Winter Solstice is here....and the New Year is not far behind!

“And the Grinch, with his Grinch-feet ice cold in the snow,
stood puzzling and puzzling, how could it be so? It came without ribbons. It came without tags. It came without packages, boxes or bags. And he puzzled and puzzled 'till his puzzler was sore. Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before. What if Christmas, he thought, doesn't come from a store. What if Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more.” ― Dr. Seuss, How the Grinch Stole Christmas

Spending all day with five and six year olds can leave me exhausted some days, excited others, and challenged others, but every day  the  rewards outweigh any frustration.  The smiles, hugs, and the excitement in the kiddos’ voices when they have something they really want to tell you!  It is so hard to believe that we are going into 2013 and I am so thankful that I have six more months with these great kiddos, and feel sad that they days will continue to move too fast! 

As you read this blog, and view some of the great projects we have done in the classroom, it needs to be clear that many of these fabulous ideas are not mine, but they are that of my wonderful co-teacher who has taught kindergarten for more than ten years.  Of course, I will take credit for some of the fun, however, a lot of my time is spent differentiating the lessons and activities she wants implemented and reviewing how the kiddos are growing.  I then change the schedule, yet again; to be sure we can provide additional instruction in the areas necessary.  I am excited about our return in January, because once again, we have made some changes that I feel will best meet the needs of our kiddos…and by needs I mean both enrichment as well as supplemental. 

So, we all know how much I love pictures, so I want to share the rest of my pictures from December, and tell you a bit about them .

Pictures from Caden’s Star Student week:

We are beginning to work on words families using the character/ sounds we have learned.  Check out our word family houses:

We spent a lot of time learning about adjectives this month including colors, numbers, and sizes.  The students each colored  their own gingerbread person and had to write about them using adjectives.  Mrs. Saggese then read the description and the other kiddos had to decide which gingerbread person was being described.  They all did such a great job using adjectives that their friends were able to immediately pick out their gingerbread person.  We then used adjectives to write letters to Santa.  The students learned quickly that without adjectives, Santa may not know exactly what they wanted.  When I offered to send the boys a pink DS, they quickly learned to include the color (except for one boy, whose favorite color is pink!)  Here are a few pictures from our gingerbread writings:

We are using the reading series, Journeys, for the second year.  We have found some really great things about this program.  One of the strategies that our students have responded to quite well is our Alphafriends.  Mimi Mouse and Pippa Pig are something that they have connected with.  For one of  our station activities I have made “Alphafriends sticks” and when I say a word they have to hold up the letter that that word begins with.  This has helped our less attentive students stay engaged and they love to use the sticks…cheap and simple, yet successful.  These are my Alphafriends sticks:

One of the students’ favorite times of the day is sharing~ and we have been asked if this is like show and tell of the past.  Well, it is similar in that students get to bring in an item to share with their friends~however, different in that these items come in hidden in a paper bag with three clues written on the outside.  The sharing student has to read their clues and they get to chose three friends to try to guess what they have in their bag.  They then reveal the item and answer questions about it.  The entire process requires the students to speak and respond in complete sentences.  Here is a picture of our sharing time:

As I mentioned in our previous post, our theme has been Holidays around the World.  We have had so much fun “traveling” to Mexico, Italy, America, Israel, and the Netherlands.  We also filled our passport with the flags that represent these countries as we traveled to them.  Here are some pictures from of what we put in our suitcase for each country:

Our Hanakiuhs from Israel (also known and Menorahs):

Our stockings and Dear Santa letters representing America:

Our La Bafana brooms to represent Italy, as La Bafana travels around on her broom to deliver gifts to children:

Snack and social time after a busy day:

Here are some pictures from our culminating activity for the Holidays around the World theme.  Waiting patiently as our wonderful parent volunteers finish up the cooking, and then enjoying the pancakes, latkes, applesauce, sausage, orange juice and turkey bacon:

A great opportunity for us to “mingle” with the students and talk about their holiday traditions:

Mrs. Murdock comes to visit and “chat” with the kiddos:

Mrs. Saggese reads “’Twas the Night Before Christmas” after our tummies are full.  You will notice, it was also pajama day!

We then opened our gifts from the families.  We had requested in our newsletter that if the parents felt they wanted to do something for us for the holiday, we would prefer objects donated to the classroom that we are frequently having to replace.  The child who brought it in got to take the items from their gift bags and share with the class what they got for them.  The students were so proud of themselves. 

Of course, even with this request, parents go above and beyond and we received many great cards with some great messages of appreciation, scratch off tickets (and I won!!), and gift cards for meals, manicures, etc, and homemade gifts such as bagels (that were truly the best I had ever eaten.)

  We are so blessed to have the amount of parent participation that we do in our classroom! 

We then went to the gym to break our Piñata, the way the children in Mexico do.  I realize that the children in Mexico do not have Spiderman Piñatas at holiday time, however, the selection was limited.  As you will see from our pictures, it didn’t take many of our very strong students to break it, so the PE teacher, a parent, and Mrs. Saggese decided some packing tape would hold it together so every student would get a turn.  As you will see from the pictures, Mr. Slater (PE Teacher) showed up wearing his holiday gear, and imagine the kiddos surprise when he brought the huge, red bag to gather his goodies when the Piñata was broken.  The students looked on at him, unsure if he was being serious or not.  Their faces in the picture look a bit worried.  (Thanks for the laughs Mr. Slater, and for allowing us to use the gymnasium and make a mess.)

And, I just have to include a picture or two of the recent Ganio brunch held at our house.  This is a great time every year when Jim’s family joins us from near and far.  Little gifts wait under the tree for the cousins’ children and there is always way too much food and never enough time.