Tuesday, November 27, 2012

Nutcracker Dancers


Today we learned to dance two of the dances from Act II of the Nutcracker!  Watch us as we practice the dance of the Spanish Chocolates and Arabian Coffee.  See the snake dance it's way out of the basket.  Mrs. Hoyt and Mrs. Parnell were very impressed at how well they did after 15 minutes of practicing.  Experiencing the dance will better prepare us to appreciate and understand the ballet when we go next week!  Imagine how great they will be after we learn and practice a little more!



Welcome Chloe!

Our class is growing!  Yesterday Chloe joined our class!  She recently moved to Town and is fitting right in!  As we begin to prepare for December lessons and our Nutcracker Dancing we will get to know Chloe and make her feel welcome.

Wednesday, November 21, 2012

Our Animal Research Project



During the months of October and November we learned about animals and animal families.  With the help from Mr. Callahan and Mrs. D'Elia of the LTC at Pine Glen we researched and produced the above video!

Tuesday, November 20, 2012

Animal Families we saw at the zoo......


Thanksgiving 3


Thanksgiving Singing 2


Thanksgiving Singing 1


Feast and Sing a long

Kindergarteners gathered to celebrate Thanksgiving today.  We dressed up, sang songs and then feasted together.  EAch student was clad in the costume of their choice and ate at their homemade woven placemat.

Be sure to watch for the large bag of project heading home with your child today.  It contains many items that we worked on during the month of November.  The Native American board game can be a fun addition to your family celebration on Thursday.

Mrs. Parnell and Mrs. Hoyt wish everyone a Happy and restful Thanksgiving.







Thanksgiving Preparations

The students in Room 101 have been learning a lot about the Native Americans and the Pilgrims.  We have discussed why the Pilgrims wanted to journey to live in America and their desire for religious freedom.  Through various stories we learned about the struggles of building a new life in their new home and all the work they had to do.
Last week we even practiced being Pilgrim children for a short while.  Did you know that Pilgrim boys and girls did not have a seat at the meal table.  They were to stand and eat.......and not speak to anyone unless an adult addressed them!  It was a quieter than typical lunch for room 101.
We also explored the Native Americans.  Depending upon which part of the country they lived, their homes were quite different.  We have created replicas of teepees, plank houses and wigwams and have also learned about Adobe homes.
A highlight of our learning to make costumes for ourselves to look like Native American and Pilgrim children.  After a recent fashion show in which the students viewed what the costumes will look like on, they each voted upon what they would like to wear for Tuesday's feast!  Our models are pictured below.


Thursday, November 15, 2012

HELP !- Supplies Needed!

Help! - Room 101 is in need of various supplies.

- Brown, handles paper bags are used for many project.  Over then next several weeks each student will need at least 3.  And then in the spring we may need more.  If you have bags from a store like Trader Joe's please think of us.  Students need them to bring projects home next week. 

- We can always use more Wet Ones hand wipes as we use them at lunch and for sticky fingers in the classroom.

Thank you!

Wednesday, November 7, 2012

Welcome Jensen!

Room 101 welcomed a new student to our class today.  Jensen was welcomed as our 13th boy in the classroom.  We are excited to share all we have been doing and are eager to get to know our new friend and classmate!

Thursday, November 1, 2012

Room 101 is going Batty!

One of the animals we learned about this month was the bat!  It seemed appropriate and fun to learn about this nocturnal animal given the Halloween season!  AND, like Ms. Frizzle in the Magic School Bus books, we went Batty!

Actually, we made Bat hats to wear along with our Candy Corn Necklaces!

On Wednesday, dressed in our festive attire we celebrated by watching a presentation by Ms. P on owls and then did some Halloween writing and math.  We did a candy corn worksheet, finished our Halloween How Many? books and then practiced ordinal numbers with some ghosts!

It was spooktacular!






Wildselves??

As one of our culminating and fun activities for our animal unit we visited the computer lab and created our wildselves.  What this means is we used a software program to incorporate different animal family characteristic into a new wild animal that each student created.  The catch was the students were to share what traits they were adding and to which animal that trait would be attributed.

The resulting creatures are awesome!

Thank you Mr. Callahan for welcoming us into the computer lab for our first visit.  It was awesome!




Schreeching Good Time!


Ms. P. of the Burlington Public Schools science center paid a visit to the Pine Glen kindergartners this week.   She brought an Eastern Screech Owl named Cricket.  We learned all about owls.  They are in the bird family, are nocturnal and do not really like people to touch them.  Cricket is special because she likes to live at the science center.  She was injured and unable to return to her natural habitat of New England forests. 

We learned about the owl's eyes, feathers and neck.  Did you know that an owl has twice as many neck bones as a human?!  That is how an owl can turn its neck nearly 360*.   Ms. P played a CD with the many different sounds that different species of owls make.