Couple quick videos!

I wanted to show these two videos!  The first video is of the students partner teaching each other about what they know about writing an informational report. 

The next video, I love how this student takes her time to solve the problem!  Awesome!!!

Informational Reports, Math and Independent Work

We have been working on our 2D and 3D shapes.  Shapes are everywhere!!  Our Kindergarten students can analyze, describe and compare 2D shapes and 3D shapes.  They can explain if a 3D shape has flat faces or curved surfaces.  They can describe how many sides/corners 2D shapes have!  Did you know you can use rectangles to make a square?  Or that you can use triangles to make a diamond?  Or squares to make a rectangle?  The Kindergarteners do!!  Check out the awesome art work they created showing that shapes are everywhere!  They can also segment the word:Everywhere....every and where... 

Happy Leaners!

We have been gearing up for Monday, February 4^th which is our 100^th day of school!  It has been an incredible first 100 days of school.  These students are truly the best students any teacher could ever wish for!  We have been preparing with some fun writing prompts.  Students finished the sentences “When I am 100 years old, I will ……” and “If I had 100 dollars, I would buy….”.  I’m sure you could imagine, the responses were fantastic!  The students would buy a batman cave, toy aliens, real aliens, puppies, cereal, a member to animal jam, etc!  The students said that when they are 100 years old, they will be an old lady, a Grandpa, be bald, have fake teeth, that I won’t know anything, that I will retire from being a rocket scientist, that I will be able to take my teeth in and out of my mouth.” 

The last couple weeks we have been learning and getting smart on the topic of Information Reports.  Students have learned that in order to write a good report, we must first read and get smart on the topic.  Students also learned that a topic can be lots of different things.  Once we read up on our topic, we can then begin to write.  To write a good report we must include: a picture, title, topic sentence and facts to support the topic sentence and title.  After much discussion and learning about Information Reports, we took our first try at writing an Informational Report.  The students all wrote a report on the same topic.  The topic was Fairy Penguins.  Students did an excellent job working through the long writing process.  Some of my speedy writers even got to type their report on the computer! 

The above video is one of the ENDLESS reasons I LOVE teaching these kids!  I am ALWAYS laughing!!!

Speed writers get their first chance at typing their Informational Report!

We have added some “independent work” to our Math centers.  I was so excited to see students picking out their own written assignments to complete before they would move onto to the next station.  They did a fantastic job working independently!  They always do an excellent job working with a partner in math centers; I should have guessed that the transition to independent work would be seamless!    

The students never cease to amaze me!  We have only been working on addition and subtraction word problems for a week, and the students are already becoming pros at it!  (The video below shows a student working on an addition word problem.  There was a technical difficulty at the end, however, she was showing her work correctly (even though using your fingers to solve is a-okay too!) and got the problem right as soon as I fixed the SMART board! 

The Lonely Pirate!

 

 

 

We had a fantastic surprise this week! (Students above are showing their surprised face!)  One of our very own students was the author and illustrator of their own book. The book was titled “The Lonely Pirate”. The student helped Mrs. Kressin read the story to the class. The Meta cognitive strategy we were working on that day was “Asking questions”. The questions could be direct and easily answered by looking in the text or they could be questions you have think or search to find the answer. The Lonely Pirate was a great book. The students had so many questions as we followed the main character, the lonely pirate. The beginning of the book began with a lonely pirate all alone on a ship. In the middle of the book, the pirate crashed into an island. On this island there were more pirates. At the end of the book, the pirates on the island became the lonely pirate’s friend and he was no longer lonely. J The students were so interested in the book; they came up with the most outstanding questions before reading the book, during the reading and after the reading!

 

After Reading:"I wonder if he is going to have fun with his new pirate friends?"

During Reading: "I wonder if he is going to make new friends on the island?" 

After Reading: "I wonder if there is going to be a Lonely Pirate Part 2?" 

Before Reading: "Did his crew get eaten by sharks?"

During Reading: "I wonder if they will all go hunting?"

digraphs, composing and decomposing numbers, >,<,=

Between last week and the beginning of this week, we have been reviewing everything that we learned prior to break and the entire second quarter.  I was pleasantly surprised that the students were still masters of most of the learning we had accomplished before break.  For phonics we have been working hard at blending (putting together sounds and words) and segmenting (breaking apart sounds and words).  We have worked on the digraphs “th, sh, and wh”.   The students get excited now when they see “sh” , I hear, “Mrs. Kressin look its sh which says shhhhhhh.” J  They are such quick learners!  If you want to see some fun movements for each digraph, ask the students to show you at home! J (Like I said in the previous blog, I am still trying to figure out why this blog site won’t let me upload pictures and videos like I use to, but when I do I will be adding some FANTASTIC videos.)

In Math the students have been working on composing and decomposing numbers.  When we are decomposing numbers we are putting them into groups of tens and ones.  Many students can look at a number now, say 56, and tell you that they will need 5 groups of tens and 6 ones.  Their learning was accelerated by competition.  The entire class raced against Mrs. Kressin to decompose 105 blocks into groups of tens and ones.  It took them a couple tries to beat my original time, but they prevailed!  One thing I try to constantly remind the Kindergarteners is to believe in themselves.  Sometimes at this age (some people are this way at any age but…) students are quick to doubt their ability.  (i.e. “we’ll never beat Mrs. Kressin…”)  I always tell the students they can do anything they put their mind too, it will just take some practice!  I have been decomposing blocks into groups of tens and ones for years! (haha…not exactly true, but I also have some fantastic problem solving skills, that they will develop in years to come. J)  Anyways, I love watching their confidence soar in every aspect of their life, as well as with their math and reading skills. 

A few minor changes have been made so some of our centers.  One of the favorite math centers is “building cups” I had always asked the students once they built their towers to use “math talk” to discuss which tower had more cups or less and in turn which number was greater than or less than.  Now I don’t have the students discuss this, they have to write the statement on the board correctly labeling it with >,<, or + symbol.  Here is a picture of the students working at this center.  They found that 28 is less than 30. (28<30).  If the students need help remembering, they know that the alligator always eats the bigger number. J

The Polar Express came to Kindergarten!

Hello families,

 

I know this blog is a few weeks late, but in my defense, me and my family have only been home for 3 nights at our home since December 20th! I am so ready to be back home and back to some normalcy and teaching! I hope everyone had a fantastic break and got to spend some quality time with their families.  I have also been having some technical difficulties with this blog.  It has not been allowing me to upload any of my videos.  I'm going to keep trying but for now all I have are pictures.   Before we left for break, we celebrated with viewing “The Polar Express”.   Although we were able to enjoy the movie with some special hot cocoa and marshmallows, we still had some learning to do.  To align with common core standards, we identified the characters, setting and major events of the movie. 




We compared and contrasted the similarities and differences between the book and the movie.  The students also identified real-life connections between words and acted out the meaning of that word and similar words.  For example, as we were watching the movie, I would pause to have the students act out the words: “outstretched, flickered, pranced, hissing, aboard, etc.)  There are so many times in books, stories, movies, and in every day conversation that we pass right over words that we assume that young people know and if you stop and ask them if they know what they word is, they will let you know.  (Another example, many students in class did not understand what the word “text” meant, so we spent some time discussing that text is really a fancy word for words in a book, magazine, etc.) 

 

The students got to open their presents from Mrs. Kressin and pass out their goodies to their friends. I must extend a gracious thank you to everyone!  I loved my gifts, especially the homemade notes and written letters of appreciation.   I will cherish them FOREVER!!!  Thank you.   

MAP testing done, done and done! :)

                                                       How much did you like the book???

 Last week as you know a majority of our week was spent MAP testing.  We had a special reading party with the book, “The Polar Express”.  The students were allowed to wear their pajamas, they needed a fun outlet during all that testing!  I also thought on Thursday after we finished our final MAP test, the kids were very deserving of a ONE SONG DANCE PARTY! 

Check out these kids, they are the best! The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree! Hehe...I have to extend a gracious THANK YOU to the parents who volunteered to help with our crafts!

 

 We were able to get all of our crafts done in one hour thanks to the help of the parents stepping up to the challenge of running their own craft center!  The students loved it and are sooo excited to give their gifts to their families! 

 This week in school, we have been working really hard on using descriptive words to make sentences better.  When describing different things we can use our senses to helps us come up with words.  What does the thing look like, taste like, smell like, sound like, feel like, what does it make you feel like?   Instead of students writing in their journal, “I like cake.”  We are working on writing “I like chocolate, pink, round, yummy cake!”  That sentence is a little extreme, but we are trying to add at least one descriptive word to each sentence. 

We are still working away in Guided Reading groups.  Working on “I wonder…” statements, as well as, “This makes me think of…..a time in my life when….or another book…or a movie….or anything that it reminds the students of.”  Getting the students to think about what they are reading is huge.  Any text to life connection they can make is fantastic!  We have also been focusing on IDENTIFYING and DESCRIBING characters, setting and major events of a text.  I always ask the students to give me their answers in complete sentences!  Complete sentences are my favorite! 

Math centers are still going strong too.  I am so excited for the break, I plan to revamp some of our Math centers.  Our math scores on MAP testing were outstanding, so there is some “proof in the pudding” that our guided math system is working!  However, I am so excited to take students to the next level with their math skills second half of the year.  Some of the students have began analyzing numbers.  Looking at number 24 for example, and being able to tell me that there are 2 groups of 10 that really equal 20, and 4 ones that equal four.  We are just introducing this concept.  The students have been “racing” Mrs. Kressin to see who can sort out a specific number of building cubes (say 38) into the correct groups of tens and ones.  Some students are not ready for place value yet, and we are working on gaining that solid foundation of addition. 

We reviewed greater than, less than and equal to this week, but took it up a notch.  Now instead of just saying it, the students are now writing their own numbers and symbols.  For example, the student were given two numbers and they needed to correctly label it with the >,<,= symbol.  Students would have to fill in the blank and then “read” what it said.  Students would write something like 5>2, and then read to the class, 5 is greater than 2.   After the students have sorted all the problems in the room.  We read through them in the class and make sure they were sorted correctly.  Students got so good at this, that the second time we practiced they got them all correct!   There were over 30 different problems they had to correctly label and sort!  Awesome!!

We started some of our Holiday celebration today and I got some great pictures!!!  I am going to wait to post all of the holiday pictures and videos together though.  I hope we have school tomorrow! 

Keep reading on www.raz-kids.com !!!!  Click on the link, then go to student login.  Then for Teacher Name it is: ovkressin, click on my name.  Then click on your students name and read away!!! :)

Awesome Math and Science Website!

Hello Families,

A teacher's (and mother's) mind rarely turns off that is why I am up so early typing this blog! :)  This week since we are having MAP testing, I wanted to take the opportunity to teach science for a portion of our week.  We have started talking about the Solar System and why we have day and night.  Brainpop jr is a great website that I use frequently in class, however you have to pay for it.  I wanted to recommend a website for your student and older siblings that I love.

http://studyjams.scholastic.com/studyjams/index.htm 

It is a website dedicated to MATH and SCIENCE.  They have great videos, slide shows and quizzes you can take to test you knowledge for each concept.  I thought it may be a little over the Kindergarteners heads, but I decided to show them the slide show of the planets and I did my own commentary for each picture and the students were AMAZED!!!  I'm so glad I didn't listen to my first instinct and not show them.  The students are really picking up the knowledge of our solar system.  A student brought in a book that we read for our read aloud that had fantastic illustrations!  Each student then got to "be" a planet, and we practiced orbited the sun and keeping the correct distance between planets.  However, my room, was not working out so well for us, (we need more room!), so next week we will head down to the gym to get a better understanding of it. 

Below you will see the introductory lesson to the solar system.  We focused on the Earth and the Sun.  Students were not understanding what "orbit" meant.  We practiced some movements to help us make a connection.  After I turned the video off, the Earth needed to sit down, they were dizzy!  haha!

Hope you like the website!

Mrs. Kressin