Gwen and Lulu

Story time for the guineas!

Fireworks in the Brain

This week, we talked about the way our brain learns new things.  We looked at pictures of our brain with its synapses firing.  I explained how all learning makes pathways in our brain.  If we are at the beginning of learning, we have very small, thin pathways.  When we have really learned something well, the pathways are bigger, stronger and faster.  We also talked about how it is easier for us to learn if  we use both sides of our brain (thinking and feeling) and if we make connections to our own lives, and as well, by practice, practice, practice!  Children's brains are wired to make new pathways.

A Brand New Year!

January has flown by!  Despite all the illnesses, the children have gotten back into the swing of school quickly and we have had a great time learning about gymnastics, 3-D shapes, winter and "the king of 'ing'"!
As well,  we have been working very hard on our self regulation goal of "paying attention, even when it's hard".  We have been observing Minerva the Amaryllis as she grows and is just about to flower.

Minerva the Amaryllis

Crazy Hair Day

Castles

We made castles using some commonly found 3-D shapes, and lots of masking tape!  This was a fun activity! 

Skating

I was very proud of how well the children did at skating this week!  Everyone gave it a try, and those who could not even stand up at the beginning made great progress by the end!

Sight words, short vowels and phonemic awareness....

CVC Words (consonant
vowel consonant) words
are great for developing
phonemic awareness

Just an update on our progress in language arts this month.  We have been working very hard on learning the sight words on the first list.  As a class, now the words displayed each week will be from List 2.  All the words from list one have come home on the back of the poems.  Please continue to review these words especially if your child is still working on list one.  This week, the poem has the 5 words that are giving us the most trouble for extra practice.  I will also be assessing reading this week and switching the groups around as need be.  Sight words are based on the Dolche list of words that appear most commonly in books.  The goal is to develop 'instant recognition' of these words.  The children are making great progress.  Many words are not sight words.  When children encounter these words in books,  we encourage them to use a variety of strategies to figure unfamiliar words out.  The most common thing we say to children is to 'sound it out'. (others include: using the pictures and context of the story for clues)  English is tricky.  Sounding out in reading requires a strong grasp of letter sounds (especially the vowels) and what is known as phonemic awareness.  That is the ability to blend the sounds mentally and connect them to a word they know.  Right now we are focusing on short vowel sounds and phonemic awareness in our literacy work.

 Journals is a very powerful tool to developing phonemic awareness.  Sounding out a word requires a great deal of phonemic awareness, much more than if students copy a word from a teacher in order for the spelling to be 'right'.  That is why I encourage the students to sound out as much as they can.  This makes for interesting journal entries!  But as the year progress, so does their spelling and writing.  As well,  not worrying too much about spelling frees the children up to write more interesting, meaningful stories.  Today,  we read the story "Ish" by Peter Reynolds to help us not to worry about having perfect spelling and drawing!

Pattern Day!

The children participated with enthusiasm in Pattern Day!  I loved their pattern clothing, face paint, shoes and jewelry!  We enjoyed making fruit kabobs into patterns and eating the delicious jello made by Mason's mom.  (Layered in a pattern, of course!)  My favorite moment was when the boys playing at the train-set were spontaneously making the cars into a pattern!  I laughed when overhearing the comment a few seconds later...."but I don't know why our teacher gets SO excited about patterns?!"  Ok. So I may have gone a bit overboard, but patterns really are EVERYWHERE!  :)

We Like Our Red Clothes!

As part of our colors unit, our second whole language book we have been learning to read is based on the song "Mary Wore Her Red Dress"  The children had a chance to choose something red and be in the song, and have been having fun dressing up, recognizing color words and practicing our basic reading skills,  tracking as we read, self correcting and developing some basic sight words.  One of our literacy centers was 'building sentances' around this poem.  Our first poem in our Poetry Book will be one that contains lots of color words.  Please practice these words with your child.  Here are a few of our red fashionistas.....

She wore her red purse, red mittens and red scarf.

He wore his red apron.

She wore her red shoes, red skirt, red purse!