week of 1/16

 I hope you all enjoyed the long weekend. This week, we will hit the half-way mark (90th school day) in our kindergarten year. This is where the kindergarten curriculum really takes off, and your continued support with the curriculum will be especially important at this time. Reading to your children and asking them questions about what they are reading, helping them blend and read/write short vowel words (eg: hop, can, rat, etc.) and reinforcing math facts and sight words is really important at this time. 

Thank you to the parents (and grandparents!) who answered the call and have filled in a lot of the volunteer spots! If you have not had a chance to read to the class at the library or help in centers yet this year, there are still openings. Feel free to email me if you have any questions. There are short explanations on the sign up genius as well. Thank you all!

Birthdays - a few parents have asked about birthday celebrations. Here is the link from the class website: https://pugliesekindergarten.blogspot.com/p/birthday-policy.html

The class website is also linked at the bottom of my email signature. Thank you!

Language Arts

We will begin reading many snow-themed stories for the next couple of weeks, and do writing projects and crafts around this theme. The culmination of this theme will end with "Snow Day" on Monday, February 5th. Children will come to school dressed up in any winter gear they have, and we'll have some snow-themed fun! 

Our sight words this week are this and that.  Our emphasis in Fundations will continue to be blending sounds to read and write words with fluency. This week, we will also begin instruction on the formation of upper case letters, covering two letters per day. As I said last week, the Fundations Parent Letter has a lot of great tips on ways to encourage blending, as well as guides to correct formation of the upper case letters.

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 do recommend that you look these over, because there will be some new vocabulary for those of you who do not have older students who have done the Eureka math program. Of particular importance are the words "compose" (finding numbers that add up to a given number-- like 3 & 2 compose 5) "decompose" (take apart a number-- like 5 can be 4 & 1 OR 3  & 2) and number bonds (a model to show mathematical thinking).

**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's Helpers & Activities
Monday: NO SCHOOL: MLK Day
Tuesday: Centers @ 12:20  (Asma & Lauren)
Wednesday: Library @ 9:10 (reader: Steve & check in/out: Rachna), Dismissal @ 1:15
Thursday:  Centers @ 12:20 (Sehwa & Hseu Hwang)
Friday: Music @ 12:30

Upcoming Events

Monday, 1/15: No School: MLK Holiday

Monday, 1/29: No School: Teacher Work Day

Wednesday, 1/31: 100th Day of School

Monday, 2/5: Snow Day

Wednesday, 2/14: Valentines Exchange ( I will send a class list of student names at a later date, valentines are optional and are done at home to bring in for a little exchange).