Back to Business

The first day back was not too bad. Everyone was a little tired, but ready to be back at school. Here are a few of today's winter themed math centers. In my class students only visit one math center per day.

In this center they have to match the number side of the mitten to the dot side.They loved this center, as you can see! :) I printed these from Childcareland a couple of years ago.

This is just a closer view of the mittens.



This is a spatial visual center with winter themed shapes. She is working on making a polar bear. I should've taken a better shot of this...sorry!



This is a favorite center. They draw a colored card, count the snowmen on the card, and then they color the corresponding number on the snowman paper. They love to get their turn in this center.

This is another counting center. They look at the number on the snowman and then they add that many buttons to him.

Can you tell that we are working a lot with numbers & number sense? I am really trying to make sure that my students have a firm grasp of reading numbers, writing numbers, & counting! So far I am pretty pleased with their progress! Tomorrow I will post some of my literacy center photos.

 

A Couple of Things

Here are a few things that I made today to get ready for when I go back on Monday....

Here is a bear tree map that we will be making.

Here is the "I can" chart for the writing center.

Can you believe that I actually got the pictures to rotate?!? Ok, that's all for now!

Happy New Year!

     So, I went to school today to drop some stuff off, run some copies, & make sure that I am totally ready for next week. I don't usually step foot in the school when I am on a break, so this was very rare for me. I'm glad I did though because I was able to put my mind at ease for the rest of my vacation that I am ready to go on Monday!

     I am starting the new year off with my bear unit. The kids usually get a kick out of learning about bears. I have lots of fun stuff planned so I will be sure to post pics when everything is done. I will end the week with them bringing in their teddy bears, yikes! I don't usually like for them to bring distractions from home, but I am going to see how it goes this one time.

     Until then, I am going to relish in what is left of my time off!!

What's the Weather?

Okay, here it is, the weather science booklet that the kids made during our weather unit. Each day we learned about a different type of weather & made a page to illustrate the weather type. 

Here is the cover, kinda boring...GOTTA fix this!

Sunny: they had to trace a circle and then add tissue paper to represent that the sun is made of fire.

Cloudy: they had to trace a cloud shape & then add cotton balls.

Rainy: they had to trace & cut out a gray cloud. Then, they added fingerprint raindrops.

Snowy: they had to trace & cut a snow cloud. Then, they added Q-tip snowflakes. Of course, we added glitter just like with the winter tree!

Rainbow: This page was pre-drawn & all they had to do was watercolor paint it. We talked out the color order of the rainbow during the lesson.

This is another unit that I love to teach. We also go outside everyday to see what the weather is. Luckily, this week, we had every type of weather except snowy! The kids really had a good time learning about why we have each type of weather & how we get each type of weather. 

The Four Seasons

Before Christmas break our Science unit was seasons and weather. We took a week to learn about both, but I will blog about the seasons stuff first.
Here is the poem that we love to say:

These are the seasons,

Four in all,

Winter, Spring,

Summer, Fall.

So, we learned about a different season each day & then we made a tree to represent that season. Here are the pics...(Sorry, but blogger will not let me rotate them)

Our Winter treee was made by tracing a tree template, cutting it out & gluing it to blue paper, and then adding the snow with a Q-Tip. You can't tell, but before they dried we sprinkled glitter on them so they would have a little sparkle. :)

Spring trees were made the same way: trace, cut, glue. Then, they added the leaves and flowers with tissue paper.

Summer Trees were made with green torn paper.

Fall tree was made by using sponges to paint leaves onto the tree.

On Friday, we reviewed all the seasons, recited the poem & added it to our poetry journal. Then, we made the cover of our book. So cute! :)

This is one of the science projects that I love! The kids are always excited to get their finished books on Friday!

Where Have I Been?

I'm back!!
I know that I have been a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad blogger lately! I'm back now & need to update about the things that have been going on in kindergarten.
Here are some photos of our happenings...


Here is a great making words magnet center! The gingerbread houses have words on them & the students read them  and make the words to match with the magnetic letters. When they finish, they write all the words down on list paper.




This is my labelling center. The students look to see what the label lines are pointing at, then they find the word from the word bank & write it into the label box. They LOVE doing these!



Syllable Center: They draw a card, clap the syllables and then sort it into the correct cookie jar.

This is a write the room activity with the word candycane.

Holiday books are always a hit in the listening center!

Everyone LOVES the pocketchart!

So, those are a few of the things that have been going on in our busy, busy kindergarten! I will try to do better posting!!

Catching Up...

Whew! It has been a whirlwind in kindergarten since we got back from our 2 week fall break. We took a field trip to the AW Shucks Corn Maze. It was so much fun! The kids visited the animal barn, the hay sack slide, the hay ride, the treehouse, the nature trail, the hay bale run, and, of course, the corn maze. The day was beautiful and we were the only school there so we had our run of the place! :)
We have been learning all about pumpkins for the last 2 weeks. I am so sorry that I do not have pictures of the fun things that we have been doing...my camera is on the fritz. :( Some of the activities that we have done are...pumpkin parts diagramming, sink or float pumpkins, sorting pumpkins by size, sequencing pumpkins from smallest to largest, counting the seeds in our pumpkin, carving our pumpkin, graphing, color mixing red & yellow to make pumpkins, painting a pumpkin patch, apple/ pumpkin comparisons, making jack o' lanterns...wow! It has really been a blast!
Tomorrow is Halloween (my favorite holiday!) and we will be having all sorts of fun. I promise to take pictures & post them for all to see!
Happy Halloween! BOO!