Who's Going to Gr8 Sk8?

Our amazing administration, Mrs. Ray and Mrs. Kimmel, were wheeling with excitement for tonight's skate party! I'm going! Are you?

 

Santa and Christmas Time!

We had a lot of fun meeting with Santa today! He listened to us share our present request. He even gave us EACH our very own brand new book! Ho ho ho!!!

 

Ugly Sweater Day was a hit with the teachers! Our wonderful Kindergarten team got in the spirit.

 

Pajama Day was fun. It was a cozy day and we enjoyed Polar Express and Hot Cocoa!

 

Here's my family's favorite (and traditional) Christmas cookies called Kringlas. Takes me back to my childhood when my Grandma Lourens would always have a plate of these saved JUST FOR ME!

S.T.E.M. Science Project

Recently I received an email from the district about a STEM competition/fair coming soon. Having some experience with STEM from my experience in other states/districts, I decided to sign our class up!

 

STEM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, Math. This is becoming a bigger and bigger initiative as the years go by.

 

Our class worked in collaborate groups to test any metal content in common cereals (an idea from the STEM Fair's list of experiments). Following the scientific process, we ground up the cereals, placed them in plastic bags, and hovered strong magnets over the cereal powder.

 

In the end, none of the cereals reacted to the magnets. We concluded that our magnets were not strong enough and the cereal was not ground up enough for the experiment to really work. However, we still designed and created displays of our data and findings to be showcased at the STEM Fair.



 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Students and family were invited to meet me there and check out all of the exhibits!

 

 

NOTE: I was very disappointed when I arrived at the fair. NOT ONE (of our 8) project boards were on display! This was very discouraging for my students. Although we had no significant findings, we still went through the scientific process at 5-6 years of age, designed our boards, and learned the significance to testing a hypothesis and concluding an experiment. We put in the time and effort and yet NOTHING was put up to show our participation except for our district's and school's informational tri-boards. I was not expecting a ribbon or placement in the competition - at the least, put up one of my class' displays (even in the corner) to inspire my kindergarteners (and other young kiddos). STEM has no age limit or creative limitations!

Muy Bien!

We are so lucky that our amazing principal, Mrs. Ray, speaks fluent Spanish and is willing to come and give us a few mini-lessons in that language. Today, she introduced us to colors!

 

 

In order to decorate the tree, we had to same the felt circle's color in English AND Spanish!

 

 

We were given manipulatives (pipe cleaners) to help us review the colors.

 

By the end of class, we had a visual chart to refer to and a decorated felt Christmas tree!

 

Thank you, Mrs. Ray, for visiting our classroom and extending our learning!

Winter Holidays

We cover quite a few of December holidays before break. Some of the holidays we studied were St. Nicholas Day, St. Lucia Day, Hanukkah, Christmas, Kwanzaa, and Boxing Day. Learning is fun!

 

 

We made little stockings to hang in our classroom in hopes that St. Nicholas would stop by our room. He did!!

 

This is just one of the fun Christmas crafts we made.

Mo Willem's Pigeon

Our class just completed a week-long author study of Mo Willems, the creative mind behind the fun Pigeon stories and other books/series. We compared four different Pigeon stories, learned how to draw our very own Pigeon, and then write an opinion piece on our favorite story from the week!

 

 

Our stories this week:

 Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus; The Pigeon Finds a Hot Dog;

The Pigeon Wants a Puppy, and The Duckling Gets a Cookie

 

 

 

Author studies are so much fun!

Thanksgiving Lunch

Today Kindergarten students had a special lunch to celebrate Thanksgiving! Families were invited to attend. Thank you to the parents that were able to make lunch more enjoyable for your child. Have a great Thanksgiving (Fall) Break!

 

 

 

I had to get one pic with one of my own kiddos - I am so thankful for my two boys!!

Crazy Hat Day



One of our Red Ribbon Week themes was "Hats Off to Being Drug-Free!" Some of my students chose to participate. Yes, that's me with a turkey hat on my head!

 



Veterans Day

We invited some veterans to come to our classroom today and share about their experiences in our country's military. We welcomed Mr. Dunkle (Third Grade teacher) and Mrs. Ray (Principal). They showed us pictures of them and some of the machines they used and locations they went to during their time of service. Thank you to our veterans for your service to our country!

 

 

 

Collaborative Sight Word Search

We worked in collaborative teams to search for sight words in our class big books. We had two searchers, one pointer, one hand-raiser/communicator, and one cube/score keeper (every team member helped search for words, but the two searchers had all of their focus on the words).

 

When a sight word (specific ones were listed on the board) was located by a searcher, the pointer would keep a finger on it while the communicator raised a hand to get my attention. Then, once I confirmed the find, the Score Keeper would collect one linking cube from me and add it to the team's tower (5 cubes was the total). Great teamwork, kiddos!

 

 

 

October is Fire Safety Month

A visitor came to our school today! He showed us all about fire and bad weather safety. We went to the portable Fire House and he demonstrated what a tornado and fire look, sound, and feel like. It was a great learning experience! Do you have your fire escape and family plan in place?

 

 

 

 

October Crafts

Our class made scarecrow glyphs this week! After reading some really great books with scarecrows as the main character, we decided to make our own. What better way to do it than by making ours to represent important characteristics about ourselves!

 

 

 

We also decorated our door as one GIANT pumpkin. After adding some 3D vines, we attached any pumpkins that came back from our Family Project Pumpkin to our class patch!

Sid the Science Kid

Our first field trip of this year was to attend Sid the Science Kid: Our Five Senses! This tied in nicely with our current science unit. The kids seemed to really enjoy the engaging songs and lessons taught by Sid and his friends. I think they also really enjoyed crossing of the waters of the Chattahoochee River! ;)

 

Sight words, Sentences, and Sidewalk Chalk... OH MY!

Students worked in teams to organize sight words into a meaningful sentence. Then the Hand-Raiser had to get my attention and the Reader had to read it correctly to me.

 

 

 

 

We paired up with a teammate's class today for some fresh air. Sidewalk chalk and letter formation, sight words, and shapes... a great reason to head to the black top!

 

 

Open House

Did you come out tonight and visit our lovely school?!?! If not, see if you can pick me out from the photo below. I'm tall, blonde, and... well, the only one pictured! I had a great time meeting families and connecting home to school a bit more. I look forward to working with you all this year as we grow your children!

 



~Mrs. Barnoski

A Good Friend

 Today we talked about being a good friend. This was fun! We paired and shared our ideas on what a good friend looks like, sounds like, and makes us feel like! Then we paired up and made friendship bracelets.

 

 

 

 

 To make the friendship bracelets, I cut up two different colors of straws. The students threaded the pieces onto their pipe cleaners using a simple AB pattern. Then we twisted the ends around our wrists and WALLA!! Our new, cool friendship bracelets!!

~Mrs. Barnoski