Teddy Bear Picnic

    The 5 Senses Bear helped us to learn about our senses - hearing (bell), sight (googly eyes), smell (cotton ball with perfume), taste (gum)  and feeling (sand paper).

    

      After reading Brown Bear, Brown Bear last week, we made our own class book titled, Kindergarten, Kindergarten, What Do You See?  This is a popular book at our Read a Book time.

     We couldn't have a bear theme without reading Goldilocks and The Three Bears.   We read different versions of the story and retold the story using magnets, drawings, and acting.  The concept of big, medium and large was reinforced by cutting and pasting a matrix using chairs, bowls and beds of Papa, Mama and Baby Bear.

     A Kindergarten standard is to distinguish fact from fiction.  We used the bears to help us with this standard.  Discussing the differences from real bears and fiction bears was quite interesting.  Our class participated in a Family Project to find three facts about bears, write them down using a source at home and return our findings to school. 

     We read the book, A Hunting We Will Go and made a class book using the frame, "We'll catch a ______ and put him in a ________".  This gave us the opportunity to learn about rhyming words.

    

     We concluded our bear theme with a Teddy Bear picnic.  Students brought their bear to school for the day, and the bears participated in many activities during the day with us.

     When it was time for the Teddy Bear Picnic, we took our bears and went on a honey hunt around the room.  Baggies with Honey Comb cereal, goldfish, teddy grams and gummy bears were hidden around the room.  The students and their bear had to find their snack and gather together outside for the picnic.  At the picnic, we had our bear snacks and glasses of milk.   Many of our parents were able to join us at the event.

     Our letter this week was S.  Sammy Snake, our Zoo-phonics animal, is a favorite of a lot of the students.  For one activity, we cut out the pictures that started with the sound of S and glued them into our "suitcase".  

    

      Tomorrow we start the week with Pocket Day!

      Picture day is Wednesday, Sept. 26.  Please return your picture envelope to me if you wish to purchase pictures.

Bears

     


     Most of my Kindergarten teaching centers around themes.  I find themes, besides being familiar and fun, provide us with many opportunities for learning.  Last week was all about Bears.  Using bears, we practiced colors, directional words, patterns and counting.

    Brown Bear, Brown Bear by Bill Martin Jr. started the week. We sequenced the characters in the book using magnet pieces.  We cut and colored our own pieces and placed them in a bag to keep so we could retell the story at home.  

     We had fun chanting the story frame using the students' names.  "Mary, Mary, who do you see?"  "I see Johnny looking at me."

     Using circles, we learned how to draw a bear.  Drawing builds confidence while improving fine motor muscles.

     We learned our first nursery rhyme of the year - Fuzzy Wuzzy.  Go here to watch a cute Fuzzy Wuzzy video with your child.  This video is from the Between the Lions television series.

     We have a poem every week.  On Friday, the class uses the poem to complete word work (highlight all the letter B's, find the rhyming words, illustrate the poem, etc.)  The poems are kept in a Poem Book so that at the end of the year, the students will have a collection of our Kindergarten poems to keep.

     Our color word for the month of September is brown.  We listed things that are brown and learned a song that helps us spell the word.

     The first letter to come to class was the letter B. Bubba Bear brought the letter.  We worked very hard all week to identify words that started with a B sound.  We practiced writing both the capital and small letters.  When forming our letters, we always start at the top and "dive down".

      We made Bubba Bear out of a capital B.  We made another bear using B items - buttons, beans and bows.

     A Kindergarten standard is to distinguish fact from fiction.  We used the bears to help us with this standard.  Discussing the differences from real bears and story book bears was quite interesting.  Our class participated in a Family Project to find three facts about bears, write them down using a source at home and return our findings to school. 

     We learned the  "by heart" word, see.   We wrote in our writing journals, "I see a bear." 

     In Math, we used our bear manipulatives to practice sorting, counting and positional words.

     Next week, we continue with the bear theme.  We will read Goldilocks and the Three Bears, Corduroy,  A Hunting We will Go  and  The Teddy Bear's Picnic.  We will finish up this very fun unit with a Teddy Bear Picnic on Friday afternoon.  The students need to bring their Teddy Bears to school that day.

     

Peacemakers

     Our class continued to discuss rules important to our classroom.  We added to our posters, Peacemakers and Peacebreakers.

          

     We read Miss Bindergarten Gets Ready for Kindergarten.  The class shared what each of us did to get ready for school.  

     We started our Zoo-phonics program this week.  Zoo-phonics is a kinesthetic method for teaching letters and sounds.  This phonics program involves the child's eyes, ears, mouth and body as they signal and make the sound for all the letters of the alphabet.  Over the years, the students have learned the letter sounds very quickly.

     While we practice and learn all the letter sounds each day, over the weeks, each animal will be individually introduced and bring the letter and sound to our classroom.  This week, Bubba Bear will bring the B.

     Much of my teaching centers around themes.  I find themes, besides being familiar and fun, provide us with many opportunities for learning.  Next week, we are starting our Teddy Bear theme.  Using bears, we will learn and practice colors, directional words, patterns,  counting and many other skills.  We will end the bear unit in two weeks with a Teddy Bear picnic.

     In Math, we will use our bear manipulatives to practice counting, sorting and patterning. 

    Besides our letters and sounds, our class is learning "by heart" words (words that we know on sight). Our list includes:

                                  name     no     yes     I

     This week we will add the by heart word, see.