Our 2nd semester is off to a great start in Kindergarten. All the DRA's (reading level tests) are completed and I will begin Guided Reading groups the 1st full week of February. It is amazing to see how much the students have grown academically and I am confident each child will progress even more from small group instruction. I'll keep you updated!
Last week the children enjoyed a unit on Outer Space. They learned about the moon, planets, stars, and astronauts. I read informational texts (nonfiction) and fiction books. It was hard for them to fathom that I was a young girl when men went to the moon! Here is a photo of an anchor chart about astronauts. As we studied this subject, the students gave answers for the "can", "have", and "are" parts of the chart. Afterwards we wrote out sentences from the chart. They also made astronauts of themselves and wrote a sentence of their choice based off of the chart. Some of our mini-lessons during writers workshop have been about punctuation and always starting a sentence with an uppercase letter. They have been taught the meaning of a period, question mark, and explanation mark. They have also learned the meaning of quotation marks and commas. Of course, I will continue teaching and reviewing these skills throughout the school year.
~ Mrs. Eilenstine
