Week Overview
Happy fall! While it doesn’t feel like fall outside yet it has been fun to welcome in this new season with a few special activities at school. On Friday we made applesauce. While we took turns preparing the apples, we searched for articles el and la in the applesauce book that we made together. I’m very, very proud of your kindergarteners and their positive attitude this week despite being hot and sticky. A huge thank you to Aubrey’s mom who brought us popsicles to enjoy after PE on Friday! I’m encouraged by your children’s eagerness to learn and excitement to be together. I hear we may even experience some cooler temperatures at the end of this week! I’m looking forward to being a little more comfortable at school. 🙂
Important Dates
September 21/October 10: TRIP Registration Meeting
September 26: Field trip to DeGraaf Nature Center
October 3: Picture Day
October 6: No PM busing/no hot lunch
October 19-20: CEA Convention (No School)
Reminders
- Field Trip: We will head to the DeGraaf Nature Center on Tuesday morning. I have a number of moms who have signed up to drive. Your child will ride in a booster seat that will be provided to them by ZCS or by the mom who is driving. You do not need to send a booster seat along for this field trip. We will leave school around 9:00 and be back to school around 11:30. There will be a snack provided for everyone on the trip. (Thank you Westerbeke and Nichols families! )There is no need to send a morning snack. If your child is staying for lunch they will need their lunch and an afternoon snack. Hot lunch will be available if you’d like your child to order before we leave. Please dress your child for the weather, including outdoor shoes. We will be outside for most of the trip. If you have questions, please let me know!
- Yearbooks: Are available for order at the same time as school pictures on the order form. (Option #14) This is the ONLY time yearbooks will be available for order this year. Don’t miss out!
- 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 closed our unit on creation by reading the whole creation story together with the Bibles Mr. McAboy presented to us several days ago! This was a very special moment for our class. The kids loved following along in their own Bibles as I read the words out loud. I hope you and your kindergartener were able to look through your child’s own creation book. I think they did an awesome job illustrating the work of our Amazing Creator!
We’ve also started practicing our Bible memory verse. I’ll assess this verse sometime in a few weeks and we’ll continue practicing at school in the meantime. This would be a great addition to family devotions or bedtime routine. Please visit our Bible Verses tab to see a video to help your child practice at home. (Please don’t laugh at me too hard! I’m not above looking like a fool to help your child!) 🙂
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: The kids have been doing an awesome job building their stamina in read to self. Someone asked what we do when we reach our goal of reading for 10 minutes on 5 days. The kids were SO excited to learn about the other 4 choices in the Daily 5! We will get there soon!
Our linguistic focus this week was articles, el and la. In Spanish all nouns have genders. El is used for masculine nouns and la is used for feminine nouns. Usually masculine nouns end in -o and feminine nouns end in -a. We noticed the articles before each noun and practiced classifying them together!
- Reading strategy: Determining importance of text
- Read aloud: Un beso en mi mano
- Vocabulary Words:
- el beso (kiss)
- el mapache (raccoon)
- el corazón (heart)
- la mano (hand)
- Phrase of the week: Ayúdame por favor. (Help me please.)
- Letter of the week: Oo
Handwriting: We worked on writing uppercase and lowercase Oo. As you watch your child write at home, consider reminding them to start writing their letters at the top.
Book of Friends: We “met” tow more new friends this week. Olivia and Asa! Your kids are getting very good at looking for the vowels and noticing that only the first letter is an uppercase letter.
Math: We continued to work in our scenes books. As we sweat like crazy this week we drew cold scenes including popsicles and snowmen for numbers 2 and 3. 🙂
Exploring God’s World: We continued to explore our 5 senses, this time focusing on our sense of touch. We classified objects as hot or cold and colored them red and blue respectively.
Up in Lights: We’re looking forward to starting this soon! Please visit our “other resources” page on our blog to see the date of your child’s turn and the English translation of these papers.
Afternoons: This week in the afternoon, in addition to rest, art, kindergarten singing and recess we worked in our math centers, created an Oo book, and played in Maestro Minkus’ air-conditioned classroom on Friday afternoon.
From our immersion program director
I wanted to take this opportunity to re-introduce myself to our immersion families. My name is Jodi Pierce, and I serve as the director of our immersion programs. Among other professional experiences, I have taught in the immersion setting abroad, served as the director of another immersion program prior to ZCS, and hold a MA in Dual Language and Immersion Education. I am passionate about the opportunities that immersion education offers our students, and I am determined to help our staff make our immersion program the best it can be. If you have any immersion-related questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to stop by my office (Office #69 between the media center and gym) or send me an email (pierce@zcs.org). It is a blessing to be partnering with you in the education of your children!
