Dear families,
What an exciting week it has been! On Monday, the children enjoyed a terrific performance about fairy tales by the Dufflebag Theatre; on Tuesday it was the Spring Craft Party; on Wednesday it was Pink Day and today was Blue and White Day! Thank you so much to the moms of Mia, Riley, Jackson, Phoebe, Sebastian and William who made wonderful crafts with the kids and brought tasty snacks too!
This week on our Ocean Inquiry we learned about Jelly Fish bio-luminescence, Portuguese Man-o-War, where sand comes from |(Video: The Amazing Life of Sand) and what we can do with it, and the Great Barrier Coral Reef. We watched a scallop swimming, learned to identify the cowrie, conch, cone, scallop, olive, turkey wing, murex and bear claw sea shells, learned how an oyster makes a pearl, and tasted real sea weed! We also watched a live video feed of the Monterrey Aquarium, watching a kelp forest, jellyfish, and sharks. The kids asked terrific questions about ocean life, inspired n=by all of this! In the Computer Lab, Miss. Santiago showed the kids videos about the coral reef. They also used a kid-safe version of Google called KIDSREX.
Thank you so much to: Henry who brought in a real fish fossil; Andrew who brought in a 100 million year old shark tooth; Hudson who brought in his penguin from Chile; Maya who shared her clown fish; Maddie who shared her duck; and Hannah's mom who read Beauty and the Beast! What a great week it was.
We also continued our inquiry into 3D shapes. I enourage the children to look for and identify 3D shapes they see.
The words of the week were WAS and I'M. Thank you so much to Ruby who collated the Scholastic Orders. They are due on May 15.
That's the news for this week. Next week we will complete our ocean inquiry and will continue our learning about 3-D Shapes.
I hope you have a wonderful Easter weekend!
Thursday, April 13, 2017
Sunday, April 9, 2017
Week of April 3-7
Dear families,
I hope you're enjoying the gorgeous Spring weather today or are at least watching the Masters indoors!
Last week we continued our Inquiry on Ocean Life, learning about Pufferfish and Jellyfish. They made awesome "Jellyfish in a Bottle" with Miss. Santiago, the SKs made jellyfish from clear plastic for our bulletin board, and the JKs will make floating Man-O-War Jellyfish. With their Reading Buddies they completed Seahorse and Jellyfish adjective/fact sheets. We watched awesome BBC Earth videos about Pufferfish and Jellyfish including an amazing video of a Japanese Pufferfish making a nest with amazing precision. The children drew their own pufferfish and nests and also made a larger one for the bulletin board display. We also tried a toothpick/water experiment in which the 10 toothpicks moved to form a star. The children are starting to decorate their dioramas with ocean objects. Exciting!
Thank you so much to Ethan who brought in a shark's jaw and to Kate who brought in a real starfish! The kids loved touching them and looking closely at them! Thank you also to Sebastian's dad who told me about the "jellyfish cam" and the "live shark cam" at the Monterrey Bay Aquarium! We will look at these tomorrow!
Thank you to Ethan's dad who was our Mystery Reader and to Hannah who shared her awesome Ocean Book with the class. Maya brought in her "Littlest Mermaid" book and Menaal shared her seashells and Mermaid book with her friends.
On Thursday we watched a terrific presentation about Birds of Prey by the Mountsberg Raptor Centre in Halton. The children saw and learned about the American Kestrel, the Red-tailed Hawk and the Great Horned Owl, and then drew a picture and wrote about the presentation.
We also started learning about (JKs) and reviewing (SKs) 3D Shapes in the man-made and natural world, for example the puffer fish becomes a sphere, an aquarium is a rectangular prism, an owl's eye is a cylinder and so on. It was great hearing the children use this knowledge in conversation, such as "My lunch bag is a cube" "My yogurt cup is a cylinder" and "The bubbles in Bubbles' tank are spheres." Please encourage your child to describe objects with this vocabulary.
To celebrate Earth Day which is April 22nd, I sent a note home about making a toy or object our of recycled materials. We reuse and repurpose a lot of objects in Kindergarten! Our Mystery Object (a daffodil bulb) sprouted roots and leaves but didn't bloom. Maybe it needed soil!
Next week we will continue our Ocean Inquiry, learning about Mollusks and Sea Shells, which is a terrific way to talk about living vs. non-living things. We'll also be learning about Sand, which will end our Inquiry (did you notice we went from Largest to Smallest, starting with the Blue Whale?). We'll also celebrate Spring with a Craft Party! Thank you in advance to the parents who have volunteered for this fun day!
That's the news for this week :)
I hope you're enjoying the gorgeous Spring weather today or are at least watching the Masters indoors!
Last week we continued our Inquiry on Ocean Life, learning about Pufferfish and Jellyfish. They made awesome "Jellyfish in a Bottle" with Miss. Santiago, the SKs made jellyfish from clear plastic for our bulletin board, and the JKs will make floating Man-O-War Jellyfish. With their Reading Buddies they completed Seahorse and Jellyfish adjective/fact sheets. We watched awesome BBC Earth videos about Pufferfish and Jellyfish including an amazing video of a Japanese Pufferfish making a nest with amazing precision. The children drew their own pufferfish and nests and also made a larger one for the bulletin board display. We also tried a toothpick/water experiment in which the 10 toothpicks moved to form a star. The children are starting to decorate their dioramas with ocean objects. Exciting!
Thank you so much to Ethan who brought in a shark's jaw and to Kate who brought in a real starfish! The kids loved touching them and looking closely at them! Thank you also to Sebastian's dad who told me about the "jellyfish cam" and the "live shark cam" at the Monterrey Bay Aquarium! We will look at these tomorrow!
Thank you to Ethan's dad who was our Mystery Reader and to Hannah who shared her awesome Ocean Book with the class. Maya brought in her "Littlest Mermaid" book and Menaal shared her seashells and Mermaid book with her friends.
On Thursday we watched a terrific presentation about Birds of Prey by the Mountsberg Raptor Centre in Halton. The children saw and learned about the American Kestrel, the Red-tailed Hawk and the Great Horned Owl, and then drew a picture and wrote about the presentation.
We also started learning about (JKs) and reviewing (SKs) 3D Shapes in the man-made and natural world, for example the puffer fish becomes a sphere, an aquarium is a rectangular prism, an owl's eye is a cylinder and so on. It was great hearing the children use this knowledge in conversation, such as "My lunch bag is a cube" "My yogurt cup is a cylinder" and "The bubbles in Bubbles' tank are spheres." Please encourage your child to describe objects with this vocabulary.
To celebrate Earth Day which is April 22nd, I sent a note home about making a toy or object our of recycled materials. We reuse and repurpose a lot of objects in Kindergarten! Our Mystery Object (a daffodil bulb) sprouted roots and leaves but didn't bloom. Maybe it needed soil!
Next week we will continue our Ocean Inquiry, learning about Mollusks and Sea Shells, which is a terrific way to talk about living vs. non-living things. We'll also be learning about Sand, which will end our Inquiry (did you notice we went from Largest to Smallest, starting with the Blue Whale?). We'll also celebrate Spring with a Craft Party! Thank you in advance to the parents who have volunteered for this fun day!
That's the news for this week :)
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