Thursday, January 28, 2010

Penguins on Parade!

Penguins on Parade 018 Penguins on Parade 001 Penguins on Parade 002 Penguins on Parade 003 Penguins on Parade 004 Penguins on Parade 005 Penguins on Parade 006 Penguins on Parade 007 Penguins on Parade 008Penguins on Parade 009Penguins on Parade 017 Penguins on Parade 016 Penguins on Parade 010 Penguins on Parade 011 Penguins on Parade 012 Penguins on Parade 013 Penguins on Parade 014 Penguins on Parade 015  

The kids really enjoyed the unit on Penguins.  It was a quick week to learn as many facts about these funny creatures that we could.  We did a KWL to organize our information.  The K stands for what we KNOW, the W is for WHAT we want to learn, and the L is for what we LEARNED.  We learned that penguins are birds but they can’t fly, there are 17 different kinds of penguins, some even live where it is warm, they are great swimmers, and we learned the words tobogganing, fledging, rookery.  Ask your child the meaning of these words.  We also learned that Emperor penguin dad’s are the best because they protect the eggs and go for 2 months without eating! They wrote stories about being a penguin and came up with some great ideas.  I will share these writing samples at conferences.  Our centers were penguin themed also.  We did antonym match (opposites) penguin contractions, penguin number line race to the igloo, penguin fact families, and penguin subtraction facts using penguin counters.  We also did a listening center on the Emperor penguin and sequenced events of how a baby penguin is born and raised by the mom and dad. Their favorite project was making the snow globes showing the penguin families. They love to show off their projects!

Happy Birthday Kansas!

Jayhawks 005 Jayhawks 001 Jayhawks 002 Jayhawks 003 Jayhawks 004

We spent the week learning about Kansas and the symbols of Kansas.  They created a book about each symbol and will share it with you this weekend.  They loved the cheer:  Kansas Sunflowers, Kansas Wheat, Kansas Jayhawks are hard to beat!  Kansas’ birthday of becoming the 34th state is celebrated on January 29!  Happy Birthday Kansas! 

Friday, January 15, 2010

Happy Birthday Martin Luther King, Jr.!

We paid a tribute to Martin Luther King, Jr. today.  The kids were quite amazed to learn how people were treated by the color of their skin years ago.  They really enjoyed the stories of how Martin could not play with another friend that was white when he was in first grade, about Rosa Parks and her simple word “no” that helped stop segregation on the buses,and about little Ruby Bridges and how she was the first black student to be integrated into a white school and how she handled the hostile situation.  We talked about how to treat others and how MLK’s dream is a live today! 

 Martin Luther King, Jr. 2010 001 Martin Luther King, Jr. 2010 002Martin Luther King, Jr. 2010 014 Martin Luther King, Jr. 2010 003 Martin Luther King, Jr. 2010 004 Martin Luther King, Jr. 2010 009Martin Luther King, Jr. 2010 005 Martin Luther King, Jr. 2010 006 Martin Luther King, Jr. 2010 007 Martin Luther King, Jr. 2010 008  Martin Luther King, Jr. 2010 010  Martin Luther King, Jr. 2010 012 Martin Luther King, Jr. 2010 013 Martin Luther King, Jr. 2010 011

Snow Friends!

Our centers this week worked with winter and snow friends.  They played a number line game “Race to the Snowman”, rolled 3 dice to add up on the three balls of the snowman, did a sentence scramble to complete sentences correctly about the story The Mitten, sequenced story events after listening to the story The Mitten, and worked on contractions and compound words. We are also working hard on recognizing numbers to 100 and putting number cards in order from least to greatest.

Winter Centers Snowmen 039Winter Centers Snowmen 011   Winter Centers Snowmen 012 Winter Centers Snowmen 016 Winter Centers Snowmen 020 Winter Centers Snowmen 021 Winter Centers Snowmen 022 Winter Centers Snowmen 023 Winter Centers Snowmen 024 Winter Centers Snowmen 009

Here is a cute art job they did to go with our story Snow Friends:

Winter Centers Snowmen 042 Winter Centers Snowmen 026 Winter Centers Snowmen 027 Winter Centers Snowmen 028 Winter Centers Snowmen 029 Winter Centers Snowmen 030 Winter Centers Snowmen 031 Winter Centers Snowmen 032 Winter Centers Snowmen 033 Winter Centers Snowmen 034 Winter Centers Snowmen 035 Winter Centers Snowmen 036 Winter Centers Snowmen 037 Winter Centers Snowmen 038 Winter Centers Snowmen 040 Winter Centers Snowmen 041