Thanksgiving Day Dinner Table STEM Challenge

Thanksgiving Day Dinner Table  STEM CHALLENGE
Challenge Assigned: Can you make a dinner table large enough to hold all of  Thanksgiving Day food (without overlapping)? Students were given a copy of the paper food, dominoes and popsicle sticks.  The children were to use the dominoes as the legs of the table and popsicle sticks as the top of the table.   Although the task was challenging, the children work cooperatively with partners.  They had to persevere and try different designs when their plan didn't work.  The biggest obstacle for the children was building the table large enough for the food to fit.   Vocabulary terms were introduced: balance  perimeter area surface  
Engineering skills, science skills involving weight and balance, stablility, surface and area, as well as mathematical reasoning were used in this challenge.

 We hope you can try this challenge at home and let us know of your successes or failures. Comment below to let us know!

 In Kindergarten, we really want the children to know that with failure comes success if you never stop working at it.  Keep on trying and looking forward.  It's the POWER of YET!

*This Thanksgiving Day STEM Challenge was created by Brooke Brown.

Happy Thanksgiving 2019

Happy Thanksgiving 2019

During this month of November, the children have been learning about Thanksgiving and what it means to be thankful.  Please add to our padlet by clicking on the plus button and share and add pictures what your family is thankful and grateful for.   We will be sharing the padlet to celebrate Thanksgiving!

Halloween 2019

Happy Halloween 2019 What a fun and successful party!  Thank you to all who donated party items such as popcorn, fruit, waters, goldfish, napkins and plates.  Thank you to the parent volunteers who came in to help out with our party!  It was a very busy and FUN time! We had 4 stations: Station 1: FOOD!! The children got to eat popcorn, goldfish, and fruit along with water!

Station 2: THE SPIDER BUCKET!!   Using the tongs to grab a spider through the web!

Station 3: SPIDER RACES! Using a straw, the children got to blow the spider to the end!

Station 4: Ghost Toss!

Toss 5 ghosts into the bucket and see how many you get in!

The faces and smiles from all of the children show the BOO-tiful time we had celebrating Halloween!

Thanks again for all of your donations!

Pumpkin Exploration

Pumpkin Exploration Day

Last Friday, the children got to explore 4 different stations during our 

Pumpkin Exploration Day! 

To get the children ready, we read the story How Many Seeds in A Pumpkin? 

by Margaret McNamara.

This story was a great introduction into facts about pumpkins.  For example:

Every line on the outside of a pumpkin contains one row of seeds on the inside!

The darker the orange color of a pumpkin means the longer it grew on the vines.

The longer a pumpkin grows on the vine, the more lines it will have.

The larger the pumpkin does not mean it will have the most seeds.

We had some amazing help with some special guests: Mrs. Baker, Digital Learning Specialist and Ms. Clemenzi, Math and Science Instructional Support Specialist.  The 4 stations included:

1. First predicting the height and width of the pumpkin.  Measuring a pumpkin with links for the width and cubes for the height.

2. Sink or Float?  First make your prediction.  Next, explore and conduct the experiment to find your answer!  Also, how many lines does the pumpkin have???  Predict first, then count!

3. Have you ever scooped the seeds from inside a pumpkin and felt the flesh?  What do the seeds feel like?  How many seeds did you scoop?

4. A pumpkin seed cycle... color and get ready to put the pictures in the correct sequence. Then, read A Seed Grows to practice our reading skills.

Station 1 with Ms. Clemenzi

Station 2 with Mrs. Baker

Station 3 with Mrs. Newton

Station 4 with Mrs. Gorman

Look for your child's Pumpkin Exploration scientific packet coming home very soon!

It was a great day!

A very special thank you to our special guests!

October Newsletter 2019

Dear Families, 

It is hard to believe that September has come and gone so quickly!  School has gotten off to a great start! The children have made a great transition to kindergarten and getting settled into Fuller Meadow School.  We are enjoying our daily routines and making new friends. It is amazing to see the kindergarteners grow and learn, and each month brings such new adventures! 

It was wonderful to see so many families at Open House!  It was nice to have time to share some of the great things we do in Kindergarten.  We also had an awesome first field trip apple picking at Smolak Farm. What beautiful weather for apple picking, eating cider doughnuts, and drinking apple cider!  

In the month of October, the children will continue to be learning about letters and practice the correct letter formation.  The children are encouraged to write their name with one capital and lowercase letters! Reader’s Workshop has begun and the students are building reading stamina during read to self.  We will also be introducing making connections and retelling, as well as the story elements: characters and setting. The children will continue rhyming and playing phonemic awareness games.  Popcorn words or sight words will be starting very soon. More information will be sent home shortly. 

In the Math In Focus program, the children have been focusing on numbers 0-5, as well as the concept of same and different. In October, the students will expand the concept of same and different and learn the numbers 6-10 and their corresponding value.  Please practice number formation at home and counting with 1-1 correspondence.  

The children have been enjoying Writer’s Workshop and using illustrations to tell a story. We will continue learning about the fall, apples, pumpkins, Columbus Day, and some Halloween activities.  It will be a great month of learning! 

Important Dates:

No School Monday, October 14

Progress Reports : October 18

Halloween Parade: October 31 at 10:00 Costumes must come in backpacks please. No Masks or face paint.

Halloween Party: October 31 at 2:10  

Welcome to Kindergarten 2019 2020

2019-2020

I am so excited to begin this school year, learn, grow and make new friends!

The children and I will be enjoying many new, fun and exciting activities together throughout the year.  Our first few weeks together will be very busy!  We will be playing lots of name games and activities, ABC letter games, and fun counting and sorting math games. The children and I will be getting to know each other and becoming a classroom of community SuperHeroes!  We will also be learning about our school community and daily routines.   

This is a very special time for all of us and I cannot wait to begin this journey with you all!

The first few weeks of Kindergarten we will be learning all about our new friends in our class.  This is a very special time to build our classroom community.  I would like to encourage you to share about your family and your child by adding to our padlet.  So please use the plus button to share a couple of sentences and pictures about your summer fun and things that are about your child.  We will be sharing the padlet as a way to encourage new friendships and classroom community.
So excited to learn all about your family and my new Kindergartners!

Winter Vacation Fun 2018

Happy New Year!  Welcome 2019!

This week has gone by so fast spending time with friends and family!  I hope you had a great week!  I am so excited to return to school tomorrow and hear all about the exciting adventures you had.  We will be writing about our adventures and this padlet will be one way of brainstorming.  So please use the plus button to share with a couple of sentences and pictures about your some of the fun.  We will sharing the padlet with each other during class!  Start sharing!