Parent-Teacher conferences are this Friday, December 2nd and next Friday, December 9th. Please be prompt and know that I only have 20 minutes to conference with you. With 20 students and 2 half days, it doesn’t leave much time for long meetings. I will keep my clock handy and keep the conferences on schedule. At the conference, I will
review your child’s progress over the first 13 weeks, give you your child’s report card, and let you know where we are headed for the next 13 weeks. I am looking forward to seeing everyone again and sharing about your child. I am sending home a reminder of when your conference is tomorrow with a copy of this newsletter.

Thanksgiving
I hope everyone had an enjoyable Thanksgiving with family last week. At school, last Tuesday, we enjoyed the Kindergarten Feast. The Feast was a chance for the entire grade of kindergarten to come together in the Café for snack. The students chose whether to attend the feast as a member of the Wompanoag tribe or come as a Pilgrim
boy or girl. The students made a hat to represent their character. On Monday, the students shook tubs of heavy cream until it turned into butter. Each classroom also mixed and baked their own cornbread. The butter, cornbread, and popcorn were shared at the feast. Each student also designed a patterned placemat that was given as a gift
to another student. The classes each sang a song to the group as well. 

Name Writing

Almost all the students can now write their first and last names neatly and quickly. If your child is still struggling with this, please practice at home. You can make it fun and practice with magnetic letters. Have your child build his/her name on the refrigerator and then write it quickly after.

Sight Words
Now that most students know the alphabet in both upper and lowercase and can match most sounds to those letters, we will be working harder on learning sight words. A good foundation of sight words is crucial for a child to unlock the key to reading and writing. You will begin to see more sight word activities come home. I also refer to these words 
as Popcorn Words, since they “pop” up all the time in reading and writing.

And some of the students already know at least 15 sight words and are ready for reading books (or are already reading books)! Everyone learns at a different pace and in kindergarten we have to work hard to accommodate the variety of learners.

Letter and Numeral Formation
Correct letter and numeral formation is very important and I try to correct it and work on it as much as possible. However, sometimes correcting every letter or number gets in the way of an activity (like journal writing or playing a math game) so you may see reversals or poorly formed letters. This is typical for five year olds. Proper handwriting
is important and is being addressed. You can also work with your child at home if you notice a letter or number that is a particular struggle for him/her.

Math
Most of the math we do in Kindergarten is through manipulatives and games. I am sure you have seen plenty of the dice roll game sheets come home. The children love to choose this activity in their free time. We also play a lot of board games and card games to learn about numbers and sets.

Our class is starting work on a unit in mathematics called What Comes Next? The focus of this unit is constructing and extending patterns. Throughout this unit, students will be working toward these goals: Copy, construct, and extend simple repeating patterns such as AB, ABC. The children have also been measuring and comparing their names to
their friends’ names with their Name Ruler. And we are always working on counting sets of objects.

I have included a few sheets with a more in-depth review of what we have been working on and how you can follow up at home.

As always, if you have any questions or concerns please let me know via a phone call, email or at our conference!

Sincerely,
Diane Alsup