Reflecting on Our Year Together

The year has come to an end and I am in awe of the growth my crew made!  The students have collaborated as a crew and built amazing friendships, learned problem solving skills and enjoyed playing together.

We grew as mathematicians who counted accurately, sorted by attributes and learned to add/subtract using manipulatives, number lines and patterns.

Students improved as writers who stayed focused on an idea, wrote multiple sentences using spaces, capitals at the the beginning and ending punctuation.

 Students are becoming strong readers by selecting just right books, using multiple strategies to solve unknown words and thinking about their reading by retelling, asking questions, inferring and making connections.  One of our favorite past times in reading was partner reading.

By far, my favorite part of kindergarten was our adventure time spent outside.  The curiosity and joy the outdoors brought to our crew was amazing.

Thank you for your partnership this year!  I loved watching each student grown and building relationships with each of your families.  Have a great summer!

Fox Trot

Fox Creek had its annual Fox Trot, fun run!  This year we ran and raised money for our new gymnasium floor and additional physical education equipment.

The students ran hard and enjoyed a yummy popsicle following our perseverance!

Hands On Learning

Kids learn best when they can have hands on learning!  

Through our expedition, Amazing Birds, students have had the opportunity to do the work of an ornithologist.  

Each Wednesday, we have the experts from HRCA Backcountry come lead us in exploration of bird's body parts.

 We learned how birds use their beaks to survive!

 Kids loved having hands on opportunities to see how a bird's beak allows it to eat food and make nests.

Students collaborated in groups to sip nectar, scoop fish, crack seeds and eat tiny bugs (rice).

 We also love when we can go out into the field to observe birds.  We traveled to Cheese Ranch to observe a woodpecker and many ducks!

We love the opportunity to take our learning outside and do the work of a real scientist.

Ornithologists

This week we kicked off our new learning expedition all about Birds!  

We had a visit from our local Backcountry Educational department to help us think about our guiding question:

What makes a bird a bird?

Students rotated between different stations to closely observe different things about birds.

Our local experts brought feathers, beaks, talons and/or feet plus eggs for our ornithologists to closely observe and touch.

Thanks to our opportunity of inquiry and the guidance of our experts we learned that birds have:

1. feathers

2. wings

3. two feet

4. a beak

We also learned that all birds lay eggs!

After our experts left, students had the opportunity to discovery read all kinds of bird books!  We are so excited to become bird experts and teach you all that we are learning!

You can support this learning by:
~getting outside and noticing birds and nests
~reading bird books
~visiting Backcountry Base camp right here in Highlands Ranch

100 Days

This week we celebrated the 100th day of school!  We are so excited to be 100 days smarter.

 In math, we counted to 100 by 10s and 1s.  

Students reflected on themselves as a mathematician.  They used the sentence starter "I am the kind of mathematician who..."

I am the kind of mathematician who does math during math workshop.

I am the kind of mathematician who moves and counts.

I am the kind of mathematician who can count by 1s to 100.

In reading, we set a goal to read 100 books as a crew.  We read 101!  Way to go!

Students reflected on how they have grown as a reader after 100 days.

Students used the sentence starter, "After 100 days, I am the kind of reader who...."

Answers included:

I am the kind of reader who reads a lot.

I am the kind of reader who can read words.

I am the kind of reader who can read longer books because I have been practicing.

Lastly, students reflected on themselves in writing.

I can reflect on how I have grown after 100 days of kindergarten.

Students wrote....

I am kinder.  I can write 3 sentences.  I have made more friends

I can read more books.  I can count to 100.  I can write lowercase letters.

I am so proud of the growth my kindergarten crew has made after 100 days of school!

It's Winter

Winter has arrived and we love the snow!

Thank you for packing weather appropriate clothing to include mittens/gloves, hats, boots, snow pants and a cozy winter coat.

No matter the weather, we work hard to get outside and PLAY!  Our entire crew loves the fresh air and the snow seems magical to this curious, playful, hard working crew!  We work hard to get outside 3 times a day!

Kids only get to be in kindergarten one year of their life so we work hard to experience all that nature and childhood have to offer!

Celebration of Learning

What a special night of celebrating all the important skills we have learned in Kindergarten!

We decided to call our Celebration of Learning, "All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten".  Students started the night by singing songs about friendship, play and thinking like a scientist.

Then the kindergarten experts took their parents to visit 4 stations where they taught their families 4 important life skills:

Read (for fun and to learn)

Play

Rest

Wonder

Students taught their families the importance of each of these life skills.  Parents had time to play with their kids and learn about our classroom "Play Commitments"

~share

~include others

~take care of materials

~use kind words

In addition, students taught about reading for fun (fiction) and to learn (non-fiction).  They traveled to the art room to do a science experiments when their families got to observe closely and wonder.  

Lastly, parents got to make calm spray (water with lavendar oil) and get their backs rubbed just like we do each day to relax after recess.

The students were so proud to share what important life skills they are learning in kindergarten!