Leprechaun Traps, and Family Math Game Night

This week was jam packed with Leprechaun trap engineering, weather, and math games! The Whales had so much fun on Monday creating Leprechaun traps. They planned out a design prior to engineering. Their designs had to have a place to hold gold, a way for the Leprechaun to get in, something to keep the Leprechaun entertained, and a letter to entice the Leprechaun inside. The Whales all had these elements in their traps, and they still did not catch the LEPRECHAUN! That Leprechaun was mischievous! They left our toilets green, they emptied out our writing caddies and book shelves!! They left foot prints on our tables and floors! We had to clean up the entire mess! Better luck next year Whales!

This week with our unit of study we learned about thermometers, wind, and clouds! We talked about how to measure temperature using a thermometer. We measured our classroom temperature, room temp water, ice water, and hot water. We then recorded our temperatures on paper thermometers. We learned that wind is made from moving air molecules. We did a few different science experiments to test trapping air, feeling strong wind (fast moving air molecules) and slow wind (slow moving air molecules), and we also tested if air has weight. Which we found out it does! But air is not very heavy. We practiced being bossy cool air that pushes warm air up and up. Which causes air molecules to move and in turn creates wind. We learned about how to predict weather by looking at the clouds. Cumulus clouds are big and look fluffy. Cumulus clouds mean that it most likely going to be a nice day! Cirrus clouds are high in the sky and they look wispy. They also mean it will be a nice day! Nimbus clouds are dark and mean storms are on the way. Stratus clouds are like a blanket across the wind that mean rain is on the way! Over spring break go cloud watching with your Whale. What do they see? What kind of weather might you be getting?

Thursday was a day full of math and fun! Thank you everyone for coming to Family Math Game Night. It was such a joy to see the Whales playing with each other and their families! We hope everyone enjoys their goody bags and get to play some new math games over spring break!

Weather and Pi(e) Day

The Whales have been learning all about weather! This week we learned that the sun is what makes our weather on Earth! We listened to a meteorologist talk about how the Earth gets warm from the sun. We learned that the Air does not get heated by the sun directly. The sun’s energy heats up the Earth and then the Earth heats up the air. We also talked about what makes us experience day and night, and the different seasons! We practiced being the Earth and the sun and revolving the Earth around the sun. When our part of Earth is facing the sun we are experiencing day, and when our part of the Earth is facing away from the sun we are experiencing night. The Whales learned that it takes 365 days or 1 year to make a full rotation around the Earth. We also learned that while the Earth spins, it is titled on an axis and this is what makes us experience the seasons. We read a book called, “On the Same Day in March”. We looked at how the different places on the Earth experience the same day depending on their location in relation to the sun! Next week, we will be diving into the water cycle, wind, and clouds!

In Literacy this week, we have been doing review of what our short vowel sounds, before we dive into our long vowel sounds. The Whales are growing as amazing readers! In numeracy, we continue to work on subtraction. During classroom choice, their math must-do this week, was Take Away Connect 4. The Whales ues dice and have to make a take away number sentence with their dice roll. They find that number on their connect 4 sheet, and have to get 4 numbers in a row.

This week in Music with Ms. McKenzie, we practiced some of the songs we will be singing for our grownups next week. We are working on changing dynamics and tempo of music. We have been using cue cards to change the speed and sound of the song. We have also been working on recognizing notes. We have been looking at whole notes, half notes, quarter notes, eighth notes, and sixteenth notes! The Whales are musicians!

This week the Whales celebrated Pi(e) Day. In kindergarten, we focus this day on the fun of math! We played Take Away 20, talked a little bit about the idea of measuring circles, baked a pie and so much more! We worked together in 2 groups to make 2 pies for our classroom. We talked about measurements and what reading a recipe looks like. We talked about following ingredient measurements in a recipe, and reading the directions. We tasted our pie later in the day, and all agreed it was DELICIOUS!

Tie-Dye and Migration!

The school has been bright with tie-dye shirts, aprons, dresses, and so much more! The Whales had such a fun time learning about tie-dye with Mr. Mark, and creating their own tie-dye designs. A huge thank you to Mr. Mark for putting this activity on every year, and to our volunteers for helping the Whales create such wonderful tie-dye designs. They truly are beautiful!

This week the Whales have been finishing up their unit of study on Migration. We made observations of similarities between our migrating animals. One of the noticings the Whales had was that many of our animals travel from the Tundra, down south to either Mexico or South America. Yesterday, we learned about the Canada Goose. Our presenter taught us that Canada Geese fly in a “V-formation” so that they can balance the amount of energy they are using to fly. In order to understand how tricky it might be to fly in a “v-formation” the Whales went outside and practiced. We realized that it is really tricky to stay in that v-formation, and to not pass the leader. Over the course of our unit, we have talked about why animals migrate. We have also been learning about how animals know it is time to migrate, and how they know exactly where to go. From our nonfiction books, we learned, that some birds know where to go because of the sun and the stars. We also talked about how there is still so much to study and discover about migration. The Whales could become future scientists or ornithologists and discover more about migration! Maybe one day, they will discover how the American Eel and the Chinook Salmon know where their exact birth spot is in the Sargasso Sea and in the Rivers. So COOL!

This week in math, the Whales have been practicing subtraction. They played take away monster math. They are mathematicians! They used number bonds and created number sentences to represent their answer. We have also been playing Take Away 20 against Ms. Abby. The Whales are masters at this game! They have figured out the strategy of giving Ms. Abby the low numbers they roll, and giving themselves the higher numbers so they can get to zero faster. You can play this game at home with a dice! On a piece of paper, create to columns. One for your Whale and one for you. In each column, write 20 -. Use a dice and roll a number. The objective of the game is to get to zero first. The trick is, if you go first, you get to choose whether you want to keep the number or give it to the other person. When the next person rolls, the person without a number has to keep that number. The first to zero wins!

In literacy, the Whales have been working on reading and spelling words with consonant blends. For example, the word “stick”. We learned the heart words “what” and “have”. The Whales are so excited to continue to challenge themselves in reading and writing. There stories in writers workshop are becoming more and more complex! We have been working on goal setting with our writing. The Whales are setting daily goals for themselves on what they want to achieve during our writing time. There have been recent publishings about Rainbow Friends, family trips, summer berries, and much more! Ask your Whale what their latest writers workshop story is about! We started a new chapter book called, “Mr. Popper’s Penguins”. Ask your Whale what has happened so far in the chapter book!

We are so incredibly proud of the hard work we have been seeing from the Whales. They are stretching themselves, and working really really hard. It is amazing to see how much they are growing in academics and just as human beings!

The Fancy 100 Heart Celebration!

The Whales classroom was buzzing this week with excitement about the 100 Day of School and Friendship Day. In preparation for the 100th day of school, the Whales worked together to cut out 100 hearts. We organized the hearts into ten groups of ten. We hung them up and have been using them to practice counting to 100. We noticed that it is quicker to count to 100 by 10’s rather than 1’s. The Whales have also been creating self-portraits of what they would look like when they are 100 years old. They will finish up the 100 year old self-portraits next week. Look forward to seeing some spectacular 100 year old Whales!!

On Wednesday, the Whales arrived in their most fancy attire. We saw bow ties, sparkly dresses, fancy jerseys, button up shirts, cowboy boots, princess dresses, and so so so much more! The Whales definitely were dressed to impress. In the morning, we decorated some 100 heart crowns, created desk buddies, completed addition mystery coloring, and engineered with 100 cups. At calendar time it was finally time to add our 100th day to our countdown to one hundred. We packed up all ten of our ten sticks and moved them into a 100 plate. Instead of doing the ten stick cha-cha, we did a 100 day march. We marched through the ELC, up the Berglund stairs, and all the way to the tip top of the building. When we got to the top, we were able to look down upon our Cedar Classroom and Piazza. What a view!!! We then counted to 100 AGAIN on our way back to our classroom. Along our route we stopped at the Sea Lion classroom. We wished the Sea Lions a happy 100 day! We love showing the 3rd and 4th graders all of the amazing learning we are doing in Kindergarten! The Sea Lions are the best supporters of our Whales.

The fun did not stop there! Now we were on to celebrating friendship! We sat in a large circle. We passed out our friendship cards one at a time. This was so we could individually say thank you to all of our friends. We wanted to make sure that our friends knew we are thankful for them. The Whales did an amazing job appreciating their friends. It is so special to see the friendships (new and old) that have formed and deepened over this year. After we passed out our friendship cards we enjoyed some strawberry cookies together. YUM!! The Whales are still talking about how much fun they had on our celebration day.

This week the Whales have started presenting about their migrating animals. So far we have learned about the American Eel, the Arctic Tundra, and the Bar Tailed Godwit. Thanks to Everett, Joella, and Landon we have learned so much already! We have been mapping their migration paths on the SMART board. We have noticed that many of our migrating animals start in the Arctic Tundra (PARTY IN THE TUNDRA!) in the North, and migrate in the cooler months to the South (Mexico, Hawaii, etc.). The Whales will continue to look at maps and talk about shorter and longer distances. We are so excited to hear more presentations. The Whales are amazing scientists.

Catching Snow Flakes

What crazy weather we have had this week! Some snow, some rain, and some sunshine. The Whales were ecstatic this week when it started to snow at school and they could run outside and try to catch some snowflakes. The Whales were trying to make snow angels (very wet snow angels) and were attempting to make very teeny-tiny snow balls. It was delightful to watch the smiles and to hear the laughter that the little bit of snow brought us.

This week the Whales have been working on stretching themselves and expanding their friendships. They were challenged to sit by new friends at lunch and to get to know them a little bit. Turns out, we have so much in common with our classmates! The Whales were talking about their favorite foods, ice-cream flavors, colors, and so much more! While outside, we worked on playing with new friends and taking turns with what we are playing. We talked about kindness. We defined kindness as; being nice and helpful to others no matter our differences. We talked about what that looks like, sounds like, and feels like. We noticed that kindness looks like people working together, playing together, and checking in on their friends. We talked about how we feel happy, loved, excited, and safe when we are kind and when others are kind to us. We also expressed that it is easier to learn when we are surrounded by kind people. We noticed that kindness sounds like; saying please and thank you, asking friends to play or read with us, and checking in on friends. Ask your Whale what new friends they have made this week!

On Friday, the Whales were so excited to start a new addition to Friday Summit. We have now added Buddy Families! All of the ELC students have been split into groups with one ELC teacher. Each group is labeled by a color. In each group their are Dolphins, Seals, Whales, Otters, Sea Lions, and a teacher. The Sea Lions are the leaders of our groups. Today, they led us in a drum roll name game for us to get to know our buddies a bit better. We will meet with our Buddy Families every Friday at the end of Friday Summit. Talk to your Whale about the games they played and the people in their group! We are so excited to get to know other students in our school and to feel connected through the different classrooms.

Hibernation Presentations

Throughout this week, the Whales worked on all things hibernation. They finished up their hibernation sites, and they practiced their presentations. Leading up to Friday, many Whales were feeling “nervited” (nervous and excited). We talked about our feelings and reassured ourselves that it is okay to have big feelings about doing something new and something in front of an audience. We talked about ways we can prepare our bodies for a serious presentation. We noted that eating healthy food like vegetables, drinking lots of water, and getting extra sleep helps us prepare for a presentation.

A huge Whale round of applause for the Whales and their amazing work on their hibernation research and presentations! In the morning of Friday, the Whales presented for the Seals and Dolphins. This was a great opportunity for the Whales to be leaders and teachers to our younger ELC students. The Seals and Dolphins were captivated and learned many new facts about hibernating animals. The Seal and Dolphin teachers shared with the Whales after the presentation how proud they were of them. It is so extraordinary to have a community that gets to share knowledge with one another. The Whales shared with each other how they felt after their presentations. They expressed; “I feel proud”, “That was so much fun!”, “I am a teacher!”, “Do we get to do that again?”. Later in the afternoon, the Whales got ready to present for a second round in front of their families. We were so excited to see siblings in the audience! We are so incredibly proud of them for being so brave and presenting in front of a large audience of grownups. They taught us some amazing facts about hibernating animals. Who knew that Snakes smell with their tongue. SO INTERESTING!

Being a Whale is such a treasure. During the week, there was a Whale friend who had an interesting wondering about the inside of a stem that he found in the Piazza. The Whale noticed that it felt soft and looked almost like styrofoam. We came up with some ideas about what we thought it might be and then we connected with Mr. Mark. Mr. Mark was able to do some investigating and came in during lunch to chat with the Whales about his findings. Mr. Mark talked about what scientists do when they have a wondering. They make hypothesis’s and they collect data. Mr. Mark’s hypothesis was that it came from a Milkweed plant. Upon collecting data from a Milkweed plant, he noticed that it was different. So he went to the sunflower’s out in the Piazza and noticed that they indeed had the same thing. His thoughts were that the inside “foam” was what helped the plant collect nutrients from the ground. The Whales told Mr. Mark that they will research some more and look in the sunflower books to see if they could find more information. A big shoutout to Mr. Mark for coming in and helping us solve our wondering!

Hibernation Site Engineering and Cozy Hibernation Party,

At Friday Summit today, the Whales listened to the Sea Lions sing a beautiful song about Change-makers. The Whales talked about spreading kindness and being leaders to our younger ELC friends. Friday Summit felt like such a great reminder of all the amazing work that every single classroom here at the ELC is doing. The Whales love coming together and celebrating with the entire school.

This week the Whales were hard at work engineering hibernation sites for their pacific northwest hibernating animals. The Oregon Black Bear group worked on painting a Den. The Little Brown Bat group worked on painting a cave and making many Brown Bats to hang inside. The Northwest Painted Turtles started making their Carapaces (top shell) and Plastrons (bottom shell). The Common Garter Snakes started to create Garter Snakes for their hibernaculum. Take a look at the photos below to see them working on their hibernation sites.

This week in literacy the Whales worked on the /h/ and /r/ sound. We practiced spelling and reading words with those sounds in them. We have also started reading words that have consonant blends such as skip, mist, and sink. We learned a few new heart words this week. We learned be, he, and me. During our reading group time, the Whales read a book called “The Animals are Sleeping”. They loved seeing their hibernating animals in a story. Read this fun story at home with your Whales! During literacy, we have been talking to the Whales about using the tools they have in their tool box when they are writing and reading. Instead of taking guesses, they can use the sounds they know to blend letter sounds and read words. They can use their bed hands to help them determine if they are reading a b or a d. They have so many tools and so much knowledge that we continue to encourage the Whales to not take random guesses. When working with your Whale on their homework tell them to use their prefrontal cortex and the tools in their tool boxes. Encourage them to not just guess but to do the tricky hard work. The Whales have talked a lot this week about stretching our prefrontal cortexes.

During numeracy, the Whales are working on recognizing teen numbers and understanding the place value associated with them. We talked about how many of the teen numbers give us a clue as to what number comes after the one. For instance, in the number nineteen, we can hear nine. That gives us the clue that nineteen is a 1 and a 9. We know that their is 1 ten stick and 9 little ones in 19. Have your Whales practice writing their teen numbers at home. Give them a teen number and ask them to figure out how to write it making sure the one comes first. Then ask them how many ten sticks and little ones are in that number.

On Friday, the Whales had a surprise Cozy Hibernation party. We enjoyed hot cocoa, and some popcorn to celebrate all of their hard work. They have really become experts at hibernating animals. They expressed during the celebration that they are excited to be teachers for the preschoolers next week and some expressed that they are feeling “nervited”. Nervous and excited. As a class we looked at our scientific illustrations and the Whales said they worked so hard on their illustrations. They talked to each other about how their animals look similar but everyone’s have differences. They loved seeing their hard work on the wall. Next time you are in the Whales classroom, please check out their hibernating animal artwork. It is truly astounding. You can also look below for a picture of their amazing artwork.

Research Papers, Scientific Illustrations, and Library Trips

The Whales have been putting their scientist hats on during their hibernation study. They have worked as groups to read non-fiction research about their hibernating animals. They have talked about the main facts and they each were in charge of writing two facts for their research papers. They also created illustrations that went along with their facts to help them remember their facts. They have been teaching each other about their animals. It has been so fun to see them sharing their knowledge with one another. They have talked about the similarities of their animals and differences. We have noticed that many animals slow their breathing down for hibernation and their heart beats slow as well. However, some animals go into true hibernation like Northwest Painted Turtles, while, other animals like the Oregon Black Bear go into Torpor.

Each Whale has spent time this week working on a scientific illustration of their hibernating animals. We talked about noticing small details when illustrating like a scientist. Their illustrations are to help others see what their animals look like in real life. They are now working on adding color to their illustrations using different art mediums. The Whales are practicing using an artist hand which is soft and helps us stay in the lines of our illustrations. The Whales are feeling extremely proud of their illustrations and have been talking about the hard work they have to put into their illustrations. They can’t wait for them to be finished and hung up!

On Friday, the Whales took their first trip to the Forest Grove library. We had a community discussion about library etiquette. The Whales did a great job being respectful of other community members in the library. They made sure to put the books they weren’t going to take and put them back where they belong. We talked about the importance of a library and the jobs of librarians. Each Whale got to pick out a book to add to our classroom library. We will hold on to these books for 2 weeks and then we will go back to the library and return them. We will be taking library trips every other Friday. The Whales are so excited to return to the library soon!

Animals in Winter

The Whales are back in action after a restful Winter Break. In a community discussion, on Tuesday, the Whales were eager to share about the memories they made during break. Some Whales traveled to see family, some went to the Mt. and played in the snow, while others stayed cozy and warm at home. It was so fun to see their smiles as they talked about their adventures.

On Tuesday, we started a new unit of study on Animals in Winter. First up, is hibernation! The Whales selected a Pacific Northwest animal to research over the next couple of weeks. They will be writing a research paper, doing a scientific illustration, engineering their animals hibernation site, and presenting to classrooms and families on their animals. This week we began reading about our animals and writing our research papers. We will continue to work on their papers next week as well. The Whales are proving to be amazing scientists. They are asking great questions and are deeply focused on their animals.

As we get closer to the 100th day of school, the Whales continue to practice counting to 100 by 1’s and groups of 10’s. This week we did a counting by 10 counting circle. We continue to talk about place value. While doing calendar, we identify how many ten sticks and little ones make up our day number. Thursday we had the 76th day of school. The Whales identified that we have 7 ten sticks and 6 little ones. We counted by tens and added on our little ones. During classroom choice, the Whales have been playing Bear Den Math. They start with ten bears. One person closes their eyes, while the other Whale hides some of the bears in the den. The person opens their eyes and has to figure out how many bears went in the den. They then have to write that number sentence on their worksheet. At the beginning of the week, the Whales thought it was a bit tricky. By Thursday, they were pros at figuring out how many bears were in the den!

In literacy, the Whales have been practicing their vowels! The Whales are learning the short and long vowel sounds. We have unlocked 5 vowel sounds in our vowel valley. The Whales are so proud of themselves! We have also been practicing reading and writing words with an -s ending. Sometimes these words can be tricky but the Whales have been doing a fabulous job listening for all the letter sounds in these words. Our heart word list continues to grow! This week we added the word “see”.

What a fun Friday the Whales had! We had a math morning playing Uno, checkers, math number coloring, addition yahtzee, and shut the box with Ms. Brooke! At Friday Summit, Landon shared with the school that the Whales are studying animals that hibernate in the Winter. It was so fun to hear what all of the classrooms are up to! During our outside time, we had an extra surprise! The Sea Lions (3rd/4th graders), set up an obstacle course for the Whales! The Whales had such a good time letting out energy doing different outside activities. When the Whales came in we talked about our thoughts about their outside time. So many Whales said “I made a new friend!”. They absolutely loved getting to know the 3rd and 4th graders.

The Tea Party in the Woods Continued

Here are some additional photos of the Whales during their dress rehearsal and performances in December!

The Tea Party in the Woods

Happy Friday everyone! The Whales did an outstanding job in their performance of The Tea Party in the Woods. Please check out the recorded video that Mr. Mark took. Ms. Aimee and Ms. Abby are just so proud of the Whales for their hard work on their lines, backdrops, and props. We hope this video adds some more joy into each of your winter breaks!

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Authors Celebration and Winter Read - In

The Whales have been a busy bunch the last two weeks. The excitement continues to grow as we get closer to our play performances and winter break. This week the Whales had some visitors amongst our classroom. After reading a book called, “The Tomten”, the Whales had their very own Tomtens visit the classroom. On their first visit, they left a riddle for each of the Whales and left behind some of their beard fluff! The Whales created a list of questions and thoughts they had for the Tomtens. For those of you who don’t know, Tomtens are a Swedish folklore tale. They are said to be a gnome/elf like person that lives on farms and works to help animals in the winter. They are shy and can be mischievous. The next time they visited us they gifted the Whales homemade wool felted acorn necklaces. The Whales were so excited and took a picture holding up their necklaces. This last time they visited they answered our wonderings that we had listed in our classroom! WOW! Check out their answers hanging in the Whales classroom. The Whales have yet to actually see the Tomtens and it remains a mystery as to where exactly our Tomtens live.

We are only 4 days to the performance of our Winter Play. The Whales have been working so extremely hard on their backdrop designs and props. They worked with teachers to figure out what each part of our set should look like based on the illustrations in the book. They painted the backdrops and had to work together as a team to complete the job. The backdrops are looking amazing and the Whales are feeling so proud of their hard work. The Whales are feeling confident with their lines and are using their strong voices to make sure an audience can hear them. Look forward to receiving your ticket for the play this week!

Thank you all for coming to the Whales Authors Celebration and Winter Read-In. What a night of laughter, joy, pride, and love. The Whales out did themselves during their performance of Peace like a River. It is such a magical feeling to see the Whales create bonds with their classmates and memories that they will remember always. Thank you to all of the Whale families who support the Whales classroom and students every day. They are such kind, hard-working, and loving human beings. On Friday, the Whales each spoke of their favorite part of the celebration. Some favorites of the evening included; “drinking hot cocoa and eating popcorn”, “reading my stories”, “spending time with my family”, “coming to school at night”, and “wearing pajamas to school”. Thank you everyone for making it a special and magical night for the Whales!!

Busy Writers, Musicians, and Mathematicians

The Whales having been getting so excited to prepare for their Whale Winter play. They decided to do the play on the book The Tea Party in the Woods by Akiko Miyakoshi. The Whales picked their parts and they are all very excited to practice their lines. Each of them got a script and their homework is the practice they lines over the weekend. So far the Whales have practiced a few times in class saying their lines. We have been talking about how to perform in front of an audience and what it will look like backstage when you are not performing. Next week the Whales will start working on creating their costumes and making the back drops for their play. They are so excited to perform for the ELC and for their families.

This week we had our last music session with Ms. McKenzie until the Spring. The Whales so enjoyed their time with Ms. McKenzie. On Wednesday, they were telling Ms. McKenzie their favorite parts of music. Many Whales like singing Firefly Firefly, others liked singing about different holidays. They worked so hard the last 8 weeks and they were so proud to perform for families at pick-up.

The Whales have been practicing addition and will soon be working on subtraction. This week, we played rainbow to 10 addition BINGO. We would give them an addition problem and they would have to solve it to figure out what number they can cross off. Many Whales were being so kind and helping friends around them if they asked for help. The Whales are huge supporters of one another and teachers throughout our day. We also practiced counting by tens and adding little ones. We have been doing this during our classroom choice activity of speedy bugs love to race to 50, as well as during calendar time. Can you believe we have had 60 days of school! WOW! The Whales counted, and figured out that we have 40 more school days until the 100th day of school.

Writers workshop has been very busy! The Whales are working incredibly hard getting their stories published. The Whales are writing their own sentences now! It is so exciting to hear them sounding out their words and creating fun and magical stories. The Whales are so excited to share their stories with their families during our Authors Celebration/Winter Read-In. The Whales are spelling phonetically in their stories. They are listening to the sounds they hear to help them decipher how to spell their words. This week we learned a new rule. When we hear the /k/ sound at the end of the word it is most often spelled with a CK. For example; duck, luck, pack, snack, chick, etc. We are seeing progress and growth every day in their writing!

This group of Whales are creative, loving, inquisitive, and hard-working. They are stretching them selfs and not giving up when things get hard. Walking into the Whales classroom, you can feel a community that learns together, plays together, and works together. What amazing students, human-beings, and friends they are.

Stone Soup Feast!

The Whales had a very exciting week leading up to Stone Soup Day. The Whales have been having a fantastic week in their reading group. They have gotten new books, practiced choral reading, and have been working on independent reading. They have new books in their book bags and they are doing an AMAZING job sounding out words and rereading when they got stuck on words. During classroom choice, the Whales have been practicing making sentences and reading their sentences to a teacher. We have been checking to make sure our sentences make sense and that we are reading it how the punctuation tells us to read the sentence.

The Whales have been really enjoying their music sessions with Ms. McKenzie. They are learning words like forte, piano, and legato. They are learning the beginning of reading music notes. This week in music, the Whales drew on a banner the things that they are grateful for in their life. Check out their banner art hanging above their cubbies.

Bring what you’ve got, throw it in the pot, we’re making stone soup!!! The Whales worked as a community to chop all of the veggies that went into our stone soup, as well as fruit and cheese! It was a tough job but they got it done! Ms. Shelby added our ingredients into the big pot. While the soup cooked, the Whales gathered into a gratitude circle. We went around the circle and each shared some things that we are grateful for. Many Whales shared they are grateful for their family, pets, and school. Later in the day we got together with all of the other classrooms to hear Mr. Mark read Stone Soup. After listening to Stone Soup, we walked to the atelier and ate with all of our ELC friends. The whole school smelled amazing and the Whales all took an adventure bite of the soup. A huge shoutout to our parent volunteers, Ms. Ren, and our head chef Ms. Shelby. Stone Soup would not happen without them! Ask your Whale what their favorite part of stone soup was!

Leaves are Falling!

The leaves are falling and the chilly weather is upon us! BRRR!

This week in the Whales classroom we asked the question; Why do leaves change color, and why do they fall off their tree? The Whales learned that leaves have chlorophyll in them which is the green pigment that absorbs light into food for trees. When it starts getting colder outside and with less sunny days trees don’t need to make as much chlorophyll because there is not as much sunlight to turn into food. With the leaves having less chlorophyll, the other color pigments start to show in leaves; turning the leaves orange, red, and yellow. Because the leaves aren’t doing much during the winter, the trees drop their leaves. If the deciduous trees kept their leaves it would be risky in the winter. If it snowed it could get too heavy for the branches to hold and they could snap. Once the first frost happens, trees can no longer lose their leaves. Go on a tree walk with your Whale and notice the trees that are being brave by keeping their leaves on still. Notice the trees that are cautious by dropping all their leaves. The Whales collected different types of deciduous leaves around our school campus. They collected Chestnut, Ginko, Maple, and Oak leaves. We put them into big bins and carried them back to our classroom. The following day we got into groups and sorted the leaves based on different attributes. One group sorted by size, another by color, and the last group sorted by leaf type. They then had to work together to count the leaves in each group. To do this, the Whales found it easier and quicker to put the leaves in groups of ten and then count by tens to find the total number. When all of the groups finished, we traveled around the classroom, where each group presented their findings. They all worked so hard and did not give up!

The Whales are READERS! We started reading groups this week. There are 4 different reading groups. The Piggies, Knuffle Bunnies, Pigeons, and the Elephants. Each day of the week the Whales will meet in their group and will do a different reading center. Once a week their group will meet with Ms. Abby to have group reading time, where they will read a new book together, work on targeted reading skills, and will get new books for their book bag. If they are not with Ms. Abby they are completing a reading activity, and then reading from their book bags. This week the Whales were so excited to find out what group they are in. They all had smiles on their faces and I heard students saying, “I love books!”. This is a classroom where we value books and we are so excited to see the growth the Whales will have this year in reading!!!

On Friday, We had a lovely math morning with some new but familiar math games. The choices were checkers, shut the box, Uno, Connect 4, and less or more addition war. These are all great games to build problem solving, manipulation with numbers, counting, recognizing numbers, positive sportsmanship, and MUCH MUCH MORE! This weekend spend some time playing a card or dice board game with your Whale!

We continue to see this group of Whales be positive cheerleaders to each other. On days where we have published books, we read the newly published books at the end of our day. All of the Whales give a Whale round-of-applause. And so many Whales will turn to that friend and say “you did such a great job!”. What a bright light these students are. Their happiness, pride, and kindness fill our classroom each day.

Trees and Leaves

The Whales have had a great start to their tree and leaf unit. The weather has been perfect for putting our scientist hats on and checking out the trees on our beautiful school campus. On Tuesday the Whales answered the question “do trees get thinner?” We learned that every year a tree will grow a new ring which makes their trunk thicker. We practiced counting rings on wood cookies to determine how old they are. The oldest one we had was 17 years old! We also learned that scientists can look at the rings of these wood cookies and can determine the environment that that tree had in each year. They can see whether it was a healthy growing environment or if is was really cold and dry that year. After looking at wood cookies in the classroom we took a tree walk around campus to look at the trees standing tall and strong. We know just by looking at a tree we can’t determine exactly how old a tree is, but we can look at the trunk and see how thick it is. We compared the wood cookies from class to the trees outside. We determined that many of the trees on campus are older than the wood cookies we have in our classroom. We also talked about the two different groups of trees; deciduous and conifer. Deciduous trees have leaves that fall once a year and conifer trees have needles that stay on their trees. Ask your Whale what some of the other differences are between deciduous and conifer trees are. Take a tree walk in your neighborhood and have your Whale think about if they are seeing a deciduous or conifer. We got to end our exploration by collecting leaves and throwing them up. Look below for some fun photos of the Whales throwing their leaves.

This week we had Felicity the Penmanship Fairy visit. We didn’t see her but she dropped off a basket full of gifts and a card for our Whales. Each of the Whales got a Felicity Penmanship book, along with colorful pencils, and smiley erasers. Felicity also gave the Whales magic writing dust that helps them write their letters. The Whales have been doing a FANTASTIC job focusing on their penmanship and taking their time becoming amazing writers. We are so proud of them!

In numeracy this week the Whales have been playing Speedy Bugs Love to Race to 30. They have been working on counting little ones and turning them into great big ten sticks. They have been adding on and counting by tens! What an amazing thing to see these Whales grow their mathematician brains! In Literacy, the Whales have been practicing reading and writing sentences and using a finger space in between each word. Next week we will be starting reading groups. The Whales will be getting reading bags with books that will change weekly. The Whales are readers!

A Halloween to Remember

Hello All!

The Whales had a fabulous week full of spooky activities, and Halloween fun! This week in the Whales classroom the Whales worked on a new art project. We read the book, “Monsters Love School”, and started to create our own funky, and silly monsters. We used oil pastels as well as water color to make our monsters POP! The Whales were so creative and every monster has its own fabulous features! The Whales will be wrapping up their Monster Art next week and they will be hanging in the cubby area. Be on the lookout for some silly monsters!

During Writers Workshop, the Whales have been having one-on-one conferences with Ms. Abby to talk about their current story that they are working on. In our conferences we are talking to Ms. Abby about the beginning, middle, and end to our story. The Whales are creating some amazing endings that are making the reader want to read more! The Whales are also working on stretching out their words. We are moving from just beginning letter sounds, to spelling whole CVC words! It is incredible to see the Whales brains continue to stretch and grow!

In Numeracy, this week the Whales are continuing to work on addition. They played a spooky game of Spider Web Roll. In this game the Whales play against a friend. Each have their own spider web. They take turns rolling a die and putting that many flies on their web. They also are writing a number sentence to show what they rolled and put on their spider web. After they have rolled twice and put their flies on their web, they add all of their flies together. The friend who has more flies all together wins the game. At home ask your Whale some simple addition problems (5+2, 7+3, 4+1).

On Halloween, the Whales had a great artistic morning of creating masks, making spooky ghost cards, story telling with witches and pumpkins, and magical painting. The Whales had a fun time showing each other their costumes. During our day, we did a choral reading of the story “Five Little Pumpkins”. The Whales did a great job using their linger finger and pointing out heart words that we have learned. Ask your Whale to read you their book at home this weekend! At the end of the day, the Whales were so EXCITED to walk in the annual ELC Costume Parade. They looked great as they waved to people who were watching the Parade. The Whales are now ready to have a restful weekend after a busy week!

Celebration of Community

What a fantastic Celebration of Community! There was laughter, smiles, and love filling each space of the Whales classroom. The Whales worked extremely hard on Thursday cutting 50 apples to make enough apple sauce for our classroom community! They felt proud to show you their hard work, and everything they have been learning thus far in Kindergarten. The Whales teachers want to give our Whale families a giant thank you for supporting the Whales in their learning, and leaning in to their studies! They are all doing such an amazing job because they have loving and supportive family and friends that show excitement in what they are doing at school and the learning that they are achieving everyday!

Take a look below at our preparation for Celebration of Community and some amazing photos of the event itself. A huge shoutout to Mark Bailey for capturing so many special memories in the making!

Music with Ms. Mckenzie, and Apple Tasting! YUM!

What a musical crew the Whales are! Last week the Whales started music with Ms. Mckenzie! We will be doing music with Ms. Mckenzie every Wednesday. The Whales each have their own musical folder, with musical terms, and all of the songs the will be learning this fall. The Whales so far have learned about Forte (which means loud in music language), and Piano (with means quiet in music language), and crescendo (starting quiet and growing to loud). The Whales have also started the beginnings of learning how to read music. This is such a special opportunity for our Whale classroom. If you would like to access the different songs that the Whales will be learning this fall click here. We so far have been learning; Hey Everybody, El Chocolate, Hasta Luego Winnegago, and Firefly Firefly. The Whales have so been enjoying their first couple of music sessions!

This week the Whales had an apple tasting. We put on our scientist caps and used our 5 senses while making noticings about the different apples we tasted. The Whales were mindful through this process. They shared their thoughts to the group. We all took adventure bites of each apple. We tried Honey Crisp, Red Delicious, Granny Smith, and Cosmic Crisp. At the end we each voted on which apple was our favorite. The Whales were asked to vote with their heart and not with their friend. We talked about how it is totally okay to have a different favorite then your friends. We graphed our votes on a bar graph and talked about which apple was the most popular in the Whales classroom (had the most votes), and which apple was the least popular (had the least amount of votes). The Whales noticed that their were votes for each apple, but the Honey Crisp was the most popular because it had the most votes, and we could see that because that bar was the tallest.

The Whales started their art study on Henri Matisse. Matisse was a still life artist that used shapes, color, and shadow in his art. The Whales will be working on creating their own Matisse apple art by using shadowing to make apples look like they are right in front of you! They are so excited to begin this project!

These Whales are so excited about learning and being in a community together. We are constantly hearing them supporting one another, and being each others cheer leaders. They are kind, hard working, and so full of joy. They are becoming scientists, artists, authors, mathematicians, readers, and so much MORE!

Investigating Apples, Hukilau (Hu-ki-lau), and Becoming Readers!

This week the Whales dived deep into their study on apples. We looked at how apples grow. We talked about the female parts of an apple blossom and the male parts. We also looked at how apple blossom flowers become fertilized. The easiest way for apple blossom flowers to become fertilized is by bees. We read that for an apple flower to be fertilized it must get pollen from a different apple tree. It can’t be fertilized by the same apple tree. During the week, we did a field study on apples in the piazza with the apple trees. The Whales worked in partners to conduct their study. Each pair picked a apple, had a knife, and cutting board. Their task was to scientifically illustrate the outside of an apple. The Whales then got to cut their apple open. They scientifically drew the inside of their apples. Then they had to find all the seeds in their apple and draw their seeds. They used their eyes to make observations about what they were seeing, and they used their nose to make noticing’s about the smells of their apples.

During literacy this week, the Whales have been working on blending, segmenting, and manipulating phonemes. During UFLI, the Whales started with making the word map. The teacher then asked the Whales to change one letter to make the word tap. The Whales had to figure out what phoneme in the word map would change to make the word tap. We will continue to practice this next week. The Whales also started learning about heart words. Heart words are irregular words that don’t typically follow common spelling rules and patterns. The first heart word that the Whales have been learning is the word “the”. The Whales are practicing saying the word in a sentence and spelling the word.

In numeracy the Whales are working on counting on and counting by tens. During calendar time we count how many days of school we have had. Friday was our 23rd day of school. That is 2 ten sticks and 3 little ones. We counted by tens and then added our little ones on. We have also been working on recognizing patterns and making our own patterns. On Friday, the Whales had a chance to make bracelets with their own patterns.

In writers workshop, the Whales are working on stretching their words. They are using the tools in their writers workshop folders to spell out their illustration labels. Friends are spelling words such as sun, dog, hat, and much more! We have some amazing authors and illustrators in our classroom. They are thinking about the beginning, middle, and end of their stories. The Whales have also been helping Ms. Abby add on to her story about being at school. They told Ms. Abby that in order to get work done on her story that she couldn’t stare at the ceiling and chat with friends the whole time! Once the Whales told Ms. Abby that, she was able to get so much more work done on her story. Those Whales are great teachers!

The Whales begun studying Hula dancing this week. Ms. Janelle a student at Pacific University will be coming every Tuesday for this fall to teach the Whales a Hula routine. On Tuesday, the Whales learned what Hula dancing is and the importance of Hula dancing in the Hawaiian culture. The Whales also learned the first bit of the Hula dance. The Hula dance the Whales are learning is called, Hukilau. If you want to listen to the song that we are dancing to click the link. Hukilau song.

During Friday Summit, we got to listen to other classrooms tell us what they have been learning. We also got to share what we have been learning about in the Whales. Joella was our first Whale Class Representative and she shared with the rest of our school that we finished our Van Gogh Sunflowers. Next week a different Whale will be our representative and will share with the school some of the things we have been learning during our apple study! What an exciting addition to Friday Summit.