Monthly Archives: August 2009
Math Work Stations
We started our Math Work Stations today and I thought I would share some pictures of them for you. Don’t forget that you can purchase the entire year’s worth of Math Work Station ideas over on my Kristen’s Kindergarten Store blog.
Math Journal Work Station–the children are cutting numbers and shapes out of magazines and gluing them into their Math Journals.
Math Games/Puzzles–the children match the number, number word, and a picture showing that quantity.
Geo-board Work Station–the children make shapes using the Geo boards and Geo bands.
Math Library Work Station–the children look at math related books (this area is separate from the Library Work Station to keep them unconfused)
Math Listening Work Station–5 Little Monkeys
Play dough Math Station–making shapes with play dough
Math Overhead Station–the children have pattern blocks, tiles, and numbers to use on the overhead
Math Magnet Work Station–the children can make shapes with magnetic shapes/pattern blocks
Math Manipulatives Station–the children are currently tracing shapes…there will be manipulatives in this station in the future! 🙂
Computer Work Station–the children are using Bailey’s Book House
Math Box Work Station–“Shapes” box by Lakeshore…the children spin the spinner and add a shape to their card.
Roll A… this will change bi-weekly, right now it’s Roll A Shape.
Let me know if you have questions! 😉
Kristen 🙂
The Wheels on the Bus Day #1
This week our big book is titled, The Wheels on the Bus”. Today we took a picture walk through the story and then I read it aloud to the children.
We also started a Predictable Chart titled, The bus…”
During our Science time, we created a KWL chart about busses. We listed things we knew about busses in the “K” column, and things we want to learn about in the “W” column. I’ll update more on this as the week goes on.
My student teacher is in the process of slowly taking over responsibilities in our classroom, so I will post the great ideas that she has as well.
Kristen 🙂
Mouse Paint
Here are a few pictures from Mouse Paint week…see the post below for more explanation on the activities! 🙂
Mouse Paint
I can’t believe that I didn’t do anything with Mouse Paint last year!! I came back to my blog and searched and searched sure that I had at least showed the book to the children and I couldn’t find a thing…which ended up being a good thing to get me back into “school” mode. I had to create activities that would fit into Math, Science, and Language Arts. I’ll be sharing them over the next couple of days, but I wanted to share what we did in Science today…
Our teams’ original idea was to use clear hair gel, mix in two colors of food coloring and let the kids squish the bags…no dice on the hair gel. When I went shopping to get some for everyone, the store had every color except clear!! I looked down one shelf and saw Suave Shampoo and Conditioner, coconut scented! It was cheaper too! So, 10 bottles of Suave later and some food coloring, here we are!
I placed a large “glob” of conditioner into a sandwich sized baggie and inserted that into a quart size FREEZER baggie (they are thicker!). After explaining to the children that they could choose two colors from red, yellow, and blue, I walked around and asked each child what two colors that they would like to have in their sandwich baggie. I then sealed the baggies shut and the children went to town squishing and squashing the baggies until something happened! We all made green, orange, and purple!
As a class, we then wrote about our results and tallied up what color each person came up with. I’ll post pictures, when I remember to take some! 🙂
I also purchased those water bottle ice cube trays from the Dollar Tree (2 for $1) and we made colored ice cubes. Two trays were blue, two were red, and two were yellow. In the freezer they went. Tomorrow, we will give two to each of the children and let them watch them melt. Last year I did this, and learned that it was best to fill them in the AM and they would be slightly frozen later in the day (about 3-4 hours later) and they would melt faster. They were also a little more difficult to get out of the trays. I’ll also take pictures of that! 🙂
Two pretty inexpensive Science experiments to get kids on the path to Inquiry! We’re taking baby steps now! Later in the year, full throttle! 🙂
Kristen 🙂
The First Week 2009-2010
Our first week of Kindergarten went very quickly. We are getting into our “normal” routines as well.
Our Big Book this week was Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? by Bill Martin Jr. and Eric Carle.
Monday we took a picture walk through the story and then I read the story aloud. Tuesday, we re-read the story and then choral read it together. I also was able to find a copy of the book on CD at Kids Ink (a local bookstore).
Wednesday, I printed out copies of the characters in the story and had the children help me sequence them in the order they appeared in the story.
Thursday, we then added the color words along side each of the animals.
Friday, I showed the children the drama props that go with this story and modeled how they are used at Drama Work Station. I got them at Lakeshore. The children use a copy of the book and the props to retell the story on a flannel board.
We also created a Predictable Chart titled, “I like….”. The children had to finish the sentence with their favorite color. We then tallied how many of each color and created a chart. Thursday, we created a graph with the same information. I also asked the children to draw a picture using only their favorite color. I hung all of these in the hallway for our Back To School bulletin board.
We also played Roll A Shape (I’ll post it later) and completed a I See Shapes Book that is similar to the pattern of Brown Bear, Brown Bear. I’ll post that one later over on my Kristen’s Kindergarten Store. It will be e-mailed to you after your purchase.
Kristen 🙂
Kristen's Kindergarten 