Farm Unit Week 3 January 29- February 3

Weekly Question and Vocabulary Related to book:

Otis

How do machines help farmers?

(tractor, startle, parade, fancy, pond, soil)

Literacy Small Groups

What's Missing? How Does it End? We will learn about how words sound when the onset (beginning sound) is deleted from the word.  We will sing a farm song where students need to guess the farm animal or item based on hearing just the rime (entire ending.) We will place a marker to on a picture mat to make our guess.  

Lowercase Letters- We will be working on lowercase letters h and b this week. We will be using magnet boards, colored salt trays, chalk boards, or shaving cream to form these letters within our small group time. We will then expose the children to the Fundation lines. Fundations is the curriculum used in kindergarten. We will be exposing the students to the language (ie. sky line, plane line, grass line, and worm line) when forming our letters.

Onset Rime Bingo- We will review segmenting words by onset & rime.  Using things found on a farm, we will practice saying words by segmenting the beginning sound and entire ending. We will work on a new skill to take away the beginning sound and say only the ending of each word (deleting the onset) to cover a spot on our board.

Story Sequencing- After reading the story Otis, we will cut pictures from our unit book. We will then trace numbers on strips. Next we will place the pictures in order to retell the story. We will retell the story orally to recall the events from our book.

Handwriting/Letter Groups

-Handwriting Without Tears Program-Diving Letters books(h and b)

Math Small Groups

How Many Animals in the Barn? We will work on our counting and subitizing skills to fill our barn with animals.  Using a dot dice, we will roll to determine how many animals to place in our barn using a 10 grid.  We will discuss how many animals we have and how many more we need to fill our barn.  After playing this game with counters, we will play our final round with dot stickers to make our own animals to take home.

Stuck in the Mud- We will use animals counters to recreate a scene from the Otis story.  This time more than one animal will be stuck in the mud.  Using our counters we will hide animals under a card and leave some showing.  We will have to guess how many animals are stuck in the mud given out total number of animals.  Using dot stickers, we will make our own number stories to share

Making Five- We will work to make combinations of 5.  Using cube trains, we will start with a given number of cubes (0-4.) We will count on to find out how many more cubes we need to add to make 5 cubes in all. We will record our answers by coloring in the additional cubes on our sheets.

Centers

Art Table-Farm animal books continued

Block Area- farm animals

Sensory Table- Tractors Stuck in the Mud (making tracks in the mud)

Book Area- Exploring Books about community

Easel-Markers and paper

Writing Table-Farm Lists

Dramatic Play-Tools Shop

Math, Puzzles, and Manipulatives- sorting farm animals

Rug- Tracks and Vehicles

Science/Social Studies/Math Circle Concepts

-Caring for plants

-Reenact the book Otis

-Wheat from the farm

-How Many Scoops

Preschool Life Skills

- We will be focusing on our curriculum of Preschool Life Skills during this time to help us transition into our new classroom.

1. When I call your name, stop what you are doing, look at me, and say ,"Yes".

2. When I give you an instruction, do it "right away"

(Ask your child what do you do when your teacher tells you to do something.  They should reply "I do it right away." You can reinforce this at home too.  "Put your legos away and do it "right away""

3. When I give you  instructions, do them "right away" (multi-step directions)

4. When something is too hard say "Help me please"

5. When you want something from a teacher or friend, say "Excuse Me" to get their attention

                                                                                                     

Farm Unit week 2 An orange in January

Unit Book: An Orange in January

Weekly Question and Vocabulary Related to book:

How does food get from a farm to your house?
(plump, drenched, transport, journey, segment, gleamed)

Literacy Small Groups

Rhyming-We will practice our rhyming skills.  Using dot markers we will hunt for farm words that rhyme with the word the teacher says.

Lowercase Letters- We will be working on lowercase letters l and t this week. We will be using magnet boards, colored salt trays, chalk boards, or shaving cream to form these letters within our small group time. We will then expose the children to the Fundation lines. Fundations is the curriculum used in kindergarten. We will be exposing the students to the language (ie. sky line, plane line, grass line, and worm line) when forming our letters.

Bingo Name Game- Using farm vocabulary, we will listen to clues about words. For example, a teacher will say "a farmer stores the food for the animals in this building"....Students will then place a marker on the silo.

Journal Writing-  Once we have learned about an orange’s journey to our homes in the middle of winter, we will write about it in our journals. We will make our own list and write the steps an orange takes to get to our homes.  We will slowly turtle talk our words and write the sounds that we hear. We will illustrate our thoughts using many colors and details .

Handwriting/Letter Groups

-Handwriting Without Tears Program-Lowercase Letter Formation Books

Math Small Groups

Take Away Stories- We will use orange pom poms to practice subtraction story problems on an orange tree. We will “pick” the oranges from the tree to discover how many are left and will even try to solve how many oranges were picked.  Use this activity at home to help your child practice the skill of taking away.

Part/Part/Whole- We will look more at whole numbers and number parts.  Using pigs in a pen, we will take a whole number and use our pigs to make number parts.  For example, using the number 7 we can place our pigs into 2 parts: 5+2, 6+1, 3+4, etc.  Try this activity at home!

How many are left? We will continue to work on our subtraction skills by solving farm story problems.  We listen to a math story dictated by the teacher and use animals counters to solve how many are left.  We will then trace our answers on our recording sheet.

Orange Segmenting- We will segment a paper orange into 6 parts. We will show how parts of the orange can equal a whole. (ie. 2parts and 4 parts are 1 whole)

Centers

Art Table-Finishing our farm animal books

Block Area- farm animals

Sensory Table-Washing produce(sponges, plastic fruit, soapy water)
Book Area- Exploring Books about community
Easel-Markers and paper
Writing Table-Farm Lists
Dramatic Play-Asian Restaurant (Happy Chinese New Year)
Math, Puzzles, and Manipulatives- Letters in a room hunt using clipboards
Rug- legos

Science/Social Studies/Math Circle Concepts
-Planes, trains, and automobiles
-What Does It Do?
-Good for you food
-Track the Sun

Preschool Life Skills 

- We will be focusing on our curriculum of Preschool Life Skills during this time to help us transition into our new classroom.

1. When I call your name, stop what you are doing, look at me, and say ,"Yes".
2. When I give you an instruction, do it "right away"
(Ask your child what do you do when your teacher tells you to do something.  They should reply "I do it right away." You can reinforce this at home too.  "Put your legos away and do it "right away""
3. When I give you  instructions, do them "right away" (multi-step directions)
4. When something is too hard say "Help me please"
5. When you want something from a teacher or friend, say "Excuse Me" to get their attention
6. When you want something from a teacher or friend, say "Excuse Me" to get their attention and then use your asking words(ie. May I have a turn?)

Songs, Word Plays, and Language

-Our Good Morning Chant

-Farmer in the Dell
-Apples and Bananas Song
-Rhyming Identifying games
-Simon Says (Farmer Lisa Says.....)

Classroom Motivational System
We will be learning classroom routines and expectations within our new classroom.  In order to create a successful and rewarding environment, each child will have a motivational system. Our classroom system promotes positive classroom behavior through positive peer modeling and teachers providing positive reinforcement for desired behaviors. 

Farm Unit Week 1 What is a farm? January 17-20

January 16: No School MLK Day
Unit Book:
What is a Farm

Weekly Question and Vocabulary Related to book:

What is a farm?
(barn, farmer, wool, silo, gate, map)

Literacy Small Groups

-Same Sound Bingo- We will practice identifying rhyming pairs with farm rhyming bingo.  After listening to the teacher say a word, children will repeat the word and then find a rhyming farm picture on his/her mat while working to get five in a row.

Letter Z We will learn what the uppercase and lowercase letter Zz looks like.  We will sort magnetic letters to find matches forZz.  We will also hunt for them in our names and the names of our classmates.  We will use crayons to hunt for them on our papers. Search for Zz's with your child at home- ask him/her if it is upper or lowercase.  

-We share sounds- We will be listening to sounds we hear in the beginning of words. We will match words that share the same sounds in the initial sound of each word. For example, cow and corn share the same sound. Gate and goat, wig and wagon, etc.

-Journal Writing-We will be writing in our journals. We will be writing about our the foods we eat from the farm. We will focus on the directionality of our writing (staring at the left and continuing to the right of the page) and continue our  practice turtle talking and listening for sounds in our words.  Remember, writing is a developmental skill and we are all working at our own pace and improving each week. (I like to eat........). We will discuss foods that come from the farm to brainstorm.

Handwriting/Letter Groups

-Handwriting Without Tears Program-Letter Z
-Monthly Self Portraits

Math Small Groups

Stack and Take Down 5 (Subitizing to 5)- We will use farm pictures to sort by number.  Using the skill of subitizing we will recognize quantities in dots and fingers.  We will decide quickly whether there are 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5.  We will work to be sure this skill is automatic.  The more practice we have with this the more automatic our responses will become

All the Ways to 5-We will play a game and try to show different ways to make 5 such as 2 fingers, 2 dots, or the number 2 are all different ways to show 2. We will play a game to demonstrate this skill up to the amount of 5.

Centers

Art Table- Barn animals for a farm mural/Farm animals for individual books (This will be an ongoing activity at the art table)

Block Area- farms

Sensory Table- Corn kernels (feed for hungry chickens)
Book Area- Exploring Books about community
Easel-Markers and paper
Writing Table- Upper Case and Lower Case Letter Z coloring
Dramatic Play-Farm Stand
Math, Puzzles, and Manipulatives- Letters in a room hunt using clipboards
Science -
Rug- legos

Science/Social Studies/Math Circle Concepts
-Farm Food Sort
-Animal Differences (2 legs/4 legs animals, animals that lay eggs/not lay eggs)
-Farm to Store process
-Farmer To Do List: What would be on the list?

Preschool Life Skills 

- We will be focusing on our curriculum of Preschool Life Skills during this time to help us transition into our new classroom.

1. When I call your name, stop what you are doing, look at me, and say ,"Yes".
2. When I give you an instruction, do it "right away"
(Ask your child what do you do when your teacher tells you to do something.  They should reply "I do it right away." You can reinforce this at home too.  "Put your legos away and do it "right away""
3. When I give you  instructions, do them "right away" (multi-step directions)
4. When something is too hard say "Help me please"

Songs, Word Plays, and Language

-Our Good Morning Chant

-Farmer in the Dell
-Growing Sound (Things that grow)
-Listening to Rhythm in music

Classroom Motivational System
We will be learning classroom routines and expectations within our new classroom.  In order to create a successful and rewarding environment, each child will have a motivational system. Our classroom system promotes positive classroom behavior through positive peer modeling and teachers providing positive reinforcement for desired behaviors. 

Ugly Vegetables (Community Unit Week 4) January 9-13

Unit Book:
The Ugly Vegetables

Weekly Question and Vocabulary Related to book:

What kinds of communities do people live in?
(neighborhood, vine, stem, sprinkle, neighbors, aroma)

Literacy Small Groups

-Sequencing Story- We will review the story elements from The Ugly Vegetables  Then discuss and look at pictures from the story.   Finally we will cut up to 6 pictures and placed them in sequential order to retell the story.  We will retell the story to a peer.

-Rhyming Bingo- We will review how rhyming words "sound alot alike" such as bat and cat. Then we will play a game of bingo by listening to a word then finding the picture that rhymes with the word we heard.

-Thumbs Up- We will identify rhyming and non-rhyming word pairs. We will listen to two words and give a thumbs up or a thumbs down. Then we will cut and sort word pairs based on if they rhyme or do not rhyme.

-Letter Xx and Yy- We will learn what the uppercase and lowercase letter Xx and Yy looks like.  We will sort magnetic letters to find matches for Xx and Yy We will hunt for them in our names and the names of our classmates.  We used crayons to hunt for them on our papers too.  

-Journal Writing-We will be writing in our journals. We will be writing about our favorite vegetables to relate to our story The Ugly Vegetables. We will focus on the directionality of our writing (starting at the left and continuing to the right of the page) and continue our practice turtle talking and listening for sounds in our words.  Remember, writing is a developmental skill and we are all working at our own pace and improving each week.

Handwriting/Letter Groups

-Handwriting Without Tears Program- X and Y

Math Small Groups

-How Tall Can It Be? We will combine foam cubes to build new shapes. After exploring the cubes, we will stack the cubes on top of one another to see how tall it can be. Then we will record on a data sheet how tall the tower became. Then we will identify which number was the most, least, and if any were equal.

-Shapes from Shape-We will use 3-dimensional shapes to duplicate creations we see in a picture.  We will discuss the shape and positions of our blocks as we build.  Some of us will even try to draw our creations!

Vegetable Memory Game- We will use memory cards with vegetables we recalled from our unit book.

Shape Hunt- We will be hunting for 3-dimensional shapes within our school.   We will be creating a class book about our experience.

Centers

Art Table- Painting with Vegetables (rolling vegetables in paint) Making Chef Hat for our Pizza Demonstration in the Cafe

Block Area- blocks and community people

Sensory Table- Garden (Dirt, shovels, seeds, seed packets)
Book Area- Exploring Books about community
Easel-Markers and paper
Writing Table- Upper Case and Lower Case Letter X coloring
Dramatic Play-Vegetable Stand
Math, Puzzles, and Manipulatives- Puzzles
Rug- legos

Science/Social Studies/Math Circle Concepts
-Soil (What is it and what is in it?)
-Describe a garden
-Food We Like to Eat

Preschool Life Skills 

- We will be focusing on our curriculum of Preschool Life Skills during this time to help us transition into our new classroom.

1. When I call your name, stop what you are doing, look at me, and say ,"Yes".
2. When I give you an instruction, do it "right away"
(Ask your child what do you do when your teacher tells you to do something.  They should reply "I do it right away." You can reinforce this at home too.  "Put your legos away and do it "right away""
3. When I give you  instructions, do them "right away" (multi-step directions)
4. When something is too hard say "Help me please"

Songs, Word Plays, and Language

-Thumbs Up to rhyming and non-rhyming pairs
-Syllable Sound Off, Compound Boogies

-Our Good Morning Chant

-Compound word break up game song

-Neighbors Chant

Classroom Motivational System
We will be learning classroom routines and expectations within our new classroom.  In order to create a successful and rewarding environment, each child will have a motivational system. Our classroom system promotes positive classroom behavior through positive peer modeling and teachers providing positive reinforcement for desired behaviors.