December 6th-11th

Hello! Here are some notes on what we'll be doing in the Kindergarten room this week!

Language Arts:
This week is a big one...we will start learning word families!! This week we will explore and learn the -at word family. The letter of the week is the letter Hh. Hattie Horse is our alphafriend. We'll also be reviewing our sight words: I, like, see, my; and we'll learn our new sight word: a. When reading to your child at home have them read these words to you or point them out and find them. Also, pointing out that the first word in the sentence starts with a capital letter and that sentences end with a punctuation mark.
We are in a new section of our Reading Series that focuses on friendship. Our story this week is Aaron and Gayla's Alphabet Book. Throughout this book we will also be finding different positional words: on, in, at, under.

Math:
We'll review our numerals and number words: 0 - 10. We'll also move on to larger numbers this week: 11 - 16. Counting one to one with larger numbers can be difficult for children if they try to rush...when counting with your child at home, remind them to slow down and take their time. On their work pages I will often encourage them to put an 'X' over the object that they counted, that way they will not loose their place and count it again.

Religion:
We will talk about St. Nicholas (Dec. 6th) and continue to talk about Advent. We'll here about the story of Jesus' birth and talk about the Holy Family. We will also be watching a video "God Loves Me" that will help us understand that God gave us the wonderful gift of our bodies and will help us learn what we need to do to stay safe and stay healthy. (This is part of our Safe and Sacred Training for our children.) At the end of the week we will also watch a video about responcibility, which is our character trait focus for the month of December. Congratulations to Viddy Wabindato for getting the student of the month for Honesty in Kindergarten for November!

Social Studies:
We will talk about the holidays and also about different traditions around the world. We'll explore the map and various different cultures that celebrate Christmas, Hannukah and Kwanza.

Science:
We will be writing and drawing thank you letters to Brad Gingras. Brad (Madison's dad) was able to come in last week and bring in various animal furs and a mounted duck to talk about the three things animals do during the winter: migrate, hibernate and tough it out! The children really enjoyed his presentation and learned a lot about the different animals in our area and what they do in the winter. They were very excited when I mentioned writing stories back to him...they all had so much to share, but we were limited on time so I decided to extend this activity and write/draw them out.

Centers:
In our centers this week we will be making snowflake ornaments, being completing a Black Bear Booklet and making hand-made presents for our parents.

Important Dates to Remember:
December 10th ~ Christmas Store...be sure to send an envelope with a list of names of who your child needs to buy for and 50 cents per gift.

Have a great week...thanks for stopping by!!!
~Mrs. Westlund =)