Since my last update my students have made amazing progress! Most of them now know all their letter names and sounds! We are assessing next week to see their official progress and I'm excited to see how far they have come. Some of my students have begun to tap out words as well as reading CVC words independently. They amaze me everyday especially when I remember that most of them did not speak English on the first day of school. Our biggest success story is a student who just moved to the United States from Guatemala last February. She does not speak any English at home yet she is the highest student in the class. She is even higher than some of our more fluent speakers. She has passed 3 of our 6 sight word lists and is amazing at word solving strategies. I cannot wait to see where all my students are in literacy by the end of the school year!
In math, we have been focusing on numbers up to 20, addition, subtraction, and position words. Most of my students can now count to at least 20 with a handful being able to count to 100. Addition and subtraction have been a bit more of a challenge. Some of the higher students in the class have picked up on it and the others are coming along as well. We introduced them to Linus the Minus which is a cute poem we found on Pinterest.
We explained that Linus always takes things away when no one is looking and you will end up with less. Well they really took that to heart and ever since then there has been a constant hunt for Linus in our classroom. When anything goes missing Linus seems to be the first one to be blamed! Last week we focused on position words such as under, over, left, right etc. This may seem like a simple concept but for 5 year olds whose first language is not English it proved to be much more difficult than I expected. We tried to keep it as hands on as possible including a treasure hunt around the classroom where each clue included a position word. The kids loved it! We will continue to include it in our daily vocabulary to reinforce it.
In science, we have covered simple machines such as ramps, wheels, and pulleys. A complex concept for kindergarteners but they picked it up pretty quickly. We use lots of chants/songs in our classroom to understand concepts. They are helpful for all students but they are especially beneficial to our English Language Learners. We review them everyday before beginning our lesson as well as linking them to other subject areas as well. For example, our simple machine chant was used to practice directionality and letter vs. word.
Each day we introduced a new simple machine and at the end of the unit we had an egg challenge. Each group got an egg that they had to get from point A to point B using a simple machine while also keeping it safe. The students got really into it and were so creative!
We started our force and motion unit last week. Again, a tricky concept to get across but the kids have gotten really into it. We have been using challenges to get the different types of motion across. According to the standards, we need to teach that objects can move in a straight line, back and forth, round and round, zig zag, fast and slow. We had a cardboard box race last week to teach the straight line motion. Students were divided into 2 teams: Team Push and Team Pull. They had to either push or pull one of their classmates down the hallway in a cardboard box. They loved it and it was hilarious to watch!
In social studies, we covered American symbols but it got a bit interrupted due to our insane amount of snow days. We have had 9 snow days so far this school year! This past week was our first full week (with no snow days, holidays or half days) since before Christmas break!
Phew, that was a whole lot and there's so much more but hopefully I will remember to update this more often and they won't be quite as lengthy :)
No comments:
Post a Comment
Thanks for visiting my blog! I'd love your feedback!