**No School Monday: Teacher Work Day
It was great hearing about all the kind acts of our Pandas during Kindness Week last week. I was so impressed with the things students were doing to be kind! It was wonderful emphasizing kind acts in the classroom, as well as at home. I hope you benefitted from plenty of kind acts in your home last week! One thing we discovered is it's SO EASY to be kind - just a smile, a greeting, or a hug will do it! We are going to continue building our chain in class.
Spring parent-teacher conferences are coming up on March 4 through March 12.
Here is the link to sign up. These are optional conferences, but are available to anyone who would like an update on their child's progress. As mentioned last week, I would like to meet with any parents whose child received any B's on the fall report card. If none of the available times or days work for you, please email me. I'm happy to find an alternative, since I've blocked out days/times to adjust for my personal schedule that week. Thank you!
Farewell to our classmate - Fellow classmate, Yujoon will be moving to South Korea with his family. His last day with us is this Wednesday. The pandas will be working on writing a little note to Yujoon for a class book we will gift him. If your child would like to write him a little note and/or draw a picture for him at home over the weekend, I'm sure Yujoon would be thrilled!
100 Day
This Wednesday is 100 Day! This is a fun celebration of the number 100 and being at school together for 100 days. There is a schoolwide Spirit Day on this day-- dress like you are 100 years old. As always, Spirit Days are totally optional, but very fun. I look forward to seeing many 100-year-old Pandas on Wednesday!
Language Arts
We have many fun stories to read and 100 day themed center activities to do in honor of this special day- it will be an all week celebration. Our sight words this week are my and is. This is the last week of Unit 2 in Fundations. We will finish upper case letter instruction, covering letters Qq through Zz this week.
A big emphasis right now is using our knowledge of letter sounds, word families, and sight words to write simple sentences. Children need to be able to put together a readable sentence on their own by the end of kindergarten. Encourage your children to write and spell phonetically as often as possible to build their abilities as independent writers. Try to resist the temptation to spell words for them if they ask, rather, encourage them to "stretch the word out" and put down all the sounds they hear themselves. They can write notes to you, grocery lists, cards for family members, etc.
Math
We will continue with Module 4 this week; just the addition portion of this module will last up until President's Week Break. Parent tips for this module can be found
here. I have noticed that some students need extra reinforcement with addition. Use objects you have at home such as Legos, Cheerios, pennies, etc. to encourage children to work on their addition skills.
We will also have lots of number & counting fun this week in celebration of 100 Day.
Kimochis
This week, your child will learn the fourth Kimochis® Key to Communication: Choose helping words. This key helps us to both think before we speak and consider our word choices. Typically, children acquire a basic ability to understand another’s perspective between 3 and 4 years of age. This allows them to become caring people. However, they will need modeling and practice to do so. In our lesson, we will talk about words that make hearts feel good and words that hurt feelings and your hearts. Your child knows that everybody makes mistakes and can accidentally use words that hurt. Your child will learn to use the following communication tool when hurting words are used: 1. Place your hand over your heart. 2. Show a gentle, but hurt facial expression. 3. Make eye contact with the person who hurt you. 4. Say, “Ouch” in a soft, but hurt tone. The children now know that this is a safe, kind way to express hurt feelings. If a mistake is made, family members can use this tool so they can apologize and make things better.
Upcoming Events
Valentines Day: I know that valentines are now available in most stores, and children will be asking about our celebration. We will exchange cards in class on February 14th, but this is not a "party." We have a fun celebration of friendship, exchange valentines, and take them home to show our families. So that you can prepare for this event, I wanted to share some information:
- Please send in a card for each child. There are 24 total students in our class: 13 girls and 11 boys.
- Please ONLY sign the card & put nothing in the TO box. It is challenging enough for kindergartners to pass out valentines to all their classmates. Having the "to" part filled out makes this extremely challenging and it takes far too long. Thank you for your help with this!
- Please try to purchase valentines that do not have candy attached. I know those can sometimes be hard to find, but there are good choices with stickers, play tattoos, and other non-food goodies.
**Library is every Wednesday. Please return your child's library book by Tuesday each week.
**School spirit days are every Wednesday. Wear your Alta Vista t-shirts or your Panda t-shirts to show your school pride (this week it's dressing like you're 100 years old instead)
This Week's Helpers & Activities
Monday: No School: Staff Work Day
Tuesday: Centers @ 12:20 (Sehwa & Lauren)
Wednesday: Library @ 9:10 (Reader: Steve & Check in & out: Nikta), Dismissal @ 1:15
Thursday: Centers @ 12:20 (Sehwa & Sara Frances)
Friday: Music @ 10:20
Monday, 1/29: No School: Teacher Work Day
Wednesday, 1/31: 100th Day of School
Monday, 2/5: Snow Day
Thursday, 2/8: Art Vista @10:30
Wednesday, 2/14: Valentines Exchange
2/19-2/23: Presidents' Week Vacation
3/4-3/12: Parent-Teacher Conferences
