Summer is Here!

I cannot believe this year has come and gone!   Each child has grown so much in their own way and is so very ready to move on to first grade...we are so proud of them!  The beautiful thing about NDLC is that we have the chance to see the boys and girls often as they move throughout the grades and grow as learners...how lucky are we?!

Here are some tips and resources to keep those little brains reading, writing and thinking about math this summer!

Below are links to book lists at different levels. 

Reminder: The reading level that is listed on the report card is your child's instructional level. Use the Matching Books to Readers sheet to better understand what your reader can be doing at each level.  

An updated Matching Books to Readers sheet for your child's current level was sent home in folders on Tuesday!

Levels C-I

Levels H-M

Here are some reading and writing choices! 

• Read 20 minutes out of your book bag/box
• Have a family member read aloud to you or take turns reading to each other
• Look at the writing you’ve done lately and set some goals.  Write them down and keep them next to you when you write 
• Write a book recommendation for a friend or family member
• Call a family member and tell him or her about your reading or writing goals
• Help write a grocery list 
• Write a poem for someone
• Read book reviews online and make a list of “must-reads”
• Find a friend and read the same book.  Set goals and make a plan to chat 
• Have a “reading marathon” - gather up a bunch of books, magazines and or newspapers, and read until you need to stop
• Spend time writing a mystery/fantasy/historical fiction/sci fi/realistic fiction story
• Draw a picture and write labels and give it to a friend or family member
• Make a comic strip
• Read a video game “cheat” book
• Read and follow the directions for a game
• Research something for your family 
• Write a letter to convince someone to do or think something
• Write a survey question and ask people their opinion and then use this in a piece of writing
• Read and follow a recipe
• Write a “how-to” for someone in your family or a friend
• Reread your favorite picture book
• Read a story to a sister or brother 
• Read a story to someone on the phone
• Write a play 
• Take a scene from your book and write a script 
• Write a letter to a friend or family member that lives far away
• Write questions and interview someone.  Take notes during your interview!
• Plan a trip (real or made-up) by researching places to go, things to see, and how you’ll get there
• Read to a pet or stuffed animal

Math Ideas

• Games with subitizing cards. 
• Top it. Split a deck of cards with different dot patterns on them. Player 1 and Player 2 will both lay a card down.  Then, they will determine which player’s card is greater. The player with the greater card will get both of the cards. If the players lay cards with the same number of dots, they will flip another card to see who has the greater card.  For a challenge each player can flip two cards, find the sum and then compare.
• Subitizing Game: To play, you need two players. a game board and tiles/counters to cover each of the subitizing patterns on the board. Once the board is covered with tiles, player 1 points to a tile and player 2 lifts the tile for one second. Player one then has to say how many dots they saw. If they get it correct, they keep the tile, if not the tile is replaced. Player 2 then has a turn. this continues until all tiles are removed, the winner is the person with the  most tiles at the end of the game. Here is a link to a gameboard. 
• Use playing cards to play Memory. They will pick a card with a number 1-10. Then they will need to find the partner to ten. 
• Here is a link to a five frame computer game. 
• This website has TONS of helpful links. Keep in mind that adding, subtracting and structuring within 10 will help your child be ready for First Grade! 

Weekly News May 23-27

This week begins our GOOD BYE countdown to the end of the school year :(.

There will be special dress up days and snacks (I will provide those) and activities each day to help us celebrate a super year!

The days are:

May 23rd G: Green Bay gear and grapes

May 24th O: Orange (wear orange) and oranges

May 25th O: Odd day and Oreos

May 26th D: Dot Day (wear dots) and Dot art
May 31st B: Book buddies and Blue (wear blue)
June 1st Y: Yummy Popsicles and Yoga (dress comfy)
June 2nd E: Exercise gear 

Upcoming Dates:
**Just a reminder to send in your child's field day slip ASAP**

May 23: Family Event at the Kaukauna Public Library 6-7pm

May 26: 1/2 Day--Dismissal at 11:30

May 27 and 30: No School

June 1: Mini Course Morning and Field Day Afternoon

June 2: Last Day of School--1/2 Day for Students

Reading:  This week we will bring our books to life by reading them like story tellers and acting them out for our partners and eventually, the entire class.  We will really use what we have learned about studying our characters to be sure we are using the appropriate expressions, feelings and actions.  I know the boys and girls will LOVE this work.

Writing:  We wrapped up our true story unit on Friday and will taking these last days of school to dabble with fiction writing.  We will learn to make up a name for a character, put them in a place and then imagine what might happen to them in that place.  We will strengthen these fictional stories by adding feelings, actions and words for our characters too.  

Math:  This week we will explore a new measuring concept: capacity.  We will work with various items and  different size containers and be making predictions about which container we think will fit the most or least and will then test out our thinking,  We will also be working one last time and modeling teen numbers in many ways to make them easy to distinguish.  We may even take some time to review important concepts by playing some of our favorite math games one last time!

Science: We will use all of the information we have gathered about balls and ramps and how they work and will be designing our own ramp experiments.  Our goal will be to draw a blue print for our ramp and then decide what we want the "job" of our ramp to be, build the ramp with various tools (pool noodles, paper tubes, boards) and possibly even video tape these experiments.  It will be a great way to wrap up our last Kindergarten science unit.  

Weekly News May 16-20

It seems as though Mother Nature is playing tricks on us with the mix of sun and rain and warm and cool temperatures...we are hoping for sunshine from here on out!  It is crazy that we are entering into our last FULL week of the school year!   As the year wraps up and many fun activities come into play, we continue to be impressed with the students' motivation to keep learning and growing!  How lucky are we to work with these kiddos?!

Upcoming Dates:

May 23: Family Event at the Kaukauna Public Library 6-7pm

May 26: 1/2 Day--Dismissal at 11:30

May 27 and 30: No School

June 1: Field Day Afternoon

June 2: Last Day of School--1/2 Day for Students

Reading: This unit on characters has been so much fun so far!  This week we will continue to study characters, but will also focus on the setting and the role that has in the way the character talks and acts.  We will also review using the picture to help us decode new words and make sure they make sense in the story.  We will wrap up the week by focusing on retelling our stories part by part and using important details about what the character said, did and felt.

Writing:  This week we will enlist the help of an editor to make our writing the best it can be!  We will spend 2 days working with a partner to revise our true stories and make sure they include: a beginning, a setting, a big character feeling or action and and an ending.  We will also have our editor check for neat printing, correct sight word spelling, punctuation and using ALMOST all lower case letters.  

Math:  This week our centers will be all about measuring and comparing!  We review concepts of comparing quantity and will explore different ways to measure and compare length.  We will also be working to solidify equation writing and recognizing we can write equations more than one way (2+3=5 or 5=2+3) and will take one more look at partners of numbers 2-10.

Our math centers will be:

• taking inventory of and comparing the contents in various bags of classroom objects
• writing about the counting strategy we used when taking inventory
• using a stick of 10 cubes to measure objects in the classroom and sharing our finding through writing
• creating our own book of measuring comparisons

Science:  This week we will conduct official "trials" to measure the effectiveness of ramps and balls.  
We will work in three different centers:

• One to observe and compare how ramp height affects the distance a ball rolls
• One to observe and compare how the size of a ball impacts the distance it can roll
• One to observe and compare how the weight of a ball impacts the distance it can roll

Word Work:  We will be spending the remainder of the school year reviewing sight words we have learned in fun ways.  We will also work to ensure we can transfer our knowledge of all these words in both our reading and writing! 

Friday Fun

We had a busy and eventful Friday!!

This morning we celebrated Mrs.Mares who will be graduating from UW-Oshkosh this weekend!!  We wrote her a special poem and performed it for her and also made her a 'designer' graduation cap!!!

This afternoon we enjoyed cookie decorated put on by the PSC for out KAT celebration!  

I apologize for sending them home sugared up on this rainy Friday!!!

Weekly Update May 9-13

We are feeling a bit in denial about the impending wrapping up of this wonderful school year together in kindergarten, but are very much looking forward to a couple week of 'normalcy,' or as close to it as possible. We have a two small presentations this week, one by the National Theatre for Children sponsored by WPPI Energy and KK Utilities focusing on Energy Conservation and another by the Kaukauana Public Library about the Summer Reading Program.  We will wrap up the week with a fun, school-wide celebration of a successful Knowledge-a-thon!

Don't forget to check out the May School and Specialist Newsletters!

Upcoming Dates:
May 12: Trail and Tailgate Family Night

May 23: Family Event at the Kaukauna Public Library 6-7pm

May 26: 1/2 Day--Dismissal at 11:30

May 27 and 30: No School

June 1: Field Day Afternoon

June 2: Last Day of School--1/2 Day for Students

Reading: We will begin our last reading unit this week which focuses on getting to know characters by performing books. We will learn to describe our characters and notice their feelings and actions in a story, or perhaps a series of stories, to get to know them like they are friends for life.  We will study the cover illustration, titles, and even the back of book for clues about the main characters as well as link the words and pictures on multiple pages of the story together to build our understanding.  We will put all of this character information together by acting like the character with our reading partners.

Writing: We will continue to work hard to bring our true stories to life this week!  Particularly we will pay close attention to illustrations that give the reader more details and then using our improved illustrations to push our selves to add more details in our words.  We will also be aiming to tell small parts of the story bit by bit to improve our elaboration skills.  As always we are working to make sure our writing looks neat and includes correctly spelled sight words and punctuation, 

Math:  As we approach the end of the year we are finding multiple ways to practice and refine the skills expected of Kindergarten (almost first grade) students.  A great deal of this work includes working and talking with a partner to explain our thinking.  This week we will work to become more automatic with recognizing numbers that come before and after a given number,  reading a number statement from left to right and being able to distinguish greater than, less than or equal to when comparing the numbers and also to add and subtract numbers within 5 fluently.  Our math centers this week will be:

• playing +1/-1 speed with partner
• using double dice to compare numbers
• use a ten frame to represent subtraction problems
• playing 5 frame Go Fish

Science:  This week we will start exploring building our own ramps using MarbleWorks, looking and pictures of various ramps and drawing diagrams, and testing out various ramps built with wood and blocks.  Students are excited to start building their own ramps after we watched a video last week of another child building a ramp.  Don't be surprised if you start to see some ramp construction around your home!

Word Work:  We will spend one more week on these sight words: they, first, next, last.  All four of these words are words that we are currently using to tell and write our true stories.  We enjoyed the beautiful weather on Friday by writing our sight words with chalk.  This could also be done with past sight words, rhyming words, family names, etc.  Another fun idea might be to get a bucket of water and a paintbrush to paint the words on your driveway. 

Weekly Update May 2-6

Here's to hoping that May will bring regular warm temperatures along with the usual May flowers and fun events as we move towards the end of the year.  New blank, orange homework calendars will come home with your child on Monday.  Please choose literacy options from the back of the calendar to complete about three nights a week and return the calendar to school with your child on Fridays so we can share our adventures in reading and writing.  You can find the lunch menu here.

Upcoming Dates:
May 3: PALS Testing (Mrs. Flanagan will be our Guest Teacher)

May 12: Trail and Tailgate Family Night--more info coming home on Monday, RSVP is due back Friday, May 6th!

May 23: Family Event at the Kaukauna Public Library 6-7pm

May 26: 1/2 Day--Dismissal at 11:30

May 27 and 30: No School

June 1: Field Day--Stay tuned for more info, but if you are thinking about volunteering and will need a background check, please let us know ASAP!  Thanks!

June 2: Last Day of School--1/2 Day for Students

Reading: This last week of our Avid Readers unit will feel like a celebration as we focus our lens on reading poems.  We will use poems that we have learned throughout the year as well as a few new poems and think about how to read them by matching our voices to the rhythm and feel of the poem.  This will also be a great time to work on our phrasing and fluency--aka, not reading like a robot. We will try our hand at writing our own copycat poems to the tune or rhythm of well-known songs before wrapping up and celebrating with a day of poetry centers.

Writing: This week we will use a beloved story, Kunffle Bunny, to study the components of a true story and how another author uses them.  We will work to improve beginnings and endings to our stories and will also add character dialogue and feelings to make our stories more interesting to readers.  Using setting and character actions will be another way to push us to write more and more in our stories.  

Math:  Our math thinking will be pushed this week as we work to refine and master many different concepts we have covered this school year.  We will explore the various ways to compare and classify objects while keeping  mind important buzz words like: length, height, taller, shorter, more, less, heavier and lighter.  Explaining our thinking when we compare objects will also be important...math talk really helps us to understand our thinking.  We will also compare numbers by quantity using the terms greater than and less than.  Reviewing shape orientation and placement of the equal sign in equations will also be focused on this week.  Our centers will be:

• creating shapes and then doing a little writing about their attributes
• using dice to add and build towers to show the added quantity for numbers 2-12
• using ten frames to solve addition and subtraction equations
• using the iPad to listen directions and then build and draw using shape and position words

Science:  We will make our own balls this week and use what we learned about how balls moved based on the material they are made of, weight, and size to help us.  We will also test how our creations move and bounce.  Then we will move on to learning about and exploring ramps.  We plan to find and explore some large scale ramps in the gym or on the playground to build some background knowledge on the topic.

Word Work:  Our last round of new sightwords for the next two weeks are: they, first, next, last.  All four of these words are words that we are currently using to tell and write our true stories.  

Weekly Update for April 25-29

Whew!  After a busy week and many schedule changes last week, we are looking forward to a normal week in Kindergarten!  Of course the thing we are looking forward to even more than that is welcoming Mrs. Hixon back this Friday!  We cannot believe that this is the last week of April...meaning May and the end of the year are right around the corner.  We will start the PALS (Phonological Awareness Literacy Screener) assessment on Friday as well and will finish next week Tuesday.  

Upcoming Dates:
April 29: Mrs. Hixon returns
April 29 and May 3: PALS Testing

May 12: Family Night

May 23: Family Event at the Kaukauna Public Library

May 26: 1/2 Day--Dismissal at 11:30

May 27 and 30: No School

June 1: Field Day--Stay tuned for more info, but if you are thinking about volunteering and will need a background check, please let us know ASAP!  Thanks!

June 2: Last Day of School--1/2 Day for Students

Reading: Our current reading unit focuses on many types of texts.  The last two weeks have focused on fiction texts, the next week or so we will switch back to nonfiction, and then wrap up this unit by falling in love with poetry.  Students have been having a BLAST in their reading playdates, which have taken the place of our partnership time for this units.  A personal favorite is when students choose to "play school" and are reading aloud to each other, pretending to be the teacher and inviting their peers to 'turn and talk' about various things in the text!  We will learn that we can also have reading playdates with nonfiction book and perhaps even decide to become a group of experts on one topic.  

Writing: Students will be learning that authors are always re-reading their writing and asking themselves if it looks right, sounds right and makes sense.  Just like we use strategies in reading for tricky words, we can also use strategies in writing for tricky words. Things like stretching the word's letters, checking our alphabet chart if we need to, making sure every word has at least one vowel, and listening for letters that work together to make their own sound…these are called blends. Finally, we will talk about how writers get ideas for their stories from other writers. We will do this is by studying how an author starts a story and trying that out in our own story.

Math: This week students will practice equalizing groups by adding and finding partners of 7, 8, and 9. Number activities will include showing numbers 1-20 and teen numbers as groups of ten ones and further ones, finding the unknown partner when the total and one partner are known, and finding the total of two partners. We will also be reviewing 2D shapes and comparing story problems with more and less.

Science:  We will continue to compare balls this week and experiment with their bounciness by testing how various balls bounce on different surfaces and how many times they bounce.  We will also use straws to test how easy it is to move different types of balls using our own wind.

Word Work:  We are continuing to focus on these sight words: were, now, saw, our, made.  One of our new favorite word work games is getting a cup with magnetic letters in it that will spell one of the sightwords.  Students must figure out what word it will spell and of course spell it.  You could recreate this at home with magnetic letters or by simply having your child write sightwords on slips of paper and cutting apart the letters.