October News

 It is hard to believe that this is the last week in October!  Time has definitely flown by in Kindergarten.  We have been soo busy and working really hard.

Homework has started.  Please be sure your child writes his/her name on the back of the homework sheet for practice and so we know who's work it is.  The senses book is due this week.  Please try to hand it in so we can share our books and our thoughts.  Continue working on the sight words.  10 new words will be coming home this week in the Wednesday Weekly.  Try to help your child see it, say it, use it in a sentence, and if possible spell it!  Writing the letters of each word like a rainbow is fun, too.  We will start a new Theme in Reading this week... Colors all Around. 

We have been introduced to each of our 7 Strategies for Reading.  Our class has done an outstanding job with these strategies!  They really know their stuff!  This week we will focus on Inferences, Monitoring Understanding, Visualizing.  We will also be using descriptive words, naming words and sequential order in a story or during our day. 

The boys and girls in our LGI-A have done a fantastic job learning some new rules, getting adjusted to our schedule and becoming friends with our classmates.  We are so proud of each other.  Thanks to our volunteers!  We really enjoy seeing you and like the help, too! 

Phonics Library stories will be coming home in the Weekly Wednesday.  This is a picture book that we have reviewed in class and would like to share with our families at home.  It doesn't need to come back to school.  Enjoy!

Thanks again for all of your help and support.  We really appreciate it.  Have a wonderful week!

Spelling List                                  High-Frequency Words                              Vocabulary 

Kindergarten has their specials from 9:58 to 10:28 every morning

Mondays           with Mrs. Deierlein 

Tuesday                with Mr. Lupolie

Wednesday            with Mrs. Laubach

Thursday                       with Mrs. Commarota 

Friday             with Mr. Thompsom

 Responsive Classroom: information was gathered from-

 www.responsiveclassroom.org 

The Responsive Classroom is an approach to elementary teaching that emphasizes social, emotional, and academic growth in a strong and safe school community. The goal is to enable optimal student learning. Created by classroom teachers, the Responsive Classroom approach is based on the premise that children learn best when they have both academic and social-emotional skills. The approach therefore consists of classroom and schoolwide practices for helping children build academic and social-emotional competencies.

Guiding Principles:

Seven principles, informed by the work of educational theorists and the experiences of exemplary classroom teachers, guide the Responsive Classroom approach: 

• The social curriculum is as important as the academic curriculum.
   
• How children learn is as important as what they learn: Process and content go hand in hand.
   
• The greatest cognitive growth occurs through social interaction.
   
• To be successful academically and socially, children need a set of social skills: cooperation, assertion, responsibility, empathy, and self-control.
   
• Knowing the children we teach-individually, culturally, and developmentally-is as important as knowing the content we teach.
   
• Knowing the families of the children we teach and working with them as partners is essential to children's education.
   

• How the adults at school work together is as important as their individual competence: Lasting change begins with the adult community.

Classroom Practices:

At the heart of the Responsive Classroom approach are ten classroom practices:

Morning Meeting - gathering as a whole class each morning to greet one another, share news, and warm up for the day ahead

Rule Creation - helping students create classroom rules to ensure an environment that allows all class members to meet their learning goals

Interactive Modeling - teaching children to notice and internalize expected behaviors through a unique modeling technique

Positive Teacher Language - using words and tone as a tool to promote children's active learning, sense of community, and self-discipline

Logical Consequences - responding to misbehavior in a way that allows children to fix and learn from their mistakes while preserving their dignity

Guided Discovery - introducing classroom materials using a format that encourages independence, creativity, and responsibility

Academic Choice - increasing student learning by allowing students teacher-structured choices in their work

Classroom Organization - setting up the physical room in ways that encourage students' independence, cooperation, and productivity

Working with Families - creating avenues for hearing parents' insights and helping them understand the school's teaching approaches

Collaborative Problem Solving - using conferencing, role playing, and other strategies to resolve problems with students

Reading:   

Strategy Instruction - Readers use strategies to help them comprehend what they read.  These are the strategies that we will focus on this year:

1.  Making Connections - (text to text, text to self, and text to world)  Readers pay more attention when they relate to the text. Readers naturally bring their prior knowledge and experience to reading, but they comprehend better when they think about the connections they make between the text, their lives and the larger world.

2.  Asking Questions - Questioning is the strategy that keeps readers engaged.  When readers ask questions, they clarify understanding and make meaning.  Asking questions is at the heart of thoughtful reading.

3.  Visualizing - Active readers create visual images in their minds based on words they read in text.  The pictures they create enhance their understanding.

4.  Drawing Inferences - Infererring is at the intersection of taking what is known, garnering clues from the text, and thinking ahead to make judgement, discern a theme, or speculate about what is to come. 

5.  Determining Important Ideas - Thoughtful readers grasp essential ideas and important information when reading.  Readers must differentiate between less important ideas and key ideas that are central to the meaning.

6.  Synthesizing Information - Synthesizing involves combining new information with existing knowledge to form an original idea or interpretation.  Reviewing, sorting, and sifting important information can lead to new insights that change the way readers think.

7.  Repair Understanding - If confusion disrupts meaning, readers need to stop and clarify their understanding.  Readers may use a variety of strategies to "fix up" comprehension when meaning goes awry.

Fluency: We will focus on attending to punctuation, using expression / inflection, using appropriate phrasing, reading smoothly, and maintaining appropriate pace while reading.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

 Liam            October 30 

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