I hope you all enjoy Thanksgiving with your friends and families, we will see you back at school Nov. 26th! As you read this, the Nocturnal Forest is being dis-assembled and our classroom is being transformed for our next unit….stop by our classroom and check it out, it will be far out! (that’s a clue)
On Thursday, Nov. 29th at 8:45am, the Quest Admissions team will be hosting an informational meeting about the WPPSI test required for Kindergarten admission. There will be Meet & Greet with some testers that are available to schedule a test date with. We ask that you schedule a testing date before contracts come out in February. This is a great opportunity, I highly recommend at least one parent attends if you are unfamiliar with the test. 
Group Work this week,,,
Monday
Reader’s Theater Prep – The Three Bears – We talked about the different characters in the story of the Three Bears, We looked at costumes we can use for the different roles. We talked about props we would need and what we could use in the classroom.
Math – Graduated Bear Size – Taking all 8 different teddy bears out of our bear den, students measured them against each other to order them from biggest bear to smallest bear. Students then explored other attributes of the bears that they could sort them by, eye color, fur color, etc.
Read-Aloud – Goldilocks and the Three Bears – We listened to a recording of Goldilocks and the Three bears while using felt pieces to act out the scenes.
Tuesday
Reader’s Theater – The Three Bears – Students took turns being different characters in the story of Goldilocks (or Golden-boy) and the Three Bears.
Problem-Solving/Construction – Little Bear’s Chair – Using index cards, students were challenged to construct a little chair that would hold up baby bear (a little plastic bear) without collapsing.
Read-Aloud – The Three Snow Bears – We read a different version of the Three Bears story by Jan Brett.
Wednesday
Guided Reading – Students read one on one with a teacher at individual levels while rest of group used literacy apps on iPads.
Math – Sorting Hotwheels by attribute – This year’s class loves cars! We applied sorting by attribute to our collection of hotwheel cars. We sorted by color, we sorted by type, we brainstormed other possible ways to sort.
Song Book –
Thursday
Read-Aloud – The First Thanksgiving – We learned about the first Thanksgiving from Anne Rockwell’s book, Thanksgivin
g Day. We talked about how our different families celebrate Thanksgiving.
Holiday – What Am I Thankful For? – Students thought about what they are most thanktful for and filled out a leaf to hang in the main building.
Holiday/Math – Thanksgiving feathered headband – Using shape templates, students created a pattern of shapes to decorate their Native American feathered headband.
Friday
Literacy – Whiteboard Letters/Words – We practiced letter formation for all of the vowels and then practiced forming cvc words.
Gross Motor – Balance Bear – Students observed how an object achieves balance by experimenting with Ernest the Balance Bear. Students then tried to apply the same principals of balance as they walked across a balance beam in the classroom. 
It does not look like it will snow again this week, but it does look cold! Please make sure to send a warm hat and mittens to school. We do have extras in case any get lost or forgotten. Our outdoor recess policy is that we go outside if the wind chill temp is above 10 degrees. I will send home a checklist for snow-clothes this week…this is the time to make sure you have gear that fits…while you can still find snowpants/boots in the store!
Read-Aloud – Bear Snores On
rotected hand in at the same time. Students were amazed that the fat-mitten hand could not feel any cold!
