Muscles

Morning Activities....

Book Corner.....
Goose on the Loose by Phil Roxbee-Cox.  "Created in consultation with a language expert, this entertaining phonics reader is specially written to help children learn to read. Humorously illustrated by Stephen Cartwright with fold-out pages, inviting young readers to guess what will happen next."

Big Pig On A Dig  by Phil Roxbee-Cox. "Big pig finds a treasure map and decides to dig for gold at the spot marked with an "X" on the map. A little yellow duck may be found on each page."

Toad Makes A Road by Phil Roxbee-Cox. "An enjoyable story with phonics-based text, designed to help children crack the reading code with ease. Some pages have fold-put flaps to give the reader a chance to guess what will happen next."

Unicorn Thinks He's Pretty Great by Bob Shea. "Ever since Unicorn moved into the neighborhood, Goat has been feeling out of sorts. Goat thought his bike was cool—until he saw that Unicorn could fly to school! Goat made marshmallow squares that almost came out right, but Unicorn made it rain cupcakes! Unicorn is such a show-off, how can Goat compete? "

A Is For Salad by Mike Lester. "Each letter of the alphabet is presented in an unusual way, such as: "A is for salad" showing an alligator eating a bowl of greens, or "B is for Viking" showing a beaver wearing a handsome helmet with horns."



Science.....
We read the book The Muscular System by Kay Manolis. 
We talked today about how our arm works and what it needs to work. If I want to move my arm up or down, our muscles change. Some muscles retract and other muscules stretch out. We looked at a cardboard arm with rubber bands and pretended it was our arm and got to see how our arm works. 

Beth "What do these rubber bands represent?
Grace : "Muscles!"
Beth : "Fingers move up and down. My head moves back and forth. Those are muscles. Show me using your muscles."
Davern "movement."
Charley "muscles."

Fun fact....
It takes 100 muscles to move your body to go for a walk.

Questions....
Corrina "how do you get a six pack?"
Grace "when you move muscles do you move your blood." "What happens if you move your muscles the wrong way?"
Beth : "They could break or get strained. Then you have to be patient and let it heal to work again properly. There is blood that gives your muscles energy to move."
Charley "Can they make you do more than one thing at a time?'
Davern "when you use muscles it can make you do a cartwheel and do a split."
Evelyn "Does this have muscles? (making a paper towel fold) 
Connie "No, but your muscles are making it move."


Free Choice......

Kindness Party

Morning Meeting....
We are becoming really great readers!! Our morning chart has gotten trickier. There is a missing word that if any student wants to they can fill it in.  The word continues to be "is". We point to different words on our chart and we are able to read most of them! Ask your child to pick out a book at home and ask them if they recognize any words in that book. It's great practice and encourages word growth and reading. So excited for these earlier readers.


Shape matching....
We continue to recognize shapes! We have done many activities around shapes. We had to identify the shape and then with the piece of a shape and had to match with someone in the room. As partners we announce the color of our shape and the name of the shape. We have green ovals, pink pentagon, maroon rhombus, dark purple hexagon, pink heart, etc. Here we are

We also made "human" shapes with partners....

Book Corner....
Sheep On A Ship by Nancy E. Shaw.  "A flock of hapless sheep drive through the country in this rhyming picture book. "The bright-colored pencil drawings and lean text make this a great choice for preschool story times, as well as for beginning readers who want a funny story." "

Arthur's Valentine's by Marc Brown "Valentine's Day is just a few days away and Arthur can't figure out who his secret admirer is. It might be Fern, but he hopes it's Sue Ellen. Or is it Buster playing pranks? Can you guess?

The Grouchy Ladybug by Eric Carle. "As children follow the Grouchy Ladybug on her journey, they will learn the important concepts of time, size, and shape, as well as the benefits of friendship and good manners."



Science....
We have done lots with the human body and its structure and function. This week we reviewed all the parts, muscles, bones, brain, stomach, lungs, heart by listening to riddles to figure it out.

YAY FOR KINDNESS!!!!!
For a while now we have been working on "Kindness" and what it means to be kind and how we can show kindness. If we were seen doing something kind or see someone being kind, we acknowledge that and then a cube is put in the jar. Once the jar is filled we have a "Kindness Party". Today was the day! We had some popcorn and watched a little movie from the Wild Kratts. Good job kids being so kind to each other. Lets see if we can have a kindness party sooner!

HAPPY 100th DAY OF SCHOOL

Today marks our 100th day of school! Always hard to believe that we have been in school 100 days, that we are more than half way through Kindergarten. Today we decorated some 100 day crowns. Read many 100 day stories! Did some math activities. It was a fun 100th day of school!

Hands

Number Corner....

We have switched to a new calendar. We are now in February and we are looking at Dots! Red dots, blue dots...the dots change each day. I wonder if we can figure out the pattern? Each day a team of two kids go to the Number Corner and read us the calendar. We go through the month, year, days of the week, the pattern, the days we have been in school with grasshopper, counting by 10's and also by 1's.

Read Aloud Books.....

Farmer Duck by Martin Waddell. "There once was a duck who had the bad luck to live with a lazy farmer. While the duck worked, the farmer lay in bed - until one day the other animals decided to take action!" 

Shape Spotter by Megan E. Bryant. "Come along with Ms. Carey's class on a scavenger hunt for shapes at school! With rhyming clues and hidden shapes in every picture for kids to spot."

Goldie Locks and the Three Squares by Grace MacCarone. " Visiting the pentagon-shaped house of the three Squares, Goldie Locks is amazed by the cottage's geometrically shaped furniture and remembers an important mathematical fact just in time to escape when the Squares come home."

Math.....

Building with pattern blocks.

Shape recognition with pattern blocks.

Finding shapes in our classroom....

We found many shapes in our classroom. We found objects that are in the shape of triangles, circles, etc.

Hamburger bun and play dough container are shaped in circles.

A block and mats we sit on are shaped likes squares.

Things that are not shaped like a circle or a square....

HUMAN BODY....Hands

We have been talking about the human body and doing many activities about the human body. Mostly  the function and structure of our bodies. Today we had an inside look at the bones. 

Syzer "Without bones you would be all squishy and be a blob."

Jared "Bones hold us up."

Why do we have so many bones in our bodies?

Davern "So we can grab things."

Today we did a project putting bones in the correct spots on our paper hands. This shows ALL the kinds of bones that we need to put our hand together. 

The Human Body

CONGRATS to Evelyn (and her family) for winning the classroom basket the other night at our school dinner. Party at the Stack's house!!! (haha, just kidding.) 

BUDDY TIME................
This week with buddies we worked on measuring. We found things in the room and measured with popsicle sticks and meter sticks.

We measured markers and pencils.

We measured blocks.

We measured kitchen items. 

We measured parts of the Number corner.

We measured our Buddies!!

We compared with our bodies.

We also read to our buddies.

How many Popsicle sticks is the length of a measuring tape?

Science.....
We have working a lot with the human body. Today we learned about what our body's function and structure is. We learned about the brain, lungs, heart, muscles, bones and stomach.  Ask your child what these parts of our body do for us.

We also worked with Jeneve, our health teacher.

Thank you Mother Nature for giving us a little break in the weather and allowing the opportunity for a little outside time. Sun's a blazin' but the air is still chilly. Thankful for a quick 1/2 hour to play!