Apple Tasting

Happy Birthday, Butterfly!

Our final Monarch butterfly emerged from a chrysalis last week. We were able to watch the emergence, then tagged and released this beautiful creature. Classmates cheered, and shouted "adios" as the butterfly began the long flight to Mexico. We were also able to determine that this butterfly was a male, by the markings on it's wings. your child should be able to explain the markings to you. We have been tagging butterflies as part of the Monarchwatch study. Each butterfly has a tiny numbered sticker affixed to its wing.Researchers can use the numbers on the stickers, to track the journey of the Monarchs.  Hopefully, we will be able to track the travel of the butterflies tagged in Room 7 this year.

Our remaining two chrysalis- an Eastern Swallowtail, and a Tent Caterpillar Moth,will probably "winter over" and will emerge in the spring. We will keep an eye on them throughout the seasons!

Kindergarten Self Portraits in September

Each child had a chance to look carefully into a mirror today, and then choose oil pastels to use in their realistic representation of their face. Can you guess who each artist is? Ask your child for some help. We will provide some clues tomorrow.....

A Photo Essay- Liberty Orchard

 

 

Reminder

We will be heading to Liberty Orchard tomorrow to pick apples. Please help your child choose appropriate clothing and shoes for a chilly, wet fall morning. We plan to leave by bus at 9:00, and will return to school about 11:15.Please see the Liberty Orchard web site for driving directions if you choose to go by car.

The best class picture ever!

Butterfly Sing-Along

All of the kindergarten classes gathered in the gym today for a sing-along. We learned a song about the  life cycle of a cycle of a butterfly. The catchy tune was fun to sing, and also to dance with. We invited Dr. Ricca, and Mr. Bradley to join us, and many of our teachers joined in too. A special guest, Screetch the owl, also came to the sing-along.

We also made beautiful butterfly headbands, to celebrate our emerging monarchs. One of our chrysalis popped open on Tuesday, and another is very close. We will keep you posted.
              
                                          

 Monarch butterflies, Dr. Ricca and Ms. Rodis at the sing-along

A Field Trip for the Kindergarten

We are going on a field trip to Liberty Apple Orchard, on Monday, September 24^th

·      We plan to leave school at 9:00.

·      We will visit the orchard, pick apples and learn about the life cycle of an apple tree.

·      We may even see living things and critters while we are there.

·      We will return to school in time for lunch!

Science and Spiders

On Friday, we had our first Four Winds Science lesson. The theme for these monthly lessons is "Adaptations". In our lesson we learned about the adaptations that spiders make in order to survive, and to catch their prey.We had a puppet show, looked at some live spiders with hand lenses, then went outdoors on a spider hunt on the school grounds. Many thanks to Emma and Angela for helping with this lesson. 

On Friday, we had our first Four Winds Science lesson. The theme for these monthly lessons is adaptations. In our lessons we learned about the adaptations that spiders make, in order to survive, and to catch their prey.We had a puppet show, looked at some live spiders with hand lenses, then went outdoors on a spider hunt on the school grounds. Many thanks to Emma and Angela for helping with this lesson.

Literacy in Kindergarten

 We read some books about a young boy named David, who often hears the words, "No, David" from those around him. We discovered that David needed some help to change his poor choices into good choices. As an extension of the story, we created a class chart with good choices and poor choices.
                                            
At  FIT ( Focused Instruction Time), we had  literacy centers in the classroom.

Mrs. Zahner, our literacy coach, helps kindergarten readers point to each word in their, "I See My Class" books.

Mrs. Michaud helps with the class name/photo matching game.

Mrs. Koch's group works on letter/sound  puzzles.

Information Night/ Open House Correction

The parent informational night/open house, scheduled for Thursday, September 20th is for students and families in grades 1-5, not for Kindergarten families.  We apologize for any confusion.  The Kindergarten team is off to a great year and we thank you for all your support. If you have any questions, feel free to ask!

Mammoth Sunflowers

We walked to Harrison field to look at some mammoth sunflowers. The seeds were planted by first graders last spring. The intent was for the kindergarten kids to have sunflower heads to study in the fall. We will bring some of these sunflowers into our classroom in the coming week, and will learn about the life cycle of a sunflower. How many different life cycles can we explore?

The mammoth sunflowers and the kindergarten kids

Practicing walking safely and crossing streets.

Caterpillar Observations

A Monarch Caterpillar

An Eastern Black Swallowtail Caterpillar

Last week, one student brought in a container with two caterpillars inside. We were able to watch the caterpillars eat, and eat, and eat until Friday. The caterpillars looked similar, but were not exactly the same.









On Friday, each caterpillar began to make a chrysalis. We noticed that one chrysalis was hanging down(the Monarch), and the other was jutting out from the stick. They were both green at the start.

 When we came to school on Monday, the Eastern Black Swallowtail chrysalis was completely camouflaged! We had trouble finding it, because it looked so much like a stick.

We will continue to keep on eye the metamorphosis of both types of caterpillars.