Week of May 29 - June 2

Dear families,

What gorgeous weather we are having! I hope you are having a great weekend and are having fun at Springfest!

This week was busy in Room 166. Thank you as always to our amazing volunteers - Rielle's dad was the Mystery Reader this week!

One of the caterpillars changed into a pupa and is hanging upside down in its little container. When all the 6 caterpillars have done this, we will move them to a new large net so they can fly around when they emerge from this stage in about 2 weeks. The children did a lot of learning about butterflies and caterpillars this week and their folders went home on Friday. They worked on symmetry, completing the other half of a butterfly (a mirror image) with their reading buddies; watched time-lapse videos of metamorphosis; learned new butterfly facts (they taste with their feet!); completed caterpillar ABC and 1-20 work; coloured and then drew a life cycle wheel themselves; traced and coloured in butterfly shapes, making sure they were symmetrical; did a butterfly colour-by-number sheet; completed and read a "caterpillar walk" booklet with position adjectives (in, around, over, on, below, eg.); looked at leaves in the Kindergarten garden that had holes in it because "caterpillars nibbled through!"; saw an inch worm; re-told the Very Hungry Caterpillar story with flash cards and manipulatives; sequenced the story with pictures; and read fiction and non-fiction caterpillar and butterfly books. The numeracy component of this inquiry was learning about symmetry, sequencing and writing numbers.

Thank you so much to Ruby and Catherine for singing the "This Land is Your Land" and "Land of the Silver Birch" for us! I will be teaching the children these songs as part of our Canada inquiry. Your probably know them yourselves! Thank you Catherine for sharing your beautiful dreamcatcher with us.

In our inquiry on Canada, we did "H is for hockey/I is for inukshuk/J is for Jasper" in our ABCs of Canada booklets. We learned all about Inukshuks. I brought a small one in from home and we learned how they are made, what they are, why the Inuit people of Canada's north make them, and what shape they are. Then the children cut and assembled one themselves out of paper, then drew one freehand. Good job!

The words of the week were FUN and FRIEND. IN the computer lab the kids played on GoNoodle.com and learned more about caterpillars.

The June words sheet and homework bingo went home in Friday's mail bag. It's hard to believe that it's June already!

Senior Kindergarten students, please send in a baby picture by June 8 for the Senior Kindergarten graduation video. Thank you.

Thank you to everyone who donated to our basket for the silent auction.  It looks great! Have fun at Springfest!

That's the news for this week. See you on Monday!