A Peek at Our Week | Ms. Courtney’s Classroom | Week of September 24th

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Five Senses: This past week the children learned how our five senses help us understand and explore the world around us. They learned that our five senses help us collect information about ourselves and our surroundings. They also learned to identify the five senses: hearing, tasting, smelling, touching and seeing.  We discovered that sometimes we use two or more senses at once; and how important it is for our senses to work together. The children had the opportunity to practice using their senses to determine properties of objects and distinguish them from one another.

Work Time

Pumpkin Scrubbing: This child is using many motor skills while also remembering the order and sequence of each action to successfully pumpkin scrub, which naturally leads to the development of concentration.
Nine Layout: This child is becoming familiar with the names and relative sizes of the categories: units, tens, hundreds and thousands. He is also discovering that if he has i.e. 6 units and adds 1 more unit he will have 7 units.
Stamp Game: This child is doing static addition (a sum without exchanging) problems using the stamp game. He is practicing addition at a higher level of abstraction.
Sandpaper Letters: This child is tracing and identifying the sounds of the letters ‘j’ ‘b’ and ‘m’ and connecting the sound with the initial sounds of different objects like jet, baby and motorcycle.
Sandpaper Numbers: This child is learning the symbols for the numbers through the sense of touch and sight.
Cursive Chalkboard Writing: This child is practicing writing the lowercase cursive letter ‘j’ on a chalkboard. He is developing multiple skills involving his eyes, arms, hands, memory, posture and body control.

Guest Reader

Reminders:

October 19 | Bring Your Parent to “Work Time”
Follow the link below to get more information and sign up for Bring Your Parent to “Work Time”.
https://www.signupgenius.com/go/4090B48A8A92DA6F94-bring

A peak into next week: Leaves

A Peek at Our Week | Ms. Courtney’s Classroom | Week of September 17th

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Feelings and emotions: This week the children learned what they can do when they are angry, happy, sad, frustrated, excited etc. They learned how to manage their feelings and emotions. The children practiced how to process, identify and appropriately express their emotions in different scenarios throughout the week. Towards the end of the week we started seeing them express their feelings and emotions to their friends on their own!

Work Time

Skip Counting: This child is working on one of our cubed bead chains, he is identifying the names of the numbers and seeing the correspondence of the quantities with the written number on the cards. He is also discovering that 10X1=10, 10X2=20, 10X3=30 and so on.
Stamp Game: This child is using the stamp game to do addition. It works like the golden beads but instead of unit beads there are unit stamps. Instead of ten bars there are ten stamps. Instead of hundred squares there are hundred stamps. Instead of thousand cubes there are thousand stamps.
Form Drawing: This child is practicing writing the form “humps” on a chalkboard. He is developing multiple skills involving his eyes, arms, hands, memory, posture and body control.
Sandpaper Numbers: This child is learning the symbols for the numbers through the sense of touch and sight. 
These children were getting snack ready when they accidentally knocked everything off the table. Because they have learned how to independently care for the environment and problem solve, they immediately went to get the dust pan and towels to clean the mess up.  

Guest Reader

Reminders:

September 26 | School Picture Day | Tallmadge
October 19 | Bring Your Parent to “Work Time”
Follow the link below to get more information and sign up for Bring Your Parent to “Work Time”.
https://www.signupgenius.com/go/4090B48A8A92DA6F94-bring

A peak into next week: Five Senses

Academic Enrichment | Week of September 17th | Tallmadge

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Bodies of water surrounding North America: The students learned where Canada, USA and Mexico are located on a map of North America. They also became familiar with and the location of different bodies of water such as: The Hudson Bay, Great Lakes, Gulf of Mexico, Atlantic Ocean and Pacific Ocean.

Cursive Handwriting: The students focused on the correct stokes to successfully make a lowercase r and lowercase w. For the lowercase r they were taught to swing up to the midline, dip and then down to the baseline.  For the lowercase w they were taught to swing up to the midline, down to the baseline, swing up to the midline, down to the baseline, swing up to the midline, dip connector at the midline.

A peak into next week: Ohio and its surrounding states

Academic Enrichment | Week of September 10th | Tallmadge

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 Equator, Prime Meridian and Hemispheres: The students learned what hemispheres are and how to identify  where each continent is located Northern/Southern/Eastern or Western hemisphere. The students also learned where the equator and prime meridian are located on a globe.

Cursive Handwriting:

The students focused on the correct stokes to successfully make a lowercase j and lowercase p. For the lowercase j they were taught to swing up to the midline, drop down halfway below the baseline, swoop, and pick up the pencil then dot. For the lowercase p they were taught to swing up to the midline, drop down halfway below the baseline, slide up to the midline, circle around to the baseline, touch and glide.

A look into next week: Bodies of water surrounding North America

A Peek at Our Week | Ms. Courtney’s Classroom | Week of September 10th

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My Family: This past week we learned that we are all part of a family and that families are configured in different ways with many factors affecting them like marriage, divorce, adoption, remarriage and therapies with biblical marriage counselors, ethnic diversity, grandparents as primary care givers, single parents, foster care, etc. We read many books and the student’s shared a lot about their families. Through this they discovered that there are different kinds of families, but most importantly all types of families love and care for each other!

Work Time

Introduction Tray: This child is being introduced to the decimal system and becoming familiar with the symbols and quantities associated with units, tens, hundreds and thousands. He is visually seeing the difference between 1 unit, 1 ten, 1 hundred and 1 thousand.
Addition: These children are using the golden beads to discover that when you put two small numbers together you get a larger number and that this process is called addition.
Knobbed Cylinder: This child is able to visually discriminate the dimensions of each cylinder to find its correct placement in the block.
Dishwashing: This child is using many motor skills while also remembering the order and sequence of each action to successfully wash dishes, which naturally leads to the development of concentration.
Nesting Dolls: This child is using her fine-motor skills, coordination, concentration, and sense of order to visually discriminate between the smallest and largest nesting dolls in order to correctly put the dolls back together.
Microscope: This child is learning how to view different organisms under a microscope, including the mushrooms she brought to school.

Guest Reader

Reminders:

September 21 | All School Field Trip | Ramseyer Farms
September 26 | School Picture Day | Tallmadge

A peak into next week: Feelings and Emotions

A Peek into Science | 9/3 and 9/10 | Tallmadge Campus

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The Leak-proof Bag: We took a plastic bag, filled it with water and then poked a few pencils through it. The students learned that the plastic bag was made out of polyethylene molecules. They discovered that when the pencils were poked through the  bag the molecules in the plastic created a seal making the bag leak-proof.

Walking Water- We placed three glasses side by side, filled the two outside glasses with water and food coloring (yellow and blue) and left the middle glass empty. Then, we twisted two paper towels placing one end in the glasses with water and the other end in the empty glass. After about 30 minutes we noticed that the water started to climb the paper towels making its way to the empty middle glass. We learned that this process is called capillary action and is also how flowers and plants move water from the ground up through their stems and into their petals and leaves.

Academic Enrichment | Week of September 3rd | Tallmadge

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Continents

The kindergartners learned that there are seven continents (Asia, Africa, North America, South America, Antarctica, Europe, and Australia). They also learned where they are located on a globe/map and a fun fact about each one. For example Australia is often referred to as “the land down under.”

Continent Map: this child is tracing and labeling all seven continents.

Cardinal Directions

The kindergartners learned that the cardinal directions (North, South, East and West) are the most commonly used form of directions. They discovered how to use a compass to find their way and learned that their are also primary inter-cardinal directions (Northeast, Southeast, Southwest and Northwest).

Cardinal Direction Race: The kindergartners labeled the playground using the cardinal directions, then had fun racing each other toward the given direction.

Cursive Handwriting

  

A peak into next week: Equator, Prime Meridian and Hemispheres

A Peek at Our Week | Ms. Courtney’s Classroom | Week of September 3rd

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Community Helpers

This past week we focused on community helpers in honor of Labor Day. The students not only  learned about firefighters, police officers, doctors, nurses, dentists, teachers, veterinarians, construction workers, paramedics, farmers, mail carriers, chefs etc. They had the opportunity to meet and get to know some of them. The students and I greatly appreciate those that volunteered their time to come in and speak to us about their careers.

Police

 

Honda/Acura Specialist 

Firefighter

 

Family Medicine Doctor

 

HR at Goodyear

School Psychologist

Pilot

Reminders:

September 21 | All School Field Trip | Ramseyer Farms
September 26 | School Picture Day | Tallmadge

A peak into next week: My Family

A Peek at Our Week | Ms. Courtney’s Classroom | Week of May 28th

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It is hard to believe that the year has come to an end and some of you will be moving up to the elementary program, going to new schools or returning next year. I want to let everyone know it was a great year, and that I enjoyed every moment of teaching all of you. We made a lot of great memories with a lot of jokes and silliness. I hope you feel the same and that you will take what you have learned this year and build on it as you continue your education. If you are not returning next year, please come back to visit all your teachers, because we will truly miss you!

Talent Show

A Peek at Our Week | Ms. Courtney’s Classroom | Week of May 14th

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Sports: This week we talked about different sports like: baseball, soccer, basketball, hockey, ice skating, bike riding etc. We talked about how sports can be competitive and are a physical activity or game. The students learned that through sports the can maintain or improve their physical abilities and skills while also enjoying themselves. We also discussed how there is specific safety equipment needed for certain sports.

Work Time:

Introduction Tray: This child is being introduced to the decimal system and becoming familiar with the symbols and quantities associated with units, tens, hundreds and thousands. He is visually seeing the difference between 1 unit, 1 ten, 1 hundred and 1 thousand.
Prepositions: This child is learning what a preposition is and reading them in different sentences. She is developing an understand that a preposition is a word used to link nouns, pronouns, or phrases to other words within a sentence.
Stamp Game: This child is using the stamp game to do addition. It works like the golden beads but instead of unit beads there are unit stamps. Instead of ten bars there are ten stamps. Instead of hundred squares there are hundred stamps. Instead of thousand cubes there are thousand stamps.
Linear Counting: This child is working on one of our cubed bead chains, she is identifying the names of the numbers and seeing the correspondence of the quantities with the written number on the cards. She is also discovering that 5X1=5, 5X2=10, 5X3=15 and so on.
Solar System: This child was so excited to present his solar system. He has been creating it at home for the past month.
Addition: These children are using the golden beads to discover that when you put two small numbers together you get a larger number and that this process is called addition.
Movable Alphabet: This child is saying the word of the object and matching the symbol with the correct initial sound to the object.
Geometric Solids: This child is developing a sense of awareness of three-dimensional shapes to objects in his environment. He is able to identify and label shapes such as sphere, ovoid, ellipsoid, cone, cylinder, cube, triangular prism, square prism, triangular based pyramid and square based pyramid.

Guest Readers:

  

Reminders:

LAST Bring Your Parent to Work Time | May 21st

Memorial Day | NO SCHOOL | May 28th

Last Day of School | May 31st

Kindergarten Graduation | June 1st | 6:30 pm to 8:00 pm

A peak into next week: Camping