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February 16th, 2024
I think I have it all back!! Technology has not been our friend. I hope everyone has been well and staying warm! We have been learning all about human-made systems. This unit includes: community helpers, transportation, and construction.
We have been working on counting and finding the number patterns. We are using picture clues and beginning sounds to predict text. We are practicing recognizing and writing our first and last names.
We have gotten to the time of year where students are beginning to feel extra comfortable and are pushing some boundaries. This is all perfectly normal at this age. It is my job to reflect with them and find better solutions to conflicts that arise in the classroom. I appreciate any support given when we share any of these incidents with you. In our classroom, we emphasize that we don’t “get in trouble,” but that we are all still learning. We don’t use time out or punishment when problems come up. We reflect on the situation and work together to figure out what could have gone better and what we can do the next time something like it happens. We will, occasionally, ask a child to choose a different activity if they are having a hard time with something.
I can’t wait to touch base with everyone at conferences so that I can tell you how amazed I am by your children!
Check out some recent photos: https://photos.app.goo.gl/cF7Lbgv6QNCvB4sP6
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November 20th – December 1st, 2023
Whew! I am so sorry about all of the technical difficulties. I think I have it all worked out now.
We have been learning all about play and how children learn and express themselves through different aspects of play. Last week, we learned about how the children in other countries play. We played games, read favorite books from and explored a few fun facts about the countries: China, the Philippines, India, and the UK. Our 3rd/4th buddies joined us for Kabadi (a game from India), we tasted panset from the Philippines, and Mr. Simon even joined us for a game of Pass the Parcel from the UK.
This week, we will be exploring board and card games. We’ll discuss rules and fair game play. We will practice using good sportsmanship while playing these games.
Playing board and card games will help us learn by counting, emergent literacy, sorting, finding patterns, reviewing colors and shapes, taking turns, and letter and number recognition.
Pictures from November 13th-December 1st: https://photos.app.goo.gl/CAD8mLJTBkgdqKKT8
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November 12th-17th, 2023
Hello there! We have been talking about being kind and sharing ways we can make and be friends. Students have come up with lots of wonderful ideas and strategies! They have even created a list of random acts of kindness that we will be doing in our Wolfpack community!
In writing/language, we’ve been working on writing our names with lower case letters. If they’ve mastered this in their first names, we have them moving on to their last names. We continue to learn letters and letter sounds in every subject.
In math/numbers, our focus has been patterns and sorting. We count daily and use written numbers in our daily routines.
I’m having trouble getting our photos from my phone to the computer for some reason, I’ll share the photo album for this week as soon as I get it fixed!
Have a great weekend!
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November 6th – 10th, 2023
It always seems like time speeds up this time of year! It feels like we’ve barely started the year, and here it is almost Thanksgiving! We had our first intruder drill this week. I tell the children that we are playing hide and seek with Mr. Simon. We hide in the bathroom and show pictures on the wall with my cool flashlight. We also had our first assembly of the year today! My friends were very principled and caring! They watched as the older students said kind words and sang songs to honor our veterans.
We talked a lot about play and how to make friends this week. We demonstrated different ways to join play and to invite friends to play with us. We were open-minded when additional friends wanted to join us in play. We did activities that centered around sports. Most of the popular sports are challenging to play at this age, but we used the ideas of several sports to practice math concepts; such as, shapes, counting, position words and sorting. We were also able to learn some new vocabulary. Did you know that people around the world play soccer? They call it football, though.
Our pretend center took on a new theme. Students decided to create a circus! We have a ticket booth, puppet stage, and games. Several students even created games for the center! We were great thinkers!
Pumpkin Jack is looking very different now. It seems as if the mold grows by the second! Nothing has sprouted yet. We’ll continue to document the changes we observe in our scientific data journals.
Check out our awesome pictures!
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October 30th – November 3rd, 2023
This week, we observed our Pumpkin Jack experiment. Pumpkin Jack has started to mold and his faceless friend is as well. We’re waiting to see how they change over time. We’ve made predictions about which one will sprout first, which one will decay first, etc. Our class is so excited to watch the transformation!
Next week, we are talking about play and how to make friends. We’ll discuss different kinds of play. We will also be working on our snow man for Kingwood Center’s winter display. We are continuing to count to numbers beyond 30. Making ABC patterns will also be a concept that we will be practicing.
Check out our pictures! https://photos.app.goo.gl/tLmSHp5TaynfRhti9
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October 23rd – 27th, 2023
What a beautiful and fun week! We spent so much time outside in this perfect weather!
Next week, we have no afternoon PreK on Thursday and Friday for parent teacher conferences. I look forward to talking to you about how amazing your children are!
Our new unit is all about play and how it is such an important part of who we are. We will be investigating different forms of play, how play has changed over time, what we choose to play, and maybe even play with some old toys from back in the day.
At home, please continue to let your children explore and discover what they are capable of. I always use the example of my oldest daughter, Grace, who was my sous chef at the age of 4. They can do so much more than we think they can. Speaking of Grace, I’m sure you’ve heard that we have a new teacher, Miss. Grace. She is not a teacher, but is aspiring to be. She will be helping out in our building for now, and will be subbing in other classrooms soon, but she has been enjoying getting to know your kids.
This weeks photos (THERE ARE A LOT!): https://photos.app.goo.gl/VMck85Nc7zeydB23A
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October 16th – 20th, 2023
What a great week back! We have had so much fun exploring pumpkins and testing out our skills of estimation and descriptive language.
Pumpkins were the topic of conversation this week, and we’ve enjoyed it so much, we’re going to keep on talking about them! We used descriptive language to explain how the inside of a pumpkin feels. As a class, we sequenced out pumpkins from smallest to largest. We estimated, and then measured the circumference of our smallest and largest pumpkins. We learned about the life cycle of pumpkins. We practiced our shapes while discussing and deciding how to carve our jack-o-lantern.
Next week, we will continue to explore pumpkins. We will start our Pumpkin Jack experiment. We will set up pumpkins in a few different environments and observe throughout the year what changes they go through and compare. We will use our measuring skills as we make some tasty pumpkin treats.
Halloween celebrations will be held on Friday, the 27th. Costumes should be worn to school. My all day friends can change before lunch if they’d like. We will be enjoying all sorts of different learning engagements that are Halloweenish. Lol!
Pictures from this week: https://photos.app.goo.gl/jHnBFcZwkcYw6oAZA
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September 25th-29th, 2023
Wow! What a week! It was full of fun activities and events and OH so much learning! Everyone was so excited for the field trip, that we decided to focus on farms. We learned about some of the things we may find on the farm and will continue to learn about them next week.
In addition to our farm study, we are currently working on writing our names using lower case letters, with only an upper case for the first letter. In math, we’ve been sorting by one attribute, making AB patterns, counting to 30 and making groups up to 6. Our unit of inquiry is all about finding similarities and differences, so it is a part of all subject areas.
I really enjoyed getting to spend time with everyone on our Honey Haven field trip. It seemed like fun was had by all! I never knew there were so many different kinds of pumpkins! Our next trip will be to Buckeye Imagination Museum on November 21st.
Fall Fest was a great way to end the week! It’s always a little crazier when we do it inside, but it was still loads of fun! We will be finding corn in Mrs. Heminger’s room for weeks, I’m sure!
Pictures for the week: https://photos.app.goo.gl/ogEzz5c7SK9JQGbJ7
Field Trip and Fall Fest Pictures: https://photos.app.goo.gl/1jt7aY2sgU6iUeRLA
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September 18th – 22nd, 2023
We have been very busy this week! In continuing our unit on same and different, we read 5 different versions of “The Three Billy Goats Gruff.” We found many similarities and differences. Some stories were very similar and a couple were WAY different! Be sure to ask your child about them! We also had a great time reenacting the original story outside on the troll bridge. I loved seeing them choosing to retell the story during their choice times!
We started working on baseline assessments this week. I’ll work with your child, one-on-one to see where they are and where there are opportunities for improvement. I’ll set goals for each child, based on these assessments. We will go over them at conferences in November.
Next week, we will learn about farms. This will be to prepare us for our field trip to Honey Haven Farm on Thursday. Remember, there is no PM preK program on Thursday. We will celebrate fall on Friday in our building, during school. Hopefully, the weather continues to be beautiful!
Pictures of our week together: https://photos.app.goo.gl/KvCY9W2GwqqSgHum8
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September 11th – 15th, 2023
The amazing weather this week led to some great outdoor fun! We spent lots of time learning through play.
We learned about our many different emotions and the colors that they associate with them. We discovered that we have many different opinions on this in our class, but we also discovered how many things are the same.
We continue practicing numeracy, rote counting, and substitizing through our calendar and weather work, as well as, during all stages of our day.
Our room is rich with print that we notice and make connections with. We have been practicing writing our names. We will be focusing on moving from all upper case letters to the more standard initial upper case and the remainder being lower case. Our cutting skills have been moving right along as well. We brought out putty a couple of times to help strengthen the fine muscles that help us write.
Our specials were so fun! We had Spanish with Mrs. Nugent. We are learning about foods! In the woods, we explored a creek bed and were fascinated about an insect that looked like a tine white fairy. We rock and rolled with Teacher Q in music class.
Be sure to fill out the field trip form for the Honey Haven Farm scheduled for September 28th. Money can be sent in folders, or handed to me at drop off/pick up.
Pictures from our week: https://photos.app.goo.gl/Wm5CHzna9N4LryPZ9
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Mrs. Ankrum's PreK 