Remote Learning Week 2!

We survived our first week of remote learning!  Way to go to the kiddos and the grown ups helping them along the way! I am blessed with some amazing little people in my life this year!  

This week is a short week as there is no school on Friday.

I would like to do another Zoom call this week and have it be show and tell.  I will be able to mute the microphone of all the kids, and then unmute the person who's turn it is to talk.  I will be sending home a survey later today asking what day/time works best for everyone.  I will try my best to find a time that works for the majority of the kid's who would like to participate.   If your kid is struggling, and you would like a one on one zoom call, please reach out.  I will do my best to accommodate those requests. 

IMPORTANT!! If your child is completing paper/pencil activities, please turn those in when you pick up this week's packet.  The office is open M-TH from 8am to 11am this week. 

This to access this weeks lessons click here! 

Today's Videos:

April 2nd - Remote Learning

Good morning!  I have some very exciting news!!!

We will be having a Zoom meeting Friday night at 7!  I just want to check in and say hi to all the kiddos and then I will read them a story.  It should last around 20 to 30 minutes tops.  I will send out an email this afternoon with specific instructions.  I do not want to post the link to the meeting on our public blog.  :) Don't worry if your child can't make the first meeting, I plan on having them weekly until we get back to school.  I am really missing my tiny kinder friends!

Can I just say that I am blown away by how hard these kiddos are working!  I love getting updates on their work and the pictures make my heart so happy!  I checked Espark, Splash Learn and KidsA-Z and I was blown away by how much growth many of them have made!  Keep up the hard work!  Remember the developmental guidelines from the state say to limit their school work to about 90 minutes daily and allow for breaks!  The weather is supposed to be beautiful this week so make sure to get outside and play a little too! 

Today's Video Links:

I love watching the jelly fish, it is so relaxing! Here are a couple more aquarium live feeds you can check out if you would like!

I will email another attendance survey between six and seven tonight for those that prefer to check in that way.  

Spirit Week Pictures from 4/1

Remote Learning Day 3

I am so bummed that school has been cancelled through April 30th.  If you have not filled out the survey I sent you, please do that soon.  From the surveys that have been returned, I wanted to address the amount of time being spent on work.  Illinois guidelines are that kids should not spend more than 90 minutes on school work a day.  If you do not get through all of the tasks it is okay, just let me know what you did get through.  I am working on streamlining the attendance process into a google form that will be emailed out daily (for today's attendance survey click here). 

Zoom Video Call - I am working on getting this set up.  I will make sure to vary the call time each day in hopes to reach the largest number of students over the course of the week.  I am hoping to have our first one done by the end of this week!  In order to participate students will need to go to follow the link provided on the day of the meeting on a computer.  Or they can download the android or iphone app.  They do NOT need a zoom account and when the app asks you if you want to purchase zoom respond NO.  They will still be able to fully participate. 

Today is April Fool's Day! I picked our favorite funny book to read today!

(what is up with these stills that youtube picks for my videos??)

Yesterday's Virtual Spirit Week Pictures!

Under the Sea Day!

This week and next week we will be learning about ocean animals.  I thought a great way to kick off our ocean unit was to spend a day going under the sea!  The kids came into luau music playing and the ambiance of being under the sea.  All day long we complete ocean related tasks! 

This morning for seat work we colored ocean pictures while listening to the Little Mermaid soundtrack!

We quickly went into math centers where we practiced addition, subtraction, making ten, teen numbers and number order to 20.  The kids had so much fun and thank goodness for extra hands to help!

Addition Toss!

Students pulled an addition fact from the bucket, solved it and then tossed beanbags through the holes.

Making Ten!

Students spun and then figured out how many more they needed to make ten. 

Fishing for Subtraction Facts!

 This one seemed to be a class favorite!

They worked together to find teen numbers at the teen number station and to put cards in order from 1 to 20 with various ocean pictures. 

After math centers each student got three different flavors of Swedish Fish.  Regular, Tropical and Tails.  We taste tested each flavor and then graphed our favorite!

This afternoon we worked in literacy centers that were, once again, ocean themed!  We fished for words with digraphs, sounded out words with blends, spelled sight words with clams and crabs, and worked on word families!

We finished off the day with a round of Ocean BINGO! 

Overall, we had a BLAST!

March Madness and Dr. Seuss Fun!

As you are all aware this week is Read Across America Week.  At Clark School we are having a little bit of fun with it! Yesterday was my FAVORITE type of spirit day, PAJAMA DAY!  

We read the book The Cat in the Hat yesterday.  I love this story because at the end it asks the kids what they would do if that happened to them.  It is a great way to discuss telling the truth versus lying.  I was proud that the majority of the kiddos said that they would tell their grown ups the truth.  We then made cat in the hat hats that had rhyming words on them.  We are still struggling a bit with rhyming words, so Read Across America Week came at the perfect time!

Today was Crazy Sock Day!  We read the Fox in Socks (that one is a real tongue twister) and then we designed our own socks and wrote descriptive writing about them.  Tomorrow students will have to guess which sock goes with which writing!

Today we had a BLAST exploring numbers with Math Stackers.  These are a great way for students to visualize numbers.  

FINALLY.....   MARCH MADNESS

We are continuing to have some issues with respect and following directions in class, so for the month of March we will be having the kindergarten version of March Madness.  I installed a basketball hoop in the classroom.  Kids get to earn shooting hoops at the end of the day by making good choices.  The more times you are caught making good choices, the more shots you get to take.   If you are not making good choices, you might get an air ball, a foul or foul out.  At the end of the month the three students who have scored the most points will get to tell me their favorite candy bar and I will buy it for them.  The kids are very excited.  Kids who move their ball up for making good choices get in the basketball hall of fame and will bring home a special certificate!