Our day in (some) pictures

We start our day off with lots of songs to get the kids moving and their brains working before we even start our morning.

The kids have started writing the morning message with me, once they get into that routine I will try to post some pictures of what I have them doing.

The kids doing one of our morning songs.

 

During our whole group time in the morning we have a phonological warm-up (beginning sounds, syllable clapping, or alphabet activities). We also read the poem that goes with our unit and work on a reading comprehension skill.



 

Working in a poetry journal

 

While I pull small groups for reading the kids are working at their table jobs. The students rotate through 4 different jobs, 1 each day. Once they complete their table job they get their bag of books (browsing bag) and read at least 3 books from it. They are then able to go to their station.

I don’t have pictures of table jobs yet, but here are some of our stations!

 

Big book station- they can read the book and build words
from the book.

Listening station- I have book on CD for the kids to read
and listen along to.

Poetry station- The kids highlight words they know, put the poem strips
in order, and illustrate poems in their poetry binders.

Word work station- This is right by our word wall so students can practice
copying words that we know. They can write on whiteboards, stamp,
or build with cut out letters.

Writing station- The kids can write stories, lists, letters,
or work on words on whiteboards.

ABC station- This one is car tracing a letter. There are
lots of alphabet games to choose from. As the year goes on
I will add word family and word games to this station.

After reading is done we have science. This unit was on using weight to observe objects. I try to make our science hands on and practical for the students.

For this activity we picked two different objects in our classroom and made predictions about which one weighed more. We then recorded our findings in our science journals.

 

Our afternoon starts off with math. We have a calendar time where we talk about the date, the day of the week, months, and the weather. We practice counting and do a couple of math songs.

Most of the time when we do math we record in our math journals, which stay at school, however many of you saw this math paper come home.

The kids had to use multiple skills to complete this activity. They had to read the number I gave them, write it correctly, and correctly count out the number of stickers (1 to 1 correspondence).

 

 

 

 



After math we have writing. We have been working on putting in beginning and ending sounds in our words, though I do encourage students who are ready for some middle sounds to add those as well. I work with small groups during this time in order to instruct at student levels.

I encourage students to think of the letters on their own and not rely on a teacher to tell them the “right way” to spell a word.

Below are two samples of writing to show the range of writing we have already in kindergarten.

Things that are orange: Orange, car, couch

 

Orange, crayon, pencil, box

We end our day with math games. During math games students are working on a specific math concept, but they are also learning some major social skills. Playing fair, taking turns, knowing how to win and lose appropriately are just some of the skills math games teach.

The game below is called “Cover All” and works on number identification (with dice), counting, and one-to-one correspondence.