just had very busy evenings at home the last little while!

Hi! I hope this message finds you doing well!

We are starting a little homework program to help your child continue to develop his or her sight vocabulary.

Over the year, your child has been working on building their sight word recognition skills here at school. We often refer to these words as “popcorn” words.

Here’s how it will work:

Please have your child practice reading the words on the train. Your child will colour the word on the train once they are able to read it easily on 3 different occasions. Once the whole train is coloured, please send back this du o-tang to be checked.

 Once checked, a new set of words to work on at home will be sent home with your child. Practice the words on the train at your own pace. Try to make connections to the words in other books that your child is reading with you. Please make sure that your child is able to transfer the words into their reading and that they read the words in random order to prevent memorization.

Please work at a pace that fits your family’s lifestyle. I do not want the children (or you) to feel stressed in any way. I am a big believer in “family time” in the evenings so please just take 5-10 minutes to work on this.

Any questions, please contact me in “Mr. Zippy”.

Thank-you for your support, as always!

Yours in Education,

Ms. Jo-Anne

Hi again!

Today was a really great, calm day here in SK! As I said in my previous post, the children were so happy, rested, recharged and ready to learn!

This morning when I asked the children how their march break was, they responded with wonderful responses. And of course because I am such a believer in writing, I had the students write about their break! I am amazed at how well they are writing! Take a look at what your children wrote about their experiences!

After our “hot news”, the children had French with Madame Marquis. They are working on increasing their French vocabulary by answering questions such as how are you feeling today? They enjoyed reading with their French Reading buddies this morning as well.

The day continued with outside play, lunch, quiet time, numeracy where we worked on our numbers by writing on our calendars and finishing a few activities that were left undone before the break. The children then had some play time where they were building at the lego centre, making paper hats at the cut and paste, colouring and drawing, playing in the house corner and of course enjoying the carpet toys. They were so happy to play and share with one another. After our outside play, the children had their second snack, went to the library to exchange our library books as well as to the computer lab, where we worked on building houses and structures  using Millie’s Math House program.

Our day ended with show and tell from Maanya and Leon, who both did a fabulous job presenting their “Me in a nutshell” to the class!

We read the story, The Cat in the Hat right before dismissal and we will continue to read Dr. Seuss books and explore rhyme and word families, along with making some fun crafts to celebrate this infamous author that we have all loved over the years!

Doesn’t that sound like a fantastic day?

Thanks for reading!

Ms. Jo-Anne:)

PS oh…I scheduled parent volunteer times for the last term, please let me know if the date works for you or not. It not, let me know which day would work for you and with any luck we can have you volunteer a different day! If you didn’t get a white sheet today and would like to volunteer, please send me line in your child’s “Mr. Zippy”.

Hi!!

I hope you had a wonderful week with your children! It is great to see the children back today! They are happy, rested and recharged!!

We will be finishing up our “Me in a Nutshell” show and tell on Thursday. Starting on Friday March 22, with Syena, we will begin a new show and tell program.  The children will work on their estimating or “guessing” skills, which is part of our measurement unit that we are working on.

One of the goals of the Kindergarten curriculum is to provide an opportunity for children to learn to estimate.

The Estimation Jar take home project is one way to develop this skill. Your child will lead the class in learning to make estimates or “guesses” then counting the items to find the exact number. We will use the 100 chart to develop our number skills. We will also continue to practice counting by 1’s, 2’s, 5’s and 10’s.

Please have your child fill the jar with no more than 50 items.

Suggestions for items include: marbles, crayons, cotton balls, jelly beans, macaroni, foam shapes or sugar cubes. Please ensure the items are the same size and if it is food, that they are nut free.

Please return the estimation jar and the activity sheet included inside the classroom bag on the date provided to ensure the next child in class will have his/her turn.

Thank-you for sharing in your child’s learning!

With appreciation,

Ms. Jo-Anne and Mr. Kneebone

PS a hard copy of this will be coming home tonight.

Hi! I hope you are nice and cozy in your homes…we sure are having quite the winter storm today! I was very happy to arrive at home after an otherwise terrible drive home!

Today was a “pink-tacular” day! It was wonderful to see the boys and girls in their pink shirts. Thank-you for your support with this. I think we sent a very powerful message against bullying today, I was very proud to wear pink and to take this stand against bullying. And so were the children.

Many of the children really liked wearing pink too! Take a look at their “hot news” writing….

Here we are!

Ok one more picture!

Have a wonderful evening!

Love, Ms. Jo-Anne

Hi! Have you heard  your child talk about Coco at all this year?

Well… he is our class stuffy or mascot!

Coco!!!

He is big, brown, cuddly dog and has cute brown eyes and a heart nose! The children love him! They enjoy reading at the book corner with him, they sing the morning song to him and they like to have him around our classroom.

Today one of our little friends, Maanya, suggested we write to Coco and “mail” letters to him during playtime. Well, what an amazing suggestion! During centre time, the children wrote many letters to Coco and even decided to dress him up in paper crowns. Take a look!

Writing letters with friends and Coco

Who is a cute doggy wearing a crown?

I have also included some of the children’s letters to Coco…and sssssh! But Coco has written them back! I think I will place their letters from Coco on their cubbies!

So cute and so fun and once again, so much learning!

I just had to share!

Thanks for reading,

remember, It is “anti bulling” day tomorrow, please send your child wearing PINK!

Love, Ms. Jo-Anne

Hello everyone! 

 …a message from our board…

Inclusive, Safe and Caring Programs encourages all schools to celebrate….

Pink Shirt Day on Wednesday, February 27, 2013. 

The goal of this day is to continue fostering acceptance among school community members and enhance awareness of the harmful effects of bullying at school. 

….So please send your child to school wearing pink please!

Thanks so much,

Love, Ms. Jo-Anne

Hi!  The week was a short but excitingly busy, nonetheless, here in SK!

We were a very small class the whole week, (8 children absent each day) as many, many of our friends were at home sick. Although we missed the children, we are so thankful that you kept your child home to recover and rest. We hope to see everyone back on Monday rested and ready to learn!:)

Don’t worry, the children will have the opportunity to catch up on the learning they missed this week.

Having said that, ironically enough we have been talking about germs, proper hand washing and ways to keep healthy! We had a presentation from the public health nurse on proper hand washing on Thursday. She brought in “The Glitter bug” hand washing kit. This is a hand washing kit, where the children use a special “glitter bug lotion” to wash their hands and after washing the lotion off, they place their hands under ultra violet lights and the germs “glow”…it shows the children where they need to wash more thoroughly. Very effective and such a good visual for us all!

Here is a link for you to go to check it out.www.youtube.com/watch?v=_VhmH_dIrGA

We have been reading many books about germs, hand washing and good health. We used our tablet and researched what germs actually looked like under a microscope and from that the children have been painting their ideas of what a germ looks like. We have even been making 3D germs and hanging them on our classroom tree!

Our letter of the week was the letter A a and the children did really well thinking of words that start with A a, making their A books and making the letter formation and words in our “chalk and sock” activities.

Chalk and sock!

On Friday we spent a good part of the mid-day outside as our new windows were being installed! We enjoyed sliding on the hills, taking a snow walk, playing snow freeze tag and observing our “tree”. We noticed that the maple seedlings are still hanging on the branches.

Checking out the tree

posed!

tired boys from freeze tag…running in the snow is hard work!

Me in a Nutshell…show and tell….amazing effort from everyone! Thank-you for helping your child with this activity, we have been very impressed! and not to mention, we are learning so much about your children!

me in a Nutshell

 Here’s what we will be doing this week:

-Computers and Library are tomorrow…please send in your child’s library book if you haven’t done so.

-We are starting to talk about good nutrition with the focus being on the 4 food groups, Canada Food Guide and taking care of our bodies.

-We will begin our measurement unit, starting with measuring length and width, using non standard units of measure.

-We will be talking about the letter J and working with words that start with J! I was thinking of making jello with the kids, and having them decide if jello is good for our bodies!

-We will be having our ” hot chocolate Friday” on Monday (tomorrow) since our classroom was out of bounds for most of the afternoon.

Thanks for reading!

Love, Ms. Jo-Anne

PS…our play dough is well-loved, any new batches would be appreciated this week!