Weekly News & Homework: January 8th-11th

Happy New Year and welcome back to school! I hope you had a wonderful Christmas and fun two weeks off with family and friends!

This is a short week, but we will still have new sight words, letter teams, and Friday tests! 

PLEASE MAKE SURE TO READ THE ENTIRE POST AS THERE IS A LOT OF NEW INFORMATION FOR THE NEW YEAR!!

There is no school on Monday, January 21st due to Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

Success Academy and electives will resume the week of January 14th. 

Right before the holiday break, began practicing writing our first and last name! We will now have each student write his/her first and LAST NAME on ALL papers, homework, etc.  If your child does not know how to write his/her last name, please practice this at home. We will be practicing at school as well. Each student now has their last name written on their name tags for support in the classroom. 

*Also beginning after the holiday break each child will have a “wallet” that they will be taking home in their backpack. The “wallet” is a ziploc baggie with their name on it. Each day your child will have the opportunity to earn money throughout our day. Students will have the opportunity to receive pennies, nickels, dimes, and quarters in the classroom as rewards for behavior and hard work throughout the day. Instead of Treasure Box on Fridays, now they will visit the CLASS STORE! Each student will sort and count money, trade money (example: five pennies for one nickel) and have the opportunity to spend their money on the items that are now “on sale” at the class store. Of course, bigger treasures will cost more money, which I hope will reinforce self-control and teach students about saving. Each child will be responsible for keeping track of their own bank and for counting the money in it. (This will be great math homework practice). Please encourage your child to take care of and keep track of his/her wallet, as lost money WILL NOT BE REPLACED!  Also, if students forget wallets at home, they will not receive money for that day. The wallet is designed to teach responsibility and accountability as well as reinforce math skills. This is a great life skill your child will benefit from in the future!! Thank you for your continued support. 

This week, we will continue taking Math Fluency Tests on adding and subtracting math facts. Each student is on their own individual level based on what level he/she has passed. Our Common Core Standard is that by the end of kindergarten, students will fluently (meaning without fingers or manipulatives) be able to add and subtract within five. Students will have the opportunity to practice these facts and take weekly tests. Please remember that we would like all students to master this standard by the end of the year. My hope is that each week, we will accomplish a little bit more on these tests. Please reinforce and practice these skills at home. Thank you for your support!

Upcoming Events:  
Monday, January 7: NO SCHOOL
Monday, January 21: NO SCHOOL
Friday, January 25: 100th DAY OF SCHOOL CELEBRATION (more info coming soon)
Wednesday, February 6: Field Trip to the Children's Museum (more info coming soon)
Monday, February 11: NO SCHOOL 
Thursday, February 14: Valentine's Day Centers (more info coming soon)
Monday, February 18: NO SCHOOL

What Are We Learning This Week?:

Sight Words: OF, BACK, SAY, SAYS, PLEASE.

Letter Team:  CK (We are learning that CK makes the K sound and helps the vowel to say it's short sound, like in BACK, NECK, PICK, LOCK, DUCK).

Reading: This week, we will read many books about winter and snowmen. We are also reading "The Mitten" and other books by Jan Brett. We will discuss and record story elements and what happens in the stories.

Writing:  We are learning how to write a five sentence paragraph. I have been modeling a structure for paragraph writing called, "Step Up to Writing" for the students. Kindergarten Step Up to Writing is writing a paragraph with a topic sentence, three sentences about that topic, and a conclusion sentence. For example, "We had a great day at school today. First, we learned about measurement in math. Next, we colored snowmen at centers. Last, we read a lot of books about winter. As you can see, school is so much fun!" 

Math: We will take Fluency Math tests and continue discussing addition and subtraction. We will also practice tally marks and counting/writing numbers to 100! Starting next week, we will begin our math unit on measurement. We are learning different ways things can be measured, including length, height, width, weight, and capacity. You can help by discussing measurement at home. Please see the homework section below for more information. 

Leadership: As always, we will continue to ROAR. Students displaying excellent leadership traits will be rewarded with money to spent at our class store. 

Homework: January 8-11

Flashcards: Make flashcards for our new sight words (OF, BACK, SAY, SAYS, PLEASE), and letter team (CK). Study flashcards every day.

Phonemic Awareness: Please work with your child on: rhyming, blending, segmenting, syllables, and beginning/middle/ending sounds. 

Reading: Read from your book bag. Read the Reading A-Z leveled books, fluency passages, library books, etc. in your book bag. Continue to read the little paper books from your at-home book box. Continue to read TO your child every night, having conversations about the stories you are reading. Continue to log onto Smarty Ants for 10-15 at least a few times a week. 

Writing: Write in your at-home journal every day. Continue to work with your child on the writing goals they need to master. While we ARE all at different writing goals, the in-class expectation is now that each child will write three or more sentences every day. Please reinforce this at home with writing homework.

Math: Continue to work on number ID, number writing, counting to 100, and counting forward. Work with your child on addition and subtraction. You will start to see these tests come home: adding +0, one more, one less, and facts within five. Go over these tests and work on areas where your child may need support. We will begin our Measurement and Data Unit. Measurement and Data in kindergarten is a fancy way of saying measuring, sorting, and graphing. See the picture below to go over our goals for this math unit. We will be learning height, weight, length, width, capacity. You can help your child at home by using Measurement Vocabulary and encourage them to use these words to describe everyday objects. (I can measure my weight with a scale, this cup measures capacity, the height of the chair is 4 books tall, the spoon is shorter than the knife, I can measure a book’s height, weight, and length, etc) You can also help your child at home by asking him or her to sort objects (shapes, colors, utensils, coins, or other every day objects laying around the house). Keep going over those Daily Math worksheets that go home each day to see if your child needs help with a particular skill.

QR Codes: Download and print the QR Code practice pages on ParentSquare. Work on these pages together.