Crunch time!

Hi everyone! I hope you are all enjoying your weekend! Originally, I had plans to head on down to Disneyland to celebrate my Godson's birthday, but, food poisoning moved my weekend in a whole new direction, so here I am, recovering on a Sunday, taking it easy.  It's like the old saying goes, "Want to make God laugh? Tell him your plans." = ) It's just as well- I am sure there was a good reason for keeping me from going!  In the meantime, I will be avoiding Mexican food for a long, long, time!

This week is going to be a busy one!  Between Study Buddies, the Advent Program, and our class Christmas party, we will be up to our ears in Christmas!  We will still have centers this week, and from the look of things, we can use an extra hand during Tuesday's centers.  Please see if you can join us! Thank you!

Regarding the Advent Program, please check my homework letter to find detailed information regarding that evening.  It is super important that everyone arrives by 6:30 in the Kinder classroom. We don't want to be late- we are the first act!

Here are my photos taken from this week.  We'll begin with some of our work with calendars.  This was a big task for the Kinder Kiddos, but thanks to our awesome document camera and interactive whiteboard, the kids could easily follow my directions on how to fill out a calendar! 

 Of course the fun part was decorating their December calendar = )  We'll have more practice with calendars each month, in addition to our calendar activities we do each morning.

Next, let's take a look at the fun Christmas tree decorating project Mr. Colvin had the kids work on in Computer class.  They are becoming great at clicking and dragging items in Microsoft Word.  They are working hard at remembering how to save and how to open files.  This will be a little easier once they can read proficiently = ) Until then, with a little guidance, they are doing just fine.
Here's a photo of a few Christmas trees:

Next up is a sneak peek photo of something that will be coming home to you at the end of this week... but that's all I'm saying for now! 

 Now onto a cute writing assignment that the kiddos worked on at my center.  We discussed how Santa might be a little bored of cookies and milk, and I had the kids come up with their own unique idea of what they'd like to leave for Santa this year.  The tough part- I had them sound out the word on their own (as best as they could).  Here are a couple photos of some of those assignments:

I will leave candy canes for Santa.

I will leave Kit Kats for Santa.

Some of the students were sharing with me about the things they currently leave for Santa... I think I should write some of these ideas down in a book and sell them at Barnes and Noble! Too funny!

The kids made some cute reindeer at centers, too.  They traced their foot and their hands, cut and glued them together, and voila! Reindeer!  It will be fun to look at these reindeer a few years down the road and see how much their hands and feet have grown!  

We also followed careful directions while cutting and pasting a Nativity scene together during centers.

We played the "Miss Hudson" version of Don't Break the Ice!  I wrote letters of the alphabet onto the ice pieces, and if any pieces fell through on your turn, you had to tell us the name of the letter and the sound the letter makes.  It sounded like the kids really enjoyed this game!

 

Finally, we enjoyed browsing through some Christmas books on the carpet during our reading center.  Here are some of our readers enjoying their time with our friend Luci!

I think one of my kinder kiddos didn't want to be photographed that day... = )

Now I will get to the wonderful Kinder Club that took place on Friday!  Of course it had a Christmas theme, complete with tree decorating, snowball (marshmallow) toss, pin-the-nose-on-Rudolph, and so much more! Here are some photos from that exciting afternoon:

Christmas puzzle activity

We loved this game of memory- it was too funny to see my photo on the game cards!

snow ball tossing

 Thank you to everyone who contributed to this month's Kinder Club! I know a lot of work went in to prepping those trees, games, and snacks, so please know you are appreciated!

Well, that's it for now!  I hope everyone stays healthy this week! We've got lots to do, and we'll need all the patience energy to do it all!  

Take care!