Highlights from our week…
I love teaching Kindergarten at this time of the year! The kids come to school ready and excited to learn. The routines are set and they’re hungry for a challenge. Some days I reflect back on our day and I’m amazed by the things your kids are accomplishing!

We can make predictions! Will the groundhog see his shadow?

Groundhog Day craft

Important Dates

• February 10: For the Kidz gymnastics field trip 10:30-12:30 (information below)
• February 10: No hot lunch or PM bussing
• February 13: 100th Day of School! (information below)
• February 14: Valentine’s Celebration (information below)
• February 20: President’s Day Break- No school
  

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Important Announcements

• Quarters for Wayne: On Friday I sent home information about a special project Kindergarteners will work together on to help raise money for our sponsor student in the Philippines. You may collect quarters directly on the sheet with tape or in a separate Ziploc bag. If you need to view the sheet again, please click here.
• For the Kidz Gymnastics Field Trip: We are planning to leave about 10:30 and return to school about 12:30. 1/2 day families please plan on picking up your child at our classroom door at 12:30. All students must have a signed waiver to be able to participate. Please follow this link  to complete the waiver for your child.
• 100th Day Celebration: We will celebrate the 100th day of school on February 13th. We will have a special 100th day snack. If you signed up to bring ingredients please bring them no later than Friday, February 10. We will also dress up like we are 100 years old! This is 100% optional, but we thought it may be exciting for the middle of February. Some ideas include baby powder in your hair to make it gray, glasses, suspenders, a long skirt and sweater, or a cane. Google “kids dressing up like they are 100” for some more ideas. ?
• Valentine’s Day Celebration: We will celebrate Valentine’s Day on February 14th. We will have a small party and exchange valentines. You are welcome to start shopping/creating valentines for each classmate. Please note:
  • We have 20 children in our class.
  • Please do NOT write a classmates name in the “to” space. Just have your child sign their name in the “from” space. Names are too complicated for the limited time we have to pass out valentines.

Check out how much we’re learning and growing in Christ! 

Bible: This week we learned about Jesus changing the hearts of several people he encountered during his ministry. We talked about Nicodemus, Zacchaeus, and the Samaritan woman at the well. When we ask Jesus into our hearts, the Holy Spirit changes us and we become a new creation. To help us understand and reflect on this concept we watched a time lapse video of a caterpillar becoming a butterfly. The caterpillar changed from the inside out into a new creation. Each child designed their own butterfly to help them remember the power of the Holy Spirit when a person accepts Jesus.

I also assessed the January Bible verse this week. Please click this link to see a video of your kids reciting their verse! This coming week I will introduce the new verse for February. I’m proud of your kids for working so hard on memorizing their verses each month! I pray that these verses will help them in their own times of need or that they’ll have opportunities to share them with others!

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Literacy: This week I dressed up as “Victoria la vaquera” (Victoria, the cowgirl.) The kids helped me round up my vacas (cows) by looking for the vacas with the letter Vv in their names. In grammar I put on a puppet show with puppets who gave each other commands using the yo (I) and tu (you) forms of verbs.

• Reading strategy: Visualizing
• Read aloud: Los patitos
• Vocabulary words
  • cruzar (to cross)
  • la orilla (shore)
  • el jardín (garden)
  • los patitos (ducks)
  • los cacahuetes (peanuts)
  • la isla (island)
  • la laguna (pond)
  • la responsabilidad (responsibility)
• Word wall word: voy (I’m going)
• Phrase of the week: Hoy es ___. (Today is ___.)
• Letter of the week: Vv

In the Daily 5 we opened up the last of the 5 center choices. We now have a “Listen to a book” choice during the Daily 5! Using the iPads has become a huge hit. 🙂

Math: Our math lessons this week introduced us to “Mariquita de 10” (“10’s ladybug”) who helped us look for groups of 10. We are just beginning to learn about teen numbers. Thinking of them as “10 and some more” has been helpful.

Writing Workshop: Your kids are amazing! They have turned into such writers! We are continuing to work on pattern books. This week some kids ventured into trying a new pattern- “me gusta” (“I like.”)

Exploring God’s World: This week we looked for pushes and pulls on the playground. Some of the ideas for pushes the class thought of included the tire swing and the day we made a giant snowball and moved it to the soccer field. One idea for pulls was the rock wall.

Handwriting Without Tears: We worked on three uppercase letters this week: I, T, and J. We are trying hard to remember to start at the top!

Play: This continues to be a favorite part of our day. It’s a stress-free way of learning and a great community builder in our classroom. It’s fun to see different kids thrive in the different environments throughout our school day. The new exciting thing in our classroom this week was the sand table!

marble run

Fire station main office

Up in Lights: Emma Texer was up in lights this week! She introduced us to her mom, dad, and two younger sisters. Emma is anticipating another new sibling very soon! She loves eating Smarties, feeling sparkles, and smelling flowers. Her favorite place to visit is school and she’d like to be a teacher when she’s older. 🙂 Thank you, Emma! God made you amazing!

Afternoons:

• Monday: art, rest, read aloud, recess, snack, play
• Tuesday: rest, math centers, recess, snack, play
• Wednesday: rest, math center,, recess, snack, play
• Thursday: rest, Groundhog Day craft, recess, snack, play
• Friday: rest, play, recess, snack, math centers, Kindergarten singing
  

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From the immersion coordinator: Here is some encouraging anecdotal news for those of you who might be a little frightened by your immersion student’s English spelling or writing. Holland Christian High School took the time to compare the English grades and writing of our first two classes of immersion students; on average these students were indeed at or above the level of the non-immersion peers with some teachers reporting that they felt that immersion students’ writing had more depth than the comparison group.

Highlights from our week…

The highlight of this past week for me was remembering Dr. Martin Luther King’s lessons on loving one another. As a class we talked about the command Jesus gave us to love our neighbor. The kids brainstormed ideas about how to draw a loving community and decided that some important things to include would be lots of colors, lots of people holding hands, and a heart to represent love. Every kindergartener at school that day contributed to our class drawing. Finally, we added our class drawing to the others on the wall and together we created a mural illustrating Dr. King’s dream of a beloved community. When I think about where I see God throughout my days at ZCS it’s in the way your kids love each other. Thank you for instilling this value in them!

Important Dates

• January 23: Teacher in-service (no school)
• February 10: For the Kidz gymnastics field trip (10:30-12:30) Please see the information below for details!
• February 13: 100th Day of School!
• February 14: Valentine’s Celebration
• February 20: President’s Day Break- No school
  

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Important Announcements

• Report Cards: By January 27 I will complete a report card for each child! They will be available to view online shortly after that so please watch for details on how to view it!  I can’t wait to report back to you on all that your kids are learning! I am so proud of every one of them!
• For the Kidz Gymnastics Field Trip: We are planning to leave about 10:30 and return to school about 12:30. There will be NO hot lunch for our class that day as we’ll be getting back to school too late. 1/2 day families please plan on picking up your child at our classroom door at 12:30. I’m sorry for any inconvenience. There were limited dates and times we could go on this field trip. All students must have a signed waiver to be able to participate. Please follow this link  to complete the waiver for your child. You’ll be prompted to enter in a phone number to add your name and address. Then you will be asked to re-enter the phone number to add your child to the account. Be sure that your phone number is entered in this format: 000-000-0000. See our field trip blog post for more information!
• 100th Day Celebration: The 100th day of school is a big deal in Kindergarten! It means the kids have been working hard for 100 days! They have learned so much, grown a ton, and formed some amazing friendships! I’m looking forward to celebrating! To mark the special day we will be dressing as 100 year old people! (This is optional.) Some ideas include baby powder in your hair to make it gray, glasses, suspenders, a long skirt and sweater, or a cane. We will also be doing lots of fun math and literacy centers, creating a special art project, and eating a special 100th day snack made of 100 items!
• Valentine’s Day Celebration: I’m looking forward to celebrating friendships with your children on this special day! It’s a great way to continue our lessons on what it means to love your neighbor. On Valentine’s Day we will celebrate with a variety of math and literacy centers. One way we will intentionally show love to each other is by sharing valentines. (This is also optional.) When you help your child address valentines for his/her classmates, if you could please write “amigo” in the To: ___ section or leave it blank, that would be very helpful! Thank you!

Check out how much we’re learning and growing in Christ! 

Bible: This week we read about Jesus calling his disciples. We learned that Jesus didn’t choose extraordinary people with special talents, but rather chose normal people with everyday jobs. We talked about the fact that we are disciples as well and God can use us too! On Friday with  Maestra Vasquez the kids learned about the day Jesus blessed the children and taught about how important children are in the Kingdom of God. This story is where our Bible verse comes from! ZCS students collect artifacts in their spiritual journals throughout their years at school. On Friday each kindergartener created their very first spiritual journal artifact! They illustrated what the Bible verse means to them.

Steve Green sings a song that comes from our Bible verse. We have been listening to the song to help us remember our verse and I encourage you to do the same at home! The link is below.

Spanish: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBkx_T1_efI

English: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lMy7rabpY6g

Literacy: In grammar we began to conjugate verbs! I remember this being very hard when I learned Spanish in school, but the beautiful thing about choosing immersion for your children is that they have been conjugating verbs from the very first sentences they spoke! Children in immersion are constantly attending to language and looking for patterns. This week we just put a “grammar rule” to a pattern your children have been observing since day 1- first person singular present tense verbs. We learned that these verbs usually end in o, for example, camino (I walk,) or hablo (I talk.)

• Reading strategy: Visualizing
• Read aloud: Los pollitos dicen
• Vocabulary words
  • los pollitos (chicks)
  • el trigo (wheat)
  • el conejo (rabbit)
  • el maíz (corn)
  • las alas (wings)
• Word wall word: son (to be (3rd person plural)
• Phrase of the week: Ya sé. (I know.)
• Letter of the week: Ff

Writing Workshop: We continue to explore pattern books. This week we learned that a pattern book has a pattern and a theme. On Thursday I read a pattern book that last year’s kindergarteners wrote. The kids thought that was awesome! We noticed the pattern and theme on each page. On Friday Maestra Vasquez read several more pattern books and the kids searched again for the pattern and the theme in each book. Next week we will start writing our own pattern books!

Math: This week we talked about 2D shapes. We read a book about shape that helped us see shapes all around us. Then we completed a math page that gave us the opportunity to practice identifying 2D shapes. On Wednesday morning we practiced making sums with a hot chocolate art project. It was a fun way to practice math in a new context.

Exploring God’s World: This week we talked about gravity. With a partner, the kids stood on top of their chairs and dropped a feather, a ball, and a beanbag. Quickly, they discovered that everything falls down. We also read the pictures of an English book called I Fall Down. 

Up in Lights: Emma Feak was up in lights this week! Emma is full of sparkling personality and almost always has a big beautiful smile on her face. When she introduced us to her dog, Maya, I’m not sure who was happier, the kids or the dog. Thank you Emma and family!

Play: This week’s play was centered around the kitchen. The kids had a great time playing house and even had a birthday party for the twin boys who were turning 1!

Afternoons:

• Monday: art, rest, read aloud, recess, snack, play
• Tuesday: ice day
• Wednesday: rest, play, recess, snack, read aloud, Benson introduced us to his new 8 week old puppy, Teddy.
• Thursday: rest, math centers, recess, snack, play
• Friday: play, rest, recess, snack, circumlocution game*

*Circumlocution means describing a word using other words. It’s kind of like 20 questions in reverse. The person who is “it” describes something and the others try to guess what the “it” person is describing. During rest time the kids listed adjectives and other descriptions of whatever they were thinking of. After snack, the kids took turns reading their descriptions while their classmates tried to guess the idea. This is a great skill to practice at home in English or in Spanish! It’s a very helpful tool for staying in the target language!

From the immersion coordinator: On Tuesday, January 31 at 7:00 pm we will host an informational meeting for anyone interested in learning more about the Spanish or Mandarin immersion programs at ZCS. We will present an overview of what immersion looks like at Zeeland Christian, hear from an immersion parent, and open it up for a question and answer time. This meeting will be geared towards potential families but will also address many questions that existing families might have, so spread the word to parents of young children and consider joining us yourself. Grandparents who want to understand immersion education better are also invited!

Highlights from our week…

Do you ever do something and it just feels “right?” It fills your heart with joy and gives you goosebumps. That’s how it feels to be back with your kids! Each morning we say “good morning” to each other in our special way and on Monday morning hearing your kids say it again after a long break brought tears to my eyes. It was so good to be back together! I think the kids missed each other. As much as I enjoyed sipping my coffee and staying in my pj’s as long as possible over break, I sure missed being with your kids! Your children’s hard work during the first part of the school year paid off and we were able to jump right back into learning. It was a week full of great learning, laughter, fun memories, building relationships, and enjoying being together!

Important Dates

• January 20: Maestra Izenbaard uses the morning for report card assessing and Maestra Vasquez subs in the classroom. (Sarah Vasquez was one of my aides last year and is phenomenal!)
• January 23: Teacher in-service (no school)
• February 10: For the Kidz gymnastics field trip (10:30-12:30) Please see the information below for details!
• February 13: 100th Day of School!
• February 14: Valentine’s Celebration
• February 20: President’s Day Break- No school

Important Announcements

• Report Cards: By January 27 I will complete a report card for each child! They will be available to view online shortly after that so please watch for details on how to view it! Please pray for our class as this means another round of assessments is coming soon! January 20 Maestra Vasquez will be subbing for me while I try to get some assessing done. I’m excited to see all of the progress that your children are making and I can’t wait to report back to you on what I discover! I am so proud of every one of them!
• For the Kidz Gymnastics Field Trip: We are planning to leave about 10:30 and return to school about 12:30. There will be NO hot lunch for our class that day as we’ll be getting back to school too late. 1/2 day families please plan on picking up your child at our classroom door at 12:30. I’m sorry for any inconvenience. There were limited dates and times we could go on this field trip. All students must have a signed waiver to be able to participate. Please follow this link  to complete the waiver for your child. You’ll be prompted to enter in a phone number to add your name and address. Then you will be asked to re-enter the phone number to add your child to the account. Be sure that your phone number is entered in this format: 000-000-0000. See our field trip blog post for more information!
• 100th Day Celebration: The 100th day of school is a big deal in Kindergarten! It means the kids have been working hard for 100 days! They have learned so much, grown a ton, and formed some amazing friendships! I’m looking forward to celebrating! To mark the special day we will be dressing as 100 year old people! This is completely optional. Some ideas include baby powder in your hair to make it gray, glasses, suspenders, a long skirt and sweater, or a cane. We will also be doing lots of fun math and literacy centers, creating a special art project, and eating a special 100th day snack made of 100 items!
• Valentine’s Day Celebration: I’m looking forward to celebrating friendships with your children on this special day! It’s a great way to continue our lessons on what it means to love your neighbor. On Valentine’s Day we will celebrate with a variety of math and literacy centers. One way we will intentionally show love to each other is by sharing valentines. When you help your child address valentines for his/her classmates, if you could please write “amigo” in the To: ___ section or leave it blank, that would be very helpful! Thank you!

Check out how much we’re learning and growing in Christ! 

Bible: We picked up our Bible lessons right where we left off and are now learning about Jesus’s ministry. This week we learned about his baptism. We discussed that this was an important event because it was one way Jesus showed his humanity and also because God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit were all on the scene.

Literacy: This week was an exciting week of Daily 5 as we opened up our writing center! Kindergarteners now choose from read to self, read to a friend, word work, and writing. Each child has a notebook with room for writing with words and pictures.

In grammar we continued to talk about the order of adjectives. We quickly discovered that, contrary to English, in Spanish the adjective comes after the noun.

• Reading strategy: Questioning
• Read aloud: Rebeca
• Vocabulary words
  • la maceta (flower pot)
  • contento/a (happy)
  • la paleta (sucker)
  • arrullar (to lull to sleep)
  • regar (to water)
  • la carreta (cart)
  • chupar (to suck)
  • la patineta (scooter, skateboard)
• Word wall word: bien (good)
• Phrase of the week: Estoy emocionado/a. (I’m excited.)
• Letter of the week: Bb

Our culture lessons in literacy this week took us to Mexico! Maestra Flores, a 1st grade aide who is from Mexico, shared lots of pictures from her trip to Mexico over Christmas break and taught us more about the Mexican culture.

Math: This week we started a new round of math centers! The kids were busy using tally marks to represent numbers, rolling and graphing gingerbread numbers, making 10’s with mittens and unifix cubes, and stamping numbers 1-12. 

Exploring God’s World: This week we integrated our adjectives knowledge from literacy and our listing and labelling work in writing workshop with our exploring God’s world work on earth materials. Each child had the opportunity to closely observe the 4 main earth materials: water, sand, soil, and rocks, (agua, arena, tierra, and rocas.) Later on we wrote down all the adjectives we could think of to describe each earth material. This ended up being a great review of our 5 senses as well! The kids loved acting as scientists!

Handwriting Without Tears: This week we finished learning about the uppercase letters that begin with “magic C.” We practiced writing Q and G together with our chalkboards, wet sponges, dry paper towels, and chalk.

Up in Lights: Lydia VanAppledorn was up in lights this week! She brought her mom, dad, brother, sister, and bunny in to meet our class! Lydia is full of spunk and has a heart that cares deeply for others. She’d like to be a doctor when she grows up. Thanks for being up in lights, Lydia!

Play: This week the kids have been busy creating courses for their cars out of a variety of blocks and legos. They’ve also opened the restaurant back up! The focus, laughter, and the way your kids have been getting along so nicely shows me that they missed playing with one another over break!

Afternoons:

• Monday: art, rest, read aloud, recess, snack, play
• Tuesday: rest. play, recess, snack, math centers
• Wednesday: rest, play, recess, snack, “bien” sight word activity and January calendar
• Thursday: ice/snow day! 🙂
• Friday: rest, play, recess, snack, K-5 singing

From the immersion coordinator: On Tuesday, January 31 at 7:00 pm we will host an informational meeting for anyone interested in learning more about the Spanish or Mandarin immersion programs at ZCS. We will present an overview of what immersion looks like at Zeeland Christian, hear from an immersion parent, and open it up for a question and answer time. This meeting will be geared towards potential families but will also address many questions that existing families might have, so spread the word to parents of young children and consider joining us yourself. Grandparents who want to understand immersion education better are also invited!

I’m crazy about your kids!

Highlights from our week…

It was a BIG week for us in Kindergarten! Monday we transitioned to even more Spanish in our classroom. Your kids did AWESOME! There are still several reminders each day, which is totally expected and fine at this point in the school year, but I am hearing more and more Spanish every day! We have filled our new pom pom jar about 1/3 full and are well on our way to earning our PJ party! Many students have colored in circles or even completed their first star for being “caught” speaking Spanish. I’m so proud of your kids and I think you should be too!

This week I could also say that I finished assessing every student! I am so excited to share with you how much your child has grown! It is good for me to step back and look at where we are now compared to where we started. God is good all the time!

Important Dates.

The next couple weeks are busy and I understand that there is lots going on both in and out of school. Please pay special attention to these important dates and reminders and, of course, let me know if you have any questions!

• November 21 & 22: conferences
• November 21: Chapel (10:30am) You’re welcome to join us!
• November 22: picture trade & friendship fruit salad
• November 23-27: Thanksgiving break
• December 2: 7 EMPTY toilet paper rolls to school please
• December 7: Love Letters to God book order DUE
  (I will send home the flyer this week)
• December 19: EMPTY shoebox to school please

Important Information

• Picture Trading –  We will be learning about trading in honor of the pilgrims and Indians during Thanksgiving. Please send in 20 wallet or 4X6 size photos of just your child. We will trade THIS Tuesday. You are welcome to use a combination of wallets (maybe from school pictures) and 4×6 prints. If you watch websites like Snapfish or Shutterfly, they often have 1 cent print options.
• Friendship fruit salad – THIS Tuesday, we will celebrate friendship by creating a fruit salad. Please send in 1 cup of chopped/prepared fruit for our salad. If you send in a container, I will be sure it makes it back home to you.
• Empty toilet paper rolls – We will be making a toilet paper manger scene as we learn more about Christmas. Please send in 7 EMPTY toilet paper rolls  by December 2
• The items from both Lost & Found locations (middle school and elementary) will be combined and placed on tables in the front entry during Parent/Teacher Conferences on November 21-22. I’m not aware of any lost items, but wanted to pass the message along to you just in case! All remaining items will be donated during Thanksgiving vacation!
  

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Check out how much we’re learning and growing in Christ!

Bible: This week we learned about Moses! We started our unit with Miriam placing Moses in a basket in the river. This coming week we will continue the story from where we left off at the 10 plagues. We are learning that God equips his people to do his work and always takes care of them.

Literacy: Daily 5 continues to go very well in our classroom! I used the time to assess this week, but after Thanksgiving I will start meeting with small groups to work on reading and pre-reading skills like letter identification.

This week we talked about Natalia and Norman who like to swim (nadar.) Can you tell what our letter of the week was- Nn! We practiced writing words on the syllbable wheel based on what syllables they contained- na, ne, ni, no, or nu. Several kids continued finding words with these syllables throughout our week! It was exciting to add them to our syllable wheel!

In grammar we reviewed the articles and nouns we’ve been talking so much about lately by labelling the rooms in a house and the things that go inside each room. Your kids loved to play with the house and practice these words throughout the day during their free time and at play time.

• Reading strategy: Making connections
• Word wall word: en (in)
• Phrase of the week: Está soleado.  (It’s sunny.) Está nublado. (It’s cloudy.)
• Letter of the week: Nn

Math: This week we practiced counting groups or objects and identifying the number being represented. We completed a math page where we practiced identifying a number and circling that number of objects as well as identifying a number and drawing that many objects.

Writing Workshop: This week we “fixed and fancied” our first piece of writing! The kids worked very hard to write the labels and add appropriate details to their drawings. This coming week we will have a publishing party to celebrate!

Play: The blocks center continues to be a huge hit! The structures your kids are building are growing in complexity (and height!) When we opened the firefighter bin this week, suddenly the block structures caught fire and a rescue team was called! This week we opened a grocery store in our classroom. The kids are taking turns being the cash register and are carefully picking out items from empty food containers (i.e. boxes of cereal or pasta, milk jugs, “Eggo” waffles, etc.)

Up in Lights: Sophia Stob was up in lights this week! Her mom, dad, and younger brother Charlie came to visit us on Monday morning. Sophia shared that her favorite food is chicken fries! That was a first for this Kindergarten teacher! Thank you for sharing some of the ways God has made you special, Sophia! We love you!

Afternoons:

• Monday: art, rest, book of friends, recess, snack, play
• Tuesday: rest. play, recess, snack, math centers & thankful turkeys craft with Maestra Burgos
• Wednesday: rest, play, recess, snack, turkey roll & color feathers
• Thursday: rest, play, recess, snack, math centers
• Friday: rest, play, recess, snack, Kindergarten sining

I just have to say again what an awesome job your kids are doing as we continue on our journey toward Spanish proficiency!  It is challenging and exhausting work, but your kids are persevering and doing an amazing job! Please pray for motivation and patience while learning in another language and attempting to speak it. As you encourage your child from home I want to remind you of the “tools” we use to stay in the target language. The kids liked it when I brought Matt’s real tools to illustrate these strategies!

Here are some tools that can help us communicate when we might not know a word in Spanish:

1. Use words that we already know in Spanish to express a new word or idea. This is called circumlocution (describe it, tell me colors/shape/place/etc.)
2.  Motions (Use your hands, point at it, act it out, or show it to me.)
3. Draw it out
4. Try anything except speaking in English. 😉

Blessings on your week ahead!

Melissa

From the Immersion Coordinator…

With the holidays around the corner, many immersion students come in contact with relatives who want them to “say something in Spanish/Mandarin.” As immersion parents, we have seen the uncomfortable look on our children’s faces; to a child, language has a specific purpose and should be in context. Consider prepping your young language learner for this situation by encouraging him/her to share a favorite song, Bible verse, prayer, or memorized phrase such as I like school and my teacher’s name is…” Hopefully, this will allow your child to show off the language without feeling too intimidated by being asked to translate or speak out of context.

Highlights from our week…

I praise God for another great week of  Kindergarten! One of the biggest highlights for me this week 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 for all of you for the parts you played in making that day so enjoyable! Thank you all for the donations of supplies, that prayers, the Gifts of Being Grand coordination, and to Christina, Doreen, Livie, Teresa, and Mindy for spending your morning with us.

This week the kids also made great progress in their Spanish pom poms jar! Each time Kindergarteners use Spanish unprompted, they earn a pom pom for the jar. When the jar is full we will celebrate! I anticipate the jar filling up this week! Soon after that, we will bump up the Spanish output expectation again. Your kids are making amazing progress! Please continue to encourage them and lift us all up in your prayers!

Important Dates.

• November 9 & 10: No PM bussing and no hot lunch
• November 10: Picture Retakes
• November 11: No AM or PM bussing and no hot lunch
• November 21 & 22: conferences
• November 22: picture trade & friendship fruit salad

Important Information

• Conference Questionnaire – Take a moment and fill out the google form sent to you last week by e-mail. This will help me better plan our conference together. Please complete by Friday, Nov. 18th.  Click here to complete the form. Thanks!
• Conference Sign Up – Conference sign up is underway.  Please sign up for a 15 minute conference with me. Refer to the email I sent out earlier for sign up information as well as the password. Please let me know if you need this information again.
• Thanksgiving –
  • Picture Trading –  We will be learning about trading in honor of the pilgrims and Indians during Thanksgiving. Please send in 20 wallet or 4X6 size photos of just your child. We will trade on Tuesday the 22nd. You are welcome to use a combination of wallets (maybe from school pictures) and 4×6 prints. If you watch websites like Snapfish or Shutterfly, they often have 1 cent print options.
  • Friendship fruit salad – On Tuesday the 24th, we will celebrate friendship by creating a fruit salad. Please send in 1 cup of chopped/prepared fruit for our salad. More details to come!
• If there are any more Gifts of Being Grand pages out there, please turn them in to me as soon as you are able. I will add them to your child’s spiritual journal, a collection of pieces gathered throughout your child’s years at ZCS.
  

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Check out how much we’re learning and growing in Christ!

Bible: This week we learned about Joseph! We learned about his family, his dreams, and his journey to Egypt. This week we will learn how God continued to take care of him while he was in Egypt. We also began our Bible verse for November. To practice with your child, please check out the video under the “Bible Verses” tab.

Literacy: This week we added Word Work to our Daily 5 choices! For the first time, Kindergarteners were also able to choose which center they wanted to do that day.

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

Math: This week we reviewed and took our first math test! I am so proud of the kids for their hard work and can’t wait to show you the culmination of their hard work this unit! I will have their math tests for you at our conference.

Writing Workshop: This week we continued to draw out our stories and label the pictures. I am encouraging the kids to remember that wherever they are is exactly where they are supposed to be. Our goal is to listen for and write the initial sound of each word.

Play: We continue to enjoy playing vet, restaurant, and build cruise ships. This week we also started making Thanksgiving cards. On Tuesday and Wednesday afternoons we practiced some math centers and on Thursday afternoon the kids helped me prepare our classroom for Grandparents Day. They loved taking part in this process!

From the immersion coordinator, Jodi Pierce…

Add.a.lingua has lauched a new resource for immersion parents and you will want to check it out! Please visit addalingua.com and scroll down to the box that invites parents to learn more. After registering, you will find brief yet excellent information regarding immersion education.

Thank you, again, for the important part you play in helping our school days go smoothly! I am so proud of the hard work your kids are putting in every day! They have grown so much and it is a blessing to get to be a small part of it!

Highlights from our week…

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! We are now filling a jar with sparkly pom poms each time I hear one of the students use Spanish. When the jar is full we will celebrate! Once it’s almost full we’ll vote on ways we’d like to celebrate. 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!

Finally outside after LOTS of indoor recesses!

Elli was up in lights! Thanks for coming mom!

Math centers- number puzzles

Math centers- pumpkin roll and color

Math centers- playdough number apple trees

Emma was glad we had no more indoor recess!

Beautiful fall recess after a rainy day.

peek a boo!

Important Dates

• October 31: Reformation Day Chapel (10:00) – please feel free to join us! You’re welcome to sit with our class or in the chairs with the other parents!
• November 4: Grandparent’s Day! We are excited to host our grandparents on Friday! If you happened to miss the information that went home before CEA, please check out our resources tab to read the information on Grandparents Day and pass on The Gifts of Being Grand.
• November 9 & 10: No PM bussing and no hot lunch
• November 10: Picture Retakes
• November 11: No AM or PM bussing and no hot lunch

Important Information

• Gifts of Being Grand: Please help me connect with grandparents by passing along these precious keepsakes. I’ll add them 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 and will have extra copies that day if anyone needs them.
• Snack: Just a friendly reminder to please send a morning and afternoon snack with your child even if he/she is ordering hot lunch that day. Thanks for your help with this! A full tummy is better for learning than a hungry one. 🙂
• Parent Teacher Conferences: God is doing amazing things through your kids this year! I am looking forward to meeting with each one of you on November 21 or 22 to share how much your child has grown and learned so far in Kindergarten! 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 November 4 you will be able to sign up for one time slot. I will send an email with a parent letter attached to give you more information about how to sign up. Thank you, in advance, for taking the time to meet with me! I’m looking forward to it!
  

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Check out how much we’re learning and growing in Christ!

Bible: This week we learned more about Jacob. God brought Jacob to his uncle Laban where he blessed him with a job, riches, and with Leah and Rachel. Later God asked Jacob to return to his homeland. Even though he was scared of what his brother Esau might think, Jacob trusted and obeyed. God never left Jacob or stopped watching over him. God never leaves us and will always watch over us! God is so good!

(Just fyi, this coming week I hope to assess the October Bible verse and start the November Bible verse. A video will be coming soon!)

Literacy: This was a VERY exciting week for literacy! In the Daily 5 we reached our goal of 10 minutes of Read to a Friend for 3 days in a row and celebrated together! This coming week I hope to introduce #3 of the Daily 5 as well as introduce choice. Kindergarteners will be able to choose which of the 3 Daily 5 choices they would like to complete with the use of a check in sheet.

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: This week we practiced the numbers 4 and 5. The kids are creating a book which is separate from our Handwriting Without Tears curriculum and will go home soon. We also practiced the letters H and K. The diagonal lines were the trickiest!

Math: This week we practiced matching sets of objects to numbers. We also started our first round of math centers! Typically, we’ll work on the same set of math centers for 2-3 weeks. Many of these centers involve powerful learning that doesn’t always include a worksheet. Please do not be alarmed if you do not see work coming home in your child’s red alert folder. If you’re ever curious about what we’re working on, please don’t hesitate to ask! I’m happy to share even beyond what I write in the newsletter. Our current round of math centers includes: playdough apple tree numbers, number puzzles, pumpkin roll and color, and apple patterns. These centers help develop number formation skills, number sense, patterning skills, counting, and number identification.

Writing Workshop: First we verbally shared our stories. Then we drew our stories. Now we are working on writing labels on our pictures! I am encouraging the kids to write all of the sounds they hear when they stretch out the words. Our goal right now is to write the initial sound of the word.

Play: This week your children created a 5 star restaurant. In art some friends chose to make menus while others were chefs and still others were servers. In the blocks center I added some people just to see what the class would do. The next thing I knew some of our friends had created cruise ships and the toy people were enjoying a vacation!

En las Luces: Elli was up in lights this week! Elli had a heart for traveling to other places and a passion for taking care of animals. Elli shared some pictures of her vacation to Puerto Rico. I was excited to see these since that is the country we are talking about during this unit! Elli hopes to be a veterinarian when she grows up. Thanks for sharing Elli!

**If you haven’t already done so, please check under the “Other Resources” tab for our Up in Lights schedule and an English translation of the instructions! I will send the packet and special animal home with your child 1 week before your child’s turn!

As we look ahead toward Grandparents Day, Thanksgiving, and Christmas things tend to get kind of busy both in and out of school. I will do my very best to communicate everything you need to know well, but please do not hesitate to let me know if you have any questions! It is such an honor to partner with you all. Thank you for supporting me and your children!

Highlights from our week

This week was full of positive learning and growing! We opened up our next Daily 5 choice, read to a friend, created our first classroom book together on Tuesday afternoon, learned about the next Fruit of the Spirit, joy, and tasted applesauce together!

Elli and Reagan perform surgery on the polar bear.

Collin gets his doctor tools ready for the next patient.

The kids did a “trust walk” to get their brains thinking about the word trust. This helped us think about what it took for Abraham to trust God would keep his promise regarding Abraham’s family.

Important Dates

• October 20-21: No School (CEA Convention)
• October 31: Reformation Day Chapel- please feel free to join us! You’re welcome to sit with our class or in the chairs with the other parents!
• November 4: Grandparent’s Day! (Pass this date on to grandparents/friends please! More information will be coming home this week! Please watch for a letter from me and a form for grandparents to fill out. I will also post them under the resources tab on the blog in case you need to print more forms or lose track of any of the information. Life can get messy and sometimes things get lost! 🙂 I get it!)
• November 9 & 10: No PM bussing and no hot lunch
• November 10: Picture Retakes
• November 11: No AM or PM bussing and no hot lunch

Important Information

• Are you new to immersion education? Have you watched your older children advance through the immersion program but have questions about this approach to education? Are you wondering what is expected of you as an immersion parent? You are invited to learn more about immersion education and meet the coordinator of the language immersion programs, Jodi Pierce. This will be an informal round table discussion time for parents to learn and ask questions about immersion education, More information will come, but for now please consider reserving one of the following times to attend: October 24 @ 9:00 AM or October 24 and 7:00 PM.
• As fall sets in, just a quick reminder to update the extra clothes in your child’s backpack to pants instead of shorts. 🙂 It is also a good idea to have a coat or sweatshirt as the temperature can change drastically in one day.  We love Michigan weather! 😉

Check out how much we’re learning and growing in Christ!

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. 

Literacy: This week I introduced the next of the Daily 5 centers, Read to a Friend. The kids discovered that they have similar jobs during this center as they did for Read to Self- stay in 1 spot, read the whole time, read quietly, start right away, and do your best. We also talked about sitting elbow to elbow and knee to knee in order to share books fairly. We discussed that even with a level 1 voice, our partners can hear us and this way we aren’t distracting others! We are building reading stamina for Read to a Friend and are consistently reading for 6 minutes!

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

Math: This week we used math manipulatives to determine which number is more (más) or less (menos.)

Exploring God’s World: This week we started our PBL, (project based learning,) which is centered around mapping and Grandparents Day. I posed the question, “After grandparents attend chapel, how will they know where to find us in our classroom?” I was anticipating answers that I’ve heard in the past like, “They’ll ask Siri.” or “They can call us on the phone.” Your kids definitely surprised me when they said, “Well, they’ll pray to God and he will lead them to us.” Please look for PBL information and a map of our school in your child’s red alert folder this week. I will also post the PBL information on our resources tab of the blog.

Writing Workshop: We have been working hard on telling true stories to other people. This week we started drawing our stories. Every Kindergartener drew the story of our field trip to DeGraaf Nature Center.

Play: My favorite part of play is the authenticity. I love observing the kids as they play and then pushing them to think deeper and use their imagination more. This week I took the animals out of the puppet theater and put them in the house. I noticed the kids pretending the pets were sick so I showed them the doctor kit. The next thing I knew we had a veterinary hospital in our classroom!

En las Luces: Bryce was up in lights this week! His parents and older sister, Leah, visited our classroom and shared some of the ways they think Bryce is special. God has given Bryce a passion for hockey which is one of Bryce’s favorite activities. Thanks for introducing us to your family, Bryce! We are so thankful for you!

**If you haven’t already done so, please check under the “Other Resources” tab for our Up in Lights schedule and an English translation of the instructions! I will send the packet and special animal home with your child 1 week before your child’s turn!

I love spending my days with your children! I think this short week will bring a nice change of pace. I’m looking forward to learning how to be a better teacher and making connections with other teachers at the CEA convention on Thursday and Friday. I can’t wait to implement what I will learn and make Kindergarten even better for your child! I hope you have an amazing week!