Propósito (Purpose) Ephesians 2:10 "For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do."
I’m so grateful for the opportunity to meet with you all last week! Touching base with you, praying with and for your families, and sharing your child’s progress with you was definitely a highlight of my week. Thank you for making our conference a priority and creating the time in your schedule!
Important Dates
November 21: Picture Trading
November 21: Chapel 1:00
November 22-24: Thanksgiving Break
Reminders
Picture Trading: In celebration of Thanksgiving we will trade pictures of ourselves with our friends. This lesson will go along with our brief learning about the First Thanksgiving. Please send in wallet size photos or 4×6 size photos of JUST your child. Your child will need to bring in 19 copies. Often Meijer or Snapfish will run a deal with photos costing just a few cents. I am informing you early, with hopes you can find a deal somewhere. 🙂 We will trade photos on November 21st.
Helpful Links from the Office:
2017-2018 ZCS Family Directory: The ZCS Family Directory contains staff, Board members, and family contact information as well as class lists. The directory remains in Google Docs, has been fully updated, and will continue to reflect the most current information. Please email zcsinfo@zcs.org to request changes or updates. (Remember to take notice of the tabs across the bottom of the document for easy access to each section!)
2017-2018 ZCS Family Handbook: The ZCS Family Handbook contains information such as school start times, cancellations and delays, calendar, dress code, hot lunch information, etc. It can be found on the ZCS Parents page. Scroll down to find the link.
Curriculum
Bible: We began our unit on Joseph last week. We talked his family’s dynamics, his colorful tunic and the way his brothers responded out of jealousy and anger. We learned about the dreams God gave him and the way God never left Joseph even when things were hard and scary. While I’m confident from the video I shared last week that your child knows the last memory verse, we haven’t celebrated with certificates yet. I hope to do that this week and then begin our next Bible verse, Proverbs 3:5-6.
Literacy: Daily 5 is going very well! As I mentioned to several of you at our conference, the kids have been working so hard on learning the structure and routines of this important learning time. They are working fairly independently and are pretty self-sufficient. I am excited to begin meeting more consistently with small guided reading groups! Beginning this coming Friday every child will bring home a book bag with literacy activities to practice at home. This is highly encouraged, but isn’t homework. Please bring the book bag home on Monday so that we can use the materials during our guided reading groups at school.
We didn’t begin a new letter, mentor text, or grammar concept this week. Our add.a.lingua curriculum is written to be taught over 5 days and I feel it’s too important not to take the time to do it well. I don’t want to stress the kids out by rushing through it either. I would rather take our time and help everyone feel more successful. We reviewed definite articles- el, la, los, and las- as we read El Otoño, a book about fall. It was a great opportunity to practice new fall-themed vocabulary and review a major grammar concept we’ve been learning about. The kids took their own copy of the book home on Thursday.
Book of Friends: We “met” Adrian, Brayden, and Brooklynn this week! I hope to finish this coming week and send the books home soon after.
Math: We’ve been working on numbers 6-10. We’re looking for groups of 5 and trying to think about these big numbers as “5 and some more.” For example, 9 is 5 and 4 more.
Writing Workshop: We continue to work on putting labels in our story drawings. We’re practicing stretching out the sounds and writing all the sounds we hear.
Exploring God’s World: We started a new unit called God’s Earth. On Thursday I sent home a parent letter with some details about this unit and some suggestions and ideas to continue learning at home if you choose. Last week we tossed around an inflatable globe and kept track of where our thumbs landed- in water or on land. We discovered that the Earth is mostly made of water!
Afternoons: This time continues to be a relaxing, fun, and educational time for our class. I encouraged the kids to play with something they don’t normally play with and then something they haven’t played with in a long time. I even closed some of the most popular centers. The kids complained at first, but when they got going, the creativity I witnessed was incredible! I saw boys fishing from “boats,” girls taking their babies to the doctor, and boys and girls using the tools (pretend screws and screwdrivers,) to make fun designs on the “wood.”
From the Immersion Coordinator
What is an aalpa?
This is an acronym that stands for add.a.lingua language performance assessment. Sometime before Thanksgiving, all students between 1st and 5th grade will complete this evaluation; K-5 will complete another aalpa in the spring as well. At its most basic level, it is a unit of study that assesses each child’s use of the language in interpretive, interpersonal, and presentational modes. The teachers will lead their students through a study of a particular topic and give the students individual feedback at each stage. They will look at language-use strengths and challenges. The teachers will use these results to guide their instruction and set language goals for each child. The results from each aalpa are entered into a computer program which allows us to track student growth and learning trends from year to year.
I praise God for another great week of kindergarten! One of the biggest highlights this week for me, and I think all of the kids, was Grandparents Day. We’ve been talking lots in Bible about God being a covenant, faithful God. His faithfulness throughout the generations was clear as kindergarteners, parents, and grandparents worked and played together Friday morning. Thank you to all of you for the parts you played in making the day so enjoyable! Thank you all for the donations of supplies, the prayers, the Gifts of Being Grand coordination, and to parents who donated their time and talents Friday morning at school!
Important Dates
November 8: No PM Bus / No Hot Lunch
November 8-9: Parent/Teacher Conferences in the evening – K-8 School in session
November 9: No PM Bus / No Hot Lunch
November 10: No School
November 21: Picture Trading
Reminders
Questionnaire: Last call to fill this out please! I’ll be reviewing your responses this week. If you haven’t already filled out the questionnaire to help guide our time together, please do so by clicking here! Thank you!
Gifts of Being Grand- I have already received a few of these- thank you!Please help me connect with grandparents by passing along these precious keepsakes. I sent home a letter detailing this form and what to expect on Grandparents Day. I’ve also included this information under our resources tab on this blog. I’ll add the Gifts of Being Grand to your children’s spiritual journals, a collection of pieces created throughout their years at ZCS. I would love to have these by Grandparents Day please and will have extra copies that day if anyone needs them. Thank you!
Picture Trading: In celebration of Thanksgiving we will trade pictures of ourselves with our friends. This lesson will go along with our brief learning about the First Thanksgiving. Please send in wallet size photos or 4×6 size photos of JUST your child. Your child will need to bring in 19 copies. Often Meijer or Snapfish will run a deal with photos costing just a few cents. I am informing you early, with hopes you can find a deal somewhere. 🙂 We will trade photos on November 21st.
Picture Retakes- If your child would like his/her picture retaken, please SEND YOUR CHILD’S UNCUT PICTURE PACKET to school on picture retake day- November 9. This serves as the reorder form and is necessary. If your child missed getting his/her pictures taken, there are new picture envelopes in the office for ordering.
Helpful Links from the Office:
2017-2018 ZCS Family Directory: The ZCS Family Directory contains staff, Board members, and family contact information as well as class lists. The directory remains in Google Docs, has been fully updated, and will continue to reflect the most current information. Please email zcsinfo@zcs.org to request changes or updates. (Remember to take notice of the tabs across the bottom of the document for easy access to each section!)
2017-2018 ZCS Family Handbook: The ZCS Family Handbook contains information such as school start times, cancellations and delays, calendar, dress code, hot lunch information, etc. It can be found on the ZCS Parents page. Scroll down to find the link.
Curriculum
Bible: We wrapped up our unit in Bible with Jacob’s escape and eventual return home. The kids were amazed when they heard the words of their Bible verse right in our Bible story! Their expressions help me understand what “childlike faith” is. I will assess the verse this week.
Genesis 28:15 Yo estoy contigo. Te protegeré por dondequiera que vayas, y te traeré de vuelta a esta tierra. No te abandonaré hasta cumplir con todo lo que te he prometido.
“I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.
Literacy: In grammar this week we learned how to change articles to match the number of nouns we are talking about. For example, el amigo means 1 friend and los amigos means more than 1 friend.
Reading strategy: Making connections
Word wall word: el papá (dad)
Read aloud: Así Vamos a Escuela (review)
Vocabulary Words:
disfrutar (to enjoy)
techos (roofs)
las zancadas (steps)
la campiña (countryside) *Some of our Kindergarten friends made connections between this word and where they live!
el titubeo (hesitation)
apurados (rushed, hurried)
los patines (skates)
Phrase of the week: ¿Qué es eso? (What’s that?)
Letter of the week: Pp
Handwriting: We learned how to write uppercase and lowercase P this week. We learned that some letters sit on top of the line and others sink beneath it.
Book of Friends: We “met” Bennett and Kate this week! We’re getting close to the end!
Math: We’ve been working on our math test for unit 1 this week. I hope to share this with you at our conference. Your kids are doing an awesome job!
Writing Workshop: We learned about labels this week. Labels are words that tell readers about our pictures. We labelled the parts of a pumpkin and then the kids had a hoot labeling me! 🙂
Exploring God’s World: Many of your children were excited to use our PBL map to give grandparents a tour of our school! On Thursday morning we practiced highlighting the route as we walked from the gym to our classroom.
Afternoons: Wednesday afternoon I assessed many students in the hallway while Maestra DeKruyter helped the kids make a November calendar. As a reminder, this is an optional activity to do at home. You might try crossing off the days that pass, highlighting any special days like birthdays or trips or using the calendar to practice counting or saying numbers in Spanish. Other things we did in the afternoons this week include: playing in the house, making LOTS of bracelets with the beads (thank you for your donations!) and creating things in the art center.
Up in Lights: Bennett was up in lights this week! He introduced us to his sisters, parents and Ava, his cat. It’s clear God made Bennett special and we’re so grateful for him!
From the Immersion Coordinator
Our teachers look forward to connecting with you at parent/teacher conferences next week. As the program coordinator, I will also be available to meet with parents. If you have questions, concerns, or seek to learn more about a certain aspect of our immersion programming at ZCS, please connect directly with me to schedule a time. My email address is jpierce@zcs.org. Thanks!
It was SO good to be with your precious kiddos for a full week again! CEA was a great time to recharge, reconnect with other teachers, and learn some new strategies, but I missed your kids! We picked up on Monday right where we left off before our long weekend. In fact, I was amazed with the Spanish output I was hearing and we began a language incentive plan! On Tuesday we began the next phase on add.a.lingua’s target language-only timeline and the kids are now expected to speak to me only in Spanish. If they use English, I rephrase their comment or question in Spanish and they repeat me. We uncovered the letters of our first secret word, otoño, and enjoyed a fall treat together. We’re already well on our way to uncovering the next surprise word! I’m so proud of your kids and their hard work! Please continue to encourage them and pray for them as we continue to raise the Spanish expectations and continue our journey toward Spanish fluency!
Important Dates
November 3: Grandparents Day! Click here for the official invitation. More information to come!
November 8: No PM Bus / No Hot Lunch
November 8-9: Parent/Teacher Conferences in the evening – K-8 School in session
November 9: No PM Bus / No Hot Lunch
November 10: No School
Reminders
Parent Teacher Conferences- God is doing amazing things through your kids! I am looking forward to meeting with each one of you on November 8 or 9. This is a wonderful time of celebration and I can’t wait to share with you all of the great things your kids are doing! You may sign up for one time slot using the link on the ZCS Parent Page. The sign up will be open until November 1 at 10:00 PM. Thank you, in advance, for taking the time to meet with me! I’m looking forward to it!
Questionnaire: If you haven’t already filled out the questionnaire to help guide our time together, please do so by clicking here! It would be very helpful if you would please fill these out by Friday, November 3. Thank you!
Gifts of Being Grand- I have already received a few of these- thank you!Please help me connect with grandparents by passing along these precious keepsakes. I sent home a letter detailing this form and what to expect on Grandparents Day. I’ve also included this information under our resources tab on this blog. I’ll add the Gifts of Being Grand to your children’s spiritual journals, a collection of pieces created throughout their years at ZCS. I would love to have these by Grandparents Day please and will have extra copies that day if anyone needs them. Thank you!
Kindergarten Readiness- Has your child mentioned working with Mrs. Pyle, Mrs. Tibbe, or Ms. Stuursma? Every kindergartener at ZCS has been assessed using a kindergarten readiness evaluation. This is something all schools in the Ottawa area will be doing next year. ZCS decided to get familiar with the assessment this year so that we can be even more prepared for next year. I spoke with Mrs. Tibbe about the results they’re seeing and she was very pleased!
Picture Retakes- If your child would like his/her picture retaken, please SEND YOUR CHILD’S UNCUT PICTURE PACKET to school on picture retake day- November 9. This serves as the reorder form and is necessary. If your child missed getting his/her pictures taken, there are new picture envelopes in the office for ordering.
Helpful Links
2017-2018 ZCS Family Directory:The ZCS Family Directory contains staff, Board members, and family contact information as well as class lists. The directory remains in Google Docs, has been fully updated, and will continue to reflect the most current information. Please email zcsinfo@zcs.org to request changes or updates. (Remember to take notice of the tabs across the bottom of the document for easy access to each section!)
2017-2018 ZCS Family Handbook: The ZCS Family Handbook contains information such as school start times, cancellations and delays, calendar, dress code, hot lunch information, etc. It can be found on the ZCS Parents page. Scroll down to find the link.
Curriculum
Bible: We continue to talk about God’s faithfulness in keeping his covenant with Abraham. Right now we’re learning about Jacob and Esau. This coming week we’ll learn how God took care of Jacob even as he fled from his brother, Esau.
We also continue to practice our Bible verse below:
Genesis 28:15 Yo estoy contigo. Te protegeré por dondequiera que vayas, y te traeré de vuelta a esta tierra. No te abandonaré hasta cumplir con todo lo que te he prometido.
“I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.
Literacy: We started the next choice in the Daily 5! We are working on building stamina in read to someone. It made me heart smile to see your kids enjoying books together! Some of the pictures up top of this post are of the kids in the first round of read to someone.
Our letter of the week was a consonant for the first time! This meant that we began to combine consonants and vowels to form syllables! We even combined some syllables to form words! We made some exciting and powerful steps toward reading this week!
In grammar this week we learned about a special ending some Spanish words have, -ito or -ita. This ending is used to speak lovingly or to show that something is small. For example, a small dog (perro) or a puppy might be called perrito. A cute kitten (gato) might be called gatito.
Reading strategy: Making connections
Word wall word: la mamá (mom) y (and)
Read aloud: Así Vamos a Escuela
Vocabulary Words:
disfrutar (to enjoy)
techos (roofs)
las zancadas (steps)
la campiña (countryside) *Some of our Kindergarten friends made connections between this word and where they live!
el titubeo (hesitation)
apurados (rushed, hurried)
los patines (skates)
Phrase of the week: Ya terminé. ( I’m finished.)
Letter of the week: Mm
Handwriting: Right now we’re taking a break from writing letters and are learning to write numbers 1-5 the school way.
Book of Friends: We “met” Levi and Greta with Maestra Larson on Thursday morning! There are just a few more friends to meet and we will be finished with our Book of Friends!
Math: This week we compared numbers 6-10. We’re learning important words to describe numbers as more, más, and less,menos. We originally learned these words when we compared numbers 1-5 and this week’s lesson was a great review.
Writing Workshop: We continue to practice drawing our stories. This week everyone drew a story about one of our indoor recesses. We blew up balloons and worked together to find the best strategy to keep them off the floor.
Exploring God’s World: We’re nearing the end of our PBL on mapping and can’t wait to share the map we made with our grandparents this week! On Monday I will send a letter detailing all the parts of our PBL and including a map of our school that you may share with grandparents if you’re able. If not, I’ll have extra copies in our classroom on Friday.
Afternoons: We play hard, rest hard, and work hard every afternoon. We’re continuing to work hard in our math centers. In play we opened a sensory bin of corn. I brought a toy kitchen into our classroom and the kids have enjoyed playing restaurant and house.
Up in Lights: Thank you, Nichols family, for sharing so many wonderful things about Levi!It’s clear he is a precious gift from God. One unique thing Levi shared was his tackle box. The kids were very interested in seeing the fly fishing lures! We love you, Levi!
From the Immersion Coordinator
What will Grandparents’ Day in the immersion classroom look like? While we do our very best to always expect only Spanish or Chinese in our immersion classrooms, Grandparents’ Day is one day where we bend the rules a little. While each teacher might do it a little differently, the teacher will always address the students in the target language and the students should talk with the teacher in the target language. However, the students may certainly speak with the Grandparents in English! The teachers will either speak directly with the grandparents in English or some teachers in the older grades may challenge their students to do the translating for their grandparents. We look forward to welcoming all the grandparents/friends on Friday!
This week was full of positive learning and growing! On Friday, for the very first time in kindergarten, the kids were able to choose which Daily 5 activity they wanted to do that round. Some chose Read to Self and others chose Work on Writing. On Monday we learned a new game, circunloquio, to help us describe a word if we don’t know the word in Spanish. This helps us stay in the target language and not slip into speaking English. Many children are becoming more comfortable at school. We had some very good conversations about using our words and bodies to love and respect others. I’m very proud of your children for all that they are accomplishing so far in kindergarten! God is so good!
Important Dates
October 16: I will be out of the building for a science conference. Maestra DeKruyter is amazing and will take great care of your children!
October 19-20: CEA Convention (No School)
October 27: All school chapel 9:00 (You are welcome to attend!)
November 3:Grandparents Day! Click here for the official invitation. More information to come!
November 8:No PM Bus / No Hot Lunch
November 8-9: Parent/Teacher Conferences in the evening – K-8 School in session
November 9: No PM Bus / No Hot Lunch
November 10: No School
Reminders
Gifts of Being Grand- Please help me connect with grandparents by passing along these precious keepsakes. I sent home a letter detailing this form and what to expect on Grandparents Day. I’ve also included this information under our resources tab on this blog. I’ll add the Gifts of Being Grand to your children’s spiritual journals, a collection of pieces created throughout their years at ZCS. I would love to have these by Grandparents Day please and will have extra copies that day if anyone needs them. Thank you!
Parent Teacher Conferences- God is doing amazing things through your kids! I am looking forward to meeting with each one of you on November 8 or 9. This is a wonderful time of celebration and I can’t wait to share with you all of the great things your kids are doing! Beginning October 25 at 9:00 am you will be able to sign up for one time slot. Thank you, in advance, for taking the time to meet with me! I’m looking forward to it!
Curriculum
Bible: This week we started talking about Abraham. God made a promise to Abraham that he would give him many children and grandchildren and that he would bless Abraham’s family. God’s plan of salvation was already taking place! We took a “trust walk” with a partner to get a better feel for what it means to trust. I also assessed each child on the Bible memory verse, Genesis 8:22. They did a fantastic job! Our next verse is below:
Genesis 28:15 Yo estoy contigo. Te protegeré por dondequiera que vayas, y te traeré de vuelta a esta tierra. No te abandonaré hasta cumplir con todo lo que te he prometido.
“I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.
Literacy: This week we talked about proper nouns. These are names that use a capital (mayúscula) letters. Kindergarteners completed their first word sort individually and did a fantastic job!
Reading strategy: Making connections
Word wall word: si, sí
Read aloud: Este soy yo
Vocabulary Words:
la sonrisa (smile)
la fresa (strawberry)
el ratón (rat)
el cabello (hair)
los cachetes (cheeks)
la lana (wool)
la luna (moon)
Phrase of the week: No entiendo. ( I don’t understand.)
Letter of the week: Ii
Handwriting:We worked on writing uppercase and lowercase Ii. We’re working on making the point at the top of lowercase i medium-size. 🙂
Book of Friends: We met Addison and William this week! We got to create their pages and discovered they both have and I in their name.
Math:This week we used math manipulatives to determine which number is more (más) or less (menos.) We compared numbers up to 5.
Writing Workshop:We continue to practice drawing our stories. This week everyone drew a story from our field trip to De Graaf Nature Center. I love the sounds in our classroom lately while everyone is so focused on their work as great authors!
Exploring God’s World: This week we started our PBL, (project based learning,) which is centered around mapping and Grandparents Day. I told the kids that my dad and I were planning on trying a new restaurant in Allegan today. We’d be meeting halfway between my house and his house in Kalamazoo and I needed to figure out how to get to the restaurant. Some ideas they gave me were to “ask my mom,” use a gps, and finally, use a map! We’ll continue this discussion about maps next week and tie it in with Grandparents Day. I’ll send information explaining our project and the idea behind PBL in your child’s red alert folder soon.
Afternoons: In play I was excited to see that the firefighters have started making maps to help them save the people who call in to the station! 🙂 I’ve also seen children playing house. They had some valuable conversations as they tried to find a role in the family for each child who wanted to play in that center.
We opened a new set of math centers this week! The four new choices are: coloring apples to match uppercase and lowercase letters, sequencing numbers 1-10 to make a scarecrow puzzle, “writing the room” (logging which numbers they find in the 10 frames around our classroom,) and a roll and color pumpkins activity. Since these activities do include worksheets I want to remind you that, even if your child completes the same worksheet twice, it is still valuable practice! These worksheets aren’t something that can be memorized and filled in without practicing the math skills and objectives. I am trying to balance keeping track of which centers each child completes while still allowing the freedom of choice to motivate the their learning.
I’m Finished, Now What? When kindergartners finish eating their lunch or snack early or have “down time” in our classroom they may visit the “I’m finished, now what?” center. I like to include activities to practice math and literacy concepts, fine motor development, and love for reading in this center. Sometimes the activities are open-ended and sometimes they aren’t. Sometimes students have time to finish the activity and sometimes I ask them to clean up and move on before they’ve had a chance to finish. That means, occasionally, your child will bring something home that appears to be unfinished. They may finish it at home, but it is not homework. It’s not that they aren’t completing their assigned tasks on time, it just means that they didn’t have time to complete both tasks. They may also visit the center more than one time/day so you may see a repeated activity in your child’s red alert folder. Please let me know if you have any questions!
From the Immersion Coordinator
Should we be concerned about the MAPS test being offered in English when our immersion students have had limited exposure to English?
Our students in 3rd grade and above have begun MAPS testing this week. While this test is fully in English, the results will still be valuable for individual and programatic data. Research has consistently displayed that standardized testing is still reliable regardless of the difference in language of testing and language of instruction. However, we do interpret the results of our immersion students through the lens of immersion; there are certain areas where we would expect our immersion students to be lower (for example–spelling) for certain grade levels. Conversely, there are also areas where we would expect them to be higher. The intent of these tests are to show individual student growth over time. It will also give us valuable information from which to compare our various programs at school. Offer your children an encouraging word as they anticipate these assessments and remind them to be confident as they approach the English…we know the skills transfer between languages and we are confident in our immersion students’ adaptability!
I spent some time in Kalamazoo this weekend with family and friends and many were asking how the school year is going so far. I told them how much I genuinely care for your children and am thoroughly enjoying the time I spend with them at school! To me it has felt like a very smooth transition. The fall of kindergarten, especially in a second language, leaves kids feeling very tired when they get home to you at night, but I hope you are feeling the same way I am about the start of school! I feel like we took some very big steps forward this week. We began the second option of the Daily 5, work on writing, started transitioning to the next writing workshop unit, completed some tough math lessons, and learned a lot of Spanish!
Important Dates
October 16: Maestra Izenbaard will be out of the building for a science conference. Maestra DeKruyter is amazing and will take great care of your children!
October 19-20:CEA Convention (No School)
October 27: All school chapel 9:00 (you are welcome to attend!)
November 3:Grandparents Day! Click here for the official invitation. More information to come!
November 8: No PM Bus / No Hot Lunch
November 8-9: Parent/Teacher Conferences – Evening – K-8 School in session
November 9: No PM Bus / No Hot Lunch
November 10: No School
Reminders
Library:Tomorrow (Monday) we will visit the library again! If your child would like to pick out a new book, please help them remember to bring their old book to school and put it in the bin in our classroom.
Curriculum
Bible:We finished talking about Noah and did a painting project. The kids painted a rainbow, the symbol of God’s promise to Noah, and discovered their own names hidden on the paper behind the rainbow! This reminds them that God’s promises are for each one of them as well. At the end of the week we read about the Tower of Babel. As second language learners this story is very interesting, I think, as it marks the day God created different languages.
Please continue to practice this verse with your child as you see fit. I plan to assess it in a week or so.
Genesis 8:22 “Mientras la tierra exista habrá siembra y cosecha, frío y calor, verano e invierno, días y noches.”
“As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night will never cease.”
Literacy:We have been focusing our attention on nouns and articles. We’ve learned that nouns have genders in Spanish. This week we learned that the articles also change when the number of objects changes. In English this is like adding an -s or -es to make a word plural.
Reading strategy: Determining importance of text
Read aloud: MIs Cinco Sentidos (My Five Senses)
Vocabulary Words:
los sentidos (the senses)
la lengua (tongue)
la nariz (nose)
tocar (to touch)
los ojos (eyes)
Phrase of the week: ¿Puedo ir al baño? (May I go to the bathroom?) This was an important phrase after learning how to ask for a drink last week!
Letter of the week: Ee
Making Ee crowns 🙂
Handwriting:We worked on writing uppercase and lowercase Ee. The lower case e was especially tricky for some of our class, but I saw lots of improvement as the week went on!
Book of Friends:We met Stella and Lauren this week! We got to create their pages and discovered they both have our letter of the week in their names!
Math: We talked a lot about shapes this week! Each kindergartener created a book about shapes as we studied each of the shapes individually.
Writing Workshop: We’re transitioning from oral language to drawing our stories. Before we draw a story we make a movie of the story in our heads, take turns sharing our story to a friend and listening to a friend’s story, and, finally, we draw our stories. This has been going very well for our class! So far every kindergartener has drawn/told a story about a time they ate something delicious. This led to a great reminder about our 5 senses!
Exploring God’s World: Science, writing workshop, and our mentor text read aloud all tied in nicely this week as we continued talking about our 5 senses!
Up in Lights: Kate was up in lights this week! She shared many of her favorite things with us. One of the things she loves most is her family. She brought her dad to school with her and he brought along a real firetruck! It was a very hands-on, memorable, and fun way to learn more about Kate and all the things that make her so special! Thank you, Schrotenboer family!
Afternoons:This week we made the October calendar. Each month we’ll make a calendar in the afternoon. (I’m sorry, I know that means sometimes your child will not be present when we make it.) This is an optional way to keep track of the days with your child. Things you might try with the calendar include: marking off the days as they pass, marking special days to come that month like birthdays or holidays, practicing counting or other vocabulary.
We also spent our afternoons playing, resting, and doing math centers. The kids opened up the fireman bin and have been really enjoying being firefighters! (I bet you can guess what insprierd that! 🙂 ) Some kids are choosing to act out scenarios and others are choosing to do firefighter-themed art.
From our immersion program director
What is the Three-Fold Goal of immersion education?
As an immersion program, we are striving for excellence in three areas. 1) Academic Achievement: We expect our students to learn the same content that is expected of our English-track classrooms. 2) High language proficiency: We strive to have our students speak the language accurately and at an age-appropriate level of proficiency. 3) Cultural Competency: We hope our students will be sensitive to cultural differences and navigate culturally embedded situations with grace and empathy. As a Christian school, we can add that our first and foremost goal is to integrate our faith into all components of our learning and growth at Zeeland Christian.
We have completed 7 days of Kindergarten! God is good! Thank you for all that you are doing to help us start this school year off well! I am speaking almost 100% Spanish with the only exceptions being to explain new routines or give important reminders about routines. I am thrilled with the amount of Spanish your children are comprehending and many of them are bravely speaking Spanish to me already! Watching your children as they form beautiful friendships and learn more each day about how to do school together brings me so much joy! At the end of the day on Friday every Kindergartener at school met together in the music room to sing praises to Jesus. We sang “Oh How He Loves You and Me” to continue reflecting on our school theme- Inmersos En Su Amor/Lost in Love. We also sang Jesus Loves Me in English, Spanish, and Mandarin- beautiful! We are looking forward to worshipping together this way each Friday afternoon. If your child was at school Friday afternoon, ask them about this special time. Once a month we’ll move to the media center and the 1st-5th graders will join us in singing.
Important Dates
September 21/October 10: TRIP Registration Meeting
September 26: Field trip to DeGraaf Nature Center
October 19-20: CEA Convention (No School)
Reminders
The kids have been doing an amazing job knowing how they are getting home from school! Continuing to review this with your child goes a long way in making them feel comfortable at school. I will continue walking students to the bus until they are comfortable finding their buses by themselves. Even then, I will walk them to the outside doors. Even if I haven’t come back to the classroom yet, you are welcome to come on in and pick up your child. I wish I could be in 2 places at once! As a school we are asking that everyone please wait for the buses to leave before attempting to dash across Central Ave. in front of the bus line. Thanks for helping us keep everyone on time and safe!
This week we’ll visit the library for the 1st time at school! The kids may check out a book for 2 weeks but will only be allowed to have 1 book at home at a time. In other words, if your child would like to check out a new book, please help him/her remember to bring the “old” book back to school on Monday! I’ll have a red bin in our classroom to collect the books in.
If you haven’t already done so, please turn in our class permission slip and activity fee. If you have multiple kids at ZCS you may write 1 check. Please turn in the permission slip to me and the activity fee to the office.
Please feel free to send a water bottle to school with your child. Hydrated brains help us learn and a shorter line at the drinking fountain means we get to head back to learning that much sooner.
Thank you for continuing to check the red alert folders. Sometimes they will be empty. This doesn’t mean your child wasn’t learning that day. 🙂 Often we spend our learning time in centers focused around hands-on learning that doesn’t include worksheets.
If you would like to order hot lunch for your child please check out the September menu here make sure there is money in your account. Please talk to your child about their hot lunch choice before school. The kids have been doing an awesome job going through the hot lunch line with me!
Curriculum
Bible: God’s creation is amazing! We have learned about the good things God created on days 1-4. Each time we learn about a day of creation I pull out a surprise from the mystery bag that represents what God created on that day. After the lesson, the kids create a new page for their creation book. I love the way slowly going through the creation week in this way helps us focus on our creative God.
Literacy:Our literacy block is taught through The Daily 5. Right now we are building stamina in the 1st of the Daily 5, Read to Self. The kids are working on reading the whole time, staying in 1 spot, and reading quietly. Try asking your child to model how we do these things for you. In our first round we read for 2 minutes! We are graphing our reading stamina together. For more information on The Daily 5, please see the document under the “More Resources” tab.
Our vocabulary words below come from our mentor text, a book that I read out loud and use to focus on different reading strategies.
Reading strategy: Determining importance of text
Read aloud: Bienvenidos a Kindergarten
Vocabulary Words:
la oficina (office)
divertido (fun)
la enfermería (nurse)
especial (special)
el patio de recreo (playground)
Phrase of the week: ¿Cómo estás? Muy bien, gracias. ¿Y tu?
Letter of the week: What is a letter? What is a vowel? a, e, i, o, u
Book of Friends:Each kindergartener is working on a book of friends. When the project is complete they will have a page for each of the kindergarten friends in their book. Creating the pages help us focus on our different names- how many letters? vowels or consonants? etc. It also gives us an opportunity to celebrate how God made each one of us unique as we draw a picture of the friend on that page. This week we started with Jesus. We looked at lots of different pictures of Jesus in different Bibles and the kids drew what they think Jesus might have looked like. Before drawing, we discussed how to draw people without skipping some of the most important features like eyes, hands, ears, etc.
Math: We are working on counting up to 10 in Spanish and using different manipulatives and strategies to represent the numbers. Try asking your child to find a group of objects that matches the number you tell them. Each morning we count the days of school we’ve completed and do that number of a variety of different exercises. In the afternoons we are working through a variety of math centers that help us practice 1:1 correspondence, counting to 10, fine motor skills, and representing numbers in different ways. We work in the same centers for a little while until we have those skills mastered. Then we move on to another set of centers to continue growing as mathematicians.
It has been such a joy to get to know your children more this week! I see the beginnings of some wonderful friendships. Thank you for entrusting your children to me during the school day. I am so blessed to be partnering with amazing families like yours! In the beginning of each newsletter I will give some of the highlights from our week at school. I often hear from parents that their children don’t share much with them about their school day. Take a peek at this section for some of the things we’ve been up to and some ideas of what to chat about with your child. Here are a few pictures of our awesome week!
Important Dates:
Here I will always include important dates coming up. There is a calendar to the right of our home page that you might find helpful.
September 4: 1st day of hot lunch and busing.
September 26: Field trip to DeGraaf Nature Center
Reminders
In this section of our newsletter you will see announcements and reminders.
If you haven’t already done so, please turn in our class permission slip and activity fee. If you have multiple kids at ZCS you may write 1 check. Please turn in the permission slip to me and the activity fee to the office.
Please make sure to take home and check the alerta roja (red alert) every day. There won’t always be something to go home each day, but I do encourage your family to find a routine that helps you remember to check the folder daily.
Please feel free to send a water bottle to school with your child. Busy learning brains need lots of water! 🙂
Hot lunch begins Tuesday. Please review the lunch options, A or B, with your child the night before. I will read through them again and help your child sign up for the right thing in the morning.
I am creating a classroom directory based on the contact information you gave me when you filled out the Kindergarten Interest Inventory, (Google form.) If you do not want your information to be given to the families in our class, please let me know. If I don’t hear from you, I will add your information.
Notes about dismissal:
Busing begins Tuesday. I will do my very best to make sure each child gets where he/she needs to be on time!
At 3:30 dismissal, I will say goodbye to the kids waiting for their parents before I walk the bus riders outside. If you’re picking up at school and would like to leave with your child before I get back from the buses, you may.
At 11:50 dismissal, please do not leave unless I see you. As you may have noticed, this dismissal is a bit more chaotic as there is lots going on in the hallway during that time. 🙂
Curriculum
In this section I’ll share some of the curriculum we worked on over the past week. The first 3 days of school were light on curriculum. We focused more on getting to know each other and our classroom. Your kids are doing a great job of learning the routines, procedures, and expectations for our classroom. One day after recess they insisted I wait in the hallway because they had a “surprise” for me. When they let me step inside the room, they were all perfectly quiet, sitting on the carpet ready to learn! It made me so happy one of the kids said “my heart must have been as big as the school!”
Each morning we start our day doing devotions. This week we talked a lot about names. We learned that the name Jesus means Savior. We talked about God’s plan to send his son to die on the cross to save us from our sins. I told the kids that God thinks names are very important and that we’d try to make names important in our classroom too. Incidentally, I explained that I don’t change their names to Spanish and I’d like them to use my name, Maestra Izenbaard, instead of just “maestra.” We also learned about our first Fruit of the Spirit, love. We talked about what it means to show others we love them with words and actions. In the afternoons we spent a short time resting, worked hard in math centers, and ventured into purposeful play.
Thank you for a wonderful first 3 days with your children! I’m looking forward to our 4 day week coming up! I will be thinking about you all and praying that you have a fun and relaxing long weekend! The first day after a long weekend can be a little tough, so I’ll be praying that the transition back in goes smoothly for everyone! As always, please let me know if you have any questions and I will be happy to get back to you as soon as possible! Thank you! I’m excited to partner with you all this year!
