02+22+2008

= Kindergarten News =

=February 22, 2008 = = from Mrs. Knee, Mrs. Neily = = and Mrs. Shepard =

We have had a busy couple of weeks in kindergarten. Our penguin study is almost complete. The children have been quite involved with learning about these interesting birds. Their investigations have surpassed my expectations causing us to spend more time on this subject that I thought we would. The children are anxious to share their penguin projects with you during curriculum night – March 6. Recently our writing work has been a combination of small moment stories and writing for the blog. Each child contributes work to the blog about once a week. Some children have wanted to work on their blog at home. If you would like to work with your child at home and help them write for their blog, please let me know. It is a great way for children to practice their writing skills. It requires a password (which I supply) and adult supervision. Another way for children to be involved at home is by making comments to their classmates blog or to the articles on the main page. This does not require a password. Our blog has attracted the attention of some university student in Saskatchewan, Canada. A University of Regina professor contacted me asking if his students could be blogging buddies for our classroom. His students are learning about using technology in classrooms. Three students have “adopted” us and are making comments to the children’s blogs and following our work. A couple of other teachers from around the country have been sharing our blog with their students and we often receive comments from them. Thursday was a very busy day for us. The day started with an international, computer to computer video call (via skype) to Australia. We spoke with Mrs. Shepard’s brother to try to learn more about a type of penguin that lives in Australia. It was midnight for him and he was very kind to talk to us. Our own DCS big buddies did some blogging work with us on Thursday. We used the lap top lab in our classroom. The big buddies helped the kindergarten children read and make comments. Everyone enjoyed their time with their buddies and lots of work was done as well. The other special event was a visit from Joshua’s grandparents. They brought 2 of their sled dogs and a racing sled. We learned lots about sled dog racing. We were able to share the sled dogs presentation with a kindergarten classroom in Alphretta, Georgia by doing another video skpye chat. We hope to learn more about sled dog racing after vacation. The Iditarod is a sled dog race in Alaska which starts March 3.

FYI • Curriculum Night – Thursday March 6 • Snack for first week of March o Monday March 3 Garrett (Birthday snack) o Tuesday Megan o Wednesday – Ryan o Thursday – Tori o Friday – Trevor o Monday March 10 – Gage (Birthday snack)