Unit:
We began our new unit by responding to the question, "What is a story?" Then we reflected on stories from our previous unit and discussed how they make us feel and recorded our responses on post-it notes. We started analyzing the stories making a list of what they have in common (i.e. characters, setting, etc.).
Taking Action:
After listening to The Very Hungry Caterpillar, a group of students took the initiative to build a story bag. The children used felt to recreate the story. They spent hours rehearsing the story over several days telling it in both Italian and English along with the felt images. Over the course of a week, they eagerly visited the other Prep classrooms to retell the story along with visiting Kinder and Nursery.
Retelling The Very Hungry Caterpillar to Nursery before nap time
Retelling The Very Hungry Caterpillar to Nursery before nap time
Retelling The Very Hungry Caterpillar to Kinder students
Retelling The Very Hungry Caterpillar to Prep RN
Special Guests:
We have had wonderful storytellers join us over the past week! Each shared an engaging story with the class. Some stories were told orally, others with props, and some stories were read from a book. Each one helped the students better understand what makes a story a story. After each visit, we had a discussion about the characters, setting, and plot along with how the stories made us feel. We still have an open invitation for any family members who would like to join us to share a story!
Prep Activities:
Our new Prep activities will focus on creating and telling stories. Each week the students will sign up for an activity of their choice and explore their storytelling abilities: Toontastic (iPad application), Puppet Theatre, and Act It Out (dressing up in costumes and performing.
Puppet Theatre- The students worked in a small group to plan and rehearse a puppet play. Then they performed in front of the class.
Prep A students are making a special Storyteller Chair. After voting on a color, several students began to paint the chair. After we returned from break, they finished painting it, and now it is used as a special place to sit while telling stories.
Language Arts:
The students are practicing their reading and writing skills throughout the day. They are increasing their reading fluency by practicing sound recognition, reading to each other, and listening to model readings. They are using letters and phonetically spelled words to write about their experiences. The children use painting, drawing, and building as a source of inspiration.
Drawing a picture and typing
Building the story first, and then writing about it
Spelling words with play dough
Math:
Through the use of games and play, the students are strengthening their mathematical skills on a daily basis. The students have been working on mastering the numbers from 10 to 20 (recognition, counting, and one to one correspondence). Furthermore, they are now adding numbers with sums up to 20. Finally, the students are working towards deepening their understanding of the value of a number. They are decomposing numbers in the teens into a group of ten and extra ones.
Purrrfectly Fast Numbers: Increasing number recognition fluency
Double Domino Addition- Pick two dominoes and add them together while recording the solution with an equation.
To develop an understanding of place value, the students sang the song Numbers in the Teens Have a Group of Ten. After the song, they had to find their partner that represented the value of their number.
Special Events:
Hearts for Haiti Bake Sale
Thank you for all the support and donations! Our bake sale was a success! The Prep students applied their mathematical skills while selling and buying cookies during the bake sale. Yum!
We invited Kinder AR and Kinder G to help us make Valentine's decorations for the Bake Sale. Great teamwork!
An afternoon with our Buddies:
Our buddies joined us on the last day before the break at our school. After enjoying lunch together and playing in the garden, the students spent time reading their favorite stories from home. After enjoying a couple of stories, the older buddies taught the Prep students how to use Puppet Pals on the iPad. Puppet Pals is a story creation application where the students use their imagination to plan, create, and record a fiction story. Everyone had a lot of fun!
The 100th Day of School!
We had a special guest surprise us in the morning...Zero the Hero!
Class Picture
He had us count in different languages, and skip count by twos, fives, and tens! He shared how wonderful the number 0 really is with his expandable zero!
"10, 100, 1000!"
The Zero the Hero read us a wonderful story about a little penguin who wanted to see one million. He searched and searched. On his adventure he saw what ten looks like. Then he found one hundred and one thousand. It was not until returned home that his mother shared with him the beauty of one million!
Before Zero the Hero left, he gave us each a special treat for being 100 days smarter!
Then he quickly flew away! Until next year...
Enjoy a video of his visit!
For the rest of the day, we enjoyed doing different activities focused around the number 100. We painted one hundred dots, made silly 100 Days of School hats, built something with one hundred Kapla blocks, and tried writing our numbers to 100! We also spent time presenting the 100 items we brought in to share. With a group, we worked together to count the 100 items by making ten groups of ten!
100 rubber bands
100 Lego pieces
100 beans
