A word from the kids...

We sang "Jingle Bells" in front of the whole school!  We were in the gym.  We sang on the risers.  We also sang "Jingle Bell Parade."  We used real bells!  It was fun.  You can watch the video to see us sing. 

One day, so many kids wanted to color that we had to put two tables together!  We had new coloring pages.  It was so much fun. 

Another Busy Week in Room 3

Here's what we've been up to, as told by the children in room 3....

We saw Mr. Chris.  Mr. Chris is a farmer.  He is famous because he is a singer.  He has cd's and a TV SHOW!!!  He came to Chamberlin School to do a concert for us.  He sang songs and played the guitar and the ukulele.  We loved it.  We gave Mr. Chris hugs and said thank you. 

                

This week we started writing about special things that we can't bring to school.  Maybe they aren't allowed, like pets. Or maybe it's too breakable.  It might be something far away, like your grandma's house.  It might be something too big, like your bedroom.  We learned that authors think hard about things and then write what they know.  In these pictures, Bowen is writing about his dog and Vanessa is writing about her bedroom.  

        We built houses.  We used different shapes to make them.  Next week will add  trees and glitter snow.  They will be so pretty.                                                                    

Snow Outside, Shaving Cream Inside!

What a nice week we've had!  Everyone came back well-rested and ready to go!  We have been buzzing along with our literacy and math work.  The kids have been labeling everything they can using their best "kindergarten spelling."  Our friend Mabel also gave us a new tool...Word Wallets to keep all of our frequency words in.  We will use those to practice every day.    PLEASE KEEP SENDING THE TOILET PAPER, PAPER TOWEL AND WRAPPING PAPER ROLLS!  WE NEED A LOT OF THEM!

AND NOW A WORD FROM THE KIDS...

We played with shaving cream.  We loved it so much. We made snowmen.  We wrote letters and words.   Shaving cream cleans tables.  It makes dried glue get soft again and you can wipe it off.  We LOVE shaving cream! 

 





We did some labeling.  How we do it is we look at the picture and try to sound the word to make that whole big word.  We use kindergarten spelling.  We write down the letters we hear in the words.   We can label and learn to make new words.  It helps us when we write stories.  

We sorted pictures by their first sound.  This week we had some tricky letters: Q,Y,C,U,D and E.  One of the pictures was UNDERWEAR!  We thought that was SOOOOOO funny!

Mrs. Rundle came to talk to us.  She taught us not to eat snow.  She said we should not throw snowballs.  We can't throw ice either.  That's really important.  Ice is really hard.  There are no snowball fights at Chamberlin School.  Mrs. Rundle wants us to be safe on the playground.  

This is a third grader who came to read to us. Her name is Lexi. She is a good reader.  She was in Mrs. Brown's kindergarten too.  She learned how to read from Mrs. Brown.  She likes to read to us.  She showed us every picture.  

Cows, Bats, and Dancing...Oh My!!

It has been quite a week in room 3!  We had a trip to the farm, made smoothies with our Farm-to-School teacher Miss Meg, started our dance residency, oh...and don't forget HALLOWEEN!  Phew!  Mrs. Brown is tired!  It was a lot of fun and the kids did a great job.  There is learning happening everywhere.  Mark your calendars for our November 15 evening dance performance at the high school.  We will practically be professionals by then!

And now a word from the kids....

Editor's Note:  The following comments are DIRECTLY from the children.  Keep reading, you'll see what I mean! 😉

We went to the Bread & Butter Farm.  We met Farmer Cory.  She showed us around the farm.  

This is us seeing the chickens.  We got to pet the chickens.  Some were in the chicken coop and some were out of the chicken coop. 

We saw cows and bulls.  They were behind an electric fence. Cows are girls and bulls are boys.  Some of the bulls were getting a piggyback ride from the cows. We were surprised!  Farmer Brandon called the cows and bulls to move them to a new place where there was fresh grass.  All the cows went running.  

We ripped apart some garlic.  We helped Farmer Cory get it ready to plant.  Garlic gets planted in the fall.  

We went inside the greenhouse.  That's a place where plants can keep growing when it gets cold.  We noticed that it got VERY warm in there when the sun was shining.  We saw some kale growing in the greenhouse.  

When we got back to school, we wrote about the things we saw at the farm.  We did such a good job that Mrs. Brown gave us special folders to keep our writing in.  

IT WAS HALLOWEEN THIS WEEK!

We made these bat hats during our party.  It was fun.  We had snacks and played bingo.  Everyone loved it.  

We Are Celebrities!

We had so much fun this week making scarecrows and then learning a song about them.  We went on a concert tour to venues such as the lunchroom, the other kindergarten classrooms, the office and the library.  It sure was fun!

Here we are in Ms. Hall's class strutting our stuff!

Our Trip to the Apple Orchard

We went to the apple orchard.  We wore our apple hats.  We had fun.  

We went apple picking in the orchard.  There was a lot of trees.  There were lots of different types of apples.  

The apples were sweet and yummy!

We learned about bees.  They get pollen from one apple blossom and bring it to another apple blossom.  That makes an apple grow.  We pretended to be bees.  

We made apple cider.  We put apples in the cider press.  The apples were crushed up and pressed.  Apple cider came out.  We drank it.  It was delicious.  

There were some chickens and bunnies at the apple orchard too!  We had a great day!

Fall is HERE!

It was a wet and chilly week!  We survived a couple days of indoor recess and still managed to have fun!  This week, we set up the painting easel.  There were paintings galore!  We also enjoyed playing the Mr. Potato Head game at one of our centers. 

On Wednesday, October 9 we will visit Chapin's Apple Orchard.  This field trip will happen RAIN OR SHINE!  Please be sure your child is dressed for the weather.  Rain boots are highly recommended since it tends to be wet at the orchard in the morning.  We expect to be back at school in time for lunch.   We will use our apples for cooking and for scientific exploration.

And now a word from the kids...

This week, our last Monarch butterfly hatched.  It was a boy.  We let him go.  He will go to Mexico. It is warm there in the winter.  This chart shows that we had 7 female Monarchs and 6 male Monarchs. 

This is Miss Meg.  She is our Farm to School teacher.  We learn about food that is good for us.  We try new foods.  This week we had apples with honey.  We learned that bees make honey.  Bees bring pollen from one flower to another.  That's how apples grow.  

This is Mabel.  Mabel helps us spell words. She teaches us about letters.  This week we learned about vowels.  The red letters in Mabel's name are vowels.  We all have vowels in our names.  

We played some math games this week.  One game is called "Beat You to Five."  The other game is "Which Numeral Will Win?"  The games help us learn how to write numbers and add cubes.  

This is us doing yoga.  Yoga helps us to be calm. It's good for your body and it's good for your heart and brain.  It helps us to cool down or warm up. 

We did a project.  We read Wemberly Worried.  Wemberly worried about everything.  She was worried about going to school but then she found a friend and she wasn't worried any more.  She got much more better.  We used paper plates and cut out shapes to make our own Wemberlys.  

This is our leaf counting center.  We gather leaves and put them in the basket.  You have to get the right number of leaves.  

Moving Along in Room 3....

It's been a wonderful week in room 3!  We have continued to practice classroom routines and expectations.   Our new phonics program has us studying names to learn letters and their sounds.  Math finds us busy exploring shapes and playing a new game, "Beat You To Five."  

This week, we spent a fair amount of time reviewing playground expectations.  There has been a bit of "rough play" lately and we want to emphasize the importance of being safe and gentle with our friends.  This would be a great topic of conversation at home too!  

I am really enjoying working on the blog WITH the children.  They are learning how to share ideas and information in a way that makes sense to the reader.   Writing our blog together also helps us to generalize what we've been working on during our literacy time.  Feel free to leave us some comments!  Enjoy!

And now a word from the kids...

This is Nelson.  He is our bear.  He lives at Chamberlin School.  We bring him home at night because he gets lonely and scared.  He has a journal and a bedtime story.  Ryan the birthday boy brought Nelson home on his birthday!

We made these pigs. They are Pinkerton pigs.  Pinkerton is a pig from a story called Me First.  We used our scissors and glue to make our Pinkertons.  

We know how to read! We read familiar books.  They are familiar because we have heard them so many times!  Now we can read them on our own!

This is our farm that Mrs. Brown bought for us. We like it! It has a tractor, animals, and farmers.  Farmers are real people but we have some fake ones.  We play with them.  

We have two babies in room 3.  Their names are Nancy and Nancy.  We like to rock them, feed them, change their clothes and read to them.  

WE LOVE THOSE BABIES!

Look what we've been up to...

Oh what fun we've been having in room 3!  This week, we started our brand new phonics program.  We've been singing, sorting letter sounds, and studying our names.  We've also had a lot of fun reading "familiar books."  These are books that we've read together several times (I bet you have some at home...) The children are so familiar with them that they can "read" them all by themselves.  This is a very important early reading skill.  

For the first time this week, we did some shared writing and worked on our blog TOGETHER! My goal is for this to be a regular part of our week, with kids explaining, in their own words, what we did in kindergarten.  Enjoy!  

And now a word from the kids...

We made these bumblebees. They are hanging on the wall. It was fun to make them.  They make the classroom beautiful. They help us to remember to be safe, be respectful and be responsible.  

We filled the hive!  Everybody at Chamberlin School traded Bee Bucks for honey cells to fill our hive.  It takes TEN Bee Bucks to earn ONE honey cell!  We will celebrate with Rainbow Day on Tuesday, September 25.  Everyone should wear their rainbow colors.  

We like to play with blocks.  Our 5th grade buddies helped us to make this castle.  

We use the geo-boards to make cool shapes.  You can make a lot of different shapes with rubber bands that are all different colors. 

We have a lot of Legos.  We LOVE to build with them.  

We LOVE play dough.  This week we used it at choice time.  We used letter cookie cutters with the play dough.  We work together to clean up when we are done.  

We love to do art.  We love to paint.  We painted these Rainbow Fish after we read the story.  The Rainbow Fish taught us about sharing.