Fingerprints and Tickle Feathers

What a fun week we've had in Kindergarten! From going to look for things we can count, armed with tickle feathers to help us keep a one - to - one ratio (not counting anything twice or missing an item) to going on a walk outside to look for what God has done, it was a full week with lots to do. 

One of our math lessons this week was on was focused on counting (I should say more focused - we count everyday). We talked about how we can count anything. Math is everywhere! KA is showing me her tickle feather that she used to count the items on my desk. "Miss K, did you know you have 30 things on your desk?" This sort of activity is hands on, engaging, and lets students count at their own pace with the numbers that they know. It's also lots of fun!

KI, ET and CA look for God's fingerprints by the tire. They found water and bugs in the water (they're trying to collect the bugs with a stick for a closer look).

SA, KA, CA, and ET find fingerprints that God left on the treeline floor.

GR, LE, KA, ET, SA, and HA exploring for God's fingerprints. LE has found a flower.

One of my favourite parts of Kindergarten is the learning centres (which the students think of as play time). During our centres, students can make choices for where to go, they can build relationships with friends old and new, and they can grow their skills that we've worked on in whole-class lessons.

KA and JA play in our new Bible centre. They are making things that God created: KA - plants for day three, and JA - sun, moon, and stars for day four.

JE, JA, and CA play at the building centre. While they build with lego, they are building their oral communication skills, problem solving skills, fine motor skills, and spatial sense skills, and exercising their imagination.

MA, HO, and CA play at the building centre. MA is looking for a particular block that she has in mind for something.

LE and HO use watercolours to make backgrounds for our upcoming word wall. The next time we did this, I overheard conversations between ET and SA, who were sharing a paint set, and HO and HA who were sharing. They were talking about which paints were juicy (my term for using water to wet the paint) and which ones were 'slimy,' 'goopy,' 'soupy,' etc. This sort of discussion grows their observation skills and their vocabulary as they talk with their friends.

GR puts on a puppet show for some of his friends.

HO, LE, and HA play at the nature centre. They can use their imagination to make up a story with the animals, build with the branch sections, or work with the shells. During this particular time, they were using all three items to make a story in the jungle.

KI and LE play in the house centre (communication, imagination, getting along, connections to real life).

Every morning, students have the same routine. Shoes by their hook, bring Miss K their envelope, put indoor shoes on, and go to table centres. At this table centre, LA is developing his fine motor skills by threading wooden beads. This morning, I came to ask him questions about what he was doing (building oral communication and explanation skills) and he showed me that he made a pattern. "Red yellow red yellow red yellow." Miss K - "What do you need next?" LA - "Red!"

A few more special notes from this week: rotation has started, which means that twice a week the Kindies have physical education with Miss R while I teach Gr. 1/2 Music. I'm told they love 'What time is it, Mr. Wolf," and are doing well in following the gym routines. We also had special times like our first Show and Tell on Friday, where students shared about their families. If you did not send in a family photo for Friday, please feel free to send one in as early as possible next week and we will have a time to share.

Lastly, we started discussion on our mission statement and classroom agreement.

Mission Statement Ideas: These were responses to my question of what is our mission, our job, what we want to be like this year. "We need to learn!" What kinds of things? "How to hold a pencil, our letters, our numbers, how to be nice..." Wonderful! They also said that we will be good friends, and we will love Jesus. Another student said that if we love Jesus we need to listen and obey him, so that will be part of our mission too! What an excellent brainstorming session!

Classroom Agreement: A classroom agreement replaces teacher-made rules. I still have procedures and routines for how we sit on carpet, how many students at a centre, etc., but this student-made agreement contains the rules we all agree to follow in everything. Our list - Be Proactive and Listen, Help People, Have Fun, and Be Nice with our Body and our Words.

We will discuss this once more and make it official by putting our hand print on them. Pictures will come on next week's blog. I love the ownership that this gives the students over their year - they are deciding in the second week of school what kind of choices we have to make to be an awesome kindergarten class!

Have a wonderful weekend!

Miss K

Highlights as told by the students in our Friday end-of-day circle: