Last Day of Kindergarten

Well, our countdown is finally over and we made it to our final day of Kindergarten! There was a buzz in the air all day, as students were very excited for their graduation in the afternoon!!

They had an hour of free choice play this morning, which was a lot of colouring and dramatic play. After our calendar meeting, we read Mrs. Bindergarten Gets Ready for the Last Day of Kindergarten. We practiced songs/poems for the grad and rehearsed what to tell people about what we've learnt this year.

Poem:

I'm a graduate (pointing to chest)
Yes it's true (knodding)
I'm a graduate (pointing to chest)
Ooh ooh ooh (hands on hips)

A little piece of paper is what I'll get (making a square shape with fingers)
So you ought to be proud (hands on hips)
Coz' I'm a graduate! (pointing to chest)


Song:
Start spreading the news (hands 'raising the roof)
I'm leaving today (marching)
I want to be a part of it (marching)
Grade One, Grade One! (turn to side, jazz hands).

After recess, we read Last Day, Hooray! and then students worked in their journals. They printed the date and "My Summer" and drew a picture of themselves this summer. Then I scribed for them their responses to how they will spend their summer.

We also did some body break videos since we were having an in-classroom Phys.Ed today. That was pretty much our morning! The afternoon was our joyful celebration, followed by snacks and dessert with families. Everyone was cleared out by 2:30 pm. and it was time to begin the year end classroom clean up! It's been such a wonderful year that I can't help but feel a little sad over it coming to an end. I've been surrounded with amazing students and staff that have made my first year of teaching such a great learning experience!

I wish my students all the best in Grade One & hope that everyone has a fantastic summer holiday! :)


Until next year....

Outdoor Adventures!

The majority of our previous two K days have been spend learning outdoors! Last Friday, we enjoyed our Play Day with the grades one to fives, as well as help from the 6's and 7's. Students rotated through activities in colour co-ordinated teams (they came up with their own team names, flags, and chants!). The school and team spirit was on high! The activities included basketball, standing long jump, high jump, ball target throw, pool noodle throw, and base running. In the afternoon, we had a few different types of relay races, water balloon toss, and tug-o-war. It was such a great day!!

Tuesday, we had our field trip to the Saskatoon  Forestry Farm Park and Zoo. It was so much fun exploring the zoo and seeing all of the different animals (and airplanes). We had some play time in the park and the Burger King play area as well. In the afternoon, we took part in a guided program called Meet the Creature. We learnt all about different types of animals and students got to feel a skink, salamander, bunny, snake, eagle and hawk feathers, and porcupine quill. We stopped for an ice cream treat on our way home, too. It was another very exciting adventure for our class.

Dads, Numbers, Memories, & Teamwork

Here are the short, but sweet, notes on our 5th last day of Kindergarten:

 

*The Grade One class was learning about birds and we got to take a look at some really cool bird nests!

*We worked on Father's Day presents, including little 'surveys' about our dad and dad portraits. It's always amusing to hear the students guess their dad's age, height, and weight!

*We completed number booklets where students traced the number word and represented the numbers 1-10 in ten frames.

*We played tag games in Phys.Ed.

*We worked on our Kindergarten memories booklets and made invitations for parents to the Kindergarten graduation.

Last period, the K-5s met in their play day teams to create team names, chants, and flags. They collaborated so well together! It was great to see the teamwork happening. I can't to watch the students work together to enjoy the play day events on Friday!

 

Tomorrow I get to meet some of the upcoming Kindergarten students at K orientation! :)

Tick Tock Tick Tock Time is Ticking Away

The days are winding down in Kindergarten! This morning we worked on our "This is me in June" pictures. It was the last time that we will be working on our self portraits. It's so amazing to see the progress from September to now!

In math we continued to work on number recognition. Students worked on a cut and paste activity to show which numbers were represented in ten frames. They also had to count the dots on the dominos and print the number.

We read The Grouchy Ladybug by Eric Carle before heading to the library. The students have really loved the Eric Carle stories. They have been a great fit with our science outcomes of learning about plants and animals.

We finally finished our ocean animal project today. Students had to print the sentence, "A _____ lives in the ocean." by filling in the blank with their ocean animal. The Smart Board came in handy with demonstrating to students how to print their letters using a sentence strip!

The rest of the afternoon was spent working on a Kindergarten memories book. It's becoming a great time for reflecting back upon our year together! I've created two new bulletin boards~ one focused on looking back and looking forward and then the other is all about our ocean learning.

 

Of course, there was also free choice time. This class loves to take the opportunity to practice printing words! I love it!

We have one more full day of classroom time before some exciting adventures including play day, two field trips, and our final day/Kindergarten grad! Fingers crossed that the weather will co-operate with all of our plans. :)

June is here!!

Our countdown continues! We now have 7 days of Kindergarten left and many students were excited that we switched our calendar over to June.

It was a beautiful day today! We took part in the town clean up by pairing up with the Grade 1 class. Students were even commenting that it was TOO hot! The students did a great job cleaning up around the school playground and rink. When we were discussing the task at hand, one of the students commented that we were cleaning up to help make the Earth happy. Then, they requested to hear the "We're Going Green" song/video we had watched in April.

First thing this morning, students had an opportunity to paint their leaves on the mural. They did an excellent job.

In Math, we talked all about the number 10. We watched a video of the song 10 Bears In The Bed, filled in our "All About the Number" chart, and worked on making 10 in two sets with a butterfly activity!

We also talked a lot about animals today. Students shared why they like animals. We brainstormed which animals live in the ocean and which animals do not live in the ocean. Together we read a book called Sharks. It was a higher level book than The Ocean book we read last day. However, we worked together and made it through! Some examples of the words were "Sharks are good swimmers. Sharks are big and little." Students also began a mini project where they each picked an animal that lived in the ocean and began colouring a picture of that animal using wax crayon. We will finish the project on Thursday, as last class we were invited to watch plays performed by the Grade 4's and 5's.

The clock is ticking! There are so many activities that I want to fit in before the end of the school  year. It's going to be a busy/fun month. :)