Highlights from our week…
I can’t believe this week will mark the middle of March already! It was another fun and full week in Kindergarten! We celebrated Eli’s birthday, watched Bodhi’s up in lights presentation, I was a mystery reader for a 4th grade class and a mystery teacher, (Maestra Ruiz from 4th grade) read to us, and we welcomed three friends from the Philippines in our chapel on Friday morning. I have been taking advantage of every moment of “down time” to assess your kids in preparation for conferences. I’ve been enjoying this special time to check in and I’m looking forward to sharing this progress with you next week at our conference!
Important Dates:
- March 15: Wear black and bring a flashlight to school! (We’ll have a black out day to celebrate March is reading month!)
- March 20: Parent Teacher Conferences- no school
- March 21: Parent Teacher Conferences PM- full day of school
- March 24: Garden Crossings field trip (AM only- I will send a SignUp Genius out soon.)
Important Announcements:
- Black Out Day: This week Wednesday (March 15) we will celebrate reading by wearing black! Additionally, if you’d like to send your kindergartner with a flashlight, we will read in the DARK!
- Conference Sign Up: Click here for sign up instructions for conferences. The website is now open! Unless you have been notified from our CLC, please only sign up for ONE 15 minute time slot. Thank you!
- Spring Conference Questionnaire: Please answer any or all of the questions here to help me better prepare for our time together. I’m looking forward to celebrating your child with you!
- Field trips sign up: If you haven’t already done so, please check out the field trip SignUp Genius for some opportunities to join us on some special field trips. Please follow this link.
- New Attendance/Absentee Email: Please e-mail attendance@zcs.org and copy ME to report an absence. Please include the student name, teacher, and reason for absence in the body of the e-mail. Thanks!
Check out how much we’re learning and growing in Christ!
Bible: We began our unit on Jesus’ Parables this week! We learned that a parable is a story Jesus used to teach his followers something important. We will be creating a parable bag with a small craft or tangible object to help us remember and retell the parables. At the end of the unit I know your child will be so excited to show this to you!
(Our next Bible verse comes from the Easter story. Because Easter isn’t on the same date every year, we sometimes have a time “gap” between our most recent verse (Matthew 7:7) and the Easter verse. This year that happens to be the case. Enjoy this time “off” to review previous verses and maybe even learn a new one as a family! Thanks for being flexible!)
Literacy: This week we talked about reflexive verbs. This kind of verb is used to express that one does an action to oneself. Often they are used when we talk about routines. For example, I get myself dressed, I brush my teeth, I wash my hands.
- Reading strategy: Inferring
- Read aloud: Corduroy
- Vocabulary words
- la tienda (store)
- la gente (people)
- el botón (button)
- la muñeca (doll)
- los pantalones (pants)
- Word wall word: muy (very)
- Phrase of the week: Yo fui al ____. I’m went to ____.
- Letter of the week: Ññ
Math: Our math time this week was spent working on a practice worksheet to reinforce several important skills including: finding groups of 5 in bigger numbers, adding, and subtracting. We also learned to identify two sets of object as equal or not equal.
Writing Workshop: I am so proud of the way your kids have taken off as amazing writers this week! We began a unit on Small Moments. We are practicing telling true stories from one moment and one place. First we visualize the small moment, then we practice retelling it using our fingers for the parts of the story, and finally we write the story!
Handwriting Without Tears: This week we practiced numbers 8, 9, and 0 on the chalkboards with wet sponges, dry paper towels, and chalk. Then we put our knowledge in context by completing our teen number book pages for 18, 19, and 20. Hopefully you saw these come home! Your kids should be very proud of themselves!
Up in Lights: Bodhi was Up in Lights this week. He introduced us to his mom, dad, and two younger brothers. Bodhi loves the smell of suckers and anything Disney and princess. He can probably put a puzzle together better than anyone I’ve ever seen! We are so thankful for you, Bodhi! Thanks for being Up in Lights this week!
From the immersion coordinator: Do you teach a specific dialect of the language or have a preference of where the native speaking teachers come from? No, we do not focus on dialects or specific regions where Spanish or Mandarin is spoken. Actually, we prefer to expose our students to as much variety as possible when it comes to variations in the languages. This helps the students gain a more diverse vocabulary, better comprehension skills, and a broader command of colloquialisms. In fact, just this week I watched a group of 2nd graders realize that peanut butter has a different name in Ecuador than in México.