Announcements
SAVE THE DATE: On September 15th, we are going to do a Crew Picnic at Bison Park in the Meadows from 5-7pm. This will be for only Ms. Lauren's Crew. Families are welcome to bring all siblings and a picnic dinner. It is a great time to connect, see who your child has been playing with, exchange contact info, and build CREW.
Seesaw: Let me know if you need me to reprint the instructions for connecting to Seesaw. This week, we uploaded a picture from play time, a video of teambuilding, a picture of playing math games, and a picture of student work. You will not want to miss out on these posts! :)
Volunteers Needed:
I am in need of a few volunteers to help with classroom projects. These projects can be completed in the staff workroom, as your schedule allows. Let me know if you are interested and when you can come, so that I can have it ready for you. These projects include making Buddy Journals, laminating items, and prep for literacy games. Please email me!
Additionally I need volunteers for filing Take Home Folders, plugging in iPads, and doing take home projects. Here is a sign up for those jobs. Thank you helping out our crew!
Remember to log your volunteer hours on Track it Forward after completing a service. If you’ve recently attended a volunteer training or belay training and/or volunteered for the school carnival, all of this time counts and every minute counts. We’re the Blue/Pike Team! Thank you for being a part of our Crew!
Action Item- RAD T-Shirt Size Needed
All students at REMS will receive a t-shirt for Renaissance Adventure Day (RAD) which will take place on Friday, October 6th. Parent Crew is providing these shirts; they just need your child’s t-shirt size. Please complete this form by Sunday, 8/20, to indicate your child’s t-shirt size.
Scholastic Book Clubs:
If you would like to purchase books through Scholastic Book Clubs:
You can choose to have your books shipped to your home or delivered to me with our class order.
With a $25 order, you can pick a FREE $5 Book (use code: READS).
Class Order Due Date: 08/27/23
Shop Our Class Page: https://orders.scholastic.com/YCRBR
Shop Digital Flyers for Our Grade with Your Child: https://clubs.scholastic.com/kindergarten
Please share the Class Page link to extended family and friends.
***All orders also earn FREE Books for our class. I love that our crew library grows from every order that is placed! Thank you for your support!
Class Code: YCRBR
Take Home Folders: Today, I sent home Take Home Folders. Please empty your folder and return on Monday. Thanks! There are samples of student writing, letter activity, math family letter, math quiz, scholastic news, some information from DCSD about funding, and more!
Upcoming Volunteer Opportunity: Kindergarten teachers would like to start having volunteers in the classroom to help with letter formation in the mornings, starting in September. Ms. Bethany and Ms. Lauren will be hosting training sessions if you are interested. We are opening this volunteer opportunity up to ALL Renaissance parents.
In this training, we will go over how, what, and why we do letter formation in a particular way. Please feel free to bring your child along as the perfect partner to practice during the training. We ask that you attend a training before you sign up to volunteer.
*9/13 Wednesday 1:15-1:45
*9/15 Friday 8:00-8:30
We plan to offer 2 volunteer slots per classroom from 8:30-9am on Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday, starting Monday September 18th. More information is available on our online portal.
Calendar
August 25th: Community Reading 8:30-9am
September 4th: Labor Day- No School
September 15th: Ms. Lauren's Crew Picnic at Bison Park 5-7pm
Crew Highlights
Hooray for our first full week on learning!
In phonics, we have been learning that words are made of letters and words are seperated by spaces. Students counted the letters of their name, in connection to reading Chrysanthemum who has thirteen letters in her name. Students were thrilled to learn their first sight word I and can. I will continue to provide you a list of sight words so that you can practice at home. Our phonics lessons also targeted rhyming, a foundational literacy skill.
*Hint at home: Find rhyming words in your nightly reading. Be a word detective for the word I or can. Count the words in a small sentence.
In reading, we read two mentor texts to show the difference between fiction (a story) and nonfiction (informational or true text). We noticed how they were different and found our own examples of each. On their iPads, students explored an app that reads stories and highlights each word as it is read. During independent reading, students continued to grow in their stamina. This sets the stage for groups to rotate to different literacy activities during our reading block.
*Read a variety of books during your nightly reading. Have your child help identify if it is fiction or nonfiction.
In writing, I cannot be more proud of the bravery that our crew is showing in taking risks with putting letters on the page! We celebrate all forms of writing in kindergarten, beginning with a picture. So many took the next step of adding a letter to their writing this week or writing a sight word. We looked at many samples of writing to gain some inspiration, which I posted on our Writing Inspiration Wall. One example we noticed were signs, so the crew made signs for our classroom. These are posted all over our room to help us remember no running, no hitting, wash your hands, library, All About Me books, and so on. How fun that our crew continues to join in the creation of our shared learning space.
*Writing is everywhere! Show your child how you use writing in your everyday life (in grocery lists, emails, articles, and so on) to bring purpose to the many forms of how we use writing.
In expedition, we are learning about Crew. We continue to read All About Me books during Mystery Person, as well as get to know key staff members, such as assistant principal Ms. Lisa and our music teacher Ms. Liesl. We are on the second round of the name game, so students are trying to beat their personal record of knowing more names each time they play. I introduced the Renaissance Core Values, in which we have been talking about integrity this week. This connected to the teambuilding activity that Mr. Cody, our adventure education director, led on Wednesday. We defined integrity as doing the right thing all the time, even when no one is looking. We brought this learning back to the classroom, as we talked about Whole Body Listening and using integrity during learning time.
*Use the word integrity at home. Talk about examples of what integrity looks like and does not look like.
In math, we wrapped up our lesson on position words, and students took their first quiz. These went home in Take Home Folders. This next unit is on length and height. Our crew enjoyed going on a scavenger hunt of the classroom to find an object that was longer and shorter than their shoe.
*Check out the "Math Family Letter" that went home in Take Home Folders. It has great information about the why, the what, and how you can support at home.
Here are some snapshots of learning from our week:
Looking at samples of writing to get some inspiration.
This was a wonderful read aloud from this week which describes your personal space about the size of a hula hoop. This visual helps young kids understand social boundaries of personal space.
Our mentor texts for fiction and nonfiction.
Meeting our incredible assistant principal Ms. Lisa!
Counting the words of a sentence.
This week, our crew learned three different math games. Check out pictures on Seesaw!
What a highlight to do an obstacle course with Mr. Cody!
Students used their integrity to share if they stepped on any of the items.
We used iPads as a learning tool.
Students learning how to *carefully* plug in headphones in addition to learning how to navigate the reading app.
Math Scavenger Hunt: Find items shorter than your shoe.
Find objects that are longer than your shoe.
Next time you are in our room, check out all of our signs. This one was for "safe hands." Love it!
Our time with 4th grade buddies was spent playing math games. They are great helpers to make sure everyone knows how to play and what to do.
We will be revealing 4th grade buddy partnerships next week! :)
In Take Home Folders, have your child share which part of whole body listening he/she is working on.
So much fun in music this week with Ms. Liesl!
Moving like animals to music.
Sleepy alligators.
