Upcoming Events/mark your calendars:
- Friday, January 19: 21+ trivia night-refer to Wednesday envelope flyer
- Tuesday, January 23: 8am Mass
What’s Due:
- Supplemental supplies: If your last name begins with N-Z, your supplemental supplies are due–thank you:https://stcletusschool.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/School-Supplies-List-2023-2024.pdf
- Laps for Laughs: please set up your family page; refer to the flyer in the Wednesday envelope.
This Week:
It was a short week in kindergarten due to the MLK holiday and “cold day” we had on Tuesday. We tried to make up for that and were busy, busy in the classroom!
Winter gear…PLEASE READ AND CHECK YOUR CHILD’ S BACKPACK:
We’re seeing a lot of hats and gloves go missing in kindergarten! If you could please check your child’s backpack (dig all the way to the bottom :)), that would be great. If there’s something that doesn’t belong to your child, send it back! Often times kids see something on the floor and stick in the nearest backpack…or at least that’s what I think is happening! Label as much as you can too. There are a lot of pink and purple hats and gloves amongst the girls! Labeling will help. I believe right now we’re missing a boy’s striped hat, a girl’s pink ear muffs and a purple glove. I will continue to reiterate–gloves go in hat, hat goes IN the backpack or jacket sleeve. I know it’s frustrating when they don’t come home with their winter gear…especially on these days when we really need it!
Next Week
We will begin the iready Math and Reading diagnostic tests. This is just ONE assessment that helps me track how students are doing. I also do my own assessments which I will share with you at March conferences.
Language Arts:
- We will read several Jan Brett stories next week including The Hat and The Mitten. We will go over characters, setting, problem and solution. We will work on retelling and sequencing.
- Last name writing practice: we are working on knowing the letters in our last names, using only one capital letter and starting at the correct lines.
- Journaling: Daily journaling continues! The kids are becoming so independent in their writing. That’s the first goal! “Write the sounds you hear” is a phrase they hear often. We are also working on more DETAILED drawings. The children are also writing the “code” or the date each day in their journals as follows: 1-11-2024.
- We will be starting interactive writing time! Students will each have a chance to share a sentence with the class. Now rather than “sharing the pen” with the teacher and writing on chart paper, they will write with me on their own individual whiteboards. After writing the classmate’s sentence, we will do some word work on our whiteboards.
- SuperKids: we will finish up “u” and will be moving on to B and R. We are now in the SUPER KIDS CLUB. A little more info is written below:
Superkids’ Club
This level continues children’s phonics instruction by teaching the remaining 13 letters of the alphabet, one sound for each, and how to write the capital and lowercase forms. With each new letter they learn, children are able to decode and encode (spell) more and more words. They read longer decodable stories as the level progresses, and lessons continue to develop their comprehension and vocabulary through reading. Expressive writing is taught the same way as in the previous level, but as children increase their knowledge of letters and sounds, they are able to write more words themselves.
- Continue to watch for book buddy bags to come home. Keep in a safe spot and practice the fluency pages, books and/or work work practice pages and return by the date indicated.
- Word wall words: we are currently working on number words one through ten. Next week we will add: by and went
- We will learn a new song for our pocket chart. It’s all about our senses!
Math: We will wrap up Chapter 5 in GO MATH which is all about ADDITION! I am hoping to finish on Friday. Then we will move on to Chapter 6 which is all about subtraction.
- We will review number formation practice for 1-9; backwards numbers will still happen, very developmentally appropriate. We will continue to practice!
- Counting by 1s to 100. Practice at home!
- Counting by 2s to 20. Practice at home! Many like to try to count past 20 (the kindergarten goal/expectation) by 2s. Great!
- Counting by 5s to 100. Practice at home!
- Counting by 10s to 100. Practice at home!
- Addition using dice, dominoes, whiteboards, manipulatives, magnetic numbers and more! Our goal is to FLUENTLY (automatically) add within 5 and be able to use drawings, fingers, etc. to add within 10.
Religion:
Our new classroom kindness project revolves around “God’s love keeps us warm”–showing love to others is how we feel God’s love!
We will begin our unit on SENSES. We learn more about God’s world through our senses! We will learn a new song: I’ve got sense, I’ve got senses, yes I do! yes I do! Seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting and touching, thank you, God. Thank you, God!